Glacier County chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1931-1940, 1940-12-06
BY HELEN TOPPING MILLER

StSdiIluiS uSlllleSS VI tile plant, QOIIle
and stack, snatching cable and roar
ing chute. There was no chilled,
modern music of steel and glass,
no men in white, no ranked battery
of shining stacks and retortS. But
there was good pulp. Through the
defeating lag of the depression, since
David's death, Virgie's market had
held. When finishing mill got an
order for extra quality paper they
wired for Morgan pulp to mill it
from. There had been half-time
work, half-week lay-offs, but always
the payroll ready on the fifth and
the twentieth, whether Virgie's
rusty old leather handbag had a
nickel of spending money in it or
not.
Tom Pruitt knew how it had run
on. And Virgie Morgan knew.
Tom Pruitt had been David Nor
gan's friend. Once Tom Fruits tim
Der land had covered three coun-
ties. Little rivers that he owned
had shuttled with trout; coves and
ridges to which he held title had
sheltered pronged buck and snuffling
bear, and the frantic industry of
beavers slowed mountain creeks
that began and ended on Toms do
main.
Then had come the incredible hys-
terra of Us.
Men, their blood carbonated by a
virus bred of the madnesses of Flor
ida, came prowling into the noun
tains, a wild, acquisitive light in
their eyes. They bought land, OPP
toned it, leased and contracted for
it.
Men came-gray men with the air
of affairs, who spoke slowly and lit
tle Men to inspire confidence. They
wanted to buy Tom Fruits land.
Tom thought things out slowly. He
was a meditative, heavy, slow-mov-
ing man. His great body was slow.
but terrible with strength.
Tom sold his land finally. There
was considerable pressure before
they got him up to the point, two
concerns bidding for it, and when he
at last gave in, there was ire
mendous down payment made -
more money than Tom Pruitt had
ever seen in his life. Too much mon
ey. Not a check-Tom was suspi-
cious of checks-but cash in green
sheafs, with heavy paper bands
around it. Fifty thousand dollars.
And more in five, seven, and ten
years, according to the contract.
Tom was dazed. The sum total of
his former possession diminished in
his mind, became subordinate to the
cash. He forgot the great stand of
virgin poplar up the Hazel Fork,
forgot the mellow bottom land with
orchards on it, where his mothers
turkeys had fed. All he thought
about was this money. Enough mon
ey to last as long as he lived, if
he spent it. But he would not spend
it. He would hold onto it. It numbed
and thrilled and frightened him.
He took it to David Morgan, his
friend. "You keep it for me-" he
begged. "Put it some place"
"I'll put it in the bank for you,"
David, the cautious, said.
But Tom Pruitt had little faith in
banks. They got robbed every now
and then. You read in the paper
where bank had busted and some
fellow gone off to South America
with all the money belonging to 9TH
er people.
mo, you keep it, Dave" Tom
begged. Then if want it I can
get it back again. If a banker gets
it he'll lend it to some of these real
estate fellers over to Asheville, and
then when the concern goes bust
my money will be sunk in one of
them subdivisions with fancy gates
and red-white-and-blue flags stuck
in the ground. And I don't want
none of them"
Morgan argued. 81 can't put fifty
thousand dollars in this old safe,
Tom"
You put it somewheres, Dave.
Put it in something SO I'll know
you've got it. Anywhere's is all
right-just SO know you got it."
Il can sell you a share of the
MILL" Morgan said abruptly.
Would you want that? I can use
your money to buy that spruce up
Cheota and to put in a new drier.
And you'll own part of the mill"
Old and taciturn as he was, Tom
Pruitt trernbled, with sudden exalta-
ton. To own even a fragment of
thing as splendid to his eyes as the
Morgan mill-to touch a brick of it
or a pet-cock from an acid tank and
think, "MineI" He wanted nothing
more from life.
He surrendered the sheaf of lush
green bills to David Morgan.
Tom was glad of his heartening
part of Morgan's work. The fifth
and the seventh year saw the pay
ments on his land defaulted. The
title was almost inextricably tan
gled in a snarl of holding compa-
mics, stock companies, second and
third pnnrtoaoes ldurnenfS and