The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1920-01-08
A Satisfied
Man
0<a
Copyright, 1919, by the Western News
paper Union.)
BY ALVAH JORDAN GARTH

|
"Those were the days, Burt; you
know it and know it, don't WEI"
EYES," nodded Raleigh Burt, just
starting out for a two weeks vacation
jaunt, to his close friend Walter Mars
ton, just returned from one. II 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, and me
ambitious, and broke away from the
| only place that will ever seem like
| real home to US. The city lured us.
Well, 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 a little better.
| but who knows what luck might have
struck US If we had stayed where we
were brought up"
81 haven't even heard from Rockton
for nearly ten years." said Burt. "Did
| you stop there?
II didn't but met old Ezra Perkins
on the train. He gave me all the news.
You know ii was Glib Reeves who
took your job at the general store.
Well 1t seems he studied law, got ad-
mitted to the bar, was elected judge
and according to Ezra, just rules the
town-dgnity, position, sort of king
about the district. Then there's Mort
Sawyer"
"Still in RocktOn, is he?"
Largely, conspicuously; you know
he superseded me in my drug store
position. Started in at four dollars
week. His old boss died rich and
Sawyer married his daughter, Nance.
Why, come to think of it, she was your
early flame, wasn't she?
"A pretty girl and a smart one" re-
piled Burt, his eyes showing the
glamour Of memory.
"Well she is now the richest woman
in the county. Just think of the luck
Sawyer fell intow
81 have half a 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
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-bred wife had been obliged to do
without all the luxury and ease that
Of course the inherited wealth of the
rich druggist had brought to his
daughter AS to Reeves, too, he felt
twinge of restlessness, for had he not
himself blocked out legal career, but
circumstances had drifted him into an
other line.
yes I'll take in RoCkton," decided
Burt, and he did. About the only per-
him when he reached the town was
Anticipated, gosspy 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
on curiosity and talk and entered with
zest into Burt's affairs.
Five thousand year, steady job,
four children and a happy wife, eh?"
he commented. "We!l, | call that top
notch, Burt"
"You do?" observed Burt.
81 should say so! Why, look at the
old crowd you once knew around here.
VegetatOrs, nearly all of 'em. Just
took what came along and dream away
their life and stick in the native mud"
"Why, | hear that Glib Reeves has
reached the highest pinnacle of the
ladder of fame"
"HO ho!" snOrted Kendall, scoffing.
"All front and fragile. What's dis
trict Judge in Macon county, any.
how? Glib is what he always was,
great big balloon-.all josh and brag.
Say, I'll wager he has his home mort
gagged up to the limit asl yet he struts
about as If he owned the town"
"And Mort Sawyer
"Oh poor old Mort Quick There
he goes with his wife Why, you must
remember Nance? There they are"
and following the indication of Ken
dalls finger Burt saw a weakened old
man and wry-faced faded woman
driving along in a disreputable gig
with feeble, wobbling crowbait held
up by the patched and spintered
shafts.
Say, Burt" continued Kendall in a
confidential tone, they say Nance has
got so stngy they live on potato par
ings. She allows Glib dollar week
for his tobacco and laundry and about
all but mauls him If he breaks over
the traces. Five thousand dollars a
year, and healthy and prosperous
looking, and bringing up your family
with all the advantages of sassiety and
education. Why, boy, you're living on
the cream of life !"
And, his illusions dispelled, Raleigh