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Updated: June 22, 2025
Barclay did not reply, but his face was hard, and his neck was stiff, and he was not moved. He was still the implacable Mr. Barclay, the rich Mr. Barclay, and he would have no patronage from old Phil Ward Phil Ward the crank, who was a nation's joke. Ting-a-ling went the bell over Watts McHurdie's head, and the little man climbed down from his bench and hurried into the shop.
Later in the forenoon Bailiff Dolan came in grinning, and took a seat by the stove in McHurdie's shop and said as he reached into the waste-basket for a scrap of harness leather, and began whittling it, "What did Gabe say when I left you this morning?" and without waiting for a reply, went on, "I've thought for some time Gabe needed a little something for what ails him, and I gave it to him, out of the goodness of my heart."
But now, facing the formless, impersonal thing called public opinion, hitherto unknown in his scheme of things, he was filled with uncertainty and indecision. One autumn day, after sending three stenographers home limp and weary with directions for his battles, Barclay strayed into McHurdie's shop. The general and Dolan were the only members of the parliament present that afternoon, besides Watts.
And so while the members of the parliament in Watts McHurdie's shop read and were disturbed at the strange twist of events, the whole world was puzzled with them, and in unison with Jacob Dolan, half the world spoke, "I see no difference in poisoning breakfast foods and poisoning wells, and it's no odds to me whether a man pinches a few ounces out of my flour sack, or steals my chickens."
Although John Barclay in that latter day bought a thousand copies of the Biography and sent them to public libraries all over the world, he smiled as he read that paragraph referring to Watts McHurdie's accordion as the "impassioned reeds."
The first flickering shadows show you the interior of Watts McHurdie's shop, and as your eyes take in the dancing shapes, you discern the parliament in session. Watts is working on a saddle, but his arms and his hands are not what they were in the old days when his saddlery won first prize year after year at the Kansas City Fair. So he puffs and fusses and sighs his way through his morning's work.
It saved loss of grain in shipping, and Barclay, being on terms of business intimacy with the railroad men, sold the Economy Strip to the railroads to use on every car of grain or flour he shipped. And Lycurgus Mason, taken from the kitchen of the Mason House, hired a room over McHurdie's harness shop, and made the strips there.
A score or so of men had passed muster. The line on the post at the wooden awning in front of Schnitzler's saloon was marked at five feet six. All had stood by it with their heads above the line. It was Watts McHurdie's turn. He wore high-heeled boots for the occasion, but strut as he would, his roached hair would not touch the stick that came over the line.
Haven't you enough money now?" And without waiting for answer, Molly Brownwell turned and left him staring into nothing, with his jaw agape. It was noon and a band was playing up the street, and as he stood by the stove in McHurdie's shop, he remembered vaguely that he had seen banners flying and some "Welcome" arches across the street as he walked through the town that morning.
And we who sit among our books or by our fire or if not that by our iron radiator exuding its pleasance and comfort should not sniff at that day when blood pulsed quicker and joy was keener, and life was more vivid than it is to-day. Thirty-five years later in August, 1908, to be exact the general, in his late seventies, sat in McHurdie's harness shop while the poet worked at his bench.
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