"Mebbe, but that's not the point, John. The MacDermotts have owned this shop a powerful while, as your ma tells you many's a time. When I'm dead, you'll be the last of us ... and you'll want to give up the shop. That's what I think's a pity. I'm with your ma over that. I suppose, though, the whole history of the world is just one record of change and alteration, and it's no use complaining. The shop'll have to go, and the MacDermotts, too!..." He did not speak for a few moments, and then, in a brisker tone, he said, "Mebbe, one of the assistants'll buy it from you. Henry Blackwood has money saved, I know, and by the time you want to sell it, he'll mebbe have a good bit past him. I'll drop a wee hint to him that you'll be wanting to sell, so's to prepare him!"
"Very well, Uncle!" John said.
"If you do sell the shop, make whoever buys it change the name over the door. If the MacDermott family is not to be in control of it, then I'd like well for the name to be painted out altogether and the new name put in its place. I'd hate to think of anyone pretending the MacDermotts was still here, carrying on their old trade, and them mebbe not giving as good value as we gave. The MacDermotts have queer pride, John!"
"I know they have, Uncle William. I have, too!"
"And they wouldn't lie content in their graves if they thought their names was associated with bad value!"
"You're taking it for granted, Uncle, I'll want to sell the shop. Mebbe, I won't. I'll mebbe not be good at anything else but the grocery. I'm talking big now about writing books, but who knows whether I'll ever write one!"
"Oh, you'll write one, John. You'll write plenty. You'll do it because you want to do it. You've got your da's nature. When he wanted a thing, he got it, no matter who had it!"
"There was one thing he wanted, Uncle William, and wanted bad, but couldn't get!"
"What was that, son?" Uncle William demanded.
"He wanted to live, but he wasn't let," John answered.