The fathers of these children wasted their substance in gambling houses and dens of vice, and their mothers eked out a wretched existence as best they could. Young men and women were walking in the footsteps of those who were lost in this wilderness, and the children were following on. Their scrawny limbs must reach out and grow to adult stature and their minds, already befogged by the uncleanliness that had been their portion from birth, were twining about the mean, demoralizing things that lead to destruction.
On the outskirts of the Flat where the Flat proper began to rise in undulations and low hills, from which could be seen stretches of field and upland, there stood an old, weather-beaten house. It was large and square and porches had once run the length of its sides. This old building had once been a summer hotel, or resort, as it was called. Vines that had been planted about it in those days now clambered about the partly fallen columns and endeavored, as Nature often endeavors, to hide from view unsightly blots and blemishes. There may be people who would cavil at using this building because of the various uses to which it had been put since the days of its freshness and popularity.
When the balance of interest became established on the Edgerly side, and the Resort fell off in the patronage of the better class of people, an unsavory fame came to attach itself to the place. We sometimes hear old tales of disembodied spirits who walk through halls and corridors and flit about apartments that they were wont to inhabit in the days of their flesh. But if the crime and suffering, the shame and woe that had existed beneath the roof of this crumbling old Resort had massed itself in one monster shape and walked the streets of the city over the hill, men and women would have cried out for a place to hide themselves, as did the Canaanites when the walls of Jericho fell down.
When gruesome stories regarding the place began to float about, when the scurry of rats and the rattling of blinds and the whistling of the wind through the crevices came to be known as the wailing and moaning of lost spirits, the place was deserted; and so it had stood for years, ruined and forsaken. But whoever might cavil at the building because of its infamous notoriety of the past, Mrs. Thorpe had no compunctions and no fears. She saw in the deserted rooms beneath the crumbling roof a place for the children, the neglected, untaught children of the Flat. Bit by bit a plan formed in her mind and grew from day to day until, full-fledged, but lacking yet in detail, she laid it before Margaret. And as though while she had been pondering the main plan, Margaret had been arranging the minor parts; now all the way seemed open before them.
The first step was to see the owner of the building and get his consent to use it for a school and kindergarten. The greater part of the Flat district was owned by a descendant of the first Bolton. This man in his younger days had cherished the old hope that the Flat would yet make a prosperous town. There is more money to be made from ownership of a prosperous, respectable town than from a disreputable Flat; but if he could not own a respectable town and make his money in a creditable manner there was but one thing left for him to do, and he put his foot squarely on his honor and did it. He saw that saloons and places of vice were erected to lure the sort of population that must people a wretched Flat.
Mrs. Thorpe called on this man at his business office in Edgerly. He regarded her keenly as she explained to him the use she wished to make of the old Resort.
"So you wish to open a school on the Flat?" he said. The expression on his face was inscrutable and his small eyes were so far sunk into the folds of flesh which surrounded them that it was difficult to know just where his gaze was directed.
"It is a long walk to the Edgerly school for the little children," she said, "and if they do not go when they are small it is difficult to get them started later."
"Exactly. I think I understand, Mrs. Thorpe." The small eyes, sunken in their folds of flesh, were looking for the future recruits for the saloons and places of vice, and the man's mind was busy with a fine calculation as to where they were coming from if these children were to be so taught as to make self-respecting citizens of them.
Sometimes we feel the atmosphere about us to be keen and rare, sometimes fragrant with the breath of flowers and the incense of morning dew; again we are aware that it is charged with a coming storm, or dark with impurities, or heavy with moisture. There are those who are as keenly sensitive to the mental atmosphere about them. Mrs. Thorpe felt strongly that unless her faith in the integrity of her purpose sustained her, her undertaking must fail before it had drawn the first full breath of life. She had stated her purpose and asked the favor and she felt little inclined to beg or plead for its fulfillment. Yet a battle was fought, keen and sharp. There was no flashing of swords nor pomp nor parade, neither were there words nor argument. It was the play of mind upon mind; penetrating, forceful. It was thought pitted against thought; right demanding its own. The small eyes shifted about uneasily and the man moved ponderously in his chair. When he spoke again his voice expressed his irritability.