His relations with the others were less strained, but scarcely more valuable in the way of companionship. Mr. Tyler did not seem to care much for his company, and never asked him to go to the “Roast Beef”—a sort of combination of club and saloon where he spent most of his evenings, where poker was the chief amusement and whisky the principal drink. From all Seth could learn, it was as well for him that he was not invited there. As for Murtagh, all his associations outside the office seemed to be with young men of his own race, who formed a coterie by themselves, and frequented distinctively Irish resorts. Like most other American cities Tecumseh had its large Irish and German elements, and in nothing were ethnographic lines drawn so clearly as in the matter of amusements. There were enough young Americans holding aloof from both these foreign circles to constitute a small constituency for the “Roast Beef,” but a far greater number had developed a liking for the German places of resort, and drank beer and ate cheese and rye bread as if to the manner born. Seth found himself in this class on his first step over the threshold of city life; he enjoyed it, and he saw very little of the others.
The two most important men on the Chronicle, Mr. Workman and Mr. Samboye, were far removed from the plane upon which all these Bohemian divisions were traced. They belonged to the Club—the Tuscarora Club. Seth knew where the club house was—but he felt that this was all he was ever likely to know about it. The first few days in Tecumseh had taught him the hopelessness of his dream of associating with his employer. Socially they were leagues apart at the outset, and if the distance did not increase as weeks grew into months, at least Seth’s perception of it did, which amounted to the same thing.
He did not so readily abandon the idea of being made a companion by Samboye, but at last that vanished too. The Editor held himself very high, and if he occasionally came down off his mountain top, his return to those heights only served to emphasize their altitude. There were conflicting stories about his salary. Among the lesser lights of the editorial room it was commonly estimated at forty-five dollars a week, but some of the printers had information that it was at least fifty—which fatigued the imagination. Seth himself received nine dollars, which his brother supplemented by five, and he found that he was regarded as doing remarkably well for a beginner. But between this condition and the state of Samboye with his great income, his fine house on one of the best streets, his influential position in the city, and his luxurious amusements at the Club, an impassable gulf yawned.
There is no pleasure in following further the details of the country boy’s new life. He lost sight of his disappointment in the consolations of a phase of city existence which does not show to advantage in polite-pages. He did not become vicious or depraved.
The relentless treadmill of a daily paper forbade his becoming indolent. By sheer force of contact his mind expanded, too, more than even he suspected. But it was a formless, unprofitable expansion, which did not help him to get out of the rut. He performed his work acceptably—at least he rarely heard any criticisms upon it—lived a trifle ahead of his small income, and ceased to even speculate on the chance of promotion.
When, thirteen months after his advent in Tecumseh, the news came to him from the farm that his father was dying, he obtained leave to go home. Mr. Workman remarked to Mr. Samboye that afternoon:
“I shan’t mind much if Fairchild doesn’t come back.”
“Is that so? He seems to get through his work decently and inoffensively enough. He will never set the North River ablaze, of course, but he is civil and all that.”
“Yes, but I can’t see that there’s anything in him. Beside, I don’t like his influence on Watts. I’m told you can find them together at Bismarck’s every night in the week.”
“Of course, that makes it bad,” said Mr. Samboye.