"Is that Sageville?" asked Frank, half doubting, and thinking perhaps his new chum was perpetrating some joke.
"Sure it is," went on Billy, still laughing. "Can't you see the opera house? It's over a hardware store, that's true, but we have shows there once in a while, when some company gets stranded and has to work its way back to New York. And we've got a bank, that gets shot up every once in a while, so nobody keeps much money in it. The depot express safe is more sure, for there is generally a man on guard.
"Then we've got a grocery, with a drug store attachment that works late Saturday nights, and there was some talk, when I came away, of starting a moving picture emporium, if that's what they're called. I wonder if it materialized?"
He looked out of the open window, to get a better glimpse of the town, and added:
"Yes, there's a new skyscraper going up. I guess that's it," and he pointed to a one-story wooden building on which some carpenters could be seen working.
"Well, I'll be jig-swiggled!" exclaimed Andy. "I thought the town was larger than that," for truly it was but a small place.
"Larger!" cried Billy. "What do you want, anyhow? This is the biggest town in this section. Big! Why, it's got more room to grow in than half a dozen of your Eastern cities. Take your New York. That can't grow any. It's reached its limit. It's hide-bound. It can't even stretch, and the people are so close that they step on each other's corns. But out here it's different. Why, we can swell Sageville up until it could take in New York and never know it."
"Not this week, though," said Frank, with a laugh, and he felt a little nettled at the slight put on his home city.
"Oh, no, it'll take a little time," admitted Billy. "But we've got the room, and you Eastern folks haven't—that's the difference."
"Yes, it's big enough," admitted Andy, as he looked at the great expanse of prairie surrounding Sageville. "But it's awful lonesome-looking."