North Carolina Newspapers

THE STORY THUS FAB Vlrsrle Morgan, widow, and owner of the Morgan paper mill in the Carolina mountain district, turns down a marriage proposal from Wallace Withers. He leaves In a rage. Rrtnford Wills, a young stranger, who has brrn lost In the mountains for three days, finis his way to the Morgan home. He li fed and allowed to remain overnight. He Identi fies himself as a government employee, w.Mklng with surveyors In the district. Wills develops pneumonia and Is forced to remain fn the household. Marian. Virgle's daugh ter. dislikes Wills. Trouble Is developing as Withers meets Stanley Daniels, the mill's crwmlst. Vlrgle learns someone is attempt ing to obtain title to timber lands owned by Tom Prultt, life-long friend of her deceased busband and part owner of the milL CHAPTER lll—Continued "We"—the older man had thin lips nnd a mouth that shut like a trap— "are victims of the Phillips' outfit." Virgie kept silent. Very likely these were some of the crowd who had put up the money to back Phil lips. Obviously they had no idea who she was. They thought her a quaint mountain character, proba bly, so she kept to the part, staring dully and curiously at them, as mountain people did. Slamming her worn gears, she drove on up the ridge, turning south at her line and bumping across a stony meadow, sun-washed and pleasant. The found her foresters eating their lunch, their legs dangling from the muddy tail of their truck. She shared their lukewarm coffee, in spected the damp little hillocks where baby spruce stood and shiv ered, feeling their cold, small be wildered roots groping in strange, chill darkness. "I hope we get a snow so they don't dry out too fast," she said. "We heard a car a while back," one of the men said. "See anybody down that way, Mis' Morgan?" "I was going to speak about that." Virgie screwed the lid on a thermos bottle. "Much obliged, you boys—l meant to get home for lunch but I got delayed, as usual. About that car— l saw 'em. And I want you to quit early—you, too, Joe—knock off before three, leave the truck here, and go over the other side down toward Little Fork. There's a piece of hardwood down there—a hundred and sixty-odd acres. Take a good look at it and call me up to night." "Pruitt's stuff, eh?" said Joe, who knew these timbered slopes and ridges as well as Virgie did. "It used to be Pruitt's stuff. Some thing's up. And I'm not going to let Tom be gypped by another bunch of slick talkers with blue-prints in tHeir hands and black iniquity in their minds. Don't call up till after sev en, hear? And don't talk to any body but me about this business." "Sure, boss—we understand. You dor.'t want it mentioned to Pruitt, then?" "I'll talk to Pruitt. Crank this old caboose for me, will you?" She was thinking so absorbedly as she drove in at the gate of the plant that she ran over a steam hose and ripped a sizable sliver from the corner of the tool-house before she came to and stopped the truck. Tom Pruitt heard the impact of her arrival and came slouching out of the back shed, picking gum off the palms of his hands. "Anybody else bust up the prem ises like that and you'd fire him," he drawled amiably. "That steering gear busted?" "Oh, shut up!" grumbled Virgie, climbing down stiffly. She was irritated by Tom. No man so huge should be so naive, so helpless. "Whoever stuck that shanty out there in the way must have thought we'd be hauling stuff in here in ox carts forever," Virgie continued to iumc ns she tramped into the office. Tom opened the door for her. "I yeckon Dave put it there," he said, calmly. "Come in here," Virgie ordered. Tom followed her obediently and began punching at the stove. Vir gie made a complicated task out of setting her hat off and her desk opened. She did not look at Tom. She was exasperated, and when her temper got the upper hand her tungue slipped, and she did not want it to slip. She had to say the right thing to Tom, who was so helpless in the presence of law and finance end the crisscross web men weave of these two strands to hide the simple intent of their act 6. "Sit down," directed Virgie, "and don't squirm. Lucy, you go out and get the time slips. Pruitt and I have got business to talk over." Lucy rose meekly, put on her coat. "How soon shall I come back, Mrs. Morgan?" "Fifteen minutes is all I need. And if you hang around that labora tory, walk in the air some before you come back in here. There may be worse smells than young Dan iels invents, but Satan has got a monopoly on 'em." Tom draped his long legs over a stool and twisted his hat. "I reckcn you found a seeder tree cut that hadn't ought to be cut," he said. "I expect I done it." Virgie swiveled her chair around. The darkened leather cushion on the bnck of it still held the print of Dav u Morgan's lean shoulder v. Hawk' Wind cv/ U p, til TAnnikir mi icn ©°- APPLETOH-CENTURY CO. BY HELEN TOPPING MILLER W-N U. service "l'm not going to talk about Mor gan trees," she said. "I want to talk about yours. Do you know any thing about that property of yours over the ridge that hardwood tract? What shape is it in?" Tom twisted the hat nervously. "I sold it. 'Way back in '26. You knew about that I reckon. I sold it to that Phillips' outfit. They paid me the first payment. They ain't never paid any more." • What sort of papers did you get? Have you got a lien?" "They're all in the safe. Dave put 'em away for me. Dave told me I'd ought to foreclose—then he got down and you know how we been ever since—we ain't had time to think of nothing but keeping this here mill running." Virgie sighed. "It's my fault, I suppose. I've got to take care of you—just like I've got to take care of Lossie and Lucy out yonder and some more helpless people." "I got a good piece of money out of that land," Tom defended. "They defaulted on the contract, didn't they? The company's out of existence. It will take a lawsuit, probably, to repossess it—but some body's interested in it. I met a couple of men—bankers, they looked like—up on the ridge. They were asking the way to that piece you've got over there—that strip down Ha zel Fork with the big poplar on it. You get those papers out, Tom, and let me look into them." Tom lumbered out of his chair. There was one kind of action he could understand, indorse, and fol low. Strange men had been on his land—land that Virgie said was his. "I 'low them fellers better keep off, over yonder," he boomed, his eyes dour. "I don't know no law, but if that's my poplar them bank ers better keep off my place." "Well, you've got to have the pa pers first. I'll have Lucy open the safe for you." But when Lucy came back, moon eyed and absent, with a droop of unhappiness about her mouth, Vir gie regarded her with impatience. Lucy had been strung tight as a fid dle lately, making mistakes and be ing rushingly apologetic about them, jumping when the telephone rang. Virgie knew what was the matter with Lucy. Young Stanley Daniels was flattered by the sight of Lucy's little silver heart fluttering on her sleeve. He had grown arrogant and cagey. Lucy needed shaking. So, because she was disgusted with Lucy's meekness, Virgie climaxed a day of exasperations by giving the girl a raise. "Go out and buy yourself a new hat and some lipstick," she ordered, "and if that young Daniels is hang ing on the gate when you start home give him the back of your hand and your chin in the air. I can do all the moping we need in this pulp business." Lucy was tremulously grateful and husky. "It isn't—thfit exactly, Mrs. Morgan. It's—oh, everything! Old lamps and the rug wearing out —and food costing so much—" "I know." Virgie was gentle. "We had a sofa that flopped over and made a bed and my brother had to sleep on it. It was always flopped down in the parlor when I had a beau. Don't let it get you down, Lucy." At night Joe and Ed reported that the two strangers had walked over Pruitt's land, climbed back into their car, and gone away again. She would hunt up her lawyer, as soon as she had time, Virgie de cided, and find out just what could be done for Tom. Young Mr. Branford Wills was still seriously ill. A half-dozen tele grams had so far failed to locate anyone who belonged to him or who might be interested in him. Virgie had that to worry about. She took time to hope that Lucy had found a decent hat. She did not know that Lucy was sitting alone at home, among the ravelings, and that Stanley Daniels was, at that moment, occupying a rocker in front of Wallace Withers' old wood-burning stove, smoking one of Wallace's five-cent cigars and thinking very well of himself. CHAPTER IV When he let himself go, Wallace Withers was an eloquent man. He loved to hear his own voice editori alizing, expounding opinions, setting the world right. Now he walked up and down his sitting-room, talking as he had not talked in months, his rough hair standing away from his temples, a flush coming and going on his wat tled neck. This young fellow, Daniels, from the Morgan mill, was a flattering auditor. Middle-age is always a tri fle flushed and important when youth condescends to listen. Withers was painting a picture of the pulp busi ness—of the Morgan pulp business, as he averred it could be. Bigger than any of them, tied in with the big Canadian mills, stacks and vats in batteries, timber rolling in, brown pulp going out by the trainload instead of a single car now and then. "Dave Morgan was Scotch," he said. "The Scotch build well, but have no foresight or imagination. They want security and they sacri fice other things for it. They let the Irish go prowling around into THE DANBURY REPORTER, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1940 all the new places, killing of? the Injuns, and then along came your Scotchman with a wagonload of goods, for sale, and he took up all the good half-sections. Then they married all the good-looking daugh ters of the Irish and tamed them down to raise sons to fit this coun try." "Maybe they married the Irish girls because, secretly, they wanted to hear somebody laugh," Daniels contributed with a grin. "Maybe so. Maybe that's why Dave Morgan married Virgie. Vir gie was a handsome woman when she was young. She's not bad look ing now." "Rather a fine-looking woman now," agreed young Daniels. "But darned impractical," de clared his host. "Business is get ting better fast—but she ain't go ing to catch up with it." "Because she turns out a hand craft product in a machine age," stated Stanley Daniels, much pleased with himself. "You're kind of smart, ain't you?" Wallace Withers relaxed his long jaw. "I reckon you must have col lected some ideas about making pulp at a profit?" He sat down, laid his long yellow fingers together, "If that's my poplar them bank ers better keep oft my place." drew his upper lip far down, giving his face a little the look of the skull beneath it. Daniels laughed a trifle nervously. This old geezer had something funny on his mind, obviously; his dry old eyes were full of sly secrets, his knuckles flexed with an involuntary, crushing movement. "Well, any young man hates to see a business dragging," he said, choosing his words carefully. "Espe cially when he sees that that busi ness is standing on its own foot, making its own troubles. That's what's wrong with the world now, Mr. Withers—the young people have the ideas and the ambition and the vision and coura^ —recklessness, I suppose you woula call it—and peo ple your age have all the power and all the money." "Some people," Withers said, "would call you a young fool. But I don't. I'm a thinking man. Per sonally, I'd like to see what you'd do—running the Morgan mill." Daniels laughed. "That," he said, "would be a grand idea—but just about as hopeless as most grand ideas. Mrs. Morgan isn't going to surrender the control of that mill to anybody." Withers did not answer for a mo ment. The stove clinked, a mouse crept out from beneath an old or gan, gave a bright-eyed, terrified look about, scurried back again. "Virgie Morgan ddn't own all the stock in that mill," he said, look ing straight ahead. "There's some of it loose—and a lot of things could happen. Things might happen so that more of it could be had. She ain't got any considerable reserve,- I know that. I know how she's fixed. If trouble was to happen in the mill or orders fell off, she'd be hard put to raise the money to carry on." Stanley Daniels felt a sudden surge of wry distaste. His tongue tasted of copper, his ears buzzed faintly. So this old hick had ideas in his ratty brain, did he? Trick stuff, likely. He had suspected it. Let him pull his own potatoes out of the fire, then. Daniels felt very noble and superior as he stood up, pulled down his coat. "Well, this has been very pleas ant, Mr. Withers. But I'm a work ing man. I'd better say good night." Withers collected his limbs and scrambled out of the chair. "But wait a minute—you ain't go ing to walk? I was figuring on tak ing you batk—car's standing out side." "I think I'd like the walk." Dan iels was smooth, impersonal, in scrutable; "Need the exercise." "Thunder—it's most five miles. I'll run you down to the main road anyway. You can walk from there if you're itching for air." Air. That was what Stanley Dan iels felt the need for. His overcoat on, his hatbrim snapped down, the door open, he felt honest again. He had had a hunch all along that this dry-eyed old guy was figuring on us- LTI e ing him somehow. What made him r hasten to be out in the wholesome f air again was the awareness that he 11 had been ready to hear Withers' y schemes. l * He had no Inner hypocrisy. He ™ knew that no loyalty would ever >* blind him to his own advantage. But he did not like being maneu -1 vered, so he sat a little stiffly and i replied in polite monosyllables to 3 Withers' remarks, as they drove the rutty road to the highway. V He walked rapidly till he reached '* the outskirts of the village, his nos- I trils stinging in the frosty air. The " town lay on a slope where the river widened, and as Daniels approached II it the linked lights'made it look like some jeweled ornament on the " breast of the mountain. He would go down to the mill, he * decided. The air was keen and he should be certain that his tests were all right. A freeze would ruin sev eral days* work. 1 At the mill he moved in authority , and this pleased his young vanity. The men he spoke to had to listen. * The forms that went out of his lab ' oratory were commands; on them j depended the quality of the Morgan pulp. ' Only a few men were at the mill— the few who tended the processes that went on night and day. Dan iels unlocked his laboratory, a tacked-on structure half brick, half wood, sheeted with metal. He snapped on the light, unlocked the cupboard where he kept his appara tus. His test-tubes, he saw, were all in good order, the thermometer stood at a safe temperature, and the rusty steam-pipe running along the wall was warm. He put out the light again, locked the place. Then he saw that a light was burning in the office. It was after ten. Mrs. Morgan must be there. Lucy would not come down at night alone. She never came at night. He stepped up to the office win dow and saw that the person inside was old Tom Pruitt. Pruitt's status at the mill had al ways puzzled young Daniels. He knew that Pruitt had worked there since the plant was built, that he was always carrying messages from Virgie Morgan, giving orders that she initiated, yet he had apparently no definite position and no authority. Daniels opened the office door. "Hello, Tom," he said, "anything wrong?" Tom Pruitt looked up from Vir gie's desk, where was spread out a ; loose array of legal-looking papers. 1 He looked baffled, his hair was standing up, but he grinned at Dan . iels. "Nope—nothing special. I'm j studying out this here. Never did i see such fine printing nor so much s writing that didn't make head nor , tail. You know anything about thiy here business?" j "Let's look at it." Stanley Daniels , slid out of his overcoat. "You gotta know something about . law, I reckon." Tom got up grate , fully, surrendered his chair. "I've 3 kept shy of the law for 50 years but, , now it looks, like it caught up with i me at last. I own stuff and I don't > own it. Take a look at all them [ and see what you make out of it. . I've done give up." i Daniels sat down at the desk briskly and unfolded one document ( after another, read them through, t with Tom looking over his shoulder, . his amazement growing. 1 "How about these contracts, Pru itt? They paid you, did they?" t 'Not since '26, they didn't. They t didn't pay in five years, nor in sev -1 en neither. They ain't paid nothing ) since that paper was wrote." 1 "You should file suit then—get your land back." "Yeah—she said that, too—Mis' > Morgan. She said I'd ought to go to I law. She wants me to hire that fel -1 ler Willis Pratt. I was just study ing about it. Pratt will want a lot > of money for nothing, I reckon— I them lawyers always do." > "But—that land must have been j worth money. How much have you j got, anyway?" , "Upwards of a thousand acres— t. mountain land. Never could raise | nothing on it." j "And these"—Daniels snapped a t rubber band about the thick bundle of certificates—"ought to be in a j safety deposit box in the bank. I > didn't know you owned this big block j of stock in the mill. You're a rich 3 man, Pruitt—l'm glad I know you." E "Rich? Me?" Old Tom rubbed his ear. "I just got me a piece of this t mill, that's all. Dave Morgan and f me worked mighty hard to keep this mill goin'—and I been workin' hard er since Dave died. No, I ain't . rich. I got no wish to be rich." "Ever draw any dividends on this ' stock? Any money for your piece of 1 the mill?" Tom shook his head. "We agreed - not to take out nothing, Mis' Mor gan and me. We pay ourselves ofit r every pay-day, just wages. I got all I need. It takes the rest to keep ,- them presses rolling and the hands i- working. We're both satisfied." "But you ought to get that land i. back. You ought to file a claim i right away." e " i c ah—I reckon so. Reckon I'll have to get me a lawyer though I >- sure do hate to pay out money to t that Willis Pratt, e "You could sell some of your e stock, if you need money. That s stuff is as good as cash, you know." (-I (TO BE CONIINVF.D) r '«> JTFDNH * LK DFPARTHENT jff IN A season when jumpers have jumped way out in front of any other school style, this one stands right at the head of its very smart class. Why? Because it's the pinafore type, cut high and dart fitted, that juniors are mad about. Because the skirt is made with unpressed front fullness that looks perfectly charming on slim little figures. Because it's adorned with two big patch pockets, as decora tive as they are convenient. Last but not least, it's easy to make. 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