Читать книгу My "Pardner" and I (Gray Rocks) - Willis George Emerson - Страница 17

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BOUT TWO WEEKS after Vance Gilder arrived in Butte City, he noticed one morning that everybody was talking about a new town, and each was asking the others what they thought about it. Glancing at the hotel register, he saw the name, Homer Winthrop, of Waterville, Idaho.

In looking over the Butte City Miner and the Inter-Mountain Blade, both healthy dailies and well edited, he was somewhat astonished to find a full-page advertisement in each of the papers, setting forth in blazing splendor the great Thief River Valley, and signed by Homer Winthrop as agent, announcing that he would be at the Mercury Hotel for a short time, and inviting those who were interested in investing a little money in a purely agricultural city, to come early and “get in on the ground floor.”

The advertisement represented Waterville as being in the midst of the great Thief River Valley, with the largest water power in the country, surrounded by an agricultural district of two million acres of the richest land the sun ever shone down upon. He termed the new town of Waterville the “City of Destiny,” and said the price of town lots would quadruple in a few years’ time.

Vance was at once interested. “Here,” said he to himself, “is a genuine town boomer, and as the fellow is stopping at this hotel, it will be an easy matter to learn just how this boom business is operated. It will make an excellent article for the Banner.”

Accordingly, about eleven o’clock that forenoon he called to see the irrepressible town boomer and hear what sort of a marvelous story he had to tell about Waterville.

He was quickly admitted into a reception room by a young gentleman who assured him that Mr. Winthrop would soon be at leisure, and begged him to be seated, calling his attention to the numerous maps on the walls, one of which covered nearly the entire side of the room.

Winthrop’s young assistant seemed to know his business, and at once commenced the preliminary skirmish of interesting Vance in the great Thief River Valley, and especially town lots in Waterville; but as Vance did not evince any inclination to purchase, the young fellow endeavored to so impress him by calling his attention to the advertisements in the morning papers. Every once in a while he would tip-toe over to the door where the great town-boomer, Homer Winthrop, was holding a private conversation with a would-be purchaser. He would put his ear to the keyhole and listen for a moment, and then come tip-toeing back and assure Vance Mr. Winthrop would soon be at leisure.

Presently the door opened and a gentleman in miner’s garb came out, and Vance was immediately shown in. As he entered the private room of Homer Winthrop, he involuntarily paused to study, if but for a moment, the face of the man who had arrived in Butte City late the night before, and now had everyone in the place agog over the prospects of a new town that had just been laid out on paper in the Thief River Valley.

Homer Winthrop, with all the easy grace of a Chesterfield, motioned his visitor to a seat, pushing a box of very superior Havanas toward him, and invited him to join him in burning a weed. He was a man above the average height, inclined to be rather slender, and possessed a rather good looking face, beaming with good nature and apparent frankness; a pair of intelligent dark eyes that laughed and smiled with as much expression as the face, changeable, however, into intenseness and earnestness seldom met with; a broad, intellectual forehead; a rather square chin, indicating great determination of character. To this add a luxuriant head of dark hair, and moustache, otherwise a clean-shaven face, and the reader will have a fair idea of his appearance.

He was evidently an adept in reading human nature, and knew his man on sight; had seen much of western life—and yet it required no second interview to discover in him the polished manners and easy grace of one who has seen much of refinement and culture. He could have entered into the gaieties of a reception in a Fifth Avenue mansion with as little effort as he had stirred up a city of 50,000 people in a few hours over the magnificent prospects of a new town that was just budding into existence.