The Chickasha daily express. (Chickasha, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1899-current, 1919-12-01
A Satisfied
Man
Copyright. 1919. by the Western News
paper Union,l
@@~-O
BY ALvAH JORDAN GARTH


"Those were the days, Burt; vol
know It and know It, don't we?"
Yes" nodded Raleigh Burt, ius
startiHg out for two weeks vacation
Jaunt to his close friend Walter Mars
ton Just returned from one. Il fancy
we didn't appreciate the old town dur.
ing the happiest period OF our lives"
Wish we'd stayed there" declared
Marston. You got restless, ana me
ambitious and broke away from the
only place that will ever seem like
real home to us. The city lured us.
Wen, we've had twenty years Of 1t.
| am still the slave of a soulless COR
poration at three thousand dollars a
year. You are doing little better,
hut who knows what luck might have
struck us il I'VE had stayed where we
we're brought up?"
! Il haven't even heard from Rockton
for nearly ten years." said Burt. Did
you stop there?"
Il didn't but | met old Ezra Perkins
ON the train. He gave me all the news.
took your job at the general store.
Well, it seems he studied law, got adj
mitted to the bar was elected Judge
and, according to Ezra just rules the
towii-dignlty, position, sort of king
about the district Then there's Mort
Sawyer
"Still In Rockt0n, Is he?"
Largely, conspicuously; you know
he superseded me in my drug store
position. Started in at four dollars a
week. His old boss died rich and
Sawyer married his daughter, Nance.
Why, come to think of 1t. she was your
early flame, wasn't shefn
"A pretty girl ana smart one" re-
piled Burt, his eyes showing The
glamour of memory.
We'll, she is now the richest woman
in the county. Just think of the luck
Sawyer fell intov
Il have half mind to put in my
fourteen days at the old burg" re-
marked Burt thoughtfully
Somehow Marston's reports of the
success in life Of Reeves and Sawyer
made Burt thoughtful Not that he
was envious, but 1t appeared to him
that fate had not been very kind to
either himself or Marston, and yet /
they certainly had started out in life
with better educations and business
ability than those successful rivals in
the race for success. Burt was not
disloyal in the slightest degree when
he recalled the bright, sprightly Nance
Porter of his boyhood days, but he
felt dissatisfied as he realized that his
city-bre3 wife had been obliged to do
without all the luxury and ease that
of coGrEe the Inherited wealth of the
rich druggist had brought to his
daughter. AS to Reeves, too, he felt a
twinge of restlessness, for had he not
himself blocked out legal career, but
had drifted him into an
other line.
"Yes, I'll take in Rockton," decided
Burt, and he did About the only per
son who remembered and recognized
him when he reached the town was
gossipy old Doc Kendall
the proprietor of the one pioneer
hotel of the place, which Burt found
was just as musty and dilapidated as
in his boyhood days. Rockton itself
If anything, was more dead than OF
yore. 1t seemed to be asleep half the
time.
Doc Kendall got Burt in a corner
and began to pump him as to his his.
tory since he had left Rockton twenty
years previous. The old gossip lived
IN curiosity and talk and entered with
,est into Burt's affairs.
Five thousand year, a steady job
our children and happy wife, ehY
le coanea'ed. "Well, call that tor
notch Eurt'
"You do!" observed Burt. =
81 should say so! Why, look at the
Id crowd you once knew around here
nearly all of 'eni just
ook what came along aud dream away
heir life and stick in the native mud.
"Why l hear that Glib Reeves has
cached the highest pinnacle of the
adder of fame"
"Ho ho!" snorted Kendall scoffing
All front and frazzle. What's a dis
rict judge in Macon county, any
ow? Glib is what he always was. q
reat big balloOn-all josh and brag
ay, I'll wager he has his home mort
aged up to the limit and yet he struts
bout as if he owned the town"
"And Mort Sawyer?
"Oh, poor old Mort Quick There
G goes with his wife. Why, you musi
emember Nance? There they are
nd following the indication of Ken
alls finger Burt saw a weazened Old
ian and wry-faced faded woman
riving along in a disreputable ss
ith feeble, wobbling crowbait held
p by the patched and splintered
lafts.
"Say, Burt" continued Kendall in
,nfidential tone, they say Nance has
1t so stingy they live on potato par
gs. She allows Glib a dollar a weeh
II his tobacco and laundry and about
I but mauls him if he breaks over
e traces. Five thousand dollars