The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1903-08-07

Der OF coarse dresses in various stages
of manufacture were strewn about the
room.
Mrs. Smith had been n pretty girl,
but hard work had v orn her almost TO
a skeleton. She viewed me at first with
evident suspicion. | saw the look that
West had described. but il faded pres
emily, and her face took on n much
more amiable expression. She sent the
girl out of the room. Then. turning to
me with an air of one who has taken IA
great resolution, she said:
you're friend of Mr.. West. Well,
/ want you TO ask him to let my hus-
band alone. He ought TO know that
John can't afford such company. John
has been out of work almost a year,
and I've had to support the family by
understanding down here
where | can scarcely make money
enough TO pay that girl at the end of
the week And yet John goes and sits
half the night with this Mr.. West,
drinking beer and paying for his share
of 1t. And he's beginning to feel above
ways of making money in this world.
If there are. l wish he'd find one of
them. and find it mighty quick"
My hair began to stir at the roots,
tried TO remember whether | had ever
let Smith pay for my beer.
Il understood" said |, that your
husband was earning money by writ
ing Are not these clippings of articles
that he has written?"
l picked mp two or three that lay on
n table i'm the middle Of the room. They
were marked in pencil with the date on
which they had been written. as was
Smiths custom. The very first one |
saw was little thing which l hap
pened 10 know had been written 10y
member of the staff of the magazine in
which it had appeared
| will spare the reader the remainder
of my interview with Mrs. Smith.
gave her such assurances as | could
and made my escape ut the earliest pos
sible moment Then | went to the office
of the electric lighting company, al
ready referred TO, where | learned that
Smith had been discharged for incor-
rigible lying. His great idea had been
patented by somebody else about two
years before and had been in use in the
plant before Smith had come 10 work
there.
| found Smith that evening before he
saw West and forced from him what
would have been a confession if the
man had been able to tell the truth. |
was convinced that he had never writ
ten a line for publication. He owed
West not 500, but $3.50, but the student
Of character still held him for an honest
man and expected TO be repaid.
| told Smith that if he borrowed any
more money of West, or spent any more
of his wifes money in my presence, or
failed TO use his best endeavors TO Sc
cure employment | would expose him,
and | think l made some impression
upon him.
But did not disclose his iniQuity to
West for | knew that to do it would be
TO destroy great work of fiction al
ready far advanced. | would not have
il on my literary conscience that | had
cheated the world of such a character
study as John smith, even in that
carly day, promised to be.
No further explanation of the success
of the book is needed. 1t is a great
piece of realism because it was written
by man gifted by Providence with an
entire inability to understand any per-
son or anything as it exists in nature
Had he possessed that unfortunate
power he would have been a scientist
and nobody would have cared to read
his writings.