A Far Country, Book 1

roper word. The next evening at supper he informed me that he wished to talk to me in the sitting-room, whither I followed him with a sinki

Robert Breck about you, and he has k

trial, sir!"

t a small but re

o this, that I was to be made a clerk in a grocery store! The fa

ered, "I don't want

me to have decided that," he declared, "was some years ago, my son. I have given you the best schooling a boy can have, and you have not shown the least appreciation of your advantages. I do not enjoy saying this, Hugh, but in spite of all my efforts and of those of

rned with it

ried, the tears forcin

-for what

the stream of tendency by which we fulfil the laws of our being; and my father, at any rate, would not have acquiesced in the definition. Dimly but passionately I felt then, as I had always felt, tha

bition, Hugh?" h

had a chance. I like it better than anything else.

e was in his voice

ather?" I a

s the city contains, and you have not availed yourself of it. Yet you talk to me of literature as a profession. I am afraid, Hugh, that this is merely another indication of your desire to shun hard work, and I must tell you frankly that I fail to see in you the least qu

nting my ambition as the height of absurdity and presumption, and with something of the despair of a shipwrecked mariner my eyes rested on the green expanses of tho

llow, a Harriet Beecher Stowe, or nothing. This was a practical age and a practical country. We had indeed produced Irvings and Hawthornes, but the future of American letters was, to say the least, problematical. We were a utilitarian people who would never create a great literature, and he reminded me that the days of the romantic and the picturesque had passed. He gathered that I de

as a refuge of the lesser of intellect that could not achieve the professions,

gh it was, the narrow streets of the wholesale district reverberated with the rattle of trucks and echoed with the shouts of drivers. The day promised to be scorching. At the door of the warehouse of Breck and Company I was greeted by the ineffable smell of groceries in which the suggestion of parched coffee prevailed. This is the sharpest remembrance of all, and even to-day that odour affects me somewhat in the manner that the interior of a

decided to honour us

iving me the place, Cou

sort of politeness, and h

tony for the groc

no,

ell, I'll give you a fair trial, my boy, and no favourit

who used to lead me, on mischief bent, through the barns and woods and fields of Claremore. He was barefoot no longer, though fr

for Hugh," s

grin gr

him out,

artment," directed Cousin Robe

ellow-clerks, as one destined for a higher mission, made out of better stuff,-finer stuff. Despite my attempt to hide this sense of superiority they were swift to discover it; and perh

when I appeared of a morning, "what ha

ndered at their contentment with the drab lives they led, at the

claimed one day to Johnny Hedges, as we sat on barrels o

en to me if I was fired? I couldn't go home and take it easy-you bet not. I just want to shake hands with myself when I think that I've got a home, and a job like this. I know a feller-a hard worker he was, too who walked the pavements for three

ing men came in from the "road" there was great hilarity. Important personages, these, looked up to by the city clerks; jolly, reckless, Elizabethan-like rovers, who had tasted of the wine of liberty-and of other wines with the ineradicable lust for the road in their blood. No more routine for Jimmy Bowles, who was king of them all. I shudder to think how much of my knowledge of life I owe to this Jimmy, whose stories would have filled a quarto volume, but could on no account have been published; for a self-respecting post-office would not have allowed them to pass through the mails. As it was, Jimmy gave them circulation enough. I

usin Robert was not aware of the fact that Mr. Bowles "showed" the town to certain customers. He even desired to show it to me, but an epicurean strain in my nature hel

ne, shivering with cold and excitement, gripped by a fascination I did not comprehend, my eyes now avert

unned, looking after her, and when halfway across the slushy street she turned and smiled again. Prodigiously excited, I followed her, fearful that I

she cried

ith shame. But she continued to rega

me on Second Street, did you? You

to the spot, trembling, convicted, for I knew that her accusatio

ther. She began to laugh, and so loudly that I glanced anxiously about. I would have

me. "Say, you get along home,

rrived at home, late for supper, my mother's solicitude only served to deepen my pain. She went to the kitchen herself to see if my mince-pie were hot,

I was his age I often worked until eleven o'clock and never f

eyes rested upon the objects of the room, familiar since childhood. Here were warmth, love, and safety. Why could I not be content with them, thankful for them? What was it in me that drove me from these sheltering walls out into the dark places? I glanced at my father. Had he ever known these wild, destroying desires? Oh, if I only could have confided in hi

me t

ion's slave, and

eart's

ettle a long-standing account. Yet the days passed, the daily grind absorbed my energies, and when I was not collecting, or tediously going over the stock in the dim recesses of the store, I was running errands in the wholesale district, treading the burning brick of the pavements, dodging heavy trucks and drays and perspiring clerks who flew about with memorandum

s somewhat astonish

said to me once, when I had performed

less when autumn came and my friends departed with eclat for the East, I was desperate indeed! Even the contemplation of Robert Breck did not console me, and yet here, in truth, was a life which might have served me as a model. His store was his castle; and his reputation for integrity and square dealing as wide as the city. Often I used to watch

ck up the invoice or employ a chemist. Here was a character to mould upon. If my ambition could but have been bounded by

gs. For alas, I had not wholly abjured the feminine sex after all! And from being a somewhat important factor in the lives of Ruth Hollister and other young women I suddenly became of no account. New interests, new rivalries and loyalties had arisen in which I had no share; I must perforce busy myself with invoices of flour and coffee and canned fruits while sle

that she too had been away almost continuously since our misunderstanding, for the summer in the mountains,-a sojourn recommended for her mother's health; and in the autumn she had somewhat abruptly decided to go East to boarding-school at Farmington. During the brief months of her absence she had marvellously acquired maturity and aplomb, a worldliness of manner and a certain frivo

of inadequacy, of unimportance, of an inability to cope with her, held me back, and from a corner I watched her sweeping around the room, holding up her train, and leaning on the arm of Bob Lan

as Ham Durrett. Capriciously re

to dance, or even told me wh

was splendid,"

nger she felt at all? Here, in this costume of a woman of the world, with the string of pearls at her neck to give her the final touch o

f the Durretts' most cherished possessions. Glancing up at me over the glass of lemonade I had given her she went on

eve this attitude meant emancipation, invulnerability against the aches and pains which otherwise our fellow-beings had the power to give us; mastery over life,-the ability to choose calmly, as from a height, what were best for one's self, untroubled by loves and hates. Untroubled by loves and hates! At that very moment, paradoxi

y well," I said. "At any rat

somehow it's hard to think

e to the boast I had made

bad as it might b

n what seemed another tone. "He makes friends, learns certai

t were fused in one resolution all the discordant elements within me of aspiration and discontent. It was not so much that I would show Nancy what I intended to do-I would show myself; and I felt a sudden elation, and accession of power that enabled me momentarily to despise the puppets with whom she danced…. From this mood I was awakened with a start to feel a hand on my shoulder, and

ese college fellows are cocks of the walk just now, but so

making a list of the stock. I remember the place as though I had just stepped out of it, the freight elevator at the back, the dusty, iron columns, the continuous piles of cases and bags and b

n which the ringing of the front door-bell produces the greatest commotion; children's voices were excitedly raised and then hushed. After a brief silence the door was opened by a pleasant-faced, brown

et!" he e

though its occupants had worried much and loved much. It was a room best described by the word "home"-home made more precious by a certain precariousness. Toys and school-boo

cally from nowhere on a platform in a chalky room at nine every morning, to vanish again in the afternoon. I had formerly stood in awe of his presence. But now I was suddenly possessed by an embarrassment, and (shall I say it?) by a

r I had never shown a particular interest in him

gh," he said, and added whimsically

made it the more difficul

s took pupils in the

d. He had indeed no reason to suspect me of thirsting for learning. "

ess. I feel-as if I ought to know more. And I came to see if you would give me lessons

en prompted by a craving for knowledge. As soon as he could recover him

ry happy over this deci

a surprise for my father; I was to take the e

examinations of preceding years from a pigeonhole in his desk, and inside of half an hour the arrangement

. Now at last I had behind my studies a driving force. Algebra, Latin, Greek and history became worth while, means to

"couldn't you have done this well at school? You mi

onally flitted into the room after we had finished. I fully intended to ke

said. My mother sighed. I knew what was in her mind; she had always been secretly disappointed that I had not been sent to college. And presently, when my father went out to attend a trustee's meeting, the impulse to confide in her almost overcame me; I loved her with that affection which goes out to those whom we feel understand us, but I was learni

ivered his ultimatum. The joke had gone far enough, he implied. My intentions, indeed, he found praiseworthy, but in

mine whether or no I should be immediately released from a slavery I detested. Would Mr. Wood persuade my father? If not, I was prepared to take more desperate measures; remain in the grocery business I would not. In the evening, as I hurried homeward from the corner where the Boyne Street car had dropped me, I halted suddenly in front of the Peters house, absorbing the scene where my childhood h

she ex

rtable, and stood l

ce was in truth reproach; yet mingled with t

father sai

l you himself. I-I don't

id she see? Was there a subtler relationship between our natures than I guessed? Did she understand by some instinctive power the riddle within me? divine through lov

are you hom

her talked less than usual, supper passed as though nothing had happened. Whether I had shaken him, disappointed him,

ined a certain reassurance. His manner was not

this proceeding of yours. The thing that strikes me most forci

within me, lik

see, I thought it would be wiser to find out firs

ent to meet such a situation. For the first time in my life I beheld him at a disadvantage; for I had, some

y," I told him, "and I have made up my

he exclai

ted because I did not do sufficiently well at

ng, but I remembered that I

e said in a puzzled voice, "and your Cou

eplied. "But I don't like the grocery business, or any o

re made for the law?" he asked,

d succeed at it. I'd like t

idiotic notion of wis

me of the futility of such a wish. I l

t another of those caprices to which you have been subject, nor a desire to shirk honest work. Mr. Wood has made out a strong case for you, and I have therefore determined to give you a trial

doors had flown open. But it is written that every happiness has its s

other, who was sitting in

ys I may g

and took me

although we shall miss

, mo

o want you to

ut fraught with a meaning that cam

that I was actually going to Harvard with him. He stood in the

he cried. "How in Jehos

on to come into my life, wondering exultantly what Nancy Willett wou