第12章

Jed built his little shop, or the first installment of it.

Mrs.Floretta Winslow died when her son was forty.A merciful release, Captain Sam and the rest called it, but to Jed it was a stunning shock.He had no one to take care of now except himself and he did not know what to do.He moped about like a deserted cat.Finally he decided that he could not live in the old house where he was born and had lived all his life.He expressed his feelings concerning that house to his nearest friend, practically his sole confidant, Captain Sam.

"I can't somehow seem to stand it, Sam," he said, solemnly."Ican't stay in that house alone any longer, it's--it's too sociable."The captain, who had expected almost anything but that, stared at him.

"Sociable!" he repeated."You're sailin' stern first, Jed.

Lonesome's what you mean, of course."

Jed shook his head.

"No-o," he drawled, "I mean sociable.There's too many boys in there, for one thing.""Boys!" Captain Sam was beginning to be really alarmed now.

"Boys! Say--say, Jed Winslow, you come along home to dinner with me.I bet you've forgot to eat anything for the last day or so--been inventin' some new kind of whirlagig or other--and your empty stomach's gone to your head and made it dizzy.Boys! Gracious king! Come on home with me."Jed smiled his slow smile."I don't mean real boys, Sam," he explained."I mean me--I'm the boys.Nights now when I'm walkin'

around in that house alone I meet myself comin' round every corner.

Me when I was five, comin' out of the buttery with a cooky in each fist; and me when I was ten sittin' studyin' my lesson book in the corner; and me when I was fifteen, just afore Father died, sittin'

all alone thinkin' what I'd do when I went to Boston Tech same as he said he was cal'latin' to send me.Then--"He paused and lapsed into one of his fits of musing.His friend drew a breath of relief.

"Oh!" he exclaimed."Well, I don't mind your meetin' yourself.Ithought first you'd gone off your head, blessed if I didn't.

You're a queer critter, Jed.Get those funny notions from readin'

so many books, I guess likely.Meetin' yourself! What an idea that is! I suppose you mean that, bein' alone in that house where you've lived since you was born, you naturally get to thinkin'

about what used to be."

Jed stared wistfully at the back of a chair.

"Um-hm," he murmured, "and what might have been--and--and ain't."The captain nodded.Of all the people in Orham he, he prided himself, was the only one who thoroughly understood Jed Winslow.

And sometimes he did partially understand him; this was one of the times.

"Now--now--now," he said, hastily, "don't you get to frettin'

yourself about your not amountin' to anything and all that.You've got a nice little trade of your own buildin' up here.What more do you want? We can't all be--er--Know-it-alls like Shakespeare, or--or rich as Standard Oil Companies, can we? Look here, what do you waste your time goin' back twenty-five years and meetin' yourself for? Why don't you look ahead ten or fifteen and try to meet yourself then? You may be a millionaire, a--er--windmill trust or somethin' of that kind, by that time.Eh? Ha, ha!"Jed rubbed his chin.

"When I meet myself lookin' like a millionaire," he observed, gravely, "I'll have to do the way you do at your bank, Sam--call in somebody to identify me."Captain Sam laughed."Well, anyhow," he said, "don't talk any more foolishness about not livin' in your own house.If I was you--"Mr.Winslow interrupted."Sam," he said, "the way to find out what you would do if you was me is to make sure WHAT you'd do--and then do t'other thing, or somethin' worse.""Oh, Jed, be reasonable."

Jed looked over his spectacles."Sam," he drawled, "if I was reasonable I wouldn't be me."And he lived no longer in the old house.Having made up his mind, he built a small two-room addition to his workshop and lived in that.Later he added a sleeping room--a sort of loft--and a little covered porch on the side toward the sea.Here, in pleasant summer twilights or on moonlight nights, he sat and smoked.He had a good many callers and but few real friends.Most of the townspeople liked him, but almost all considered him a joke, an oddity, a specimen to be pointed out to those of the summer people who were looking for "types." A few, like Mr.Gabriel Bearse, who distinctly did NOT understand him and who found his solemn suggestions and pointed repartee irritating at times, were inclined to refer to him in these moments of irritation as "town crank."But they did not really mean it when they said it.And some others, like Leander Babbitt or Captain Hunniwell, came to ask his advice on personal matters, although even they patronized him just a little.He had various nicknames, "Shavings" being the most popular.

His peculiar business, the making of wooden mills, toys and weather vanes, had grown steadily.Now he shipped many boxes of these to other seashore and mountain resorts.He might have doubled his output had he chosen to employ help or to enlarge his plant, but he would not do so.He had rented the old Winslow house furnished once to a summer tenant, but he never did so again, although he had many opportunities.He lived alone in the addition to the little workshop, cooking his own meals, making his own bed, and sewing on his own buttons.

And on the day following that upon which Leander Babbitt enrolled to fight for Uncle Sam, Jedidah Edgar Wilfred Winslow was forty-five years old.

He was conscious of that fact when he arose.It was a pleasant morning, the sun was rising over the notched horizon of the tumbling ocean, the breeze was blowing, the surf on the bar was frothing and roaring cheerily--and it was his birthday.The morning, the sunrise, the surf and all the rest were pleasant to contemplate--his age was not.So he decided not to contemplate it.