The Quality Of Mercy. William Dean Howells
young man. "Why, what did that fellow mean, over at the drug store, just now, by his getting out for Canada?"
"What fellow?"
"Little slim chap, with a big black moustache, and blue eyes, blue and blazing, as you may say."
"Oh,—Mr. Putney! That's just one of his jokes. He's always down on Mr. Northwick."
"Then I suppose he's just gone up to Ponkwasset about the trouble there."
"Labor trouble?"
"I guess so."
The woman called toward an open door at the end of the room, "William!" and a man in his shirt sleeves showed himself. "You heard of any labor trouble to Mr. Northwick's mills?"
"No, I don't believe there is any," said the man. He came forward inquiringly to the table where his wife was standing by the Events' young man.
"Well, I'm sorry," said the young man, "but it shows that I haven't lost so much in missing Mr. Northwick, after all. I came up here from Boston to interview him for our paper about the labor troubles."
"I want to know!" said the hostess. "You an editor?"
"Well, I'm a reporter—same thing," the young man answered. "Perhaps you've got some troubles of your own here in your shops?"
"No," said the host, "I guess everybody's pretty well satisfied here in Hatboro'." He was tempted to talk by the air of confidence which the Events' young man somehow diffused about him, but his native Yankee caution prevailed, and he did not take the lead offered him.
"Well," said the young man, "I noticed one of your citizens over at the drug store that seemed to be pretty happy."
"Oh, yes; Mr. Putney. I heard you tellin' my wife."
"Who is Mr. Putney, any way?" asked the Events' man.
"Mr. Putney?" the host repeated, with a glance at his wife, as if for instruction or correction in case he should go wrong. "He's one of the old Hatboro' Putneys, here."
"All of 'em preserved in liquor, the same way?"
"Well, no, I can't say as they are." The host laughed, but not with much liking, apparently. His wife did not laugh at all, and the young man perceived that he had struck a false note.
"Pity," he said, "to see a man like that, goin' that way. He said more bright things in five minutes, drunk as he was, than I could say in a month on a strict prohibition basis."
The good understanding was restored by this ready self-abasement. "Well, I d' know as you can say that, exactly," said the hostess, "but he is bright, there ain't any two ways about it. And he ain't always that way you see him. It's just one of his times, now. He has 'em about once in every four or five months, and the rest part he's just as straight as anybody. It's like a disease, as I tell my husband."
"I guess if he was a mind to steady up, there ain't any lawyer could go ahead of him, well, not in this
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