Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1913-07-08

ligion of success, he who fails is either
vicious or lazy. So he came to the riv-
er bottoms where his wife had heard
of an uncle squatted on unclaimed
land and truck-raising for a livelihood.
There, crowdlng into Uncle Michigan's
house-boat, which had grown through
the years by the addition Of several era
zy lean-tos until 1t was now rambl-
ing cottage, the Lindstroms were one
of the few very poor families Of the
rich county. They were big with the
hope of the country five years ago.
They did not know that, first Of all,
the farmer Is capitalist, and the city
man turned adrift there, penniless and
with mouths to feed, is helpless. John
became a day worker in Tanners
quarries; his wife, Tennessee wo-
man, long expatriated from her hills,
whining to be gone forever of Chica-
go, was now a querulous invalid, what
with labor and child-bearing. There
Lindstrom fought his inevitable losing
fight; but with Old Michigan's truck
raising, which cloaked his whisky ped
ding, and Johns wages they all got on
until Tanners quarry machine crushed
the chief bread winners hand.
So 1t was damn the law When one
is old, bewildered, helpless before all
these smooth phrases and precedents,
all this fine talk of sleek men to the
jury, and one hears the Judge direct
the verdict against one, does one mince
words? Why, then. did the lawyers
say one had right If the judge knew
so glibly different? A good workman,
too, on the rock pile; quiet steady.
matching his strength against the
young men, those terrible. merciless
young men who fling the discard aside,
take his job and go whistling down the
road, pipe in mouth, when the day is
done! And now, broken, crushed, be-
wildered with the smooth talk Of the
lawyers. and knowing one has lost
does man take it calmly when the
Judge sentences him and his children
to beggary? No, he raises his fist
and damn the law!
Lindstrom came back the quarry
road to his shanty. He sat across the
table from his two freckled sons and
the old. one-legged soldier whisky
smuggler smoking his pipe by the
wood box. They feared to question the
returned jailbird; when his wife whin-
ed some complaint, as she held the
baby to her fiat breast, stirring hel
pots over the, stove, he growled q
rough tenderness.
There, woman. The jail-you car
smell 1t on me, but no matter. And the
work-we can do a bit yet with the
garden. It's here we'll stay, for I'll moi
lift my face in town again. They
heaped the filth of the law on me. and
my children's name. Well have nc
more of their town and schools and all
II I'm no fit man for 'em, my lads are
not-we'll take no more Of their time
and money" .... .,,.. ta..
She looked up in her slattern fright
He ruled them with his heavy Puri.
tans righteousness. Even Aurelie
Michigan's gipsy limb Of a girl, undel
Johns -parenthood these five
years since the Lindstroms came, hat
to be still before him. ." .'."
"Ah, John!" the mother cried. "Takt
the children out Of school? Knuts
ready for his seventh grade, and Azure.
lie in high school. And like to gradu'
ate IL we can get the dress and ALL
She rubbed her bony k2nd across hel
chin to ease the sting of the burning
pork fat and muttered, my mans
crazy!" ' .''." ...
Damn their schools" he growled-
"and courts God will hold US safe, no
man with his fine talk Of justice. II
have no more Of It."
Old Michigan took out his pipe II
murmur. John, man-don't take 1t 81
bitter. There's enough know you're al
honest man. A day in jail-who'll thinl
worse Of ye for that?"
The quarryman Topped his big frame
over a chair at the table. Year by yea
he had come to extend his authority
over Michigan's sorry house and patel
of land snatched from the willow
slough of the ever changing river bed
The old Confederate had taken himsel
to the woods when the Lindstrom
overran him too much; Aurelie ha'
been the bond that held him to hi
niece's family-it made something Of
home for her, mean as 1t might be.
They were we'll through the mea
when the woman's brother, Albert
came in He sidled to the tin basin b!
the window, took off his celluloid cuff
and began to wash his thin red wrists
like a man who would rather not b.
squarely seen; he snuffed the cold wa
ter into his struggling beard as If l
put sting into his rabbits heart. H
combed his hair and pulled on his cuff
and sat down with a fatuous smile. !
man of towns, he had followed tn
family from Chicago because he wa
too weak to stand alone, always tn
under dog, finding odd jobs about tn
country; a canvasser and agent, for
ever the recipient of catalogues an
contracts from mail-orde houses an
manufacturers and medical fakirs, for
ever talking about his nostrums an
gimcracks, peddling about the farm
and villages; a ringer of door-bells,
beseecher of women, a pleader to buy
shuffiing in and out Of gates with hi
pitiful cards and dodgers-one Of thos
men who sit to be preached to an
stand in line to be counted, with hi
weak chin and fiaring ears and vapi
eyes bulging-one Of those men Il
short, whom the undertakers are for
ever burying.
John, the burly religious fanatic
with his defeated bull strength, hate
him-at best he gave the toleratin
contempt of the man Of overalls TO
the shabby collar-and-cuffs pretense @
the peddler-collar always soiled, cuff
always frayed. Lindstrom glowered a
him q moment and went on eating.
"Ah. the good soup!" said the ped