"Jack went as he had promised. Isaacs, who was a thoroughly good man, was delighted to see him, shook hands cordially, and then suddenly, with a mysterious look, led him to the extreme rear end of the store, and when there, placing his lips close to Jack's ear, in a hoarse whisper, said:
"'Meester Marshall, de vater here is —— bad; it is poison, horrible. You drinks nodings but vine until you gets used to de vater.'
"Marshall went to work at once. It was in 1863. The war was at its height, and Jack was intensely Union, while Isaacs, his employer, was a furious Democrat. Nothing of especial interest transpired for a couple of weeks, when one day an emigrant woman, just across the plains, leading two little children, came into the store.
"She was an exceedingly poor woman, evidently. All her clothes were not worth three dollars, while her children were pitiful looking beyond description.
"Isaacs was in the front of the store; Jack was putting up goods in the rear, but in hearing, while another clerk was in the warehouse outside of the main store. Isaacs went to wait on the woman. She picked out some needed articles of clothing for her children, amounting to some six or eight dollars, then unrolling a dilapidated kerchief, from its inner folds drew out a Confederate twenty-dollar note and tendered it in payment.
"Isaacs, who had been all smiles, drew back in horror, exclaiming: 'I cannot take dot; dot is not monish, madam.'
"Jack overheard what Isaacs said and the woman's reply, as follows:
"'It is all that I have; it is all the money that we have had in Arkansas since the war commenced. Everybody takes it in Arkansas.'
"This conversation continued for two or three minutes, and the woman was just about turning away without the goods when Jack, unable to longer bear it, stepped forward and said:
"'Mr. Isaacs, Mr. Smith would like to see you in the warehouse; please permit me to wait upon the lady.'