Mrs. Gormley was a faded little woman—a widow—who went out sewing for better-to-do people in Sunrise Cove. She naturally thought her boy Chetwood a great deal smarter than other people thought him. And—as was natural, too—Chet developed something like keenness in the sunshine of her approval.
“You know, mother,” he said, on this evening of the arrival of Carolyn May, “I never have seen any great chance to rise, workin’ for Mr. Joseph Stagg. His ain’t a business that offers an aspirin’ feller much advancement.”
“But he pays you, Chet,” his mother said anxiously.
“Yep. I know. Don’t be afraid I’ll leave him till I see something better,” he reassured her. “But I might be clerkin’ for him till the cows come home and never see more’n six or eight dollars a week. But now it’s apt to be different.”
“How different, Chet?” she asked, puzzled.
“You know Mr. Stagg’s as hard as nails—as hard as the goods he sells,” declared the gawky boy. “No brass hinge, or iron bolt, or copper rivet in his stock is any harder than he ’pears to be. Mind you, he don’t do nothin’ mean. That ain’t his way. But he don’t seem to have a mite of interest in anything but his shop. Now, it seems to me, this little niece is bound to wake him up. He calls her ‘Hannah’s Car’lyn.’”
“Hannah Stagg was his only sister,” said Mrs. Gormley softly. “I remember her.”
“And she’s just died, or something, and left this little girl,” Chet continued. “Mr. Stagg’s bound to think of something now besides business. And mebbe he’ll need me more. And I’ll get a chance to show him I’m worth something to him. So, by-and-by, he’ll put me forward in the business,” said the boy, his homely face glowing. “Who knows? Mebbe it’ll be Stagg & Gormley over the door one of these days. Stranger things have happened.”
“Wouldn’t that be fine, Chet!” agreed his mother, taking fire at last from his enthusiasm. “And you think this pretty little girl’s comin’ here is goin’ to do all that?”
Perhaps even Chetwood’s assurance would have been quenched had he just then known the thoughts in the hardware merchant’s mind. Mr. Stagg sat in his back office poring over the letter written by his brother-in-law’s lawyer friend, a part of which read: