And in due time the homesick Ulysses, waiting a welcome from Ithaca, received this answer to his letter:
Luke B. Shelby, Springfield, Mass.
Sir,—Yours of sixteenth inst. rec'd and contents noted. In reply to same, beg to state are sending last special number Daily Eagle, giving full information about city and sites.
Yours truly,
Joel Spate, Secy. Exec. Comm.
Shelby winced. The hand he had held out with pearls of price had been brushed aside. His brothers laughed.
"We said you were cracked. They don't want your old money or your society. Go somewheres where they do."
But Luke B. Shelby had won his success by refusing to be denied, and he had set his heart on refurbishing his old home town. The instinct of place is stronger than any other instinct in some animals, and Shelby was homesick for Wakefield—not for anybody, any house, or any street in particular there, but just for Wakefield.
Without further ado he packed his things and went.
II
There was no brass band to meet him. At the hotel the clerk read his name without emotion. When he required the best two rooms in the hotel, and a bath at that, the clerk looked suspicious:
"Any baggage?"
"Three trunks and a grip."