Under the Big Dipper

by Desiderius George Dery

“Dear dad, I am so glad to be home again. You are looking fine and not a bit changed. Get well again, dad, because I want you to teach me how to be of use to you. I want you to be proud of me.”

“Proud of you, John? Why, I always have been and still am proud of you. There isn’t a finer fellow in Ohio. You’ll make good; I’m dead sure of that. All right, nurse, I’ll be good. John, I’m afraid we’ll have to obey Miss Persing. She says that six in the morning is too early for children of my age to be up. I’ve got to sleep for a couple of hours longer. No, you go back to mother and Ruth. I guess they’re dying to hear all you have to tell them. Hello, mother; good morning, my dear.” Mrs. Morton and Ruth had that moment appeared in the doorway. His wife went to the bedside and kissed her husband tenderly while Ruth stroked his hand.

“What’s the orders, nurse?” Mr. Morton asked as he looked at her over his wife’s shoulder.

“You would better be resting, Mr. Morton. The doctor will be here at half past eight and he’ll scold me if he finds you feverish.”

“All right, Miss Persing, I’ll be good.”

The family withdrew leaving the old man, weak and pale but with a face wreathed in happy smiles. His head sought the pillow gratefully and soon he was sleeping like a child.

It was now that John heard the full details of the accident to his father. He had been suffering all summer, diabetes the doctors had said. When they came to New York from Newport, he was much improved and felt himself well enough to go out to Utah to look over his pet mine, the Calumet Minnie. It was there the accident occurred. Nobody knew just how it happened. The elevator had been inspected only the week before. In the cage with him were the manager, Carson, the superintendent, two engineers and a foreman. At the hundred and fifty foot level something went wrong—the safety clutch didn’t work—and the cage dropped some eighty feet. Carson was killed, the foreman also, and the rest badly hurt. His father’s weakened state before the accident complicated things and the doctor considered the case serious. Later in the seclusion of her own room, his mother broke down utterly before him. She knew his father would never get better, she said, and she feared the worst. John tried all in his power to comfort her, but he succeeded only in bringing pathetic smiles to her face and hopeful looks in her eyes as she looked at him. He understood what was passing in her thoughts and swore inwardly that he would never fail her.

Then came the anxious days of hope and fear, when the elder Morton’s strength failed to respond to the doctors’ treatment. To John these days were inexpressibly distressful. Gloom settled on the old mansion which had seen the happiest times for both parents and children. John did all he could to brighten the home, and spent many hours with his father in intimate talk of his ambitions and aims in life. It was in these confidences that he learned to know his father and, in knowing him, to honor and admire him.

Dan Morton prided himself on the great fortune he had made, because in making it he had never wronged another and he had brought the treasures of the earth to enrich his fellow-men’s lives. That was the secret spring of his success and power; and he knew how to use that power because he was most keenly aware of the responsibility which its use entailed.

The younger son of a Connecticut banker, who had made considerable money in his native state, Dan Morton, quite early in life, had become impatient of the narrow New England environment. He decided to go West. With the legacy left him by his father, he followed the then drift towards the great undeveloped country beyond the Mississippi. Mines, ranches and the building of railroads claimed his enthusiastic attention. The astonishing development of the Middle West gave his investments a solid foundation and furnished opportunities for realizing greatly increased values. During the second half of the decade following the Civil War, Dan Morton had become a power in the financial world of America. Great sections of the Pacific Slope and the country of the Oregon trail were largely opened up by the aid given by him and his associates. It was in this way that he helped to promote the country’s wonderful growth.