“Yes. But what’s the matter with you? Why don’t you do a little holding yourself?”
The man’s eyes darkened and he frowned. “Too late.”
“It’s never too late.”
The man jerked himself up, and energy flashed in the weak face. “Not too late for you. Opportunity will pass your way many times. Catch her every time—hold her. By Heaven! With your face and body, your clean mind and good brain, you can do anything,—be a young god. Billy, a fellow at the open door of life doesn’t suspect his power, doesn’t use a fraction of it.” He reached his hand up to the summer sky. “Up there, down here,” he dug his foot into the fecund earth, “a thousand million possibilities wait for us to draw them forth with our minds.”
“And you?” Billy asked as the other looked off gloomily.
He wheeled almost angrily. “I? I have ruined my chances. It takes a clear eye, a steady hand, and a clean heart—mind you, a clean heart—to see and hear the secrets up there, down here.” Again he indicated earth and sky. “Under desert skies, miles from any human habitation, I’ve watched the stars march from purple twilight to golden morning, and heard things—whispers right out of heaven that would have been triumph for me if—if I had been fit.”
The foreman called, and they took up their shovels; and Billy’s was no longer heavy. But the man settled into his habitual silent, uneven effort.
Side by side they worked till mid-afternoon, when the Smiths’ machine appeared in the distance, May Nell alone in the tonneau. Billy’s first impulse was to straighten and greet her, but it flashed across him that the men must not know of his acquaintance with the daughter of the “boss.” “Stand in front of me, will you?” he asked of the man, and bent to re-tie his shoe.
“What did you do that for?” the tramp inquired as the machine flew by. “Do you know her? If you do, don’t let any devilish pride keep you from standing in her presence, a man, clean-faced or dirty.”
Billy grinned. “That’s all right; it’s part of my game.”