Flossy came into the office, leading the boy by the hand, and called
Ellis aside. Old Jeremiah had done wonders for the little fellow; but
on Flossy Hinton's face there was a look that boded ill to some one.
"I sent for Brother William to meet me here," she said crisply. "I
want you to back up all that I say."
Before Ellis had breathed twice, she was out looking up the street, and
in less time than you could think it out, she was back, towing the
Judge, who puffed explosively. Ellis and the three boys had retreated
to the rear office.
"There is not a bit of use to argue, William," she said, her lips in a
hard, straight line. "Ellis has done more than any one else in town
could do. When I heard that you had subscribed five thousand dollars
to the new church, I concluded that your charity was a little far
fetched. Now I want you to subscribe five thousand dollars to the
institution that is making a man of your son. I want five thousand
dollars for the printing office. It is too small, and the press is out
of date. We need all that goes into an up-to-date printing office."
Her brother looked upon her tolerantly.
"Keep it up, Floss. It never fazed you to ask favors, and you ain't
run down yet."
"It's a shame," she stormed. "Just look at this little shed! Why,
even a cross-road blacksmith shop is better."
He looked around appraisingly.
"I reckon it'll house all Ellis's business," he commented.
"Ellis," she flashed, "tell William about the railroad."
Ellis came from the inside office. He generally withdrew from the
conferences between Flossy and her brother.
"Wat Harlow told me that two of the big railroad systems have entered
into a joint arrangement to shorten their mileage, on through trains to
the West. He's got it all fixed for the new track to pass through
Bloomtown. It will give us all the benefit of two railroads."
"You see," said Flossy triumphantly, "the town will boom. People will
move in, and a first-class newspaper will be the greatest asset."
"I think that the town will take a big start," assured Ellis. "The
boys will have all they can do with job work, and the office is small
for our present needs."
"Pap, you should watch us carving letters when we get short,"
interposed Bill. "Last week Jap had to carve three A's for Allen's
handbill. There are only three of 'em in that case, and Allen wanted
to use six. His name is Pawhattan Abram Allen, and he wanted the whole
blamed thing spelled out in caps. I told Jap it was lucky Allen's
folks didn't name him Aaron, on top of all the rest."
"That's good practice for you boys," the Judge snorted. "I'm mighty
glad you learned something for all the money I spent on you." He
glanced at his sister witheringly; but Flossy had her eyes fixed on her
husband.
"I wish," Ellis stirred himself to say, "that the town would boom
enough to take all these frame shacks off of Main street, so that the
place wouldn't look like a settlement of campers."
"A good fire would help," commented Bill boldly.
Judge Bowers looked over his glasses at his son.
"Well, when the railroad comes, and the rest of the shacks are moved
out, I will write you a check for five thousand dollars," he snorted,
turning his rotund form out of the door.
Flossy picked up the boy and flounced out, in speechless indignation.
By argument and cajolery she had succeeded in getting six months apiece
for Bill and Jap at the School of Journalism, and at twenty the boys
were far more expert than Ellis was when he began the publication of
the _Herald_. She had set her heart on the new printing office, and
her eyes were abrim with tears as she stumbled home.
The week wore on until printing day. It was a day of unimagined
exasperations. Everything went wrong. Ellis's usually smooth temper
bent under the stormy comments of the boys, and in the late afternoon
he developed a violent headache and went home. Things continued to
pile up until it was evident that the boys would have to print the
paper after dark.
It was ten o'clock when they finished. Jap followed Bill to the
pavement, pausing to lock the door and slip the key in his pocket. The
town was asleep. Not a soul was to be seen on Main street. Bill, who
usually took the short cut across the Public Square to his fathers
house, turned with Jap and walked along Main street to the farther end
of the block. At Blanke's drug store, he turned into Spring street.
He was saying, in a tone of mixed penitence and anxiety:
"I wish we hadn't riled Ellis so, to-day. I don't like those headaches
he's having so often, and the way his face gets red every afternoon.
If he ever sneaked out and took a drink--But I know he never does."
"Oh, Ellis is all right, now that little J. W. is getting strong," Jap
insisted.
They had gone some distance in the direction of Flossy's cottage, when
Bill looked across an expanse of vacant lots to where a dim light
burned in the loft of Bolton's barn.
"They're running a poker game," said Bill wisely.
Almost before the words were gone, a wild shriek rent the air. A flash
of light from the barn loft, a scrambling of feet, and a succession of
dark objects catapulted the ooze of the barnyard, and it was all
ablaze. A stiff breeze was blowing from the southwest. Bill ran to
the mill to set the fire whistle, and Jap scrambled through a window of
the Methodist church and began to fling the chimes abroad, so that he
who slept might know that there was a fire in town. There had been no
rain for weeks, and the frame structures were ripe for burning.
In less than half an hour the row of stores on Main street, in the
block below the _Herald_ office, began to smoke. From Hollins's
grocery store a brand was carried by the wind and lodged among the dry
shingles of Summers's saloon. The excitement was augmented, a few
minutes later, by a series of pyrotechnic explosions. Bucket brigades
were formed, the firemen mostly in undress uniform.
Jap and Bill were in their glory. Jap was mounted on top of the Town
Hall, directing operations. Right down the row rushed the flames,
eating up the town. As if in parting salutation, the fiery monster
leaped across a vacant lot, thick set with dried weeds, and clutched
with heat-red claws at the _Herald_ office.
"This way, men!" yelled Jap. "You have to get the press and enough
type out to tell about the fire."
Ellis was staring hopelessly at the flame that was licking at the rear
of the office. The water was exhausted from the town well, and there
was no hope of saving the plant. But youth is omniscient, and the
townsmen followed the wildly yelling apprentices and hastened to
demolish the office and drag away the debris, some of it already
blazing. From the salvage rescued from Price's hardware store, and
heaped in a disorderly pile in the Public Square, Jap handed out the
latest thing in fire fighting apparatus. The flimsy structure, that
had been Ellis Hinton's stronghold for almost twenty years, gave way to
an assault with axes, and the contents, pretty well scattered, were
left standing. It was nothing that Granger and Harlow's bank went down
with little left to show its location save the fire-proof vault, and
that only a shift in the wind prevented the flames from crossing to the
fashionable residence section east of Main street.
In the morning the _Herald_ force began business in the ruins of its
time-worn shelter, and set up gory accounts of the fire, on brown
manila paper with vermilion and black ink. A crowd assembled to watch
the exciting spectacle.
"What's the use of a railroad now?" bleated Judge Bowers. "There ain't
no town to run it through."
"Why ain't there?" asked Jap sharply.
"Why, all the folks are talking of pulling up stakes and moving to
Barton."
"Well, if that is the kind of backbone they have been backing this town
with," snapped the youth, his red hair standing erect, "you help them
move, and the _Herald_ will show them up for quitters--and fill the
town with real men."
And being full of wrath, he proceeded to incorporate this thought in
the half column he was setting up. The paper was eagerly snapped up by
the crowd.
"Who wrote this?" fairly howled Tom Granger. "I want to hold his grimy
hand and help him shout for a bigger and better town."
Ellis shoved Jap forward.
"Here is the fire-eater," he announced. Jap flushed through the dirt
on his face.
"It's true," he said, half shyly. "There's no good in a quitter. The
best thing is to smoke them out and get live men to take their places."
"Bravely said," shouted Granger. "The bank will rebuild with brick.
Who else builds on Main street?"
Before the end of the following week the town was humming with
industry. Every hack brought its contingent of insurance adjusters,
and merchants elbowed contractors in the little telegraph office, in
endeavors to get supplies. On Thursday a curious crowd stood watching
Ellis and the boys run the blistered but still faithful Washington
press in the boiling sun.
"Goin' to get winter after a while, Jap," shouted one of the
bystanders. "You'll have to wear ear muffs to get out your paper."
Jap grinned and swung the lever around methodically.
"What are you going to do, Ellis?" asked the honorable member from the
"Halls of Justice," who had hurried to his little home town in her hour
of trouble. "There ain't a vacant shack in town. It seems a darned
shame that you'll have to give up, after starving with the town till it
gets its toes set in gravel at last. Now that the railroad is running
this way like a scared wolf, the town needs a paper worse than ever."
"Who said they was going to quit?" demanded Judge Bowers pugnaciously.
"They ain't! Ellis is goin' to have a two-story brick, with a printin'
press that runs itself. This here town ain't no quitter." He glared
fiercely at Harlow.
Jap lingered with Ellis until the last of the day's work was finished.
As he started for home he came upon an animated group, in the shade of
the half-burned drug store. Behind a pile of wreckage, Bill was
holding court. Jap stopped short. Bill was telling a lurid tale of
superhuman strength and dare-devil bravery, of which Jap Herron was the
hero, a tale that grew with every telling. A wave of embarrassment
swept over Jap. As he turned hastily away, he felt a soft clutch on
his arm. He looked back. Two sparkling black eyes were looking up
into his.
"I think that you are the bravest boy in the world," whispered Isabel
Granger, "and--and I am glad I kissed you that time."
Jap stared at her, stunned by a new emotion. In another moment she was
gone, flying across the street in the direction of her home.
"Anybody but Jap would 'a took her up on that," insinuated Bill, who
had heard Isabel's last words.
Jap turned a murderous look upon him. The crowd of girls tittered as
they dispersed. When supper was over Jap returned to the spot, and
long after dark he sat upon the pile of wreckage, thinking long, long
thoughts.