Book Two: Chapter VI

by Sherwood Anderson

　　Steve Hunter decided that it was time something was done to wake up hisnative town. The call of the spring wind awoke something in him as in Hugh.It came up from the south bringing rain followed by warm fair days. Robinshopped about on the lawns before the houses on the residence streetsof Bidwell, and the air was again sweet with the pregnant sweetness ofnew-plowed ground. Like Hugh, Steve walked about alone through the dark,dimly lighted residence streets during the spring evenings, but he did nottry awkwardly to leap over creeks in the darkness or pull bushes out ofthe ground, nor did he waste his time dreaming of being physically young,clean-limbed and beautiful.

　　Before the coming of his great achievements in the industrial field, Stevehad not been highly regarded in his home town. He had been a noisy boastfulyouth and had been spoiled by his father. When he was twelve years old whatwere called safety bicycles first came into use and for a long time heowned the only one in town. In the evening he rode it up and down MainStreet, frightening the horses and arousing the envy of the town boys. Helearned to ride without putting his hands on the handle-bars and the otherboys began to call him Smarty Hunter and later, because he wore a stiff,white collar that folded down over his shoulders, they gave him a girl'sname. "Hello, Susan," they shouted, "don't fall and muss your clothes."

　　In the spring that marked the beginning of his great industrial adventure,Steve was stirred by the soft spring winds into dreaming his own kind ofdreams. As he walked about through the streets, avoiding the other youngmen and women, he remembered Ernestine, the daughter of the Buffalo soapmaker, and thought a great deal about the magnificence of the big stonehouse in which she lived with her father. His body ached for her, but thatwas a matter he felt could be managed. How he could achieve a financialposition that would make it possible for him to ask for her hand was a moredifficult problem. Since he had come back from the business college to livein his home town, he had secretly, and at the cost of two new five dollardresses, arranged a physical alliance with a girl named Louise Truckerwhose father was a farm laborer, and that left his mind free for otherthings. He intended to become a manufacturer, the first one in Bidwell,to make himself a leader in the new movement that was sweeping over thecountry. He had thought out what he wanted to do and it only remained tofind something for him to manufacture to put his plans through. First ofall he had selected with great care certain men he intended to ask to go inwith him. There was John Clark the banker, his own father, E. H. Hunter thetown jeweler, Thomas Butterworth the rich farmer, and young Gordon Hart,who had a job as assistant cashier in the bank. For a month he had beendropping hints to these men of something mysterious and important aboutto happen. With the exception of his father who had infinite faith in theshrewdness and ability of his son, the men he wanted to impress were onlyamused. One day Thomas Butterworth went into the bank and stood talking thematter over with John Clark. "The young squirt was always a Smart-Aleckand a blow-hard," he said. "What's he up to now? What's he nudging andwhispering about?"

　　As he walked in the main street of Bidwell, Steve began to acquire thatair of superiority that later made him so respected and feared. He hurriedalong with a peculiarly intense absorbed look in his eyes. He saw hisfellow townsmen as through a haze, and sometimes did not see them at all.As he went along he took papers from his pocket, read them hurriedly, andthen quickly put them away again. When he did speak--perhaps to a man whohad known him from boyhood--there was in his manner something gracious tothe edge of condescension. One morning in March he met Zebe Wilson the townshoemaker on the sidewalk before the post-office. Steve stopped and smiled."Well, good morning, Mr. Wilson," he said, "and how is the quality ofleather you are getting from the tanneries now?"

　　Word regarding this strange salutation ran about among the merchants andartisans. "What's he up to now?" they asked each other. "Mr. Wilson,indeed! Now what's wrong between that young squirt and Zebe Wilson?"

　　In the afternoon, four clerks from the Main Street stores and Ed Hall thecarpenter's apprentice, who had a half day off because of rain, decided toinvestigate. One by one they went along Hamilton Street to Zebe Wilson'sshop and stepped inside to repeat Steve Hunter's salutation. "Well, goodafternoon, Mr. Wilson," they said, "and how is the quality of leather youare getting from the tanneries now?" Ed Hall, the last of the five who wentinto the shop to repeat the formal and polite inquiry, barely escaped withhis life. Zebe Wilson threw a shoemaker's hammer at him and it went throughthe glass in the upper part of the shop door.

　　Once when Tom Butterworth and John Clark the banker were talking of the newair of importance he was assuming, and half indignantly speculated on whathe meant by his whispered suggestion of something significant about tohappen, Steve came along Main Street past the front door of the bank. JohnClark called him in. The three men confronted each other and the jeweler'sson sensed the fact that the banker and the rich farmer were amused byhis pretensions. At once he proved himself to be what all Bidwell lateracknowledged him to be, a man who could handle men and affairs. Having atthat time nothing to support his pretensions he decided to put up a bluff.With a wave of his hand and an air of knowing just what he was about, heled the two men into the back room of the bank and shut the door leadinginto the large room to which the general public was admitted. "You wouldhave thought he owned the place," John Clark afterward said with a note ofadmiration in his voice to young Gordon Hart when he described what tookplace in the back room.

　　Steve plunged at once into what he had to say to the two solid moneyedcitizens of his town. "Well, now, look here, you two," he began earnestly."I'm going to tell you something, but you got to keep still." He went tothe window that looked out upon an alleyway and glanced about as thoughfearful of being overheard, then sat down in the chair usually occupied byJohn Clark on the rare occasions when the directors of the Bidwell bankheld a meeting. Steve looked over the heads of the two men who in spiteof themselves were beginning to be impressed. "Well," he began, "there isa fellow out at Pickleville. You have maybe heard things said about him.He's telegraph operator out there. Perhaps you have heard how he is alwaysmaking drawings of parts of machines. I guess everybody in town has beenwondering what he's up to."

　　Steve looked at the two men and then got nervously out of the chair andwalked about the room. "That fellow is my man. I put him there," hedeclared. "I didn't want to tell any one yet."

　　The two men nodded and Steve became lost in the notion created in hisfancy. It did not occur to him that what he had just said was untrue. Hebegan to scold the two men. "Well, I suppose I'm on the wrong track there,"he said. "My man has made an invention that will bring millions in profitsto those who get into it. In Cleveland and Buffalo I'm already in touchwith big bankers. There's to be a big factory built, but you see yourselfhow it is, here I'm at home. I was raised as a boy here."

　　The excited young man plunged into an exposition of the spirit of the newtimes. He grew bold and scolded the older men. "You know yourself thatfactories are springing up everywhere, in towns all over the State," hesaid. "Will Bidwell wake up? Will we have factories here? You know wellenough we won't, and I know why. It's because a man like me who was raisedhere has to go to a city to get money to back his plans. If I talked to youfellows you would laugh at me. In a few years I might make you more moneythan you have made in your whole lives, but what's the use talking? I'mSteve Hunter; you knew me when I was a kid. You'd laugh. What's the use mytrying to tell you fellows my plans?"

　　Steve turned as though to go out of the room, but Tom Butterworth took holdof his arm and led him back to a chair. "Now, you tell us what you're upto," he demanded. In turn he grew indignant. "If you've got something tomanufacture you can get backing here as well as any place," he said. Hebecame convinced that the jeweler's son was telling the truth. It did notoccur to him that a Bidwell young man would dare lie to such solid menas John Clark and himself. "You let them city bankers alone," he saidemphatically. "You tell us your story. What you got to tell?"

　　In the silent little room the three men stared at each other. TomButterworth and John Clark in their turn began to have dreams. Theyremembered the tales they had heard of vast fortunes made quickly by menwho owned new and valuable inventions. The land was at that time full ofsuch tales. They were blown about on every wind. Quickly they realized thatthey had made a mistake in their attitude toward Steve, and were anxious towin his regard. They had called him into the bank to bully him and to laughat him. Now they were sorry. As for Steve, he only wanted to get away--toget by himself and think. An injured look crept over his face. "Well," hesaid, "I thought I'd give Bidwell a chance. There are three or four menhere. I have spoken to all of you and dropped a hint of something in thewind, but I'm not ready to be very definite yet."

　　Seeing the new look of respect in the eyes of the two men Steve becamebold. "I was going to call a meeting when I was ready," he said pompously."You two do what I've been doing. You keep your mouths shut. Don't go nearthat telegraph operator and don't talk to a soul. If you mean business I'llgive you a chance to make barrels of money, more'n you ever dreamed of, butdon't be in a hurry." He took a bundle of letters out of his inside coatpocket, and beat with them on the edge of the table that occupied thecenter of the room. Another bold thought came into his mind.

　　"I've got letters here offering me big money to take my factory either toCleveland or Buffalo," he declared emphatically. "It isn't money that'shard to get. I can tell you men that. What a man wants in his home town isrespect. He don't want to be looked on as a fool because he tries to dosomething to rise in the world."

　　* * * * *Steve walked boldly out of the bank and into Main Street. When he had gotout of the presence of the two men he was frightened. "Well, I've done it.I've made a fool of myself," he muttered aloud. In the bank he had saidthat Hugh McVey the telegraph operator was his man, that he had broughtthe fellow to Bidwell. What a fool he had been. In his anxiety to impressthe two older men he had told a story, the falsehood of which could bediscovered in a few minutes. Why had he not kept his dignity and waited?There had been no occasion for being so definite. He had gone too far, hadbeen carried away. To be sure he had told the two men not to go near thetelegraph operator, but that would no doubt but serve to arouse theirsuspicions of the thinness of his story. They would talk the matter overand start an investigation of their own. Then they would find out hehad lied. He imagined the two men as already engaged in a whisperedconversation regarding the probability of his tale. Like most shrewd menhe had an exalted notion regarding the shrewdness of others. He walked alittle away from the bank and then turned to look back. A shiver ran overhis body. Into his mind came the sickening fear that the telegraph operatorat Pickleville was not an inventor at all. The town was full of tales, andin the bank he had taken advantage of that fact to make an impression;but what proof had he? No one had seen one of the inventions supposed tohave been worked out by the mysterious stranger from Missouri. There hadafter all been nothing but whispered suspicions, old wives' tales, fablesinvented by men who had nothing to do but loaf in the drug-store and makeup stories.

　　The thought that Hugh McVey might not be an inventor overpowered him and heput it quickly aside. He had something more immediate to think about. Thestory of the bluff he had just made in the bank would be found out and thewhole town would rock with laughter at his expense. The young men of thetown did not like him. They would roll the story over on their tongues.Ribald old fellows who had nothing else to do would take up the story withjoy and would elaborate it. Fellows like the cabbage farmer, Ezra French,who had a talent for saying cutting things would exercise it. They wouldmake up imaginary inventions, grotesque, absurd inventions. Then they wouldget young fellows to come to him and propose that he take them up, promotethem, and make every one rich. Men would shout jokes at him as he wentalong Main Street. His dignity would be gone forever. He would be made afool of by the very school boys as he had been in his youth when he boughtthe bicycle and rode it about before the eyes of other boys in theevenings.

　　Steve hurried out of Main Street and went over the bridge that crossed theriver into Turner's Pike. He did not know what he intended to do, but feltthere was much at stake and that he would have to do something at once.It was a warm, cloudy day and the road that led to Pickleville was muddy.During the night before it had rained and more rain was promised. The pathbeside the road was slippery, and so absorbed was he that as he plungedalong, his feet slipped out from under him and he sat down in a small poolof water. A farmer driving past along the road turned to laugh at him. "Yougo to hell," Steve shouted. "You just mind your own business and go tohell."

　　The distracted young man tried to walk sedately along the path. The longgrass that grew beside the path wet his shoes, and his hands were wet andmuddy. Farmers turned on their wagon seats to stare at him. For someobscure reason he could not himself understand, he was terribly afraid toface Hugh McVey. In the bank he had been in the presence of men who weretrying to get the best of him, to make a fool of him, to have fun at hisexpense. He had felt that and had resented it. The knowledge had given hima certain kind of boldness; it had enabled his mind to make up the storyof the inventor secretly employed at his own expense and the city bankersanxious to furnish him capital. Although he was terribly afraid ofdiscovery, he felt a little glow of pride at the thought of the boldnesswith which he had taken the letters out of his pocket and had challengedthe two men to call his bluff.

　　Steve, however, felt there was something different about the man in thetelegraph office in Pickleville. He had been in town for nearly two yearsand no one knew anything about him. His silence might be indicative ofanything. He was afraid the tall silent Missourian might decide to havenothing to do with him, and pictured himself as being brushed rudely aside,being told to mind his own business.

　　Steve knew instinctively how to handle business men. One simply created thenotion of money to be made without effort. He had done that to the two menin the bank and it had worked. After all he had succeeded in making themrespect him. He had handled the situation. He wasn't such a fool at thatkind of a thing. The other thing he had to face might be very different.Perhaps after all Hugh McVey was a big inventor, a man with a powerfulcreative mind. It was possible he had been sent to Bidwell by a bigbusiness man of some city. Big business men did strange, mysterious things;they put wires out in all directions, controlled a thousand little avenuesfor the creation of wealth.

　　Just starting out on his own career as a man of affairs, Steve had anoverpowering respect for what he thought of as the subtlety of men ofaffairs. With all the other American youths of his generation he had beenswept off his feet by the propaganda that then went on and is still goingon, and that is meant to create the illusion of greatness in connectionwith the ownership of money. He did not then know and, in spite of his ownlater success and his own later use of the machinery by which illusionis created, he never found out that in an industrial world reputationsfor greatness of mind are made as a Detroit manufacturer would makeautomobiles. He did not know that men are employed to bring up the nameof a politician so that he may be called a statesman, as a new brand ofbreakfast food that it may be sold; that most modern great men are mereillusions sprung out of a national hunger for greatness. Some day a wiseman, one who has not read too many books but who has gone about among men,will discover and set forth a very interesting thing about America. Theland is vast and there is a national hunger for vastness in individuals.One wants an Illinois-sized man for Illinois, an Ohio-sized man for Ohio,and a Texas-sized man for Texas.

　　To be sure, Steve Hunter had no notion of all this. He never did get anotion of it. The men he had already begun to think of as great and to tryto imitate were like the strange and gigantic protuberances that sometimesgrow on the side of unhealthy trees, but he did not know it. He didnot know that throughout the country, even in that early day, a systemwas being built up to create the myth of greatness. At the seat of theAmerican Government at Washington, hordes of somewhat clever and altogetherunhealthy young men were already being employed for the purpose. In asweeter age many of these young men might have become artists, but they hadnot been strong enough to stand against the growing strength of dollars.They had become instead newspaper correspondents and secretaries topoliticians. All day and every day they used their minds and their talentsas writers in the making of puffs and the creating of myths concerningthe men by whom they were employed. They were like the trained sheep thatare used at great slaughter-houses to lead other sheep into the killingpens. Having befouled their own minds for hire, they made their living bybefouling the minds of others. Already they had found out that no greatcleverness was required for the work they had to do. What was required wasconstant repetition. It was only necessary to say over and over that theman by whom they were employed was a great man. No proof had to be broughtforward to substantiate the claims they made; no great deeds had to be doneby the men who were thus made great, as brands of crackers or breakfastfood are made salable. Stupid and prolonged and insistent repetition waswhat was necessary.

　　As the politicians of the industrial age have created a myth aboutthemselves, so also have the owners of dollars, the big bankers, therailroad manipulators, the promoters of industrial enterprise. The impulseto do so is partly sprung from shrewdness but for the most part it is dueto a hunger within to be of some real moment in the world. Knowing thatthe talent that had made them rich is but a secondary talent, and beinga little worried about the matter, they employ men to glorify it. Havingemployed a man for the purpose, they are themselves children enough tobelieve the myth they have paid money to have created. Every rich man inthe country unconsciously hates his press agent.

　　Although he had never read a book, Steve was a constant reader of thenewspapers and had been deeply impressed by the stories he had readregarding the shrewdness and ability of the American captains of industry.To him they were supermen and he would have crawled on his knees beforea Gould or a Cal Price--the commanding figures among moneyed men of thatday. As he went down along Turner's Pike that day when industry was born inBidwell, he thought of these men and of lesser rich men of Cleveland andBuffalo, and was afraid that in approaching Hugh he might be coming intocompetition with one of these men. As he hurried along under the graysky, he however realized that the time for action had come and that hemust at once put the plans that he had formed in his mind to the test ofpracticability; that he must at once see Hugh McVey, find out if he reallydid have an invention that could be manufactured, and if he did try tosecure some kind of rights of ownership over it. "If I do not act at once,either Tom Butterworth or John Clark will get in ahead of me," he thought.He knew they were both shrewd capable men. Had they not become well-to-do?Even during the talk in the bank, when they had seemed to be impressed byhis words, they might well have been making plans to get the better of him.They would act, but he must act first.

　　Steve hadn't the courage of the lie he had told. He did not haveimagination enough to understand how powerful a thing is a lie. He walkedquickly along until he came to the Wheeling Station at Pickleville, andthen, not having the courage to confront Hugh at once, went past thestation and crept in behind the deserted pickle factory that stood acrossthe tracks. Through a broken window at the back he climbed, and crept likea thief across the earth floor until he came to a window that looked outupon the station. A freight train rumbled slowly past and a farmer came tothe station to get a load of goods that had arrived by freight. George Pikecame running from his house to attend to the wants of the farmer. He wentback to his house and Steve was left alone in the presence of the man onwhom he felt all of his future depended. He was as excited as a villagegirl in the presence of a lover. Through the windows of the telegraphoffice he could see Hugh seated at a desk with a book before him. Thepresence of the book frightened him. He decided that the mysteriousMissourian must be some strange sort of intellectual giant. He was surethat one who could sit quietly reading hour after hour in such a lonelyisolated place could be of no ordinary clay. As he stood in the deepshadows inside the old building and stared at the man he was trying to findcourage to approach, a citizen of Bidwell named Dick Spearsman came to thestation and going inside, talked to the telegraph operator. Steve trembledwith anxiety. The man who had come to the station was an insurance agentwho also owned a small berry farm at the edge of town. He had a son who hadgone west to take up land in the state of Kansas, and the father thought ofvisiting him. He came to the station to make inquiry regarding the railroadfare, but when Steve saw him talking to Hugh, the thought came into hismind that John Clark or Thomas Butterworth might have sent him to thestation to make an investigation of the truth of the statements he had madein the bank. "It would be like them to do it that way," he muttered tohimself. "They wouldn't come themselves. They would send some one theythought I wouldn't suspect. They would play safe, damn 'em."

　　Trembling with fear, Steve walked up and down in the empty factory. Cobwebshanging down brushed against his face and he jumped aside as though a handhad reached out of the darkness to touch him. In the corners of the oldbuilding shadows lurked and distorted thoughts began to come into his head.He rolled and lighted a cigarette and then remembered that the flare of thematch could probably be seen from the station. He cursed himself for hiscarelessness. Throwing the cigarette on the earth floor he ground it underhis heel. When at last Dick Spearsman had disappeared up the road that ledto Bidwell and he came out of the old factory and got again into Turner'sPike, he felt that he was in no shape to talk of business but neverthelessmust act at once. In front of the factory he stopped in the road and triedto wipe the mud off the seat of his trousers with a handkerchief. Then hewent to the creek and washed his soiled hands. With wet hands he arrangedhis tie and straightened the collar of his coat. He had an air of oneabout to ask a woman to become his wife. Striving to look as important anddignified as possible, he went along the station platform and into thetelegraph office to confront Hugh and to find out at once and finally whatfate the gods had in store for him.

　　* * * * *It no doubt contributed to Steve's happiness in after life, in the dayswhen he was growing rich, and later when he reached out for public honors,contributed to campaign funds, and even in secret dreamed of getting intothe United States Senate or being Governor of his state, that he never knewhow badly he overreached himself that day in his youth when he made hisfirst business deal with Hugh at the Wheeling Station at Pickleville. LaterHugh's interest in the Steven Hunter industrial enterprises was taken careof by a man who was as shrewd as Steve himself. Tom Butterworth, who hadmade money and knew how to make and handle money, managed such things forthe inventor, and Steve's chance was gone forever.

　　That is, however, a part of the story of the development of the town ofBidwell and a story that Steve never understood. When he overreachedhimself that day he did not know what he had done. He made a deal with Hughand was happy to escape the predicament he thought he had got himself intowhen he talked too much to the two men in the bank.

　　Although Steve's father had always a great faith in his son's shrewdnessand when he talked to other men represented him as a peculiarly capable andunappreciated man, the two did not in private get on well. In the Hunterhousehold they quarreled and snarled at each other. Steve's mother had diedwhen he was a small boy and his one sister, two years older than himself,kept herself always in the house and seldom appeared on the streets. Shewas a semi-invalid. Some obscure nervous disease had twisted her body outof shape, and her face twitched incessantly. One morning in the barn backof the Hunter house Steve, then a lad of fourteen, was oiling his bicyclewhen his sister appeared and stood watching him. A small wrench lay on theground and she picked it up. Suddenly and without warning she began to beathim on the head. He was compelled to knock her down in order to tear thewrench out of her hand. After the incident she was ill in bed for a month.

　　Elsie Hunter was always a source of unhappiness to her brother. As he beganto get up in life Steve had a growing passion for being respected by hisfellows. It got to be something of an obsession with him and among otherthings he wanted very much to be thought of as one who had good blood inhis veins. A man whom he hired searched out his ancestry, and with theexception of his immediate family it seemed very satisfactory. The sister,with her twisted body and her face that twitched so persistently, seemedto be everlastingly sneering at him. He grew half afraid to come into herpresence. After he began to grow rich he married Ernestine, the daughter ofthe soap maker at Buffalo, and when her father died she also had a greatdeal of money. His own father died and he set up a household of his own.That was in the time when big houses began to appear at the edge of theberry lands and on the hills south of Bidwell. On his father's death Stevebecame guardian for his sister. The jeweler had left a small estate and itwas entirely in the son's hands. Elsie lived with one servant in a smallhouse in town and was put in the position of being entirely dependent onher brother's bounty. In a sense it might be said that she lived by herhatred of him. When on rare occasions he came to her house she would notsee him. A servant came to the door and reported her asleep. Almost everymonth she wrote a letter demanding that her share of her father's moneybe handed over to her, but it did no good. Steve occasionally spoke to anacquaintance of his difficulty with her. "I am more sorry for the womanthan I can say," he declared. "It's the dream of my life to make the poorafflicted soul happy. You see yourself that I provide her with everycomfort of life. Ours is an old family. I have it from an expert in suchmatters that we are descendants of one Hunter, a courtier in the court ofEdward the Second of England. Our blood has perhaps become a little thin.All the vitality of the family was centered in me. My sister does notunderstand me and that has been the cause of much unhappiness and heartburning, but I shall always do my duty by her."

　　In the late afternoon of the spring day that was also the most eventful dayof his life, Steve went quickly along the Wheeling Station platform to thedoor of the telegraph office. It was a public place, but before going inhe stopped, again straightened his tie and brushed his clothes, and thenknocked at the door. As there was no response he opened the door softlyand looked in. Hugh was at his desk but did not look up. Steve went in andclosed the door. By chance the moment of his entrance was also a big momentin the life of the man he had come to see. The mind of the young inventor,that had for so long been dreamy and uncertain, had suddenly becomeextraordinarily clear and free. One of the inspired moments that come tointense natures, working intensely, had come to him. The mechanical problemhe was trying so hard to work out became clear. It was one of the momentsthat Hugh afterwards thought of as justifying his existence, and in laterlife he came to live for such moments. With a nod of his head to Steve hearose and hurried out to the building that was used by the Wheeling asa freight warehouse. The jeweler's son ran at his heels. On an elevatedplatform before the freight warehouse sat an odd looking agriculturalimplement, a machine for rooting potatoes out of the ground that had beenreceived on the day before and was now awaiting delivery to some farmer.Hugh dropped to his knees beside the machine and examined it closely.Muttered exclamations broke from his lips. For the first time in his lifehe was not embarrassed in the presence of another person. The two men,the one almost grotesquely tall, the other short of stature and alreadyinclined toward corpulency, stared at each other. "What is it you'reinventing? I came to see you about that," Steve said timidly.

　　Hugh did not answer the question directly. He stepped across the narrowplatform to the freight warehouse and began to make a rude drawing on theside of the building. Then he tried to explain his plant-setting machine.He spoke of it as a thing already achieved. At the moment he thought of itin that way. "I had not thought of the use of a large wheel with the armsattached at regular intervals," he said absent-mindedly. "I will have tofind money now. That'll be the next step. It will be necessary to make aworking model of the machine now. I must find out what changes I'll have tomake in my calculations."

　　The two men returned to the telegraph office and while Hugh listened Stevemade his proposal. Even then he did not understand what the machine thatwas to be made was to do. It was enough for him that a machine was to bemade and he wanted to share in its ownership at once. As the two men walkedback from the freight warehouse, his mind took hold of Hugh's remark aboutgetting money. Again he was afraid. "There's some one in the background,"he thought. "Now I must make a proposal he can't refuse. I mustn't leaveuntil I've made a deal with him."

　　Fairly carried away by his anxiety, Steve proposed to provide money out ofhis own pocket to make the model of the machine. "We'll rent the old picklefactory across the track," he said, opening the door and pointing with atrembling finger. "I can get it cheap. I'll have windows and a floor putin. Then I'll get you a man to whittle out a model of the machine. AllieMulberry can do it. I'll get him for you. He can whittle anything if youonly show him what you want. He's half crazy and won't get on to oursecret. When the model is made, leave it to me, you just leave it to me."

　　Rubbing his hands together Steve walked boldly to The telegrapher's deskand picking up a sheet of paper began to write out a contract. It providedthat Hugh Was to get a royalty of ten per cent. of the selling price on themachine he had invented and that was to be manufactured by a company tobe organized by Steven Hunter. The contract also stated that a promotingcompany was to be organized at once and money provided for the experimentalwork Hugh had yet to do. The Missourian was to begin getting a salary atonce. He was to risk nothing, as Steve elaborately explained. When he wasready for them mechanics were to be employed and their salaries paid. Whenthe contract had been written and read aloud, a copy was made and Hugh, whowas again embarrassed beyond words, signed his name.

　　With a flourish of his hand Steve laid a little pile of money on the desk."That's for a starter," he said and turned to frown at George Pike who atthat moment came to the door. The freight agent went quickly away and thetwo men were left alone together. Steve shook hands with his new partner.He went out and then came in again. "You understand," he said mysteriously."The fifty dollars is your first month's salary. I was ready for you. Ibrought it along. You just leave everything to me, just you leave it tome." Again he went out and Hugh was left alone. He saw the young man goacross the tracks to the old factory and walk up and down before it. When afarmer came along and shouted at him, he did not reply, but stepping backinto the road swept the deserted old building with his eyes as a generalmight have looked over a battlefield. Then he went briskly down the roadtoward town and the farmer turned on his wagon seat to stare after him.

　　Hugh McVey also stared. When Steve had gone away, he walked to the endof the station platform and looked along the road toward town. It seemedto him wonderful that he had at last held conversation with a citizenof Bidwell. A little of the import of the contract he had signed came tohim, and he went into the station and got his copy of it and put it in hispocket. Then he came out again. When he read it over and realized anew thathe was to be paid a living wage and have time and help to work out theproblem that had now become vastly important to his happiness, it seemedto him that he had been in the presence of a kind of god. He rememberedthe words of Sarah Shepard concerning the bright alert citizens of easterntowns and realized that he had been in the presence of such a being, thathe had in some way become connected in his new work with such a one. Therealization overcame him completely. Forgetting entirely his duties as atelegrapher, he closed the office and went for a walk across the meadowsand in the little patches of woodlands that still remained standing in theopen plain north of Pickleville. He did not return until late at night, andwhen he did, had not solved the puzzle as to what had happened. All he gotout of it was the fact that the machine he had been trying to make was ofgreat and mysterious importance to the civilization into which he had cometo live and of which he wanted so keenly to be a part. There seemed to himsomething almost sacred in that fact. A new determination to complete andperfect his plant-setting machine had taken possession of him.

　　* * * * *The meeting to organize a promotion company that would in turn launch thefirst industrial enterprise in the town of Bidwell was held in the backroom of the Bidwell bank one afternoon in June. The berry season had justcome to an end and the streets were full of people. A circus had come totown and at one o'clock there was a parade. Before the stores horsesbelonging to visiting country people stood hitched in two long rows. Themeeting in the bank was not held until four o'clock, when the bankingbusiness was at an end for the day. It had been a hot, stuffy afternoonand a storm threatened. For some reason the whole town had an inkling ofthe fact that a meeting was to be held on that day, and in spite of theexcitement caused by the coming of the circus, it was in everybody's mind.From the very beginning of his upward journey in life, Steve Hunter hadthe faculty of throwing an air of mystery and importance about everythinghe did. Every one saw the workings of the machinery by which the mythconcerning himself was created, but was nevertheless impressed. Even themen of Bidwell who retained the ability to laugh at Steve could not laughat the things he did.

　　For two months before the day on which the meeting was held, the town hadbeen on edge. Every one knew that Hugh McVey had suddenly given up hisplace in the telegraph office and that he was engaged in some enterprisewith Steve Hunter. "Well, I see he has thrown off the mask, that fellow,"said Alban Foster, superintendent of the Bidwell schools, in speaking ofthe matter to the Reverend Harvey Oxford, the minister of the BaptistChurch.

　　Steve saw to it that although every one was curious the curiosity wasunsatisfied. Even his father was left in the dark. The two men had a sharpquarrel about the matter, but as Steve had three thousand dollars of hisown, left him by his mother, and was well past his twenty-first year, therewas nothing his father could do.

　　At Pickleville the windows and doors at the back of the deserted factorywere bricked up, and over the windows and the door at the front, where afloor had been laid, iron bars specially made by Lew Twining the Bidwellblacksmith had been put. The bars over the door locked the place at nightand gave the factory the air of a prison. Every evening before he went tobed Steve walked to Pickleville. The sinister appearance of the buildingat night gave him a peculiar satisfaction. "They'll find out what I'm upto when I want 'em to," he said to himself. Allie Mulberry worked at thefactory during the day. Under Hugh's direction he whittled pieces of woodinto various shapes, but had no idea of what he was doing. No one but thehalf-wit and Steve Hunter were admitted to the society of the telegraphoperator. When Allie Mulberry came into the Main Street at night, everyone stopped him and a thousand questions were asked, but he only shook hishead and smiled foolishly. On Sunday afternoons crowds of men and womenwalked down Turner's Pike to Pickleville and stood looking at the desertedbuilding, but no one tried to enter. The bars were in place and windowshades were drawn over the windows. Above the door that faced the roadthere was a large sign. "Keep Out. This Means You," the sign said.

　　The four men who met Steve in the bank knew vaguely that some sort ofinvention was being perfected, but did not know what it was. They spokein an offhand way of the matter to their friends and that increased thegeneral curiosity. Every one tried to guess what was up. When Steve was notabout, John Clark and young Gordon Hart pretended to know everything butgave the impression of men sworn to secrecy. The fact that Steve told themnothing seemed to them a kind of insult. "The young upstart, I believe yethe's a bluff," the banker declared to his friend, Tom Butterworth.

　　On Main Street the old and young men who stood about before the stores inthe evening tried also to make light of the jeweler's son and the air ofimportance he constantly assumed. They also spoke of him as a young upstartand a windbag, but after the beginning of his connection with Hugh McVey,something of conviction went out of their voices. "I read in the paper thata man in Toledo made thirty thousand dollars out of an invention. He got itup in less than a day. He just thought of it. It's a new kind of way forsealing fruit cans," a man in the crowd before Birdie Spink's drug storeabsent-mindedly observed.

　　Inside the drug store by the empty stove, Judge Hanby talked persistentlyof the time when factories would come. He seemed to those who listened asort of John the Baptist crying out of the coming of the new day. Oneevening in May of that year, when a goodly crowd was assembled, SteveHunter came in and bought a cigar. Every one became silent. Birdie Spinkswas for some mysterious reason a little upset. In the store somethinghappened that, had there been some one there to record it, might later havebeen remembered as the moment that marked the coming of the new age toBidwell. The druggist, after he had handed out the cigar, looked at theyoung man whose name had so suddenly come upon every one's lips and whom hehad known from babyhood, and then addressed him as no young man of his agehad ever before been addressed by an older citizen of the town. "Well, goodevening, Mr. Hunter," he said respectfully. "And how do you find yourselfthis evening?"

　　To the men who met him in the bank, Steve described the plant-settingmachine and the work it was intended to do. "It's the most perfect thingof its kind I've ever seen," he said with the air of one who has spenthis life as an expert examiner of machinery. Then, to the amazement ofevery one, he produced sheets covered with figures estimating the costof manufacturing the machine. To the men present it seemed as though thequestion as to the practicability of the machine had already been settled.The sheets covered with figures made the actual beginning of manufacturingseem near at hand. Without raising his voice and quite as a matter ofcourse, Steve proposed that the men present subscribe each three thousanddollars to the stock of a promotion company, the money to be used toperfect the machine and put it actually to work in the fields, while alarger company for the building of a factory was being organized. For thethree thousand dollars each of the men would receive later six thousanddollars in stock in the larger company. They would make one hundred percent. on their first investment. As for himself he owned the invention andit was very valuable. He had already received many offers from other menin other places. He wanted to stick to his own town and to the men who hadknown him since he was a boy. He would retain a controlling interest in thelarger company and that would enable him to take care of his friends. JohnClark he proposed to make treasurer of the promotion company. Every onecould see he would be the right man. Gordon Hart should be manager. TomButterworth could, if he could find time to give it, help him in the actualorganization of the larger company. He did not propose to do anything ina small way. Much stock would have to be sold to farmers, as well as totownspeople, and he could see no reason why a certain commission for theselling of stock should not be paid.

　　The four men came out of the back room of the bank just as the storm thathad all day been threatening broke on Main Street. They stood together bythe front window and watched the people skurry along past the storeshomeward-bound from the circus. Farmers jumping into their wagons startedtheir horses away on the trot. The whole street was populous with peopleshouting and running. To an observing person standing at the bank window,Bidwell, Ohio, might have seemed no longer a quiet town filled with peoplewho lived quiet lives and thought quiet thoughts, but a tiny section ofsome giant modern city. The sky was extraordinarily black as from the smokeof a mill. The hurrying people might have been workmen escaping from themill at the end of the day. Clouds of dust swept through the street. SteveHunter's imagination was aroused. For some reason the black clouds of dustand the running people gave him a tremendous sense of power. It almostseemed to him that he had filled the sky with clouds and that somethinglatent in him had startled the people. He was anxious to get away fromthe men who had just agreed to join him in his first great industrialadventure. He felt that they were after all mere puppets, creatures hecould use, men who were being swept along by him as the people runningalong the streets were being swept along by the storm. He and the stormwere in a way akin to each other. He had an impulse to be alone with thestorm, to walk dignified and upright in the face of it as he felt that inthe future he would walk dignified and upright in the face of men.

　　Steve went out of the bank and into the street. The men inside shoutedat him, telling him he would get wet, but he paid no attention to theirwarning. When he had gone and when his father had run quickly across thestreet to his jewelry store, the three men who were left in the banklooked at each other and laughed. Like the loiterers before Birdie Spinks'drug-store, they wanted to belittle him and had an inclination to begincalling him names; but for some reason they could not do it. Something hadhappened to them. They looked at each other with a question in their eyes.Each man waited for the others to speak. "Well, whatever happens we can'tlose much of anything," John Clark finally observed.

　　And over the bridge and out into Turner's Pike walked Steve Hunter, theembryo industrial magnate. Across the great stretches of fields that laybeside the road the wind ran furiously, tearing leaves off trees, carryinggreat volumes of dust before it. The hurrying black clouds in the sky were,he fancied, like clouds of smoke pouring out of the chimneys of factoriesowned by himself. In fancy also he saw his town become a city, bathed inthe smoke of his enterprises. As he looked abroad over the fields swept bythe storm of wind, he realized that the road along which he walked would intime become a city street. "Pretty soon I'll get an option on this land,"he said meditatively. An exalted mood took possession of him and whenhe got to Pickleville he did not go into the shop where Hugh and AllieMulberry were at work, but turning, walked back toward town in the mud andthe driving rain.

　　It was a time when Steve wanted to be by himself, to feel himself the onegreat man of the community. He had intended to go into the old picklefactory and escape the rain, but when he got to the railroad tracks, hadturned back because he realized suddenly that in the presence of thesilent, intent inventor he had never been able to feel big. He wanted tofeel big on that evening and so, unmindful of the rain and of his hat,that was caught up by the wind and blown away into a field, he went alongthe deserted road thinking great thoughts. At a place where there were nohouses he stopped for a moment and lifted his tiny hands to the skies. "I'ma man. I tell you what, I'm a man. Whatever any one says, I tell you what,I'm a man," he shouted into the void.