The Pleasantville press. (Pleasantville, N.J.) 1912-1929, 1923-10-24
CHAPTER ViIi-Continued.


Jennie blushed, and to conceal her
slight embarrassment, got out for the
purpose of cranking her machine.
But If | cannot line him up?" said
she.
Il tank" said Haakon. IF you can't
line him up, you will have a chance
to revoke his certificate when you
take Office"
Jennie thought of Mr.. Peterson's
suggestion as to Ginning up Jim irwin
as SO thoroughly sensible that she
gave it a good deal of thought that
day. To be sure. everybody had al
ways favored more practical educa-
ton" and Jim's farm arithmetic.
farm physiology, farm reading and
writing, cow-testing exercises. seed
analysis, corn clubs and the tomato.
poultry and pig clubs he proposed to
have in operation the next summer,
seemed highly practical but to Jen-
MES mind, the fact that they intro
duced d~issension in the neighborhood
and promised to make her official life
xeXatiOus seemed ample proof that
Jim's work was visionary and imprac.
teal. Poor Jennie was not aware of
the fact that new truth always comes
bringing, not peace to mankind, but a
sword.
Father" said she that night, lets
have a little Christmas party"
All right" said the colonel. "Whom
shall w invite?"
Don't laugh" said she. 81 want to
invite jim Irwin and his mother, and
nobody else"
"All right" reiterated the colonel.
But why?'
oh" said Jennie. 81 want to see
whether | can talk Jim out of some
of his foolishness."
You want to line him up. do your
said the colonel. "Well, that's good
politics, and incidentally, you may get
some good ideas out Of jim"
Rather unlikely" said Jennie.
IL don't know about that" said the
colonel, smiling. Il begin to think that
Jims u Brown Mouse. I've told you
about the Brown Mouse, haven't Iy'
YES" said Jennie. you've told
me. But Professor Darbishire's
brown mice were simply wild and in
corrigible creatures. Just because it
happens TO emerge suddenly from the
forests of heredity. it doesn't prove
that the Brown Mouse is any good.'
Justin Morgan was a Brown
Mouse" said the colonel. "And he
founded the greatest breed of horses
in the world"
You say that. said Jennie. be
cause you're a lover of the Morgan
horse"
Napoleon B%onaparte was a Brown
Mouse" said the colonel. $50 was
George Washington, and SO was Peter
the Great. Whenever a Brown Mouse
appears he changes things in a little
way or a big way
For the better, always?" asked
Jennie.
No. said the colonel. THE Brown
Mouse may throw back to slant-head-
ed savagery. But Jim some
times | think Jim is the kind of
Mendelian segregation II of which
we get Franklins and Edisons and
their sort. You may get some good
ideas out of Jim. Let us have them
here for Christmas, by all means
There is no doubt that on Christ
mas day Jennie Woodruff was justi-
fled in thinking that they were a
queer couple. They weren't like the
Woodruffs. at all. They were of a
different pattern. To be sure, Jim's
clothes were not especially note
worthy, being just shiny. and frayed
at cuff and instep. and short of sleeve
and leg. and ill-ftting and cheap.
,Jim's queerness lay not so much in his
clothes as in his personality,
On the other hand. Jennie could not
help thinking that Mrs. lrwin's queer
ness was to be found almost solely in
her clothes. The black alpaca looked
~unoeniably respectable. Jennie felt
It must have a story-a story in which
the stopped, rusty, somber old lady
looked like a character drawn to har-
monte with the period just after the
war.
But Jennie had the keenness to see
that if Mrs. Irwin could have had an
u~p-to-date costume she would have
become a rather ordinary and not bad
looking old lady. What Jennie failed
to divine was that if Jim could have
invested a hundred dollars in the sery-
ices of t%ailors, ha~berdashers, BARRIERS
and other specialists in personal APP
pearance, and could have .blotted out
his record as her fathers tield-hand,
he would have seemed to her a dis
Misunderstanding young man. Not
handsome, of course, but the sort peo-
pie look after-and follow.