"When war broke out the niggers run away, along of Jerusalem Blome, that got up a nigger regimint. After the war there was talk of a railroad. It would run right through the Blome farm and cross the Barton place crossways. My daddy was overseer for Mis' Barton. Simp didn't have nothin' to say about the runnin' of the place. I was a tyke, doin' errands for everybody, and I heerd a lot o' the railroad talk. Old Blome was sellin' his farm in town lots, gettin' ready for the boom—for who would 'a' thought that Mis' Barton would turn her back on such a proposition?
"You see, it was this-a-way: Mis' Luellen was allus speculatin' in niggers, and a month before war broke, she had bought a load of Guinea niggers—the kind that looks like they are awearin' bustles, you know. Simp kinder smelt war, but, Lordee, Luellen wouldn't be dictated to! And she went broke, flat as a flitter. All that was left was the thousand acres of Barton land.
"Railroad? No, siree! She heard about old man Blome's activity, and she had it in for Blome. She sat up and primped her lips when Pee-Dee Jones come in behalf of the railroad. That's how the Barton Joneses come to settle in this neck o' the woods. Pee-Dee Jones—no kin o' mine—had a winnin' way, and he purty nigh got Mis' Luellen's name on the paper, when he let slip that he intended buildin' a town on her land. 'Do you think that I am agoin' to have a lot of blue-bellied Yankees in my very dooryard?' she yelled. 'You are mistaken.' And so she stuck.
"Afterwards she learned that Pee-Dee Jones had follered Grant. Whew! She nigh busted with rage. Mis' Luellen allus said that she could smell a Yankee a mile, and as she didn't like the smell, she cropped the railroad boom. It went five mile north of her place, and missed Bloomtown twenty mile. That's why the two towns are just livin' along. The folks that bought lots of old Blome tried to get another railroad to come their way. That was when the Wabash looked like it was headed for my farm; but I reckon that opportunities like that don't come but onct in a lifetime.
"I wonder that Mis' Luellen's spook don't howl around Barton every night, for Jones bought the big house after she died, and the fambly comes back there to live whenever their luck goes wrong. Pee-Dee's boy, Brons Jones, started a paper there, about the time that Hallam started the Bloomtown Herald. He sold out to a poor devil that's racin' to see if he can starve quicker'n Ellis. Brons ain't been around these parts, the last few years, but he owns a lot o' Barton property that he thinks 'll make good some day."
Kelly aimed a clear stream of tobacco juice at the dingy brown cuspidor, and made as if to settle himself for further narrative.
"Jap, Bill, get to work," commanded Ellis. "And, Kelly, much as I appreciate you and your excellent wife, I must dispense with your society. I need these boys."
As the farmer departed, grinning cheerfully, Tom Granger appeared at the door of the Herald office. A conference of prominent citizens had been summoned to meet, early that afternoon, in the Granger and Harlow bank, a somewhat more pretentious building, separated from the Herald office by a narrow alley; and during a lull in the morning's business Tom was serving himself in the capacity of errand boy. From his place on the front steps, he could watch for the possible advent of depositor or daylight robber, there being no rear door to the bank.
"You'll be on hand, Ellis," he reminded. "Couldn't have any kind of a meeting without the Herald, you know. We won't keep you long."
But the session was more important than the banker had anticipated. Judge Bowers had prepared a lengthy discourse, and others had opinions that needed ventilating. Once or twice, Ellis was irritated by shrieks of laughter that emanated from the office across the alley, usually in Bill's shrill treble. When the cause of the merriment had reached an exceptional climax, the Editor pounced upon his assistants, wearing the scowl of a thunder god. Jap and Bill got up, shamefacedly, as he demanded: