Part 9 (1/2)
”It sounds sortathe recital ”Kind of a Pollyanna tale with a Horatio Alger finish But in none of his stories did Alger ever portray a tougher background or give it a bigger skyrocket finish Just think of it, Mrs Gillis! Here was a kid with the black thought that he was never to be a man; was never to do a man's work, never to win in any manly contest Worse yet, he had never seen his father or felt a mother's caress He never had had a place called ho in?
”Well, it worked out better than I hoped The next day Mrs Lannarck beganthe furniture in one of the bedrooms She eht in other things Then she invitedand this was to be s? Why, I had come into that home with a busted head and not a penny in ed to the county Except for the little drawing tools I had, you could have put all of field
”I lived in that room four happy blessed years They were years of few incidents and no friction Mrs Lannarck bought , and she was as particular about the details as if it were a bride's trousseau She even provided me with a weekly allowance, sht on at school and helped around the house wherever I could I kept Mr
Lannarck's books, made out his estimates, and drafted his plans I checked up his payrolls, e of the court when they adopted ed my name
”I went to church with Mrs Lannarck, went to Sunday School, and took part in the entertain card and they featured the appearance of a ht bythe war, the co fellow I teae Ruark He was nearly a seven-footer and weighed three hundred I could stand in his two hands as he held theed everybody to back up the war as strongly as I was backed It ot results
”And then inevitable but unwanted death stalked in, to ruin everything Mister Lannarck died He was older than I had thought He was always careful and honest He was putting a new roof on the Auditorium when he fell Maybe it was a stroke They took him to the hospital He died on the third day after the fall
”This was the beginning of the end A link was broken in the chain It never mended Mrs Lannarck bore up bravely, but I could see that she had lost all earthly joys and simply awaited her suood shape He left quite an estate The incoh Mrs Lannarck sio on She died in a little over a year following the death of her companion For the second time in my life, I was an orphan
”But this tially adopted I was the heir I was rich In the first fifteen years of my life, I had never seen money, never a penny of my own Noas the other way
After the funeral I went down to the bank to consult with Mister Gaynor He handed e from the dear, kind, motherly Mrs Lannarck It was a letter of kindly advice, personal and spiritual She said that she never doubted but that I would walk in the right path, but she made this final appeal If I never married, never had heirs or dependents, and if there was any of the Lannarck estate left ata portion of it to the Grace Avenue Presbyterian Church, in trust for its upkeep, and a portion to the county orphanage, for the occasional entertainment of its inmates
”Mrs Gillis” Davy was the one now affected by the recitals His voice was lower and slower ”Mrs Gillis, after reading that e, I hadn't the tears out ofthat will Gaynor did the work, he kne, that was his business, and he made it read just as Mrs Lannarck had requested The Trust Department of the bank was made the trustee One-half of all income from my estate was to be paid to the church, the other half for orphanage entertainh the value of the estate has doubled
”The Lannarck estate hat the bank folks called Income Property
It included two suburban store rooood residences, five shares of bank stock, bonds and notes and a considerable bank deposit I made a resolution then and there, that I would never touch a penny of it, and that resolution has been kept The income has piled up until it now nearly equals the principal Poor old Gaynor, the next-best friend I ever had, keeps the income collected and invested, and if this depression would only let up and give him a chance, he could build those Presbyterians a new church and give the orphans a picture show every night
”Of course I've earned quite a lot ofaccount; says circuses and vaudeville are not a dependable source of incoo broke This Ralph Gaynor is a wonder in his line, but it's not ins of safety, of unearned incres like that His is not the big bank, with its long rows of figures His is just a little 'Dollar-Down' concern, and he owns it all Just now, in this depression, the Big Fellows are running to hi 'em to trim sails and stay close to shore
”Ralph Gaynor is the second helpful rew sick and tired of being gawked at, during allhours and resolved to duck away froo back to Ralph Gaynor for advice He just wouldn't understand The word 'recreation'
is not in his vocabulary Colts, dogs, kid-saddles, horseback riding, Landy's wisecracks, and my present-day joys have no listed values with Ralph Gaynor, and I passed hiive it sy of the life story of onesummers with circuses and the winters spent in vaudeville (both with theircrowds) and it's almost a completed volume There is yet one chapter to be added and I want to talk about it to the public One ets--little people--than any other person, in all ti and personality
I never reat work he did for an underprivileged group And I will tell 'eht”
9
Gillis and Welborn did not return from their mission the next day as they had planned Sunday passed by without word of their whereabouts
The stay-at-hosters Did Welborn's fifty-to-one chance fail? Davy had planned to ride over to the B-line, and go over his speech-plans with his er and promoter Now, it see station seeking news of theones Monday noon, the faithful old Gillis car labored up the hill and caot out to inquire if dinner was ready
Little was said during the meal as to the outcome of their trip Jim made a brief explanation that they had been as far as Rawlins, acco the sheriff in his disposition of his boarders The sheriff explained that he wanted to take them past the penitentiary to show them what they missed, and where they would live if they ever came back to this section He took them all to the railway station, loaded two on the east-bound train and test The sheriff retained the count's car as security for advances , however, after Davy had returned froathered in the Gillis sitting rooave more details ”This man Welborn h old top sergeant, er the general in coed every detail andworked out as planned
”We kept old Maddy out of the judge's sight, 'en it ell enough that we did, for Judge Withers was pretty hostile towards these crazy galoots that invaded the community and disturbed the peace He would enforce the sentence, but he listened to the sheriff's complaint that four such prisoners were too many for his crae agreed to suspend sentence on condition that the sheriff would deport 'em and keep 'e Maddy's claim to the two sacks of dust Maddy easily identified 'esters? Would the count surrender title to the daed car to coree to leave and never come back? The sheriff had had several intervieith 'eained assent to the plan, especially as to the count and his car The sheriff was bothered, didn't believe it could be done