Then Patsy thanked his long neglected saints, imported his wife and little ones, took his eldest daughter out of the box factory, and his eldest son out of the printing office; and by the end of the summer they were comfortably established and ready to attend to the chestnut crop.
Arnold worked as hard as his man. Temporarily he hired other sturdy Italians, mechanics of experience; and spent his little store of capital in a way that would have made his father swear and his brother jeer at him.
When the year was over he had not much money left, but he had by his second waterfall a small electrical plant, with a printing office attached; and by the third a solid little mill, its turbine wheel running merrily in the ceaseless pour. Millstones cost more money than he thought, but there they were—brought up by night from the Hudson River—that his neighbors might not laugh too soon. Over the mill were large light rooms, pleasant to work in; with the shade of mighty trees upon the roof; and the sound of falling water in the sun.
By next summer this work was done, and the extra workmen gone. Whereat our poet refreshed himself with a visit to his Ella, putting in some lazy weeks with her at Gloucester, happy and hopeful, but silent.
"How's the chestnut crop?" she asked him.
"Fine. Ver' good," he answered. "That's what Patsy says—and Patsy knows."
She pursued her inquiries. "Who cooks for you? Who keeps your camp in order? Who washes your clothes?"
"Mrs. Patsy," said he. "She's as good a cook as anybody need want."
"And how is the prospect?" asked Ella.
Arnold turned lazily over, where he lay on the sand at her feet, and looked at her long and hungrily. "The prospect," said he, "is divine."