Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1913-07-04
Wiley sighed. He pulled his short,

H
Europe. 1t was rumored that he had
been in Jail. One can learn deal in
each. Mr.. Curran, it seems, had learn
ed to laugh.
| town." unused Rube, Il wonder why
| you didn't marry Janet. Everybody
thought you would" He added apollo
| getically: "She thought you would"
Wiley shrugged. Old friends can say
much and hurt little.
why the blazes," resumed Rube,
don't you marry her yet? You and
your old shop! Then you'd make liv-
ing. II shed marry me, I'd been bat
ting 400. Now see I'm busher and
going down." .s.
Wiley sat listening. II suppose" he
murmured, like man who relishes his
anticipation but draws back. from its
ends. He had swung the circle of the
west like most Of the Midland young
| men. demonstrating in Dakota, min
ing, timber cruising, selling real estate,
running country papers, leading for
| lorn hopes Of impossible reforms in the
wide-open camps of Nevada and Mon
tana, fruit raising on the Matagorda
coast of Texas. exploiting reclamation
projects in Louisiana-always the en-
thusiast, the dreamer, gaining, for him
self nothing at all except the ardor Of
the game-the mighty and expiring
drama of the old West in the nineties
he had seen and lived and exulted in;
freefooted and shiftless for sixteen
years he had missed nothing of the
last of the great days. He had written
once Of the final roundup in the
southwestern cattle country and its
epic note had aroused the magazine
makers for its brilliance and its pa
thos A dying flame with the life 1t
celebrated. He had done nothing
more; he was back in the old town,
and merely Curran Of the News.
He looked from Janet Vance's office
| window to his shop, long one-story
building, unpainted, gray, like a worm
that had crawled hungrily down from
the bluff to High street, to stare at
the court house from its two grimy
windows. You would never have
thought that out of this lethargic mon
ster came more contraband opinions,
and into it more unpaid bills than any
printshop in Iowa
Over the lawn from the basement
jail came a man who smelled of car
bolic acid. The town kids knew he was
a "trusty" and that some Of the prison
ers came every day to- get the ex-
changes from the News Office. The fu-
migated one spoke pleasantly to the
editor and went in for the papers. He
rumaged the editors desk, opened a
drawer and filled his pipe from the ed
itor's tobacco, and came out. In the
drawer were two dollars Of the editors s
| money but the jailbird did not touch
| that-that wouldn't have been playing
square with Wiley"
Rube watched him go back to the
court house Jail. Around the square
lights were coming now and then; from
| Dickinson's grocery, the Hub Clothing
House with it's Isenbaum & Kcken-
heimer clothes from New York; the
Palace Of Sweets, with a departing
group of high school girls, and a coun-
tryman gazing in the window mill-pond
at the gold fish; the First National
bank with the gilt legend, ivan Hart
& Donley," above the cornice, and be-
fore it the historic hitching-post with
the lead bullet implanted in the cop
| perhead riot of '63-prosy aand COM
monplace it might be, but how dear
and familiar was it all.
Even Wiley T. Curran, the towns
insurgent, knew 1t, now that he was
back, a bit gray about the temples af-
ter years on the great highway beyond
the everlasting hills.
| Rube voiced the curious call OF
home coming: Its funny how some
| times we all want to get back. There
was the two Schnitzler boys and Nor
rison-ain't he in the bank, now? And
you and me-once Hen McFetridge
batted a fly clean up in the court house
and stopped it for six months-remem-
ber? And the night he was stealing
Tanners grapes, and you fell through
the arbor on the old woman, and they
pinched you-remember? What's Thad
Tanner doing now?"
Still running the county board
soaking us on bridge contracts"
Same little old boss, eh? And Boyd
ston and Curry-still on the board and
putting Tanners work through"
| Sure"
And Old Mowry, the undertaken
still living across from the Widow
Stegers and watching for the old
lady to die, eh?"
"Yes-still buying his groceries OF
Dickinson, the old lady's nephew
though he hates him worse'n poison
because he figures on getting the case
when she passes. Yes, sir-seVer
years now Mowry has traded at Dick
inson's waiting for the widow to pass
anu every Weeh liieS ShpSSI hSi ~ o.
and she hangs on"
Rube looked across at the widows
garden, it's cannas and fire-bush bril-
liant in the dark. suffering John'
son, don't anybody ever die here
Wiley?"
:; mo. If they did the News would
have a linotype, Rube, and be daily
and the old town would have stree
lights and sidewalks. Look at Earl
VILE with it's factories springing up
, and the way they're opening up th'
soft coal streaks on the upper creek
Why we could have had all that 1
people here had allowed the railroad
!; to come in! They chased away fir
!, ty-thousand dollar canning plant las
: spring because they didn't want fac
tory class at Rome. came pretty nea
suspending publication when 1 heart
T that"
What Rome needs is few first
: class funerals, Wiley"
| "you bett" prayed the editor fer