Canada -- Fiction; World War, 1914-1918 -- Canada -- Fiction
Mrs. Gwynne followed him to the door, her face flushed, her eyes aglow,
a smile hovering uncertainly about her lips. “Mr. Sleighter,” she said,
“the Lord sent you to us because He knew we were in need of guiding.”
“Ho, ho!” laughed Mr. Sleighter. “Like that Samaritan chap in the
reading, eh? I guess you had got among thieves all right, more of 'em
perhaps than you recognised too.”
“He sent you to us,” repeated Mrs. Gwynne, offering him her hand.
“Well, I donno but that He steered me to you. But all the same I guess
the advantage is to me all right.” Mr. Sleighter looked hard down the
street, then turned and faced her squarely. “I want to say that it's
done me a pile of good to have seen you, ma'am. It's made things look
different.”
“You are a good man, Mr. Sleighter,” she said, looking at him with misty
eyes.
“A good man!” Mr. Sleighter was seized with a cough. “A good man! Good
Lord, ma'am! nobody never found it out but you--durn that cough anyway.”
And still troubled by his cough, Mr. Sleighter hurried down the path to
the gate and out on to the road.
Once resolved to break up their home in Eastern Canada, the Gwynnes
lost no time in completing their arrangements for the transportation of
themselves and their household gods and such of their household goods as
Mr. Sleighter advised, to the new western country.
Mr. Sleighter appeared to regard the migration of the Gwynne family to
the western country as an enterprise in which he had made an investment
from which he was bound to secure the greatest possible return. The
principle of exchange which had been the basis of the deal as far as
the farms were concerned was made to apply as far as possible to farm
implements and equipment, household goods and chattels.
“What's the use of your packin' a hull bunch of stuff West an' my
packin' a hull bunch of stuff East. We'll just tote up the stock an'
stuff we have got and make a deal on it. I know all my stuff an' yours
is here. We'll make a trade.”
To this Mr. Gwynne gladly agreed. The arrangement would save trouble
and useless expenditure. Hence the car was packed with such goods as Mr.
Sleighter considered especially useful in the new home, and with such
household furniture as the new home lacked and such articles as were
precious from family or personal associations.
“What about the pictures and curtains?” inquired Mr. Gwynne. “We don't
need them.”
“Take 'em all,” said Mr. Sleighter. “Pictures are like folks. They got
faces an' looks. And curtains--my missis got hers all packed. Curtains
are like clothes--they only fit them that owns them.”
“And the piano?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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