"Yes—you have astonished me, Howard; your all-around progress is amazing, and in another five years you will be the most prominent man in Southern Georgia."
"You can't ever know what it means to me to hear you say that, for"—he hesitated again to control himself—"for I would still be a Georgia Cracker if it wasn't for you," and unashamed he looked at me squarely with moistened eyes.
"An'—an'"—he halted again, contemplating as anyone might the one thing apparently unattainable. His lips quivered as he looked out past the plant and cabins to the growing cotton, the stump land and swamp which his genius had converted into a garden of usefulness and beauty. Then, with even voice under control, he went on, "I ain't much more'n a Cracker yit. I talk Cracker an' I think Cracker, that's why I ain't no match for Purdue even when it comes to tradin'. I ain't got time to go to college. What can I do? There's no livin' being I'd take advice of that kind from 'cept you. My dad and mam, I suppose, did the best they could, but they didn't give me much but life and an appetite for moonshine. We come from good English stock, but it's run down. I'm asking you what I can do for myself, 'cause I know you kin tell me, can't yer?"
"Howard," I began, delighted that he could see himself, and that he was ready and willing to struggle for better things. "Are you making money now?"
"Yes, I'm making money. Every roll of paper that drops off that machine is clear profit, worth around fifty dollars, and you know they come off pretty fast, but, shuckins!—ye soon find money don't git ye much. It's more fun to see the black stumps turn into white paper and the cotton grow where they cum from!"
"You are better off now than most college graduates," I replied, "but you do need better English. It will help you to think better. Write to a northern college to send you a sort of tutor secretary, give him some work about the office, watch him, and learn to talk as he does. Insist that he corrects you every time you make a mistake. Get the best dictionary, learn how to use it, and keep it handy all the time. Also an encyclopedia, and an atlas. It strikes me that you are already long on arithmetic." He laughed at this thought.
"An' I'll git rid of my Cracker talk, will I?" he asked, his face brightening in delightful anticipation.
"Yes, in a year."
"I knew there was a way, an' you could tell me," said he. Then he linked his arm in mine and dragged me out in the open for a little look around the place.