The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1916-05-27


family. Born during that most danger
Gus and anxious of the early years.
he was an ill-nourished baby, and
grew mea gerIy. only Iengthwise.
through feeble childhood At his
christening he was committed for life
to "Bibbs" mainly through lack of
imagination on his mothers part, for
though it was her maiden name. she
had no strong affection for it. One
day when the sickly boy was nine. he
requested with unwonted vehemence
to be allowed to exchange names with
his older brother. Roscoe Conkling
Sheridan. or with the oldest, James
Sheridan. Jr.. and upon being refused
went down into the cellar and re
NAMED there the rest of that day. And
the cook. descending toward dusk. re-
ported that he had vanished; but
coal-pile. completely covered and still
burrowing. Removed by force and
carried upstairs, he maintained cryp-
tic demeanOr. refusing to utter syl-
liable of explanation, even under the
lash. This obvious thing was wholly
a mystery to both parents; the mother
was nonplused. failed to trace and
connect; and the father regarded his
son as a stubborn and mysterious fool.
an impression not effaced as the years
went by.
At twenty-five Bibbs was physically
no more than the outer scaffOlding of
a man, waiting for the building to be-
gin inside-a Iong-shanked, lOng-faced,
rickety youth, sallow and hollow and
haggard, dark-haired and dark-eyed.
with a peculiar expression of counte-
nance: indeed, at first sight of Bibbs
Sheridan he seemed upon the point of
tears. To a slightly longer gaze, not
grief. but mirth, was revealed as his
emotion; but Bibbs never, on any oc-
casion in his life, either laughed aloud
or wept.
He was a disappointment" to his
father: At least that was the parents
wOrd-a confirmed and established
word after his first attempt to make
business man" of the boy. He sent
Bibbs to 'begin at the bottom and
learn from the ground up" in the ma
chine shop Of the Sheridan Automatic
Pump works, and at the end of six
months the family physician sent
Bibbs to begin at the bottom and learn
from the ground up in a sanitarium.
you needn't worry, mamma" Sher-
idan told his wife. There's nothin'
the matter with Bibbs except he hates
work so much it makes him sick. l
put him in the machine shop, and 1
guess l know what I'm dOin' about
as we'll as the next man. Ole Doc Cur
ney always was one O. them nutty
alarmists. Does he think I'd do any
thing d be bad for my own flesh
and blood? He makes me tiredI''
Anything except perfectly definite
health or perfectly definite disease was
incomprehensibIe to Sheridan. He
had a genuine conviction that lack of
physical persistence in any task in
vOiving money must be due to some
subtle weakness of character itself, to
some profound shiftlessness or slyness.
Look at me-" he said. Look at
what / did at his age! Why, when 1
was twenty years old. wasn't 1 up ev-
cry morning at four o'clock chopin
wood-yes! and out in the dark and
snow-to build a fire in a country gro
Gerry store? And here Bibbs has to go
and have a doctor because he can't
Pho! 1t makes me tiredI If he'd gone
at it like a man he wouldn't be SICK
He paced the bedroom-the usual
setting for such parental discussions
in his night gown. shaking his big,
grizzled head and gesticulating to his
bedded spouse. "My Lordr' he said
eff the little, teeny bit O. work like
this is too much for him. why. he amt
fit for anything! It's nine-tenths imag-
ination, and the rest of it-welI, l
won't say its deliberate, but l would
like to know just how much of it's put
onr'
''Bibbs didn't want the doctor" said
Mrs. Sheridan. cit was when he was
here to dinner that night. and 1 noticed
how he couldn't eat anything. Honey.
you better come to bed"
"Eatr' he snorted. Eat! It's work
that makes men eati And there's an
other thing you'll notice about good
health. if you'll take the trouble to
look around you, Mrs. Sheridan; busy
men haven't got time to be sick. and
they don't get sick. You just think
it over. and you'll find that 90 per
cent of the sick people you know are
either women or Ioafers. Yes. ma'amp'
Honey" she said again. drowsily.
you better come to bed"
Look at the other boys" her hus-
band babe her Look at Jim and Ros-
coe Look at how they work Right
now there isn't a harder-workfn',
brighter business man in this city than
Jim. I've pushed him. but he give me
something to push against. You can't
push nervous. dyspepsiaP And look
at Roscoe; just look at what that boys
done for himself. and barely twenty
seven years old-married, got a fine
wife, and ready to build for himself
with his OWN money when / mt Nm the