The Savannah morning news., 1902-12-21
THE GENTLEMAN
FROM INDIANA
BY BOOTH HARRINGTON.
Copyrighted by Mcclure, Phillips & Co.
BY BOOTH HARRINGTON.
Copyrighted by Mcclure, Phillips & Co.

so poor that everybody admitted it
was a poor paper-wOrse. the neighbour
ing county of Amo possessed a better
paper, the "Amo Gazette" The Car
low County Herald" was so everlast-
ingly bad that Plattville people bent
their heads bitterly and admitted even
! TO citizens of Amo that the Gazette
was the better paper The Herald"
, was weekly, issued on Saturday:
sometimes it hung fire over Sunday
and appeared Monday evening. In
their pride, theNCarlow people support
, ed the Herald" Ioyally and long; but
finally subscriptions began to fall off
and the Gazette missed fire alto
3 gether for several weeks; then IL came
out feebly, two small advertisements
occupying the whole of the fourth page.
1T was breathing it's last. The editor
was a clay-colored gentleman with a
goatee, whose one surreptitious eye
/ betokened both Incidence of disposition
and a certain furtive shrewdness. He
collected all the outstanding subscrip-
| lions he could, on the morning of the
| issue just mentioned, and, thoughtful
Iy neglecting several items on the
other side of the ledger, departed from
| PIattville forever.
The same afternoon a young man
| from the East alighted on the platform
4 town, and, entering the rickety omni-
| bus that fingered there, seeking whom
| IL might rattle to deafness. demanded
| to be driven to the Herald Building. 1t
| did not strike the driver that the news
| conner was precisely a gay young man
| when he climbed into the omnibus:
but, an hour later. as he stood in the
| doorway of the edifice he had indi-
| Gated as his destination. depression
Gaap1ad IN have GpffIad into the mar
row of his bones.
Plattville was instantly alert to the
strangers presence, and interesting
conjectures were hazarded all day
long at the back door of Martins Dry
Goods Emporium, where all the clerks
from the stores around the Square
came to play checkers or look on at
the game. CThis was the club during
the day; in the evening the club and
the game removed to the drug. book,
and wallpaper store on the corner).
At supper, the new arrival and his
probable purposes were discussed over
every table in the town. Upon inquiry,
he had informed Judd Bennett. the
driver of the omnibus that he had
come to stay. Naturally, such a declar-
alton caused q sensation, as people did
not come to Plattville to live. except
through the inadvertency of being
born there. In addition, the young
mans appearance and attire were re-
ported to be extraordinary. MANY of
the curious. among them most of the
manageable females Of the place, took
occasion to pass and repass the sign
of the Carlow County Herald" during
the evening.
Meanwhile, the stranger was seated
in the dingy office upstairs with his
head bowed low on his arms. Twilight
stole through the dirty window panes
and faded into darkness. Night filled
the room. He did not move. The young
man from the East had bought the
Herald from an agent; had bought
1t without ever having been within a
hundred miles of Plattville. He had
vastly overpaid for it. Moreover. the
price he had paid for it was all the
money he had in the world.
The next morning he went bitterly
to work. He hired a compositor from
Rouen young man named Parker.
who set type all night long and helped
him pursue advertisements all day.
The citizens shook their heads pessi-
unsteady. They had about given up
the idea that the Herald" could ever
amount to anything, and they betray-
ed an innocent. but caustic. doubt Of
ability in any stranger.
One day the new editor left a note
on his door, "Will return in fifteen
minutes"
Mr. Rodney McCune. a politician
from the neighboring county of Gaines
happening to be in Plattville on an
errand to his henchmen, found the
note, and wrote beneath the message
the seathing inquiry, "Why?"
When he discovered this addendum,
the editor smiled for the first time
since his advent, and reported the in
Rinnnf nANyf
brio, why Has the Herald Returned
to Life?" as text for a rousing edi-
torlal on honesty in politics." sub
| 1ect of which he already knew some
thing. The POLITICAL district to which
Carlow belonged was governed by a
limited number of gentlemen whose
wealth was ever on the increase; and
honesty in politics was a startling
conception to the minds of the passive
ana resigned voters, who discussed the
editorial on the street corners and In
the stores. The next week there was
another editorial, personal and local in
| its application and thereby 1t became
| evident that the new proprietor of the
Herald" was theorist who believed.
in general. that politicians honor
| should not be merely of that middIing
healthy species known as honor
| amongst politicians" and in particu-
| lar that Rodney McCune should not
| receive the nomination of his party for
| Congress. Now, Mr.. McCune was the
| undoubted dictator of the district. and
his followers laughed at the strangers
| fantastic onset.
| But the editor was not content with
the word of print; he hired horse and
| rode about the country, and Ito his
| own surprise) he proved to be an adap-
table young man who enjoyed exercise
| with pitch-fork to the farmers profit
while the farmer talked. He talked
| little himself, but after listening an
hour or so, he would drop a word from
the saddle as he left: and then, by
some surprising wizardry, the farmer.
| thinking over the interview, decided
there was some sense in what that
| young fellow said. and grew curious
TO see what the young fellow had fur
Their to say in the Herald"
| Politics Is the one subject that goes
to the vitals of every rural American:
and Hoosier will talk politics after
| he is dead.
! Everybody read the campaign editor
ials, and found them interesting, al
| though there was no one who did not
| perceive the utter absurdity of young
/ Cf