DAWS ON '11- 
 FORTUNE 
 HUNTER. 
 
 eon
 
 
 /
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER
 
 DAWSON '11 
 
 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN T. McCUTCHEON 
 
 PICTURED BY THE AUTHOR 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 
 1912
 
 COPYRIGHT 1911, 1912 
 BY JOHN T. McCUTCHEON 
 
 The cartoons in this book have appeared serially 
 in the CHICAGO TRIBUNE
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 OW, don't you worry about me, Mother. I'll get a job all 
 right, and before you know it I'll be driving back here 
 in a hansom hack drawn by four white horses. And, 
 besides, Chicago isn't a long way off, and I'll be home on a 
 visit before you'll realise I'm gone. I'll write every week and 
 
 2O26S54
 
 2 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 report progress. . . . Certainly, if I need any I'll let you 
 know. . . . Well, I'm not going to get into any trouble, 
 Dad, so you needn't worry about that. . . . All right, I'll 
 promise to tell you if I do. . . . Yep, Mother, every night, 
 one chapter. You put it in my grip, did you ? . . . Sure, 
 Sis, I'll send you a set of the prettiest ones I can find, all in 
 colours ; and say, kid brother, as soon as I can, I'll send you the 
 baseball mask. . . . Now, please don't, Mother; I'll soon 
 see you again. Good-bye, all; I'm off to make my fortune and 
 I must hurry before the rest of the 'n crop get all the good
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: I arrived safely and am living in a 
 boarding-house down on Wabash Avenue, one of the prin- 
 cipal streets of Chicago. I secured my room at a great bar- 
 gain for the landlady but it does very well for sleeping pur- 
 poses. I'm sending you a rough sketch of it. My home life 
 is simple. I eat in a little restaurant near by I call it a near-
 
 4 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 restaurant but the cooking is not as good as it used to be. 
 So far I haven't created a great stir in the city, but I've suc- 
 ceeded, by alert activity, in keeping from being run over by the 
 street cars. This has kept me so busy that I haven't yet had 
 time to secure a position. But the job-hunting crusade is in 
 full blast just the same. I've struck sixteen different employers, 
 but they seem to be too busy to be interested in a would-be wooer 
 of Mammon from the tall grass. About half tell me to call 
 again, and when I do they have left on their summer vacation. 
 One man gave me some good advice, told me to aim high, etc. 
 Perhaps I'll get work on the seventeenth floor of some building. 
 Still, this job hunting is good practice, and in time I expect to be 
 the most expert job hunter in Chicago, if experience counts for 
 anything. Everything is hustle, bustle, and rustle up here, and 
 the energy in the air is so infectious that I find myself busier 
 than I've ever been before. 
 
 My health is so good that I have to do a lot of walking to 
 keep it under control. Consequently, I do not patronise the 
 street cars, much to the dismay of the magnates. My funds are 
 lasting pretty well and I don't apprehend hard times for some 
 days yet. By that time I expect to establish friendly relations 
 with the business end of some concern that needs a young man of 
 my height and complexion. There I'll lay the corner stone 
 of a swollen fortune that will put the Dawson tribe on Easy 
 Street. Don't worry about me. I'm feeling great and hope 
 to report grand results in my next letter. I enclose some post-
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 5 
 
 cards for Sis and send you all oceans of what requires no extra 
 postage. 
 
 I shall now peruse the evening paper and then repair to my 
 luxurious boudoir. This is James' evening out, so I'll have 
 to undress myself. 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: Things are coming along beautifully. 
 I haven't quite reached the pinnacle of success yet, but if 
 all goes well, I hope to get started soon. They say that 
 "Opportunity knocks once at every man's door," and one of these 
 fine days some discerning magnate will observe me floating along 
 among the by-products of civilisation and will recognise that 
 his opportunity has arrived. Then is when yours truly will
 
 DAWSOX 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 7 
 
 modestly but firmly arise to ornament the niche of Fame and 
 Fortune that is reserved for him. In the meantime I am in an 
 actively receptive state. I am on the waiting list of some of 
 the biggest concerns in Chicago. I've walked a rut in the best 
 sidewalks and am now one of the landmarks of the city. People 
 steer by me. 
 
 There are several prominent firms here that wouldn't think 
 the day had started right if they hadn't gone through the 
 ceremony of refusing me a job. This is their daily programme : 
 8 A. M., unlock the store; 8:10 A. M., unlock the safe; 8:15 
 A. M., refuse Dawson a job, and so on ad nauseam. If I should 
 fail to appear some morning it would throw the whole force in 
 confusion. 
 
 I've made quite a study of city life, but the one particular thing 
 I've inferred from having heard it repeated several hundred 
 times is that summer is the dull season. Then is when com- 
 merce yawns and puts its feet on the desk. The marts of 
 trade hum in a lower key and jobs are as scarce as farm hands 
 in the country. The modest suppliant who comes wooing a 
 job is asked to come around later. I never seem to get around 
 late enough. However, don't think I am discouraged. Hope 
 is surging within me, where there is always lots of room. I 
 wake up in the morning with it buzzing away, and sometimes am 
 kept awake nights by it. We are great chums. And above all, 
 please don't worry about me. I'll get along all right. I've 
 moved from my sumptuous rooms in Wabash Avenue because I
 
 8 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 didn't like to make a vulgar display of my wealth. I am now 
 more centrally located. Tell Sis I'll send her a set of those 
 postcards before long. Give my regards to the hammock that 
 hangs under the apple trees, and tell the fried spring chickens 
 with cream gravy that I haven't forgotten them. With lots of 
 love, I am, your incipiently successful son, 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 P. S. Excuse pencil; my private secretary is having his 
 evening out.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 P\EAR MOTHER: Success at last is hovering near, with 
 * ^ both arms full of laurel leaves. While I have not yet 
 got my full name on a pay roll, yet I feel that I am worm- 
 ing my way on, a letter at a time. The ramparts and bastions of 
 commerce can't hold out long against my combined assaults, and 
 something soon will have to give, and it won't be your loving
 
 io DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 son, either. He couldn't if he tried. However, don't worry 
 on that score, for I still have money left. They haven't got it 
 all away from me yet, and before that time comes, Victory, from 
 her proud perch upon my banners, will be eating out of my hand. 
 The triumphal chariot upon which I plan the joyous ride adown 
 Life's rugged stream is at the door, panting to be off, but on 
 account of tire trouble there is a slight delay in starting. 
 
 Don't be discouraged! Success that comes too easily is 
 not the best kind, and if I dropped into a fat job the very first 
 thing, it would spoil my biography when future historians write 
 it. You know that all successful men have modest beginnings, 
 accompanied by slight disappointments. They are what make 
 character, and while unpleasant at the time, like mathematics, 
 they have a grand effect on mental discipline. 
 
 Thus far the Moguls of Finance have not shown that fierce 
 competition for my services that I had hoped to see. But 
 they will soon awake to the fact that there is a determined man 
 in town, and then there will be articles in the financial columns 
 about one Dawson getting a job. And then look out! Some 
 fine day you will see coming down the pike eight white horses 
 and a hack, within which will be seated the proud figure of your 
 loving son the erstwhile Napoleon of Job Hunters. 
 
 I've been having some very interesting and amusing ex- 
 periences from the standpoint of a sociologist. I wish very 
 much I were the latter so that I could enjoy them. I've been 
 collecting data and statistics upon why business men do "not
 
 DAWSOX 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER n 
 
 wish to assume the responsibility of giving me a job. I think 
 I hold the world's record for waiting to see busy men. They 
 listen patiently to the story of my life, and ask me to come 
 around next Thursday and they'll see what they can do. I wait 
 impatiently for Thursday, and they forget all about it. One 
 man told me to call at three, and when I got there he was leav- 
 ing the office at 2 145. I tried to catch his eye but muffed, and 
 he made a home run. I went to the office three times after 
 that and learned that he had sailed for Europe. I don't be- 
 lieve I'll follow him. 
 
 I dreamed about you last night. We were eating fried 
 chicken. That's the fourth time this week I've dreamed about 
 eating, and it's only Thursday. When next I write I'll hope 
 to have grand news, so don't be discouraged! Love to all and 
 oceans of it for you. 
 
 . CHARLEY.
 
 12 
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: Don't think of letting Sis stop her 
 music lessons on my account. I'll be able to manage 
 things up here until I connect with a friendly pay roll, so 
 please don't think of sending me any money. You'll have enough 
 to worry about in putting up blackberry jam sufficient to supply 
 me when I come home to visit next fall. That is now your
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 13 
 
 sole mission in life, so far as I am concerned. Just settle back 
 in your arm-chair and swat the hot spell with a large palm-leaf 
 fan, and when you think of me, which I hope is often, just pic- 
 ture me on the trail of a swollen fortune, such as will make 
 John D. and Pierpont turn green with envy. I am designing 
 a ten-cylinder touring car for you and a beautiful new plug 
 hat, model 1911, for Dad. His present hat is about due to 
 come back in style in another year or two, however. 
 
 News is scarce this week. The supply of work is just 
 one short of meeting the demand. I had hoped to chronicle the 
 pleasing item that C. Dawson, Esq., Journeyman Fortune Hun- 
 ter, had accepted lucrative employment on the sunny side of a 
 roll-top desk, or a bench, but such is not the fact at the time we 
 go to press. The Eternal Law of Economics has decreed 
 otherwise. Fortune is trying me out in her crucible a little 
 longer, so that by the time I get my opportunity I will not 
 only greatly appreciate it, but will work twice as hard to make the 
 most of it. I am like the crude iron ore that is going through 
 the furnace before it becomes steel 
 
 The weather has been open to some much needed criticism 
 during the last week. When your shoes stick in the asphalt 
 and the sun kisses with the ardent passion of a busy mustard 
 plaster, it is no nice way to do, to say the least. Consequently 
 the crusade for employment has languished somewhat. Last 
 Monday I invited, dared, and implored eleven business men to 
 hire me, and was just on the point of putting an "ad" in the
 
 i 4 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 paper when the twelfth man dangled a rose-coloured bunch of 
 Hope before me. He told me to come in Wednesday and he'd 
 see what he could do. I felt sure I had a place landed, but 
 when I went back Wednesday he was out playing golf ; on Thurs- 
 day he was at a directors' meeting and sent out word for me 
 to come Friday without fail, and on Friday he went to New 
 York. His office boy said he'd be back in a week or ten days. 
 For about three minutes I was somewhat disheartened, but 
 then Hope, like Atlas rising from the sea, sprang up with a 
 loud cry and swatted Despair a staggering jolt, and Optimism 
 once more reigned supreme. 
 
 You have no idea how beautiful the parks are. The moon 
 is beautiful and hundreds of young couples are out looking for 
 jobs as husbands and wives. It reminded me of the campus in 
 June. Have you seen Nell lately? How is she? I haven't 
 written to her because I didn't like to write until I could tell 
 her I had succeeded. When you see her, write and tell me 
 everything she said. I saw Scads Allcott on the street last 
 week. He is going to Wisconsin for the summer and intends 
 to try for a position here in the fall. 
 
 Well, I guess that is about all this time. I have spent a lot 
 of time in the parks; it's so much cooler than my room. And 
 I'm trying a new dietary system. I think people eat too 
 much in the summer. The body does not require much food 
 to create the heat necessary to the system when the weather sup- 
 plies quite enough. So I am going light on heavy foods. .How-
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 15 
 
 ever, if you should happen to have fried chicken, just please 
 remember me lovingly to a couple of bites in the second joint. 
 I am trying absent treatment on my appetite. Love to all, and 
 don't worry about me. Lots of love to you. 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 16 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 TT\EAR MOTHER: Just a post card to-day it's threat- 
 ^-^ ening to clear up and get hot again. I intended to write 
 you a nice, long, fat letter last night, with at least four 
 cents' worth of postage on it, but out of sympathy for the poor 
 postman who would have to lug it, I am compromising on this 
 silver-lined post card. It is a picture of one of the boulevards 
 with miles of mansions and thousands of automobiles. "In the
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 17 
 
 foreground you will see a handsome man with a silk hat. That's 
 going to be me ! And that large automobile just behind is the 
 one in which I expect to show you the town when you come up 
 to visit me in the fall. You wouldn't enjoy coming now, it's so hot 
 and sticky. But in the fall you and Sis and Bud and Dad must hop 
 on the cars and come up and we'll have a regular orgy of sight- 
 seeing, with at least two hours every day in the dressmaking 
 shops. Won't it be great when we're all together again? I 
 can feel my mouth water right now for one of the kisses that 
 Mother used to take. My chauffeur will explain the sights as 
 we ride along. 
 
 I suppose you are anxious to hear what luck I've had this 
 last week. Well, let's see; I hardly know where to begin. I 
 tried a few benighted business men on Monday, but they said 
 it was the dull season. Perhaps a little later, etc. One man 
 told me to come back Thursday because I had an honest face 
 that inspired confidence. Hooray! Bouquet for loving son! 
 So on Tuesday I spent the day reading in the public library, 
 and on Wednesday I met Mr. Graves from home and had dinner 
 with him a regular gorge that made kind host comment fa- 
 vourably upon the relative capacity of the city appetite as com- 
 pared to the untrained country one. I thanked him in gut- 
 tural tones tones choked with food and tried to wear my hon- 
 ours with becoming modesty. Well, I thought my luck had 
 changed and was certain that Thursday would dawn with the 
 banners of Hope flying high in the heavens and with joy singing
 
 1 8 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 arias all around me. I was sure that the closed season for jobs 
 was over and that before the shades of evening fell upon the great 
 city I would be attending my own coronation on Easy Street. I 
 was too confident. I counted my chickens before they were 
 hatched; in fact, I not only counted them but had them all 
 fried in cream gravy served out on a beautiful table built for 
 five. 
 
 Well, at the appointed hour I was on hand with hair 
 brushed and face washed until it glistened. My prospective 
 employer was waiting for me.. He was a fine-looking gentle- 
 man, with a grey cutaway, a diamond pin in his cravat, and 
 two handsome diamond rings on his fingers. He certainly looked 
 like ready money from top to bottom. 
 
 At last, thought I, I am about to realise a life-long ambi- 
 tion and get a job, with real money rolling in every week. He 
 didn't ask any questions about references or experience, but 
 said he'd give me twenty-five dollars a week to start on. I 
 nearly fell over with joyl I would have thrown up my hat, 
 but was afraid of breaking the electric-light fixtures. He then 
 said he wanted me to get some better clothes and began count- 
 ing out some money for that purpose. Real money! I pinched 
 myself a couple of times to make sure. He told me that it was 
 important to put up a good front and then explained the work 
 I was to do. He said with my face and some good clothes I 
 could easily make a hundred dollars a week in commissions aside 
 from my salary. There was something about it that didn't look
 
 -FORTUNE HUNTER 19 
 
 quite honourable to me. So I refused the job, and the real 
 money, and departed with my hat and other possessions intact. 
 I'm sure you will think I did right, and I'd give a good deal 
 just to see you to-night to explain the whole thing. IVe never 
 wanted to see you so much as I do to-night not that I am dis- 
 couraged. Not much ! We'll land something in a day or two, 
 never fear! I think I hear Opportunity knocking at my door 
 now. So good-night, with lots of love. 
 
 Am moving, and until I get settled you'd better address me 
 care General Delivery. 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 20 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 The Rural Free Delivery
 
 DAWSOX 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 21 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: Your welcome letter with the money 
 arrived just before dinner yesterday, although what in 
 the world you sent it for I can't imagine. I hope you 
 haven't got die impression from my letters that I needed any. 
 But that's just you, mother, all over always denying yourself 
 for us kids. I suppose it's a habit by this time. And you'll al- 
 ways go on thinking of me as a little boy instead of a grown-
 
 22 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 up. But you mustn't send me any more, for I know 
 how much you need it at home, and instead of you sending me 
 money I ought to be sending some to you. It makes me feel a 
 little ashamed, as though you thought I was not making good 
 up here. I'll keep the ten for the present, however, although 
 I'm going to prove before long that your investment of twenty- 
 one years of unselfishness in Son Charley will bring you a rich 
 reward. I'll refuse to compromise on less than a thousand per 
 cent, interest in cash and a million per cent, in love, in proof 
 of which I hereby send you a large instalment of the latter and 
 hope soon to send some of the former. 
 
 I've had some funny experiences in the last two weeks 
 you'll laugh when you hear them. I've answered about forty- 
 'leven ads, but always found that somebody else had got the 
 job just before I arrived, thus proving that you've got to get 
 there early. At one place the choice narrowed down to two of 
 us, and I think I'd have got the place, but the other fellow 
 was married, had two children, and had been out of work for 
 three months. I withdrew in his favour and he got the job. He 
 needed it more than I did, and his gratitude was worth the 
 temporary loss of my meal ticket. Another ad that I answered 
 was at a large business place. When I got there the boss was 
 in a towering rage and wouldn't be bothered with me. One of 
 the clerks told me that the old man had just got his tax assess- 
 ment and they had raised him from $12,000 to $15,000. The 
 clerk said his collection of paintings alone was worth $200,000,
 
 DAWSON f 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 23 
 
 and I decided that my rich friend must he a gigantic liar at 
 least. I don't want to work for such a man. I'd rather go hack 
 home and work in the livery stable. I also called upon a prom- 
 inent philanthropist to lay before him a proposition whereby I 
 was to be allowed to ornament his pay roll. He gives hundreds 
 of thousands of dollars to charity every year or so, and when I 
 heard that he pays some of his girl employes only five a week I 
 decided he wasn't good enough for me. 
 
 I'm sometimes doubtful whether I can adjust my ideals to 
 the practical necessities of the situation up here, but I'm going 
 to keep on trying, at least for a while, anyway. So don't be dis- 
 couraged. Keep a stiff upper lip. When I do get a job it will 
 be something neither of us will be ashamed of, whether it pays 
 very much or not. 
 
 I have moved to a little boarding-house and have a room 
 with a window. I eat at restaurants, spend my time after 
 banking hours in the public library, and am giving a theater 
 party for myself to-night at the moving-picture show. Oh, this is 
 a delirious life, surrounded by wealth and luxury, but so far I 
 have not contracted any of the expensive vices of the idle rich. 
 I have organised the rest of the boarders into a Seeing Chicago 
 club. They've elected me president. Each Saturday afternoon 
 we shall go on excursions, and in the winter we'll have debates 
 and readings. Am enclosing a poem I copied from one of the 
 books in the library; I thought you'd enjoy it.
 
 24 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 Give my love to the old-fashioned hammock that hangs in 
 the trees, and with oceans of love to all of you. 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 P. S. This is the time of year when everybody wishes he 
 had a vacation and didn't have to work, so you see I'm in a 
 somewhat enviable position.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 25 
 
 "Charley's got a job, Mrs. Dawson!"
 
 26 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 P\EAR MOTHER: I enclose $10 and 10,000 kisses, which 
 -*-^ please apply to my long-standing indebtedness to you. You 
 probably don't want any payment except in the latter me- 
 dium, but I intend to pay you back both in cash and love, or as 
 far as they can go toward paying you. If I live to be a mil- 
 lion years old and made weekly payments I couldn't begin to 
 discharge the debt in full, but at least you will always know that 
 I am not forgetting what I owe you for skimping and denying 
 yourself so much, that I might get an education.
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 27 
 
 The account stands as follows, according to my reckoning: 
 To sitting up five (5) hundred nights when I was 
 
 a baby, @ $10 . $ 5,000.00 
 
 To walking 2,000 miles (approximately) trying to 
 
 put me to sleep, @ $i per mile. . . 2,000.00 
 
 To rocking me to sleep nine (9) hundred nights, @ 
 
 $5 4,500.00 
 
 To singing while rocking nine (9) hundred nights, 
 
 @ $10 per song 9,000.00 
 
 To various sums advanced for circuses, ice cream, 
 
 candy, etc., etc. (approx.) 500.00 
 
 To interceding with father in times of impending 
 
 danger 2,550.25 
 
 To dresses you needed but you didn't get while I 
 
 was going to school and college 2,000.00 
 
 To efforts to make me wash, say prayers, read Bible, 
 
 go to Sunday School, and other Herculean tasks 10,000.00 
 To loss of sleep while worrying about me when I 
 
 went swimming, etc. 2,000.00 
 
 To cash advanced on present fortune hunting cru- 
 sade 35.00 
 
 To interest on above 50,000.00 
 
 $87,585.25 
 
 Deducting the ten which I enclose leaves $87,575.25, 
 which is still due you, and I shall vigorously fight any com-
 
 28 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 promise, no matter how much you may insist upon settlement 
 in affection alone. 
 
 Your last letter was so full of encouragement and good 
 cheer that it made me feel like old Mr. Alexander the Great 
 when he went out looking for more worlds to conquer. Things 
 certainly have changed a lot in the last two weeks. I don't 
 mind confessing to you now that for a while I was almost dis- 
 couraged. Nobody seemed to need me, no matter how much I 
 tried to convince them differently. But now, how different! 
 The birds are singing and the sun is shining, and down in the 
 innermost recesses of my pocket there is the musical jingle of 
 real money; while in the equatorial region there is a compla- 
 cent snugness that eloquently tells me that I have recently eaten 
 a good meal. This evening I am sitting here in my 
 luxurious boudoir, clasped in the friendly arms of an easy-chair, 
 with the Goddess of Fortune smiling graciously down upon me 
 from the frame of the old master that hangs on the wall. 
 Two weeks ago she wouldn't look at me, and yet here she now 
 is, practically eating out of my hand and making eyes at me 
 something scandalous. I think she likes me. 
 
 The financial centre of the world is slowly shifting in my 
 direction, and I have twelve dollars of actual money in my 
 pocket, with more waiting for me at the end of the week. It's 
 perfectly wonderful how it rolls in at the rate of $16 a week. 
 
 I like my new boss, and if he proves to be honest and in- 
 dustrious I'll stick to him. As a general thing all employers de-
 
 DAWSOX 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 29 
 
 mand honesty and industry from the men they hire, and it seems 
 just as important that the employes should demand the same 
 from their employers. So as long as my boss is on the square 
 he can count upon me through thick and thin. 
 
 I haven't heard a word from NelL I wrote her when I 
 got my job. Is she at home now? Scads AUcott is here 
 after his summer in Wisconsin. He says he is looking for a 
 position. 
 
 Love to all and more anon. 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 P. S. You needn't worry. I'm not going up in one of 
 those aeroplanes.
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DEAR MOTHER : Another week gone by, and I'm just 
 that much, plus $8, nearer my fortune. It certainly feels 
 good to be rich. I started a bank account to-day, and 
 I understand it created considerable excitement in the financial 
 district The money market steadied and consols went up a few 
 points, and I expect every minute to hear that the magnates are 
 getting jealous of me. But that's the way the world goes. They
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 31 
 
 never noticed me when I was poor, except to ask me to call 
 around later when business picked up. It was the same way with 
 the late Mr. Jason. Before he found the Golden Fleece he 
 was hardly able to borrow a dollar in Athens, but after he found 
 
 it, he was the High Cock-a-lorum of the Forum. Anybody 
 would lend him money when they found he didn't need it. Now, 
 when I first came to Chicago, I couldn't have borrowed a dollar, 
 but now that I've started a bank account, I could easily borrow 
 a hundred times more than I could then. It seems to me that
 
 32 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 if Jason could make good, Dawson can, with all the modern 
 appliances, although the Fleece seems particularly scarce around 
 here just at present. 
 
 Things have been rather dull at the office lately, and I'm 
 sometimes apprehensive that they may try to run the business 
 
 without me. Every time the manager sends for me, I have 
 nervous prostration for fear he may tearfully inform me that the 
 firm and I have come to a parting of the ways, and that hence- 
 forth they will try to struggle along alone. But if that day 
 ever comes, it will take the whole office force to fire me. It's a 
 big concern, with an enormous factory out in the edge of town, 
 and they employ an army of hands. I was sent out there last
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 33 
 
 week, and I made up my mind that if the chance ever comes I'll 
 ask to be transferred to the factory. I can learn more about 
 the business there than in the office. I'm reading up now on 
 the various processes they use, and have sent for a set of con- 
 sular reports dealing with the development of the business in 
 the Argentine. 
 
 I met Scads Allcott on the street the other day. He's liv- 
 
 ing in a swell boarding-house on the north side. He likes it 
 up here and says he's been to the theatre every night and the 
 ball game every afternoon, and looks for a job in the forenoon. 
 He told me he had several letters from Nell, which, of course, 
 cheered me up considerably. If she is looking for a husband 
 who can make nine holes in bogey and has a lovely tan, then 
 Scads is exactly the party for her. 
 
 I must close now. I want to walk down past the bank 
 where my $8 dollars are. Did you get the book I sent you,
 
 34 
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 and how did Sis like the set of post cards? Give my love to the 
 cook and with oceans of it for you and the rest. 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 P. S. Am enclosing some original sketches showing life 
 in Chicago. 
 
 P.S. 
 
 *cdT 
 
 -W- UfrKu.^ o^A^^
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 35 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: Fortune favours the Busy ! The boss 
 knows me by sight now, and upon three different occa- 
 sions he has honoured me by inquiring my name. It will 
 not be long before he knows me both ways at once, and then is 
 when Fortune will begin to take notice of her humble suitor. 
 Fifty years from now the historians will say: "At about this 
 point the fortunes of the future money monarch underwent a 
 change. His wages were raised to the proportions of a salary
 
 36 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 and it was noticed that a large smile overspread his classic 
 features." 
 
 Of course, coming back to earth again, I haven't had a 
 raise yet and I haven't done anything to deserve one, but I'm 
 on the job every consecutive minute and am taking a real in- 
 terest in the work. I have a theory, as yet unexploded, that 
 these things will count in the long run and that some day the 
 boss will want a man for a big place and will say to the man- 
 ager : "How about this young fellow Dawson ? I've been watch- 
 ing him for some time and I think there's something to him." 
 So you see, Mother, I've got it all figured out, and when the 
 call comes I'll be within hearing distance. 
 
 I'm afraid you'll begin to think that my sole object in 
 life is to get rich, and I don't mind confessing that it was 
 when I came up here. My one dream was to make a lot of 
 money and then go back home and drive up and down Main 
 Street in a gilded hack. I wanted to see old Mr. Allcott, who 
 never noticed me in his life, hustle down the steps of the bank to 
 greet me as an old-time friend, and to have Nell's father invite 
 me to sit on the bench with him at the courthouse. That would 
 have been glory enough for one lifetime. 
 
 But somehow I've changed my mind since then. I still 
 want to get rich, of course, but, first of all, I want to do it in a 
 way that we both can be proud of. There's something about 
 money that hardens people who think of nothing else, and I 
 don't want to get the disease. I believe I'd rather be like old
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 37 
 
 Judge Courtright down home, with all his friends and high 
 ideals, than any rich man I know. You may be sure that if I 
 ever do make a fortune there will not be a cent of it whose 
 source I shall wish to hide or the method of its acquisition con- 
 ceal. Why, there are people up here, with more money than 
 they know what to do with, who own property which is rented 
 for all sorts of improper purposes. I sometimes wonder how 
 they can let their children enjoy money that comes from such 
 sources. I'd rather be just comfortably rich and feel serene in 
 my own mind than to have barrels of money without the re- 
 spect of my neighbours. 
 
 Scads Allcott doesn't agree with me. We had quite a 
 talk about it last night. He says this is a commercial age 
 and everybody looks up to the man who has the stuff. A big 
 pile is the hall-mark of success and a man is a fool who doesn't 
 go out and get as much as he can. Every man ought to look 
 out for Number One, and, if anybody gets in the way, climb 
 over him. He says when he makes more than he wants he will 
 become charitable. Scads is certainly a chip off the old block. 
 And you know how much every one down home loves old All- 
 cott. If he lost his money to-morrow there wouldn't be a person 
 who would sympathise with him. 
 
 With these few remarks I'll close before the letter needs 
 4 cents postage. I'm going to try to come down in a week 
 or two, so please fatten up a chicken or two and have an o. f. 
 kiss and hug ready. Loads of love to all. CHARLEY.
 
 38 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 39 
 
 At Home, 1 1 30 p. M. 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: It's after u, and so I'll just write a 
 little two-for-a-cent one to-night. Some of the other 
 boys here in the boarding-house dropped in to-night and 
 we had a great discussion. We came out for clean politics. I 
 know you'd like them. One of them, Jim Merritt, is in the office 
 with me and is an awfully nice fellow. He got me to come to 
 this boarding-house. He showed me a picture of his mother, 
 and she's an awfully nice-looking lady almost as nice looking 
 as you are. Compliment ! Two of the boys are in a bank and 
 a wholesale house, and another, Sewell, is a stenographer, a sort 
 of assistant private secretary, to the head of the firm of Dodge & 
 Co. They are our strongest rivals in business, but Sewell and I 
 get on all right. He's a quiet chap and seldom says very much. 
 Well, we had it hot and heavy from politics and finance and 
 back again by the way of matrimony, colleges, and athletics. We 
 decided everything before we got through. Well, in the middle 
 of it who should come in but Scads Allcott. You could have 
 knocked me over with a feather. He said he had nothing to do 
 and thought he might as well come over and see how I was 
 situated. He incidentally told me he had received a letter to-day 
 from Nell. By the way, how is she? I don't want to ask 
 Scads. He hasn't got a job yet, but says his father is trying 
 to get him in a broker's office. After the other boys had gone 
 to bed Scads sat here and talked until I thought he never 
 would go. You see, he doesn't have to get up early. He says
 
 40 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 I ought to move to a better neighbourhood and get acquainted 
 with the kind of people who can be useful to me. I told him 
 I didn't like the idea, and he called me a chump, and we let 
 it go at that. No more for to-night. With love to all 
 Your loving son, 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 __ 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: I don't know that I ought to tell you, 
 but I might as well now as later. The fact is that I've 
 had a little trouble with the head of the firm and I'm 
 very much afraid that he is going to try to worry long without 
 me. I'll know on Monday. Perhaps there'll be another Chicago 
 fine, in which I will figure prominently as the fire-ee, but anyway, 
 whatever happens, you mustn't worry for a minute. The fall is 
 a good time to look for a position, and with my experience I'll 
 have no trouble whatever in landing another one. So don't wor- 
 ry for a second.
 
 42 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 This is what happened : You remember I wrote you about 
 a fellow named Sewell who lives at my boarding-house. He 
 seems like a nice fellow, rather quiet and not very confidential, 
 but I liked him and found that he could give me a lot of 
 good advice about my work. He's with Dodge & Co., which 
 is in the same line as our firm in fact, I suppose they're our 
 strongest competitors. Both firms do an enormous business and 
 I guess there isn't the best feeling between them because they 
 are constantly bidding against each other on big contracts. 
 
 Well, Sewell has been dropping in to see me every evening 
 of late, and a couple of times we have gone to the theatre 
 together. He's been just as friendly as any one could be and 
 said he might be able to put me in the way of making a lot 
 of money outside of my regular work. He didn't tell me how. 
 Last Saturday he telephoned for me to have lunch with him, 
 and I met him down at the entrance of our building. Just as 
 I met him the manager of our firm came out of the elevator 
 and nodded to me. I thought he looked rather queerly at 
 Sewell. Since then I've found out that Sewell used to work 
 for our firm, but suddenly left for some reason or other, I 
 don't know what. 
 
 Late Saturday afternoon the boss sent for me. Well, maybe 
 I wasn't excited! I felt like a girl who knows she is about to 
 have her first proposal. It was the first time I had been offi- 
 cially noticed by the Grand Mogul and I went into the private 
 office with my heart in my throat. I thought maybe he was
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 43 
 
 going to take me into the firm or consult me about next year's 
 policy. 
 
 He glanced up, motioned to a chair, and then abruptly 
 asked me how much I was getting. I told him sixteen and he 
 smiled pleasantly. 
 
 "I suppose you would like to make more," he said, and I 
 supposed I grinned expectantly. He asked me how I liked the 
 work, where I lived, where I had come from, if my parents 
 were living, and a lot more things. It was becoming quite a 
 social occasion. 
 
 Suddenly his smile faded and his face became serious. 
 
 "Young man," he said, "I don't mind telling you that we 
 have had our eye on you lately. Whenever a young man shows 
 promise we are disposed to give him every chance for ad- 
 vancement, and I thought it might interest you to know that 
 we are looking for some way to help you along. In a couple 
 of weeks we hope to get a large contract if our bid is success- 
 ful, and if we do we may be able to put you in on that work 
 at a considerable advance at once, with bigger opportunities 
 later. You will have a chance to show what's in you." 
 
 Well, say ! Talk about joy ! I was in for jumping up on 
 the chandelier and giving nine rahs for everything and every- 
 body. I thanked him in a choking voice and as he turned to his 
 work I started out. 
 
 "Oh, by the way," he then said, like an afterthought, 
 "you live with young Sewell of Dodge & Co. ?"
 
 44 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 "Yes, sir," said I, wondering what was coming next. 
 
 "It just occurred to me that you might be of some service 
 to us. The Dodge people are bidding on this contract, and 
 perhaps you might get a little line on their bid from Sewell. 
 Do you know him very well?" 
 
 I was amazed. You could have knocked me over with a 
 feather. 
 
 "You want me to find out their bid from Sewell?" I man- 
 aged to say. 
 
 "Why, certainly; not in a dishonest way, but just casually, 
 you know. Perhaps you can get a slight indication of their 
 bid." 
 
 I got up and was almost afraid to speak, I was so near 
 crying. It seemed as if the lights had all gone out. He didn't 
 seem to notice my agitation, for he turned to his desk and began 
 to fumble with his papers. 
 
 "Just think it over," he said; "it may mean a good deal to 
 you. Let me know in a few days." 
 
 Then I found my voice. 
 
 "Mr. Morrill, I can let you know now. You and everybody 
 around here have been kind to me and I don't want to seem 
 ungrateful, but I can't do what you suggest. I don't want to 
 succeed that way." I started out and was getting madder and 
 madder every minute. At the door I stopped and turned 
 around and blurted out: "Mr. Morrill, before I go I want to 
 tell you that I'd see you and your old firm and your contracts
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 45 
 
 plumb to thunder before I'd do that kind of crooked work." 
 I then retired while the retiring was good, and now you know 
 the whole situation. I suppose I'll be fired, but I had the satis- 
 faction of stating my position. I'll let you know how it comes 
 out. Lovingly, 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 P. S. Don't worry.
 
 4 6 
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: Well, the plot has thickened and 
 thinned a good deal since I wrote you. Everything is lovely 
 now and the goose hangs high, although I don't mind 
 confessing that the goose hung pretty low for awhile, especially 
 just after I had told my boss, Mr. Morrill, that I'd see him in 
 thunder before I'd try to find out Dodge & Co.'s bid from Sewell. 
 When I went home that night and had time to cool oft I felt 
 pretty blue. All my dreams seemed to have collapsed. At 8
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 47 
 
 o'clock I was a pale blue, at 9 a deep blue, and at 10 a fright- 
 fully deep blue. And it was just then that Sewell dropped in to 
 see me and at once asked me what was the matter. I told him 
 I had had some words with the boss, but didn't tell him the 
 cause. He advised me to go back and apologise and by all means 
 to hold my job. He said that it would mean a good deal of 
 money to me in the long run. I asked him how, and he said that 
 with me in Merrill & Co. and him in Dodge & Co., and both 
 these concerns bidding against one another on big contracts, we 
 each could do pretty well if we worked together. It suddenly 
 began to dawn upon me what Sewell was driving at, but I 
 thought I'd let him go on just to see what sort of a fellow he 
 was. "For example," said he, "just now there's a job worth 
 several millions that they are bidding on. If you can find out 
 Merrill's bid and let me know it will be worth a pretty good sum 
 of money to you, more than you can make in a year plugging 
 along at your present salary." I think he saw that I was 
 getting mad, because he continued: "Now I suppose that idea 
 shocks you. You are just out of college and have a lot of 
 fancy ideas about honour and moral ethics. I was that way ten 
 years ago, but I found that it didn't pay. Business nowadays 
 is a cutthroat game, and the object is to win out, no matter 
 how, and the man that is useful to his firm is the one who 
 gets boosted along. Why, there isn't a big business in this 
 city that doesn't do a lot of things that wouldn't look well in 
 broad daylight, and somebody has to do them. The stockholders
 
 48 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 want dividends, and they are not very particular just how they 
 get them. If there is any crooked work necessary they shut 
 their eyes and only open them the day their dividend cheques 
 come in. If the dividend is reduced they want the manager 
 fired and a new one put in who will produce the dividends. 
 You would be surprised to know how much crookedness goes 
 on in business affairs and at the respectable people who wink 
 at it. 
 
 "Now sooner or later you will discover that there will 
 come a time when you will be asked to do something that 
 seems a little shady. If you refuse, out you go, and if you 
 consent you will hold your job and be regarded as a very useful 
 and valuable man. The firm will stand by you as long as you can 
 produce results. For five years I plugged along on a high 
 moral plane, was fired four times, and finally decided that I 
 would get into the money-grabbing game regardless of meth- 
 ods or morals. You will probably be shocked to know that it 
 has paid, and that I am now the boss's private secretary. I 
 suppose I've done a lot of things that aren't strictly on the 
 square, but I've been a useful and willing worker. I've had to 
 perjure myself on the witness stand several times, but I believe 
 it is only right to stand by your boss in trouble as long as he 
 stands by you. Now, Dawson, you think it over. I don't want 
 to persuade you to do something you don't want to do, but in 
 ten years you will thank me for the advice I'm giving you. 
 You can't get rich working on a salary, and you know you can
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 49 
 
 always reform after you've made your pile and your children 
 are going to college. I'm going to cut out all this crooked 
 work some day, but not until I am safe on Easy Street." 
 
 I was perfectly amazed. I couldn't imagine anybody talking 
 in such a cold-blooded way, and I didn't know exactly what to 
 say. But finally I found my voice. "I suppose you mean all 
 right, Sewell, from your point of view. And I suppose you 
 will succeed up to a certain point, but I'd like to bet anything 
 I'll ever have that in the long run you'll lose out. They'll get 
 you just at the time when it will hurt you most, perhaps years 
 from now when you have children in school and your wife 
 has a lot of nice friends. Then the exposure will come and 
 your whole family will be disgraced and ashamed. Every day 
 or so I read of how some fellow gets caught, and I honestly 
 believe that it always comes sooner or later. I intend to be on 
 the square, and if it doesn't pay very much at first I believe 
 it will win out in the long run. Now, Sewell, I wish you 
 would go out and never come in my room again." He flushed 
 up a little, then smiled queerly, and said : "All right, my boy, 
 you go your way and I'll go mine. If you ever need any 
 money let me know." With that he walked out. 
 
 Now comes the real joke. When I went down to the office 
 on Monday the boss sent for me. I didn't care what hap- 
 pened, so I walked boldly in. He was smiling and very 
 pleasant. "Dawson," said he, "you are a very excitable young 
 man, but I'm convinced you are all right Sometimes we take
 
 50 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 queer measures to find out which of our men are honest, and it 
 was to test you that I proposed last Saturday that you try to 
 get the Dodge bid from Sewell. The manager had seen you 
 with Sewell, you know. You answered me just as I hoped 
 you would, and if you keep on in that way you may be certain 
 that we'll not overlook it. I've asked the treasurer to advance 
 you to $20 a week." He shook my hand and smiled pleasantly, 
 and so I am still on the pay roll. 
 
 I thought you'd like to hear all about it, and so I've written 
 it all out. There's one thing you may be sure of, Mother, and 
 that is, when you are old and grey you will not be trembling 
 in fear of being disgraced by any exposure of crookedness on 
 the part of your loving son 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 51 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: This is certainly pumpkin-pie 
 weather, isn't it? Do you ever think of such worldly 
 things? It's funny, but I got to thinking of it this 
 morning while dressing, and I haven't been able to think of 
 anything else since. I can't get it out of my mind. 
 I'm simply haunted by the pleasant ghosts of bygone
 
 52 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 pies, and I don't know what I am going to do 
 about it unless I organise an expedition of one and go 
 down home for much needed relief. To-day is Sunday, and as 
 I walked through the park and smelled the leaves and breathed 
 in the fresh October air, the whole world seemed to whisper 
 pumpkin pie to me. The little flurries of wind and the whirl- 
 ing leaves sang pumpkin pie until I felt exalted and 
 uplifted as though I were in a great cathedral, with an organ 
 swelling in mighty volumes of sound and with an angel chorus 
 carolling an anthem all about pumpkin pies. To tell the truth, 
 I was considerably homesick for pumpkin pie and "the mother 
 that made pumpkin pie famous" at least famous to me. 
 
 Why, I had never even heard of pumpkin pie before 
 you first introduced it to my polite attention, and I may say 
 that I have always remembered it favourably. I liked 
 the poetry you put into it, as well as the music, and when- 
 ever I think of one of your pumpkin pies, which I 
 do with staggering frequency, I think of it as an 
 edible golden sunburst, glorified by the skill of a master in 
 pie craft. Some day, when I am rich and philanthropic, intent 
 upon handing myself down to fame and reflected glory, I shall 
 erect a marble monument to the memory of your justly cele- 
 brated pumpkin pies. I planned it all out while walking through 
 the park this morning and picked out a suitable site for it. 
 First, there will be a marble pedestal fifty feet square, at the 
 end of a long avenue lined by Maxfield Parrish poplars and
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 53 
 
 pilasters. Upon the four sides of the pedestal will be the 
 words, "To die memory and glorification of pumpkin pie, the 
 pie of the Pierides, erected by Charles Dawson, the eminent 
 connoisseur and pie-lanthropist." On top of the pedestal will be 
 a big bronze pie, 400 feet high, high enough to be a landmark 
 for sailors coming down from Milwaukee and points north, 
 and lighted at night by a row of arc lights around the edge 
 like a golden diadem. Perhaps I'll have this pie revolve, 
 like die Ferris wheel, but that hasn't been definitely decided 
 as yet. I'll have a famous sculptor do the decorations around 
 die border of the pie, and when I get ready to build the memo- 
 rial I want you to send me some of your thumbmarks and linger 
 prints, so that the pie may be historically correct. Also, I 
 shall keep a candle burning in front of the pedestal, day and 
 night, to impress people with the solemnity of the surroundings. 
 Of course, I'll invite you up to the unveiling, so don't make 
 too many engagements far ahead. And don't tell anybody just 
 yet, because I don't want it to get into the papers until the 
 Municipal Art Commission has approved the plan of the "Pie 
 Beautiful Memorial." 
 
 Now I suppose I'll have to leave this pleasant theme and 
 come down to worldly affairs. 
 
 I suppose Bud has been out nutting these days and that 
 the farmers are waiting for the first frost before beginning 
 their husking. I'd like to be down there, wading through 
 the leaves in Marshall's woods, with a bag of shell barks on
 
 54 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 my back and with my fingers black from walnut stains. I 
 tell you that's the kind of life that gives a fellow a grand 
 appetite, and by the time he gets home and catches a whiff 
 of fried chicken and biscuits and honey, with the hallowed 
 perfume of pumpkin pie hovering near, he is in a most recep- 
 tive mood as regards the supper hour. 
 
 I can see you now, standing at the kitchen stove, sur- 
 rounded by a circle of eager little faces, including Old Shep, 
 and with ever)' eye following the supper preparations with 
 alert and expectant interest. Those were grand old days, those 
 days when I was on the jury to judge your cooking. Loud 
 cheers for them, and viva la Pumpkin Pie I 
 
 Here I am again talking about pie, so I guess I'd better 
 stop before I use up all my stationery. Give my love to the 
 kitchen stove and to my place at the table, and be sure to 
 keep my napkin-ring polished up ready for an emergency. With 
 oceans of love to you and all the folks. 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 55 
 
 DEAR MOTHER : Only about four weeks more till 
 Thanksgiving, and then LOOK OUT ! You'll see a familiar 
 figure dash down the road from the depot, jump the 
 fence in one leap, and light right smack in the family circle with 
 a choice lot of hugs and kisses imported especially from Chicago 
 for home consumption. I may have to come down on the night 
 train, but I hope I may be able to arrange to take the afternoon 
 train the day before. It will be simply great, and I'm look- 
 ing forward to my visit as eagerly as I used to look forward
 
 56 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 to Christmas. Why, already I've lived over my trip home a 
 hundred times in anticipation, and each time it gets nicer. Sis 
 must play over all the grand tunes she's learned, and Bud must 
 give me a few lessons in how to crack hickory nuts and eat 
 Belleflower apples. I'm afraid I've gotten completely out of 
 practice since I came up here. You see, they don't specialise in 
 eating hickory nuts in the good old way up here. They don't 
 know that the only genuine way to enjoy hickory nuts is to 
 crack them on a flatiron in front of a roaring fire and without 
 company manners to hamper your technique. 
 
 I suppose Nell Courtright is at home now and will be 
 when I come down. Scads Allcott dropped in again last 
 night and casually mentioned that he had received a letter 
 from her, but I didn't ask any particulars, for fear of afford- 
 ing him the pleasure of being considered an authority 
 on the subject. He says he's going down on Thanksgiving, 
 too. 
 
 I don't know what to make of Scads. I think the city 
 is going a little bit to his head. He isn't as nice as he used 
 to be. You remember, I used to like him in college, but he 
 certainly has changed since he came up here. I don't know 
 just what it is, but whenever I'm with him I seem to notice 
 that he seems a little coarser and more sporty than ever. When 
 he came in last night I was working, and I actually believe 
 he resented it. 
 
 "Great Scott!" he said, "can't you get enough work in
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 57 
 
 office hours without lugging it home with you? You'll be an 
 old man at forty, Dawson, if you keep this up." 
 
 I didn't say anything, so he lighted a cigarette, and eyed 
 my work with disapproval. 
 
 "Do you know what I think?" said he. "I think you're 
 seventeen kinds of a chump to sit in this stuffy hole working 
 while there are so many pleasanter forms of exercise. I'll bet 
 your boss isn't working to-night, or any other of the big men 
 in your office. Not much !" 
 
 I didn't want to get into an argument with him, but I 
 just couldn't help remarking that the boss and the big men 
 probably had to do a lot of night work in order to be where 
 they are to-day. "Rats and again rats!" remarked Scads. 
 "You're getting to be one of these goody-goody boys, and if 
 you don't wake up and sow a wild oat or two you will be 
 about as exciting as a last year's bird's nest. Come on, put 
 on your coat, and let's get out among the bright lights. I'll 
 show you what you're missing before it's too late." 
 
 I told him he would have to count me out. 
 
 "All right, all right. Far be it from me to tempt any 
 nice young man from the paths of rectitude. Stick to your 
 work, Dawson, and by forty you'll have a couple of thousand 
 dollars saved up and be baldheaded, with the last remnant of 
 your youth gone. Now is the time to play, when you have 
 the capacity for enjoyment, and not when you are an old man 
 who doesn't know how to do anything but work. Sure you
 
 58 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 won't come? I know a couple of live girls who will make you 
 sit up and take notice." 
 
 "Go ahead, Scads. Have all the good time you want. 
 Burn up the town if you feel that way, but just count me out. 
 I have a certain hunch that when a young fellow is trying to 
 get started in business, that that is not the time for him to 
 be chasing around. Competition's too keen these days. So, if 
 you'll just kindly excuse me, I'll stick to my knitting till I'm 
 established. Then there will be time to relax occasionally." 
 
 "Sounds like a baccalaureate address. Say, Dawson, do 
 you ever get any pleasure out of life? Do you ever cut loose 
 and act like a natural human being?" 
 
 "Sure," said I, laughing. "I go to a good play once a 
 week, I take in a moving picture show occasionally, and I'm 
 getting to know a lot of very clean, decent young fellows. I 
 also expect to get a lot of satisfaction out of the fact that 
 I'll make good in my work, if I do, and there'll be some 
 pleasure in that." 
 
 Scads laughed in an unpleasant way. "Why, you're 
 getting to be quite a preacher, aren't you? That ought to make 
 you very popular, because people love to be preached to. Have 
 you tried the Y. M. C. A. yet?" he asked. "You'd have a 
 lovely time there reading the papers and discussing moral 
 topics." 
 
 "Scads, you're becoming quite a humourist. By the way, 
 how are you getting on in your work?" I casually inquired.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 59 
 
 "Oh, ho ! Sarcastic, eh? Well, you never mind about me. 
 I'll get along all right, and I won't be a sissy, either." And 
 with that he went out, carefully slamming the door. 
 
 The joke of it is that Scads has had two jobs since 
 he's been up here and was politely let out of each one in 
 spite of his father's influence. Just now he is at leisure. If 
 he didn't have his father to fall back on he would be up 
 against it good and plenty, or else he'd have to try harder 
 to hold his jobs. 
 
 With these few remarks and with love to all 
 Affectionately your son, 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 P. S. I think before I get through I shall have to lick 
 Scads. He seems to be lacking in proper respect.
 
 6o 
 
 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: I had a curious experience yesterday, 
 which has left me feeling quite depressed ever since. I 
 was walking down to my work, as I usually do in the 
 morning, ambling gayly along, enjoying the sunshine, and think- 
 ing favorably of my coming Thanksgiving pilgrimage down 
 home, when suddenly a little dog dashed out of a side street and 
 hustled down the sidewalk ahead of me. You should have seen 
 him. He was the most woebegone specimen I've ever seen all 
 matted and frowsy and, I suppose, without a friend in the
 
 DAWSON f 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 61 
 
 world, although willing to make friends with anybody. He was 
 very thin, and his eyes had the hurt and frightened look of 
 one who has been kicked and chased throughout the whole length 
 of his short and wretched life. He had the look of one who 
 has learned by bitter experience that he is not welcome any- 
 where. Well, I felt so sorry my heart went right out to him. 
 He didn't see me until I was quite near, and then he gave 
 a startled look and scurried out of the way. I guess he thought 
 I was going to kick at him, as mostly everybody else had 
 done, so I resolved that if I never did anything else in my 
 life I'd give that dog one good time that he would always re- 
 member. So I stopped and whistled to him. He was very 
 much surprised. Here was a new game and he didn't know 
 what to make of it. His head was cocked inquiringly to one 
 side. So I whistled some more and spoke to him so kindly 
 that a wistful look came into his eyes, his tail began to wag 
 apologetically, and he slowly wriggled his way toward me. I 
 made more friendly overtures, but he was afraid to trust him- 
 self within patting distance, and so, after trying so long that I 
 was afraid of being late at the office, I sadly resumed my way. 
 After some time I turned and what do you think? There he 
 was, trotting along behind me. When I stopped he stopped, 
 still out of reach. I again addressed him in friendly terms, 
 and after that he seemed to think that the miracle had hap- 
 pened and that at last he had found a friend. His eyes seemed 
 to brim over with trustfulness and gratitude. So he joined me
 
 62 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 in my walk, sometimes trotting at my side, sometimes ahead, 
 and sometimes he would make little detours to investigate al- 
 leys and garbage boxes, but all the time looking around, so 
 as not to lose me. Once I had to go back to find him, and 
 he seemed overjoyed at this evidence of my concern. He 
 wagged so violently that I was afraid he would put his tail out 
 of joint, and I'll bet his little ribs rattled in the slack of his 
 corrugated sides. I resolved to give him a feast that would 
 take every wrinkle of hunger out of those sides, and as I walked 
 along I was busy making plans for his future. There is a little 
 restaurant near where I work and the man who runs it used to 
 live in the country, so that even city life has not entirely smoth- 
 ered his sympathetic interest in the homely little things of 
 life. I decided to take my new friend to this man, purchase 
 a lavish banquet for him, and then try to devise a future home 
 for him. The thought made me quite happy, and I got my 
 reward every time I looked down at the bedraggled but friendly 
 creature that trotted so airily beside me. Two minutes before 
 I reached the restaurant he was at my side, then there was a 
 crush of traffic at a street crossing and when I got across the 
 dog was nowhere to be seen. I went back and looked for him, 
 but he was gone probably had seen some other dog over in 
 the park, or, becoming frightened by the roar of the downtown 
 district, had turned to go back to the quieter districts from 
 which he had come. 
 
 Well, I was terribly sorry, and all day long at my work I
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 63 
 
 couldn't help thinking of him. And somehow the more I 
 thought of the incident the more significant it became. It 
 reminded me of some people I have known the ones who 
 always get discouraged and quit trying just at the crucial mo- 
 ment, when success is almost in their grasp. They may be 
 honest and well meaning, but they give up just a moment too 
 soon. Now, if that dog Alexander the Great, Jr., I called him 
 had stuck two minutes longer he would have had wealth and 
 friends and a comfortable home. But, like lots of people, he 
 quit, or got discouraged, or allowed himself to be distracted by 
 something else, and now, I suppose, is shivering and hungry 
 and friendless again. After hopefully waiting all his life for 
 Opportunity to knock on his door he quit waiting just a moment 
 before the summons came. I think I've learned a good deal 
 from that little dog, but I'm terribly sorry for him. 
 
 We've been having a lot of scrambled weather here. Yes- 
 terday a man was overcome by the heat and to-day it is bitterly 
 cold. Have you started polishing up my napkin-ring? Lots of 
 love to all and an extra helping to you. 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 P. S. Yours with relation to the evils of fighting duly re- 
 ceived, and in answer will say that all peaceful measures short 
 of the loss of my self-respect will be observed in my dealings 
 with Scads.
 
 i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 TAEAR MOTHER: I have just marked off another day on 
 -J-^the calendar, so that there are now only ten days to be 
 hurdled before I land in your midst on Thanksgiving 
 Day. It doesn't seem so long except when I count it in seconds, 
 and then the result almost gives me heart failure 864,000 
 seconds ! It sounds like a lifetime, so I figure in weeks instead of 
 seconds. You see, it's only one week and a little over, and I 
 think by superhuman patience I can last that long. I'm al- 
 ready beginning to feel a pleasant glow that makes me very 
 happy, and also, when I allow myself to think of what I shall do 
 to the food supply, I confess that I am strangely interested. 
 If you'll be one hundredth part as glad to see me as I'll be to 
 see you, you'll certainly be considerably tickled.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 65 
 
 I've been practising for the Thanksgiving dinner for some 
 time. Every Saturday night Merritt and I go to a new restau- 
 rant and practise up, so that by the time I go home I shall 
 be no amateur with the knife and fork. Merrill's a nice fellow 
 and I am trying to persuade him to go home with me for 
 Thanksgiving his own home being too far away and I know 
 you'll like him, because he's a very clean and clever citizen who 
 is sure to amount to a good deal one of these days. 
 
 The prospects are that I'll arrive in good condition. You'll 
 be glad to hear that Scads and I buried the hatchet last night 
 not very deep, I'm afraid, but deep enough so that only the 
 handle sticks out and I imagine we won't have to go to The 
 Hague or the mat just yet. Even as I write I can still 
 hear the echoes of the white-winged dove of peace as it flapped 
 gayly around us last night. In fact, it flapped almost too 
 loud to be comfortable, for the peace conference was held in 
 a restaurant and attracted a great deal of concentrated atten- 
 tion from the rest of the people at the tables. 
 
 This is the way it happened : Merritt and I had been to 
 our weekly show, and as it was Saturday night we stopped in 
 at a restaurant to get a bite before wending our way home- 
 ward. Well, while we were sitting there discussing affairs 
 of state and giving expert advice on how to run the government, 
 who should come in but Scads. He had some girl with him, and 
 they took a table over in the corner not far from us. Scads was 
 trying to convince the girl that Yale would eat up Harvard next
 
 66 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 week and the girl was urging him not to talk so loud. You 
 would have thought Scads was at least the president of Yale, 
 to hear him talk, though, of course, he's never been there in 
 his life and only knows the yells from hearsay. Finally Merritt 
 and I started out and Scads saw us and called to us as if shouting 
 across a football field. Everybody looked around to see what the 
 trouble was, while Scads in his efforts to reach us knocked over 
 a chair and spilled a lot of overcoats and hats on the floor. It 
 was very embarrassing, because Scads was determined that we 
 shouldn't go until we had met his friend. "Come over, Dawson, 
 and meet my little playmate. You, too, Merritt; the 
 more the merrier." Well, to avoid a long and painful argument 
 out in the middle of the floor we went over, Scads whispering 
 to us to remember that his name was Livingston Herbert 
 Livingston and that he lived in New York. He introduced us 
 and began hammering the table for a waiter. It was awfully 
 embarrassing, because everybody was looking at him and some 
 of the people were getting sore. I felt sorry for the girl, 
 though she didn't seem to mind it very much, but kept telling him 
 to keep quiet. Well, we got away at last and I breathed a sigh 
 of relief when we got outside. I'm afraid Scads will have a 
 quick finish if he keeps up this pace very long, and I can't help 
 feeling sorry that he is losing his head so fearfully up here. 
 
 Well, it's getting late now, so I must close. Don't forget 
 the day and date November 3<Dth ! and with love to all. 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DEAR NELL: Scads has just told me the news of your 
 engagement, and I want to express my sincerest good 
 wishes. I hope the future will be full of happiness, and 
 that all the good things in the world will be yours, as you so 
 richly deserve. Of course, I have expected the announcement 
 for weeks ever since the middle of the summer when Scads 
 showed so plainly that he was carrying about a big secret that 
 he was almost bursting to tell me so that now the news does 
 not come altogether as a complete surprise. I am only sur- 
 prised that I was so dull as not to suspect it even before I left
 
 68 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 home in June, but I suppose I was so excited by the prospect of 
 my job-hunting crusade in Chicago that I failed to observe the 
 indications. It seems years since June, Nell, and what a lot 
 of things have happened since then ! I'm sure you will never 
 realise how very much your good wishes and encouragement 
 did for me during the first few weeks up here. There were 
 times when I almost lost heart. Those were certainly days of 
 failure and disappointment, though fortunately they didn't last 
 but for a time. I hadn't the heart to write to my friends that 
 I had failed to catch on. You have no idea how ashamed I 
 was, and how it hurt my pride to have the friends back home 
 think that I wasn't making good. Possibly it might please you a 
 little to know that your good wishes and encouragement did 
 worlds of good for me, and made me determined to justify my- 
 self in your opinion. I don't suppose you thought anything 
 about it, but it made a big difference to me, and I shall never 
 in the world forget your kindness, or be able to repay it, ex- 
 cept in the good wishes that I now send you from the bottom 
 of my heart. I hope you'll be very happy and that some time 
 I may see you to thank you as much as I can for being my good 
 angel in the dark days when I was hovering on the brink of 
 total discouragement. I had hoped to come down for Thanks- 
 giving, but it is possible I may not be able to arrange it on 
 account of a matter that has recently come up. 
 
 Please remember, Nell, that if there is ever anything 
 in the world that I can do for you, you will let me know. 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 69 
 
 D 
 
 AWSON 'n settled back for the five hours' ride and 
 gazed sombrely out of the car window. He was going 
 home for Thanksgiving, the first trip back since he had 
 come to Chicago six months before, and the joy that he had 
 expected to feel was not in him. His chin was buried in his 
 hand and his eyes gloomily followed the changing scene as it 
 shifted from tall grain elevators to ragged outskirts and then 
 to the brown November landscape of the open country. At last 
 he was actually making the trip that his fancy had pictured to
 
 70 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 him so glowingly for weeks past, yet here he was wrapped in 
 melancholy meditations. The one person besides his mother 
 whom he had most eagerly looked forward to seeing had been 
 torn from his dreams and he must not think of her any more; 
 which, of course, made him think of her a good deal more. 
 Each thought was painful, but there was a grim pleasure in 
 martyring himself to this self-inflicted pain. 
 
 "Why in the world did I come?" he asked himself over 
 and over, and then felt ashamed of himself for asking it. 
 He knew perfectly well what the answer was, and it was always 
 the same. It was because his mother had looked forward to 
 his coming for weeks, and he hadn't the heart to send the 
 telegram that was to say that he couldn't come, when he knew 
 that by so doing he was following his own wishes at the ex- 
 pense of the bitter disappointment he knew she would feel. 
 
 "Oh, well, it's all in a lifetime," he thought, bitterly, 
 "and I might as well look on the bright side of things. I've 
 got no business thinking of getting married for a year or two, 
 anyway, and besides, maybe I'm not as sad as I think I am. 
 Perhaps it's just my vanity that is hurt. Anyway, it's all over 
 and I'll just proceed to dismiss her from all future calculations." 
 So saying, he made an elaborate motion as though plucking 
 something from him and dropping it in the aisle. "There she 
 goes. She is no more, so far as I'm concerned. I've got along 
 without her for twenty-one years and I guess I can worry along 
 for a little while longer. Henceforth we are merely old friends,
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 71 
 
 or acquaintances. She'll never know how I've felt. If I meet 
 her, I'll greet her as though I'd never dreamed of being any- 
 thing but an old friend. I'll congratulate her on her engage- 
 ment to 'Scads' as though I took a fatherly interest in them." 
 He thought for a moment. "I wonder whether I'd better 
 call and congratulate her. It will be awfully hard to do, but 
 if I don't call, she'll think I'm fearfully disappointed and sore." 
 In this way his thoughts rambled on, and he was beginning 
 to have quite a pleasant time in making himself so miserable. 
 The daylight was waning, and the car was becoming dark with 
 the late afternoon shadows. 
 
 "I wonder why 'Scads' isn't on board? He said he was 
 coming down on this train." This lead furnished material for 
 profound meditation. Perhaps "Scads" had failed to come. 
 There was a pleasing flavour in that reflection, but, perhaps, im- 
 patient to see Xell Courtright, he had come down on an earlier 
 train. That thought was not so pleasing. 
 
 "Great guns," he muttered, "one would think I'd never 
 been in love before, the way I keep on thinking of this tiresome 
 subject. I must brace up and stop thinking about her. I didn't 
 think of her half as much before I heard she was engaged to 
 'Scads,' which shows that it's only my vanity that is hurt. 
 Little Charley got his all right, and he's peeved." 
 
 Finally in the midst of these joyous meditations, he be- 
 came conscious that the train was rushing along amidst familiar 
 landmarks. There was a mill that he had known from boyhood,
 
 72 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 here a deep cut and heavy grade that told him home was only 
 a few minutes away. Home! A warmth suffused him like 
 a wave. His heart was beating faster at the thought that only 
 a few minutes away was the mother he so longed to see, and the 
 dear old home and all the ones he loved and the places that 
 were so enshrined in his memory. Only a few minutes more 1 
 
 Long before the train had stopped he was out on the lowest 
 step, and when it slowed down to a full stop he was in the arms 
 of the happiest-looking middle-aged woman one would see 
 in a year's journey. Bud and Sis and Dad were each struggling 
 to seize the returned magnate, and the chorus of questions and 
 exclamations were too chaotic to be analysed. It was not 
 until they were half way home that the conversation began to 
 get straightened out into anything like coherency. 
 
 And it was not until the train had pulled out and the 
 platform lay bare in the loneliness of its darkness, that a girl 
 drove away from the station alone. 
 "Scads" had failed to come.
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 73 
 
 DAWSON'S visit home was a great success. His troubles 
 faded away in the genial atmosphere of affection that 
 pervaded the old home. At first he was vaguely de- 
 pressed by the feeling that he was regarded as "company," for 
 he was conscious that his brother Bud was subdued and quiet, as 
 though awed by the presence of a visitor from far away in the 
 great city. The thousand and one questions that the boy had 
 saved up to ask were restrained beneath a respectful silence, 
 and it was not until the talk touched the subject of football 
 that Bud was thawed out of his reserve, and the great flood of
 
 74 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 questions burst forth in such a torrent that his father was obliged 
 "unreasonably" to restrain him from monopolising the con- 
 versation. 
 
 Dawson's little sister, with her hair combed so tight that 
 it stretched the corners of her eyes, also was shy and oppres- 
 sively awed by the presence of a visitor. When she played 
 her newly learned "pieces," painfully picking out the notes, 
 she made so many mistakes that she was deeply humiliated, 
 and was only partly consoled by hearing such words of praise 
 as not even a Bloomfield-Zeisler had ever received. 
 
 Old Shep remembered him and wagged his shaggy tail in 
 such an excess of joy that he threatened to demolish all the 
 bric-a-brac within reach. 
 
 It was an evening to be remembered, an evening when 
 the atmosphere fairly purred with happiness and contentment, 
 and Dawson made new resolves in his heart that he would try 
 harder than ever to deserve the trust and faith of those whose 
 love had followed him so steadfastly throughout his trying days 
 in a strange and friendless city. As he looked at his mother, 
 rocking and sewing and beaming, he felt himself strengthened 
 in his determination never consciously or wilfully to do anything 
 that would bring pain or disappointment to her. Some men, he 
 reflected, remember their mothers only when they are in trouble; 
 others remember them only when they wish to use them in in- 
 fluencing a jury to clemency; he would try to remember her
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 75 
 
 before he got into trouble, and, because of her, try his best 
 to keep out of it. 
 
 When Dawson was curled up in his old bed that night 
 his last waking remembrance was that some one was tucking 
 the covers about him.
 
 76 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 WHEN Dawson ' 1 1 awakened, the sunshine of Thanks- 
 giving morning was streaming into his room. All about 
 him, like faithful friends, stood the familiar pieces of 
 old-fashioned furniture that he had known since he was a child, 
 and as he looked affectionately at each well-remembered article 
 something of the spirit of the day found joyous expression in 
 his heart. My, but it was good to be home again ! 
 
 Suppressed sounds from below told him that the house- 
 hold was stirring and that they were moving about quietly
 
 DAWSON J i i FORTUNE HUNTER 77 
 
 to avoid wakening him. "I'll bet mother told them to let 
 me sleep as long as I wanted to. However, here goes ! The 
 hot biscuits and honey are waiting, and I don't want to dis- 
 appoint them." 
 
 After breakfast, he announced his intention of taking a long 
 walk to inspect the changes that Time had wrought in the 
 scenery during the last five months. 
 
 "I must go into training for dinner," he said, "and I 
 think a five-mile stroll will put me in condition for certain 
 gastronomical triumphs I have in mind." 
 
 "I thought 'Scads' Allcott was coming down with you," 
 said his mother. 
 
 "I thought so, too, but I guess he came down on an earlier 
 train. I'll probably run across him somewhere this forenoon." 
 
 "Well, remember to be back before dinner. It's at one, 
 remember !" 
 
 "I'll be here all right, mother, waiting right in the front 
 row when the dinner-bell rings." 
 
 As Dawson prepared to go, his mother asked him to be 
 sure to drop in and see Uncle Fred and Aunt Emma, also 
 eight or ten other friends and relatives who would be offended 
 if the returned "fortune hunter" failed to pay his respects. 
 
 "And you ought to go round and see Nell Courtright," 
 she added as an afterthought. Dawson paused at the door. 
 
 "That's a good idea," he said. "I think I will drop in for 
 a moment, and, besides, I'd like to say howdy to the judge."
 
 78 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 "She was here yesterday." 
 
 "Who Nell?" 
 
 His tone was one of intense interest. 
 
 "Yes; she came in to see me about some work in con- 
 nection with the church bazaar and " 
 
 "I didn't know you knew her very well she's been away 
 so much. Does she come to see you very often?" 
 
 "She's been to see me twice once just after you went 
 away and then yesterday about the bazaar." 
 
 Dawson nerved himself to make a casual inquiry. 
 
 "Did she have anything to say about loving son?" he 
 asked. 
 
 "Oh, no; she just came about the bazaar; but, of course, 
 I told her you were coming down to-day." 
 
 As Dawson walked down the street he was the storm 
 centre of a great many conflicting emotions. At one moment 
 he would allow himself the pleasure of an optimistic hope, 
 and at the next he would plunge himself into a sea of gloom. 
 
 "Mr. Dawson," he said, "you are seventeen kinds of a 
 chump. You are entitled to a medal of the Amalgamated 
 Order of Jays. What you want is to discharge a large cargo 
 of excess hope and face the cold, unrelenting facts of the case. 
 She is engaged, and you are in the discard. She doesn't care 
 a whoop whether you are here or are spending the week end in 
 Kamchatka. Now, just remember that !" 
 
 Fortified by this stern admonition he walked twice past
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 79 
 
 the gate of Judge Courtright's old-fashioned home the first 
 time without looking in and the second time with a sweeping 
 glance that might reveal the presence of one "Scads" Allcott if 
 such a person were there. 
 
 "This is childish!" he exclaimed in disgust. "What's 
 the harm of going boldly in, saying howdy to the judge, wish- 
 ing Nell prosperity and happiness, and then a graceful exit 
 in my best city style?" 
 
 When he had rung the bell he waited in dread lest the 
 family were out, and more dread lest they were in. But he 
 did not have to wait long. The door was suddenly flung open. 
 
 "Why, Charley Dawson! When did you come down? 
 Why, it's so nice to see you even if you will neglect your old 
 friends since you've gone away to the city." It was Nell. All 
 his urbane manner faded away and the old shyness returned, 
 together with the peculiar spell that he always felt when with 
 her. In hanging up his hat he dropped it and inwardly reviled 
 himself as a jay of purest ray serene. He could be perfectly 
 natural with anybody but her; all his awkwardness seemed to 
 leap forth and clamour for recognition whenever he was with 
 her. 
 
 "My, it's good to see you again, Nell!" he exclaimed, his 
 face glowing with a tumult of assorted emotions. He noticed 
 with regret that she was prettier and nicer than she had ever 
 been before. He had half hoped she would not be as attractive 
 as his dreams had made her.
 
 8o DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 "I couldn't go back without calling around to see you 
 and your father," he said. "My, but it's good to see you, 
 Nell; you're looking perfectly fine." 
 
 "I'm afraid you're trying to flatter me, Charley. I know 
 I must look a fright, for I haven't been feeling very well 
 lately nothing serious, just nerves, I guess. But never mind 
 about me. Tell me about yourself. What have you 
 been doing? Tell me all about Chicago and the things you've 
 been doing and the people you know. I suppose you've met 
 lots of nice girls by this time?" She paused. "Not engaged 
 yet, are you, Charley?" 
 
 He assured her in a strange, unnatural voice that he 
 was not. 
 
 "It won't be long," she continued, "you'll soon find some 
 nice girl up there, I'm sure." 
 
 "Where is 'Scads'?" said Dawson suddenly. "I expected 
 to find him here." 
 
 Her face lost the look of bantering merriment and her 
 lip trembled a little. 
 
 "Did you want to see him especially?" she asked. 
 
 "No, of course not " stammered Dawson. "Only " 
 
 "Well, suppose we don't speak of him, then."
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 Si 
 
 DAWSON ~'i i was mystified. As he sat with Nell Court- 
 right in the old library of her father's house his mind 
 was grappling with the problem that her words created. 
 Why had she asked him not to speak of "Scads," to whom she 
 was engaged? Was the subject one that she considered too 
 sacred? Or had she discovered, by some discerning instinct 
 peculiar to the feminine mind, that he cared for her and for 
 this reason she wished to spare him the pain of discussing a 
 subject that could afford him only wretchedness? One by 
 one he marshalled up the evidence in the case, hopefully nursing 
 the favourable signs and gloomily facing the ones that were not.
 
 82 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 Was "Scads" in town? If so, why was he not here? This 
 question haunted him. It flashed through his thoughts over and 
 over again, and yet he would not allow himself to ask aloud 
 the simple question that would settle it. She had asked him 
 to refrain from mentioning "Scads"; therefore he would re- 
 frain. If it was a subject too sacred for him, very well. "Scads" 
 could remain as sacred as he blame pleased, so far as he was 
 concerned. 
 
 In the contemplation of these distracting thoughts, so 
 fraught with grave importance, Dawson's conversation was no- 
 ticeably vague, so vague, in fact, that at last Nell turned to 
 him suddenly. They had been looking at an old kodak album. 
 
 "Charley," she said gravely, "I'm afraid these old kodaks 
 are boring you. You haven't been listening to a word I've 
 been saying. Now, have you ?" He began to remonstrate, but 
 she shook her head. 
 
 "No, you haven't. Your thoughts are some place else. 
 I know. You've grown away from the things that used to 
 interest you here. Your life in Chicago, where everything 
 is so big and life is so vivid, has changed you, though you 
 may not realise it. I'm perfectly sure, this very minute, that 
 you're wishing you were back there with your new friends 
 who " 
 
 "No, honestly, Nell, I'd rather be here than any place in 
 the " 
 
 " your new friends," she continued, "who are so much
 
 -FORTUNE HUNTER 83 
 
 more attractive than we old-fashioned country girls can ever 
 hope to be." 
 
 Dawson turned to her suddenly. In his honest eyes there 
 was a hungry look that warned her. It was a look in the depths 
 of which she saw his soul shining clearly, and it told her more 
 than a thousand burning words could ever tell. She became 
 panicky, and began nervously twisting and untwisting her hand- 
 kerchief. He was so fearfully in earnest. 
 
 "Nell, will you let me tell you something?" She hastily 
 arose. "I simply must before I go away. Please. Nell, just 
 this once. Then I'll go away and not bother you again." 
 
 He followed her to the window, where she had gone with 
 her handkerchief pressed to her lips. She was trembling. 
 
 "Listen, Nell. Do you remember when I left in June " 
 
 The gate clicked. Some one was coming. 
 
 "Is it 'Scads'?" he asked quickly. 
 
 "No, it's father." She dabbed at her eyes with the little 
 crumpled handkerchief, and then slowly turned to face him. 
 Her eyes were misty with a look that he had never seen there 
 before. Then a queer little smile quivered on her lips, like 
 a ray of sunshine that shines through the clouds, and she made 
 a brave attempt at levity. 
 
 "Didn't you say you had come to see father, Charley?" 
 
 Dawson assented, Imt his words were contradicted by the 
 disappointment in his looks. 
 
 The judge was cordial and friendly after the dignified
 
 84 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 manner of the old-school gentleman. For an instant Dawson 
 construed this as a favourable sign, but his second thought 
 told him that the judge would be cordial to any guest, no 
 matter whom, and that it didn't really mean anything of a com- 
 forting nature. The judge asked about Chicago, and was 
 politely interested in his young friend's welfare. The clock 
 struck. It was either half past 12 or i. Dawson hastily 
 prepared to go. He had no idea it was so late. 
 
 "Are you down for long?" the judge was asking. 
 
 "I must go back on the four o'clock train this afternoon, 
 sir," said Dawson, and then waited eagerly for a word that 
 might give him hope of coming in again before the train left. 
 He waited in vain. There was an awkward pause in which 
 Dawson was conscious of hearing the measured ticking of the 
 clock. 
 
 "Well, I guess this is 'good-bye,' Nell," he said, hardly 
 daring to trust his voice. 
 
 "Good-bye, Charley. Try to think of your country friends 
 once in awhile if you can." He looked at her in an injured 
 way, but the presence of the judge prevented any violent re- 
 monstrance to what he considered an unjust insinuation. 
 
 As Dawson descended the steps, his ears burning with hu- 
 miliation and wounded pride, the light had gone out of the 
 day for him. A hopeless feeling, like homesickness magnified a 
 thousand times, made him faint and weak. He v/as profoundly 
 depressed. She had not asked him to come again. That meant
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 85 
 
 only one thing, he mournfully reasoned. "Scads" was to be with 
 her that afternoon, and there would be no room for outsiders 
 to cumber up the place. 
 
 He was fifteen minutes late to the Thanksgiving dinner, 
 and, without the ghost of an appetite, he silently plodded 
 through the gorgeous feast, his mother's masterpiece. Many 
 times she looked at him and sighed, but, though her heart was 
 aching for him, she said nothing. 
 
 "Poor boy," she thought; "I'm afraid there's nothing that 
 I can do to help him." 
 
 At four o'clock Dawson started back to Chicago.
 
 86 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 IN the late evening of Thanksgiving Day, Dawson alighted 
 from the train that had brought him from his old home 
 back to his new one. He was in Chicago once more. The 
 noises of the station, the glare of lights, and the absence of a 
 friendly face among all the hurrying people about him made 
 him feel lonesomer than he had ever felt before in his life. 
 Not a soul in all these self-absorbed crowds knew him or cared 
 what became of him. The brilliant electric lights were cold and 
 impersonal and seemed to symbolise the heartless indifference
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 87 
 
 of the great city. They made Dawson feel so small and incon- 
 sequential. 
 
 "I'll never get used to this place if I live here a hundred 
 years," he thought. "I wonder if anybody ever gets to feel at 
 home here." 
 
 He ate his supper in a restaurant in the station and then 
 proceeded to his boarding-house. How different it seemed 
 to him now, and what a contrast it was to the home he had 
 just left! The place was so quiet! Everybody was out, and 
 when he reached his room he sank wearily in a chair and aban- 
 doned himself to tender melancholy. The trip to his home 
 and back had left him subdued in spirit, and, try as he would, 
 he could not throw off the dull ache that seemed to pervade 
 him like a physical illness. 
 
 He tried to analyse his emotions. Why was he feeling 
 so blue? His mother and father and Bud and Sis had been 
 everything that his hungry heart had craved. The old friends 
 who had greeted him in the streets of his home town had been 
 cordial and friendly and interested in his welfare. The weather 
 had been perfect. Why, then, should he feel so depressed and 
 friendless ? Was it Nell ? No, for she had been just as nice to 
 him as he could expect from a girl who was engaged to some 
 one else ; in fact, she had been far nicer than he had any reason 
 to expect. . . . Perhaps that was it! If she had been 
 less cordial in the warmth of her friendliness, he could have 
 consoled himself by the thought that she was not really as
 
 88 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 nice as he had always believed her to be. Yes, that was the 
 trouble. She had been too nice. She had made him realise 
 how much he was losing, how much he cared for her, and how 
 dark his future would be without the thought of her to brighten 
 it. Yes, that was it. That was what made him so wretched 
 and miserable. 
 
 For an hour he sat thinking. What was there now for 
 him to live for and to work for? Why not plunge into the gay 
 seductions of the city and seek forgetfulness in the pleasures 
 that it held and offered so freely? In the vivid excitement of 
 city gayety he would soon forget. And then, if he became a 
 wreck, she would always feel sorry and would blame herself. 
 He would be on her conscience, rendering her unhappy forever- 
 more. Her's would be the hand that had pushed him on his 
 downward course. "Poor Charley Dawson!" she would sigh; 
 "he might have been a successful man if it hadn't been for me. 
 It's all my fault that he threw himself away and went to the 
 dogs." 
 
 She would be remorseful and unhappy. That pleased Daw- 
 son in his present frame of mind. In his mind's eye he could 
 see her sitting out by the fire talking sadly to her father 
 But no I She wouldn't be with her father. She would be with 
 "Scads" ! She and "Scads" would be pitying him! 
 
 The thought electrified him! The mere thought of Nell 
 and "Scads" pitying him aroused him like a call to battle! 
 Would he allow "Scads" to pity him? Not much! He would
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 89 
 
 sail in and make a name for himself that would make them 
 sit up and take notice. Now was the time for him to show 
 that he wasn't a quitter, that he had the real stuff in him, and 
 that he was strong enough to overcome disappointment and ad- 
 versity. That was the test. He would make good if he had 
 to work his blamed head off. Adversity should be the spur 
 that would urge him on to future prosperity. He would show 
 that he wasn't weak and that he wasn't a quitter. Henceforth 
 the slogan should be "Excelsior," with Victory as his Goal. He 
 would forget Nell, and put her out of his mind forever. In 
 this militant mood he retired, and tossed himself to sleep. 
 
 That night he dreamed of her nearly the whole night long.
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DAWSON 'n faced the future with a resolute heart. Al- 
 though disappointed in love and with a hurt that seemed 
 beyond all hope of healing, he resolved not to parade his 
 misery in the face of an unsympathetic world. People should not 
 whisper, when they saw him stalking sombrely through life, that 
 he was nursing a great sorrow, due to an unrequited love affair 
 early in life. He knew enough to realise that the world loves 
 cheerfulness and shrinks from gloom, and although it often has 
 to face the latter, it prefers the former for steady company. 
 Therefore would he mask his dyspepsia of the soul under a
 
 DAWSON 'i iFORTUXE HUNTER 91 
 
 smiling face and greet the world in a sunny-hearted manner. 
 He would be brave! Dawson, the Brave Heart! He rather 
 liked the sound of it, and the more he thought of it the more 
 determined he was not to become a martyr to melancholy. 
 
 "To forget" that was now his battle cry. With work 
 and achievement would he woo forget fulness ; in them would he 
 find surcease of sorrow and tranquillity of mind. Henceforth 
 there should be no sentimental moonings to distract him, hence- 
 forth he would plunge into his work with a whole heart and a 
 singleness of purpose. Nothing should arise to divert him from 
 the course that he had laid out for himself to follow; no morbid 
 fancies should fog the long road that lay ahead, the road to 
 Honourable Success. Upon that road would he travel, swerving 
 neither to right nor left, ignoring the siren lure of quick suc- 
 cess, yet always pressing forward toward a certain definite goal, 
 conscious that success that is built slowly and carefully is more 
 lasting than that which comes in a single bound. The reason 
 some men fail, he thought, is because they work without a def- 
 inite ambition to guide them, and when a man doesn't aim at 
 something he very seldom hits it. Work with a definite pur- 
 pose! Therein lay his salvation. Work, the master which 
 sometimes may seem a cruelly exacting one, but which in the long 
 run confers the most satisfying rewards. Work ! The solvent 
 of all sorrows and the bestower of the most lasting happiness. 
 Dawson was fired with a great ambition. He felt a soaring 
 elation of spirit.
 
 92 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 Like a general who marshals up his columns and ponders 
 well the forces pitted against him, he formulated his plan of 
 battle. First of all, he reviewed his .own resources with cold 
 and unsparing precision. He knew that there were thousands of 
 young men in exactly his own position, and he knew that nine 
 hundred out of every thousand would never arrive. It was up 
 to him to decide whether he should be in the nine hundred that 
 fail or the one hundred that succeed. They all had an even 
 start. Therefore, why were some to fail and why were some to 
 succeed. He considered the subject critically. 
 
 First of all, he took an inventory of those qualities which 
 a man must have who succeeds. Health, honesty, industry, and 
 intelligence these were the cardinal virtues which successful 
 men of all ages had proclaimed as the fundamentals of success. 
 Of course, some men had succeeded without health, but this was 
 because they were by natural endowments exceptionally great or 
 exceptionally strong. Some had succeeded by dishonesty, but 
 that was only material success, and not the real kind. Some had 
 succeeded without industry, but that was accident, and some had 
 succeeded without much intelligence, but that was dogged de- 
 termination and aggressiveness. 
 
 Dawson felt that he had as fair a measure of the cardinal 
 elements of success as most young men. He had health, which 
 was the corner stone, and which must be preserved by all means 
 in his power. Without health he could not be industrious; 
 without a healthy body he could not retain a healthy mifid, and
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 93 
 
 without a healthy mind he could not hope to be honest or to use 
 to the greatest advantage what natural intelligence he had. 
 
 He also felt that he was of a naturally buoyant nature, due 
 perhaps to a healthy body therefore he should allow no excess 
 or indulgence to jaundice the one or weaken the other. He re- 
 solved not to drink at least not during the first ten years dur- 
 ing which he was to lay the foundations of his life and character. 
 He reflected that while many successful men drink, they had 
 succeeded in spite of it rather than because of it. No man that 
 he had ever heard of had succeeded because he drank. There- 
 fore as a cold-blooded business proposition he would not assume 
 a habit which is never a help and is very often a serious handi- 
 cap. While it might not hurt him, it certainly would not help 
 him, and he was now determining the things that would defi- 
 nitely help him. Let the other young men drink if they wished. 
 He would not presume to preach to them, for that was their own 
 lookout; yet he felt that by not drinking he stood a greater 
 chance of being in the one hundred who succeed rather than the 
 nine hundred who fail. As a hygienic and business measure he 
 resolved not to burden himself with a habit that he could get 
 along without, and if he couldn't get along without it he might 
 as well drop out of the race at once. It would be a confession 
 of lack of character and strength of purpose. Also, from the 
 economic standpoint, it was a habit that cost money that he 
 thought could be spent to much greater advantage for things 
 more essential to his advancement.
 
 94 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 As to the other two elements considered essential to suc- 
 cess honesty and industry Dawson felt that he was pretty 
 well equipped. He was certain that he would work his head 
 off in order to succeed. As to honesty, he was certain that 
 he was honest. 
 
 Dawson, however, had never yet encountered a really 
 strong temptation,
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 95 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: The Weather Man has certainly 
 been behaving something scandalous up here for a week 
 or two. I'm afraid his New Year's resolutions haven't 
 agreed with him. It's been as cold as the sheets in Aunt Em- 
 ma's spare bedroom, and if there's anything colder than that 
 I'd like to have Robert E. Peary try to prove it. That room 
 was the headquarters of Winter. There was more fresh air
 
 96 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 to the square foot in there than any place this side of latitude 
 86, and I shiver even now every time I accidentally think 
 of it. Whenever I slept there I used to sit up so late in the 
 warm sitting-room that they finally had to drive me up to bed, 
 and when I struck the icy sheets I would utter one agonised 
 yell, and then try to catch my breath for ten minutes while 
 I warmed up a little patch in the shape of a letter Z. Probably 
 that room is one of the reasons why I always think that the 
 old-fashioned winters used to be so much colder than the mod- 
 ern steam-heated ones. There's one compliment I can sincerely 
 pay to cold weather, though. It certainly makes you feel like 
 working, and consequently I have been doing some tall hustling 
 at the scene of my daily toil. So it's an ill Winter that works 
 no good. 
 
 I wish you knew some of the boys up here; I'm sure 
 you would like them very much. They are a lot of mighty 
 clean young fellows, and they have certainly been awfully good 
 to son Charley. A big firm like this is like a little world all 
 in itself, and the amount of office news and gossip that flies 
 around is amazing. If the manager has an attack of indiges- 
 tion, the whole office knows it and comments on it before 10 
 A. M. Most of the gossip is good-natured, but, of course, in 
 a big place like this, there is naturally more or less knocking 
 and intriguing, some from the chronic grouches, and some 
 from those who are constitutional trouble makers. I'm keeping 
 out of all this office politics, and am sticking to my knitting
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 97 
 
 as closely as I can. The work is tremendously interesting if you 
 want to make it so, and I'm trying to learn as much about the 
 business as I possibly can. I've read all the books in the office 
 library, and several that relate to our business and the markets 
 covered by our business which I got from the public library. 
 Even if it doesn't help very much, I figure that it can't hurt 
 any to be up on this end of the work. Some day some one 
 may want to know how many tons a year the Argentine Repub- 
 lic uses, or why German shippers are cutting into American 
 markets in China, and I'll be there with the information. 
 
 This last week there has been quite a little excitement in 
 the office. One of the young fellows, an awfully keen young 
 chap named Weller, was discharged on account of some irregu- 
 larities in his work. He was the requisition clerk, and had to 
 get bids from various firms for all the materials and supplies 
 used in the Chicago end of our concern. I don't know exactly 
 what the trouble was, because there are all sorts of stories float- 
 ing around. At any rate he was let out, and there are a lot 
 of the boys feverishly manoeuvring to get the job. Everybody 
 with a pull is sitting up nights burning the lamp of hope. I was 
 sorry to see young Weller go, because he was a popular fellow, 
 and a great mixer with the people around the office as well as 
 with the salesmen and solicitors that sell goods to our firm. 
 
 I now hear the dulcet notes of friend Morpheus calling, 
 and I have serious intentions of adjourning to the land of 
 dreams for a welcome sojourn of about eight hours.
 
 98 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 I hope this weather hasn't affected you, and that you are 
 feeling as well as 
 
 Your affectionate son, 
 
 CHARLEY.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 99 
 
 DEAR MOTHER: Things certainly are stirred up in the 
 office these days, and all on account of the vacancy in 
 the job of requisition clerk. Every fellow with a pull is 
 exerting his influence to beat the band, and the gossip and dis- 
 cussion that you hear in my stratum at the office is something 
 coslosterous, to say the least. The Presidential nominations 
 can't hold a candle to the excitement that rages about the va- 
 cant job in the great house of Morrill & Co. I'm expecting 
 to see torch-light processions marching through the office, with
 
 ioo DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 stump speakers standing on every desk. The favourite in the 
 race seems to be a young fellow named Ellwood. He's been 
 in the office for three years and is considered the brightest one 
 of the bunch of aspirants. The only thing against him is the 
 fact that about once every three months he gets slightly "lit up," 
 and sometimes shows up at the office looking rather frazzled 
 about the nerves. In spite of this he is clever and capable and 
 is considered a valuable man in the force. I'd like to see him 
 land the job, for probably the increased responsibility would 
 steady him down, and he'd cut out his occasional leaps from 
 the water wagon. He's really a very nice fellow. 
 
 Some of the boys think the place will go to a young chap 
 named Vosburg, a perfect wonder of efficiency in matters of 
 detail. He is not particularly popular because he is inclined 
 to be grouchy, and somewhat ill-tempered once in a while, but 
 we all have to admit his ability and thoroughness. He's straight 
 as a string, and a great student, but I can't help wishing he 
 didn't have these grouchy spells. Perhaps if he gets a boost 
 he will be more cheerful. Then there are two or three others 
 that seem to be considered in the running more or less, but 
 Ellwood and Vosburg undoubtedly have the inside track, ac- 
 cording to office gossip. The job pays thirty a week, and, of 
 course, it's a grand prize. 
 
 The weather up here has been causing much talk of a de- 
 rogatory nature and I am pleased to chronicle that I have added 
 a few words towards swelling the volume of talk. A lot of men
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 101 
 
 are out of work, and I shudder to think what their families 
 must be suffering these cold days. Last pay day I selected 
 three large able-bodied dollars from my salary, and ordered 
 them out to the relief of the suffering. Some place in this 
 great city those three valiant heroes are working hard, and while 
 they may not look so big as viewed from above, 
 they certainly look big as viewed from below. I know from 
 experience. 
 
 Last summer when I was trying to woo a smile from 
 Dame Fortune, I met face to face certain unforgettable mo- 
 ments when a dollar looked as big as the Ferris wheel, but that 
 was summer, and nature at least was kind, even if fortune was 
 not. I certainly can sympathise with anybody who is up against 
 it, especially during weather when you can't sleep in the 
 park. 
 
 Even in our boarding-house we have had one pretty sad 
 case in the last two weeks. One of the boarders, a young 
 lady who works downtown, got sick after the Christmas rush, 
 and some of the rest of us are contributing a little each week 
 to help her while she is laid up. She got only six a week, and 
 I guess it wasn't enough for carfare and food, and as she had 
 to have carfare, I fear she had to go light on her lunches. 
 She's picking up slowly and we're having a hard job trying to 
 keep her from starting back to work before she gets strong. 
 She's very nice, and they say she comes from down in the 
 country some place. I feel awfully sorry for her.
 
 102 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 Well, now yours truly must repair to the feathers. If I 
 catch cold I'll take care of it as you request. In the mean- 
 time, scatter my love lavishly around the old homestead, and 
 with loads of it to you, I am, 
 
 Yours affectionately, 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 The next day when Dawson ' 1 1 returned from luncheon 
 he found a telegram and a note on his desk. 
 
 The note was on Mr. Merrill's private stationery, but 
 Dawson opened the telegram first. "Can you meet me 4:30 
 train, Polk Street, this afternoon? N. C." Great Scott! It 
 was from Nell ! Half bewildered, he mechanically opened the 
 note. "Mr. Morrill wishes to see you at 4 130 this afternoon."
 
 DAVVSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 103 
 
 ~T\ AWSON ' 1 1 was face to face with a real crisis. When he 
 -^ read Nell Courtright's telegram asking him to meet her 
 on the 4.30 train, he was first amazed and then per- 
 plexed. What in the world could it mean? Why should she 
 telegraph him to meet her while "Scads" was in town? Was 
 it merely the friendly act of a girl acting upon the impulse 
 of the moment; or did the telegram indicate a serious situa- 
 tion in which she wished his advice or help? Well, he soon 
 should know, for the train would arrive at 4 130, and he would 
 be there to meet it. 
 
 Then he opened the formal note in which he was asked 
 to report to the head of the firm, Mr. Morrill, in the latter's 
 office at 4:30. For a moment the fact that the hours were
 
 io 4 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 the same did not strike him, but when it did, it struck him with 
 staggering force. He sank limply into his chair. 
 
 "Great guns!" he thought. "Here's a lovely complica- 
 tion. Both at 4 130, and I've simply got to report to the boss. 
 There are no two ways about that! If I sent word that I 
 couldn't see him because I had to meet a girl, it would be 
 all up with me. He'd probably think I was meeting girls 
 during office hours every day, and I'd never get a chance to 
 explain the exceptional nature of this particular case. No, I've 
 simply got to see him. It's his time, and he's paying me for 
 it, and he has the first call on it. But how about Nell ? What 
 will she think if I fail her in the first thing she has ever asked 
 me to do? She'll be sure to feel hurt and humiliated for having 
 exposed herself to my indifference and will certainly never give 
 me another chance to see her while she's in town. If I don't 
 meet her I won't even know where she's stopping." His brow 
 wrinkled in perplexity as he solemnly contemplated the note 
 and the telegram. 
 
 "What's the matter, Dawson? No bad news, I hope?" 
 It was Ellwood, the young fellow who was considered likely 
 to get the appointment as the new requisition clerk. Dawson 
 gloomily pointed to the two communications. As Ellwood 
 read the note from Mr. Morrill his lips tightened almost im- 
 perceptibly, as though an unwelcome thought had struck him. 
 Then he laughed pleasantly and slapped Dawson on the back. 
 
 "Don't let a little thing like that worry you. Tell the man-
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 105 
 
 ager you've got a splitting toothache and have to see the dentist. 
 The manager will square it with the boss, you can meet your 
 young kdy and see the hoss to-morrow morning." 
 
 Dawson looked up sharply at these words, and there was 
 something in his look that made Ellwood flush and hastily 
 continue in a different strain. 
 
 "Or, better still," he said, "don't beat about the bush, but 
 go straight to the boss, and tell him exactly the situation. He'll 
 advise you to meet the train because it may be an urgent 
 matter." 
 
 "No," said Dawson, "I'm afraid I can't do that. If I 
 were in the habit of seeing the boss frequently I shouldn't 
 hesitate to put it up to him squarely, but as this is only the 
 second time he's ever asked me to come in, I don't believe 
 he'd like it if I tried to beg off." 
 
 "Well," resumed Ellwood thoughtfully, "how about this? 
 Get a time-table and telegraph her on the train and explain 
 why you can't meet her. Ask her to wait at the station for a 
 half hour, and you can go there after your conference." 
 
 "I might telegraph her, but I couldn't be sure that the 
 telegram would reach her. And, of course, this would be 
 the one time of all times that it would slip up. Besides, I 
 don't like to ask her to wait at the station, for there may be 
 others who will also meet her. She has another friend up 
 here, and if he meets her she wouldn't be likely to keep him 
 sitting around the station waiting for some other man. Of
 
 io6 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 course, if I were sure no one else was to meet her, that plan 
 would be good, but then there would always be the uncertainty 
 of the telegram reaching her." He brightened up as a new 
 thought struck him. "How would it do to have some one else 
 meet her when she arrives? I could explain everything in a 
 note and ask her to let me know where I can see her this 
 evening. That's what I'll do. I'll send the telegram, and also 
 send some one to meet her. It will be perfectly easy to identify 
 her, for she'll be the prettiest girl on the train, fair hair, blue 
 eyes, black furs, medium height, with N. C. on her suitcase. 
 A messenger couldn't miss her." 
 
 "Well, good luck, Dawson. I hope it works out all right, 
 and that all ends happily. You can get one of the boys in 
 the mailing room to go to the train. Their work is prac- 
 tically over by four o'clock. 
 
 Dawson thanked him warmly, and at once set in motion 
 the machinery that was supposed to meet the crisis. He found 
 that the train was likely to arrive on time, as it usually did, ex- 
 cepting during heavy snow falls. So he sent a telegram, which 
 he hoped would catch the train at a certain station. Then he 
 got one of the mail clerks, and arranged for him to meet 
 the train and give a note to a certain young lady, fully de- 
 scribed in minute detail, and received an emphatic assurance 
 that it was as good as already done. 
 
 "You can depend upon me," said the mail clerk, holding 
 a prophetic finger in the air. Dawson noticed with some mis-
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 107 
 
 giving that the finger was yellow with cigarette smoke, and 
 that it shook nervously. 
 
 Lastly, Dawson overcame his pride sufficiently to call up 
 "Scads" Allcott at the latter's home. A cold, impersonal voice 
 told him that Mr. Allcott had not been there for two nights, 
 and that he probably was out of town. 
 
 "Probably with Nell," thought Dawson gloomily. "But 
 if so, why the telegram ? It's too much for me. I can't figure 
 it out." 
 
 At 4:29 Dawson presented himself to Mr. Merrill's secre- 
 tary, and his name was sent in to the august master of the 
 great house of Merrill & Co. A moment later a buzzer 
 sounded, and Dawson was directed into the holy of holies.
 
 io8 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 TX 7"HEN Dawson 'i i entered the private office of Mr.Mor- 
 ' * rill he was conscious of a sudden sense of depression. 
 Why did Mr. Morrill want to see him? For the first 
 time the thought struck him that perhaps the interview was not 
 to be a pleasant one; that perhaps his work had been unsatisfac- 
 tory, and that the great house of Morrill & Co. had decided to 
 worry along without him. The sense of depression became 
 a panic within him, and in the brief moment that he stood 
 waiting to be recognised he felt his hopes tottering, and saw 
 his bright air castles dissolving in sombre clouds. Mr. Mer- 
 rill's note had given no indication of the purpose of the inter- 
 view, and his back, as he bent over his desk, struck Dawson 
 as being ominously rigid. 
 
 Without looking up he motioned Dawson to a seat and
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 109 
 
 continued writing. Letter after letter was signed, deliberately 
 blotted, and very deliberately laid to one side. The silence be- 
 came oppressive, and the formal richness of the room grew more 
 formal and unfriendly. Each tick of the little clock on Mr. Mor- 
 rill's desk smote Dawson with uncomfortable misgivings. It was 
 now 4:40, and Nell had probably arrived, and was reading the 
 note which the clerk from the mailing room had taken to 
 the station. He tried to picture her face as she read it, 
 and hoped that it would reflect sympathetic understanding, 
 rather than wounded pride and disappointment. For a moment 
 the grim irony of the situation struck him. What a 
 tragedy it would be if he had missed meeting her merely to 
 keep an appointment with a boss who was going to discharge 
 him! 
 
 "Well, young man." Mr. Morrill had leaned far back in 
 his chair, and was teetering back and forth as he wiped his 
 glasses. An unmistakable twinkle was in his eye, and at the 
 sight of it Dawson's spirits shot up from the depths like a 
 rocket that leaps to the freedom of the heights above. His face 
 became radiant with sudden relief, and the change in expression 
 was so spectacularly abrupt that even Mr. Morrill noted it 
 with mild amazement and wondered at it. 
 
 "You seem to be in very good humour, young man better 
 than when you were last in here." 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "Let's see. Upon that last occasion, if I remember cor-
 
 no DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 rectly, you told me that I and my firm could go to thunder, 
 didn't you ?" 
 
 Dawson smiled a faint admission to the charge, noting in 
 the meantime that the "old man" was beaming amiably at 
 the recollection of the last interview. There was sunshine in 
 Dawson's heart. 
 
 "Now, Mr. Dawson, I suppose you are a busy man, so I 
 won't take much of your time. You naturally want to know 
 why I've called you in to see me. Very briefly, it's this: 
 There is a vacancy in the place of requisition clerk, and I've 
 decided to give you a chance at it." Dawson was amazed. 
 He hadn't dreamed that he was even being considered. Ell- 
 wood had seemed so sure of it, or, rather, the office was so sure 
 that Ellwood would get it. In spite of his exaltation of spirits, 
 he was conscious of sympathy for Ellwood, and regretted that 
 his own triumph must cost some one else unhappiness and dis- 
 appointment. 
 
 "Our last man," continued Mr. Morrill, "turned out badly. 
 He couldn't stand prosperity. We shall soon see how you will 
 stand it. The position you will have, like that of purchasing 
 agent, is one that offers certain temptations, and you will have 
 many opportunities to show whether you can resist these 
 attractive temptations. Salesmen and agents who wish to 
 sell supplies to the firm will try to make it worth while 
 to you to favour their own goods; you will be offered 
 courtesies in the form of theatre tickets and presents, all
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER in 
 
 of which are forms of bribery, and are meant as such. Every 
 cent a salesman spends on you will ultimately be paid by our 
 firm, either in higher prices paid for supplies or in the in- 
 feriority of supplies bought. If you accept these favours you will 
 have to reciprocate by giving orders for goods. This is a 
 form of bribery that is very common, but it is just as much 
 bribery as though you were given actual cash. The only dif- 
 ference is that it is slightly disguised in the form of Christmas 
 presents, or loans, or other convenient mediums. Now, it's up to 
 you, young man. You have the two courses to follow. Either 
 you will yield to these temptations, as our last man did, or 
 you will resist them. Your salary will be $30 a week, and I 
 hope you will make good. I merely wanted to let you know 
 what you will be up against, and let you work out your own 
 salvation." 
 
 Dawson was very serious during this speech. In a gen- 
 eral way he knew of the insidious methods which are used 
 to influence men in such positions as he was to occupy, and 
 he further knew that the difference between bribery of this 
 sort and friendly courtesy was very narrowly defined. Yet 
 he felt that he could differentiate between them, and he longed 
 for the test that should prove his ability to rise above all these 
 forms of bribery in disguise. He believed that he would be 
 strong enough to make his business success conform to his ideals, 
 and not suffer his ideals to conform to his business success. 
 
 "I'll do my best, Mr. Morrill, and I thank you ever so
 
 1 12 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 much for giving me the opportunity. I may fall down, but 
 it won't be because I haven't tried. You never know what 
 you can do till you try." Unconsciously Dawson had expressed 
 in words a phrase which he was destined to repeat often in 
 after life, and to which in a large measure he was to owe his 
 success. He never conceded that he couldn't do a thing before 
 he tried to do it. 
 
 When Dawson left the private office of Mr. Morrill it was 
 after five o'clock. His face was sobered by the serious respon- 
 sibilities ahead of him, and to Ellwood, who glanced sharply 
 at him as he passed, it revealed nothing conclusive. Dawson 
 might have been coming from a funeral, so serious was his 
 demeanor, and it was not until he approached his desk that his 
 face suddenly flamed with radiance. 
 
 There sat the mailing clerk, grinning and waving aloft a 
 letter. "It must be from Nell!" thought Dawson as he fairly 
 rushed forward to seize it. But the mailing clerk hastily with- 
 drew it behind his back, and was shaking an unsteady finger at 
 him. 
 
 "Promise me you'll not get sore," he said. 
 
 "Certainly not," answered Dawson. "Hurry up; give me 
 the note." The mailing clerk handed forth the note, and 
 then burst into a loud laugh. It was the note that Dawson 
 had written. It had not been delivered. 
 
 "What does this mean?" exclaimed Dawson impatiently. 
 
 "What does it mean?" answered the clerk, controlling
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 113 
 
 his mirth. "Why it means that Willie fell down on his job. 
 That's all it means. I was at the station five minutes before 
 train time, and they said the train was five minutes late. So 
 I thought I would have time to go across the street for a 
 minute, and when I came back the darned old train had come 
 in and the platform was empty. Not a girl in sight. Awful 
 sorry, old man ; but mistakes will happen, you know." 
 
 Dawson thanked him, and the clerk, grinning broadly 
 about him, weaved his way slowly toward the door. 
 
 "That's the type of man," thought Dawson bitterly, "who 
 never will amount to anything. If he falls down on a little 
 thing like that, he will fall down in everything else he tackles." 
 
 In the meantime, where in the world was Nell ?
 
 n 4 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 BEFORE Dawson 'n went to his room that night he 
 ' had exhausted every means in his power to find where 
 Nell Courtright had gone after her arrival in Chicago. 
 He telephoned "Scads" Allcott, but the same impersonal voice 
 informed him that Mr. Allcott had not yet returned, that he 
 was probably out of town, as he had taken a suitcase with 
 him. Dawson got a grain of comfort from this information, 
 for it was evident that "Scads" was not expecting Nell, or he 
 would be in town. Unless Dawson turned cold at the thought 
 unless he was with Nell, and had come to Chicago with 
 her. But if so, why should Nell have telegraphed Dawson 
 to meet her? Surely not to act as No, the idea was pre- 
 posterous that would be a crowning piece of cruelty which 
 neither Nell would tolerate nor "Scads" dare to ask. No, she
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 115 
 
 must have come alone, and furthermore, she did not expect to 
 see "Scads," or she wouldn't have telegraphed to him Dawson. 
 
 He telephoned to the hotels where, in an emergency, Nell 
 might have gone, but no guest of that name had been regis- 
 tered. 
 
 He also considered telegraphing, or even telephoning, to 
 Judge Courtright, but decided not to do so. It would be hard 
 to explain over the telephone how urgent were the reasons 
 why he had failed to meet Nell after she had telegraphed him 
 to meet her. The old judge was proud, and he would bitterly 
 resent what he might consider a slight to his daughter: or. if he 
 didn't resent it, he would probably say that if Miss Courtright 
 wished very much to see Mr. Dawson, she would probably 
 telephone him herself. No, he couldn't ask Judge Courtright 
 for her address. It was not that he was afraid of exposing 
 himself to humiliation he would gladly have exposed himself 
 to anything for her but he reflected that such a course was 
 unlikely to produce the result he wanted. 
 
 When he went to bed that night he tossed about for an 
 hour, racking his brain for some means of locating Nell at 
 once, and at last, unable to sleep and unwilling to try without 
 having done everything possible, he got up and wrote a letter 
 to her, addressed to her home with the request on the en- 
 velope that it be forwarded to her. He mailed it so that it 
 would catch the last collection, and then, feeling that he at least 
 had done something, he went to bed again.
 
 n6 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 When Dawson arrived at the office of Morrill & Co: the 
 following morning he was surprised to find that the news of 
 his promotion already had spread among the office force. 
 
 "We had it all 'doped' out that Ellwood or Vosburg 
 would get the job," said one of the boys, "but Vosburg's 
 chronic grouch was against him, and the fact that Ellwood 
 once in a while gets 'lit up' was just enough to turn the scales 
 against him." 
 
 By nine o'clock Dawson had been transferred to his new 
 quarters in a little fenced-off enclosure near the office of the 
 purchasing agent. By ten o'clock two salesmen had called, and 
 at eleven a pleasant, middle-aged man, well dressed, and with 
 good nature brimming over in his twinkling eyes, dropped in a 
 chair near Dawson's desk and presented his card. 
 
 "Well, my boy, I see you've got Weller's job, and I wish 
 you good luck in it. I think I can see that you're going 
 to make good." His manner was most friendly and cordial. 
 "From this little piece of literature," he said, pointing to his 
 card, "you will see that my name is James Garvin of the Titanic 
 Stationery Company. If you ever want to stock up on some 
 of the best stationery in the world, just remember I am the 
 party to order it from." 
 
 "Well, Mr. Garvin, I'm pretty new on the job," answered 
 Dawson, "but when we need any stationery, I'm sure yours will 
 get proper consideration." 
 
 "That's all I want, my boy. My goods will take care
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 117 
 
 of themselves in any competition. Only please remember the 
 name and address. Your house has not bought any paper from 
 us at least not for some time and I want to get our line 
 in here again." Mr. Garvin arose and shook hands, and was 
 just on the point of going when a note was laid on Dawson's 
 desk. Dawson stared at it electrified. His head swam! It 
 was in Nell's writing! He forgot Garvin, and the office, and 
 stationery in the tumult of excitement that overwhelmed him. 
 
 With trembling hands he opened the note, dreading the 
 possibility that it might be full of reproaches or else couched 
 in the formal terms that meant an end to all his hopes. 
 
 "Dear Charley: I was sorry you could not have met me 
 yesterday afternoon, but your telegram reached me on the 
 train, so I was not expecting you. I came up to see about 
 some costumes for the play that the Dramatic Club is giving for 
 charity in May somebody had to come, and so I volunteered, 
 thinking that I could arrange it all yesterday, and take the 
 evening train home. That is why I telegraphed you. I thought 
 perhaps you, being such a confirmed city man by this time, 
 could tell me where to go, and might perhaps help me a little 
 in seeing about the costumes. I know you must be very busy, 
 but if you have time, won't you please telephone me Edge- 
 water 9709 and give me the address of some good costumer? 
 I shall appreciate it so much. 
 
 "Sincerely your friend, 
 
 "NELL."
 
 n8 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 Not a word of reproach! Not a syllable of wounded 
 pride ! Dawson loved her more that minute than he ever had 
 before. A tremendous load was raised from him and his face 
 was radiant with relief and happiness. 
 
 Mr. Garvin had resumed his seat when the note arrived, 
 and narrowly watched Dawson's face as the latter read it. 
 He shrewdly surmised that it was a note from a girl, and fur- 
 thermore that it was from a girl in whom the new requisition 
 clerk had more than a passing interest. So he waited, and 
 when Dawson suddenly turned to him he was innocently in- 
 specting an art calendar hanging on the wall. 
 
 "Mr. Garvin, do you know of a good costumer here in 
 Chicago? A friend of mine wants to get some costumes for 
 an amateur play and wants the address of a good concern." 
 
 Mr. Garvin pondered a moment, then he slapped his knee 
 as a great thought struck him. 
 
 "I know the best one in town," he exclaimed, "and when 
 you get ready to go over, just telephone me and I'll go over 
 with you. My number's on the card there. And if I can't get 
 you a discount of 30 per cent, my name isn't Garvin. I'll save 
 you some money, my boy." 
 
 Dawson grasped his hand with impulsive gratitude, 
 thanked him warmly, and promised to telephone him just as 
 soon as he could arrange a suitable time for going. He then 
 turned to telephone Nell.
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 119 
 
 AT noon on the day after Dawson telephoned to Nell 
 Courtright, the shoppers in the waiting-room of a certain 
 large department store were aroused to sudden interest 
 by the arrival of a young man who rushed eagerly forward 
 to greet a young girl who evidently was expecting him. A 
 broad smile of amusement blossomed on every face, for the 
 frank joyousness of the young man's greeting, as well as the 
 embarrassed but happy light in the young girl's eyes, told a 
 story which every woman instinctively and sympathetically un- 
 derstood. For a moment the tide of commerce paused in its 
 mad rush, and then flowed on, carrying with it faces that were 
 brighter, and hearts that were softer because of the amusing
 
 120 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 little drama it had witnessed. Old ladies beamed amiably, 
 young ladies smiled knowingly and a little wistfully, while 
 hardened old business men grinned broadly and thus for a 
 brief moment the world was made more cheerful than it had 
 been before. 
 
 At last Dawson 'n had met Nell, and if his words were 
 only the conventional words of friendly greeting, his beaming 
 features spoke volumes which all who ran could read. 
 
 When Dawson and Nell left the waiting-room of the 
 department store it was half past twelve, and Dawson was 
 happier than he had ever been before. A sense of joyous 
 elation in being able to serve the one girl he liked more than 
 all the other seven hundred and fifty million girls in the world 
 put together was almost more happiness than he could stand. 
 The noonday throngs that crowded the sidewalks observed him 
 with interest, and knew that he was not the young lady's brother. 
 
 "We've got to hurry," Dawson explained, "because Mr. 
 Garvin is to meet us at the costumer's at half past twelve. He 
 says he'll be able to get you a big discount from the regular 
 price. You'll like him, Nell. It was a great piece of luck, 
 getting him interested." 
 
 "I think it's perfectly fine, Charley, saving us all that 
 money, and I know I'll like your friend very much." 
 
 "He's not exactly a friend, Nell, for I just met him yester-
 
 DAWSON 'i ^FORTUNE HUNTER 121 
 
 day; in fact, I met him for the first time only a few moments 
 before your note came. He was sitting by my desk at the 
 time, and after I read your note I asked him if he knew of any 
 good costuming concern where you could get your things for 
 the Dramatic Club. He volunteered to help us out." 
 
 "Well, anyway, I think it is awfully nice of him to go 
 to all this trouble for somebody he hardly knows. I'm begin- 
 ning to like Chicago better already. I thought everybody up 
 here was too busy with his own affairs to bother with anybody 
 else, and now I find that I've been doing them all an injustice. 
 I*m sure he must like you, Charley, or else why should he be 
 so nice to you ?" 
 
 Dawson was silent. For the time he began to ask him- 
 self questions which in his innocence had not before occurred 
 to him : Why was Mr. Garvin going to this trouble for him ? 
 Why was he doing favours for a man he hardly knew? 
 Dawson was struck by sudden illuminating misgivings. Was this 
 part of that great system of grand and petit graft that was 
 said to honeycomb the commercial world? Was it the first 
 move of a man who wished to put him under obligations in 
 the hope that the favours would be returned, not by Dawson 
 in his private capacity, but by Dawson, requisition clerk, who 
 had it in his power to order big supplies of stationery which 
 Mr. Garvin had to sell? Was this that bribery in disguise 
 which he, Dawson, had so firmly resolved to resist and which 
 now appeared in such an innocent and friendly guise? Was it
 
 122 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 the entering wedge by which Mr. Garvin was to test Dawson's 
 integrity, to see whether he could be "reached" ? 
 
 The more Dawson thought of it, the more convinced he 
 became that Mr. Garvin's motives were not entirely unselfish, 
 and as this conviction grew he resolved with more deter- 
 mination than ever not to lower his fixed standards of business 
 ethics. No, he would not accept favours in private which 
 might obligate him to return them in his official capacity. 
 
 Dawson was so absorbed in this new and unexpected line 
 of thought that Nell looked anxiously at him and asked him 
 why he was so silent. 
 
 "I've just thought of something, Nell, that hadn't struck 
 me before. I've decided that we mustn't accept any favours 
 from Mr. Garvin. I'll tell you all about it afterwards; there 
 isn't time now, for here we are." 
 
 A couple of minutes later they entered the costumer's, and 
 were met by Mr. Garvin, the soul of good humour and friend- 
 liness, and by him were introduced to the proprietor of the shop.
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 123 
 
 DAWSON 'i i found himself in a most uncomfortable posi- 
 tion. He didn't wish to offend Mr. Garvin, salesman of 
 the Titanic Stationery Company, and at the same time he 
 was determined not to accept special favours in his private 
 capacity which he might be expected to return in his official 
 position as requisition clerk of Morrill & Co. Of that he was 
 certain, but he was far from certain whether Mr. Garvin, 
 in wishing to serve him, was actuated by simple kindness, rather
 
 i2 4 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 than a calculating design to place him under embarrassing 
 obligations. If the former were true, it seemed unfair to 
 repel Mr. Garvin's courtesy with suspicion and distrust. By 
 doing so he would be placing himself in a "holier than thou" 
 attitude, which would be absurdly narrow and prudish, as well 
 as unjust to a man who was acting only in a genuinely unselfish 
 spirit. The line between a friendly service and a calculating 
 service at all times is hard to define, but the more Dawson 
 analysed the present circumstances the more convinced he was 
 that he could not reasonably expect Mr. Garvin to be wholly 
 unselfish, in view of their very short acquaintance. So, when 
 the first opportunity offered, Dawson told him not to ask the 
 costumer for a special rate on the costumes that Nell Courtright 
 was getting for her dramatic club entertainment 
 
 Garvin looked at him in surprise. 
 
 "Why, what's the matter?" he asked. 
 
 "Well, to put it plainly, Mr. Garvin, there are certain 
 reasons why I'd prefer not to be under obligations which I 
 might never be able to repay." 
 
 Garvin shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "Well, of course, if you feel that way about it, all right," 
 he said slowly. "I was only trying to do you a simple kind- 
 ness. You asked me if I knew a good costumer, and I 
 saw a chance of doing you a little service, that's all. If I've 
 butted in, I'm sorry; but I meant all right." 
 
 Dawson flushed with humiliation. He felt mean and small,
 
 DAWSON f 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 125 
 
 and his attitude in having repulsed the generous courtesy of 
 a well-meaning acquaintance seemed petty and prudish be- 
 yond words. He saw himself in the light of a self-assumed 
 sanctity that made him look ridiculous and hateful, for of all 
 types he detested most, the sanctimonious was the one. Yet 
 something far within him told him that he was right, and 
 that, no matter how hard it would be for him to live up to his 
 principles, he stubbornly would stick to them, regardless of 
 consequences. If he appeared quixotic or prudish, all right. 
 They were his principles, and he was resolved to stand by them. 
 
 Garvin was watching him, as though expecting a reaction, 
 but it failed to come, and he was surprised. Usually the re- 
 action came quickly, for it is hard for abstract moral prin- 
 ciples to withstand such an appealing human quality as friend- 
 liness. He decided that Dawson was a moral crank, well mean- 
 ing but narrow, who was trying to apply antiquated Sunday 
 School ethics to the cut-throat world of business. 
 
 "Mr. Garvin, I mink I know what you are thinking about 
 me, and perhaps, from your point of view, you are right; and 
 I suppose you know perfectly well why I don't want to be under 
 obligations to you." 
 
 "Perfectly well," assented Garvin, smiling grimly. "You 
 think I am trying to get 'next' to you, now that you are in a 
 position to be of use to me over at Merrill's. Well, I'll ad- 
 mit that that angle had occurred to me. It's part of the game, 
 my boy, and some day you'll have to recognise and accept it.
 
 126 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 In tfie meantime," he continued, starting to go, "if I can ever 
 do you a favour that you're willing to accept, just let me know." 
 
 "Wait a minute, Mr. Garvin. You can do me a favour 
 now. I wish you would take lunch with Miss Courtright and 
 me." 
 
 Garvin laughed good naturedly. 
 
 "All right, my boy. My feelings are not hurt in the least. 
 We will study each other as business curiosities." 
 
 A few minutes later the three were seated in a restaurant 
 and Dawson and Garvin were launched in a discussion of busi- 
 ness ethics, each defending views that were widely variant.
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 127 
 
 AS they sat at the luncheon table Dawson and Garvin dis- 
 cussed the subject of business morals, each from his own 
 point of view, while Nell sat by, an interested listener. 
 Dawson argued from the standpoint of one who is 
 strong in the idealism of youth, when honour and self-respect are 
 more important than material success; Garvin argued from the 
 standpoint of one who has been in the game so long and has 
 suffered the hard knocks of life so much that material success 
 is all important. With him the end "justified the means." The
 
 128 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 important thing was to "make good," and he felt certain that 
 the world wasn't very particular about the small details of how 
 he made good. 
 
 "Now, you're just getting in the game, Mr. Dawson," he 
 said, "and I've been in it for twenty-five years. You come 
 up here with certain ideals which you are trying to apply to 
 modern business life. Isn't that so?" 
 
 "Well, so far as I am concerned, it's so. I'm trying to 
 apply certain standards to my own business life. I'm not trying 
 to reform anybody else." 
 
 "Well, I want to tell you right now that you'll find it 
 mighty hard to live up to those ideals if you expect to get any- 
 where. If everybody was honest it would be easy, but everybody 
 isn't." Garvin was very much in earnest. "You have to fight 
 fire with fire. You have to do business with men who are willing 
 to do anything providing they get what they are after. They 
 will use any method to 'do' you, and it's impossible to compete 
 with them unless you adopt those methods yourself. Take 
 rebating, for instance. What chance would you have against 
 a competitor who was willing to take secret rebates? Not a 
 chance in the world. How many of the rich men of to-day have 
 made their fortunes by adhering to ideals? Mighty few, let 
 me tell you, yet now they are honoured and respected, while the 
 men who tried to fight them with high ideals are gone and 
 forgotten." 
 
 Dawson couldn't help smiling. This argument was such
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 129 
 
 an old one, and the one that every dishonest man in the country 
 was using to justify and extenuate his own moral obliquity. 
 
 "Times are changing," said Dawson. "The country is 
 waking up to the necessity of raising business standards. The 
 old style methods of doing business are going out, and people 
 won't stand for crookedness the way they used to. You can 
 feel it in the air, in business as well as politics." 
 
 Mr. Garvin evidently had not felt it ; at any rate, he didn't 
 seem convinced. Twenty-five years of easy tolerance in business 
 methods had made him conservative in adapting himself to a 
 new and more rigid standard of business ethics. Any demand 
 for a change from the old order of things was, in his mind, an 
 effort to unsettle business and destroy confidence. If Mr. Garvin 
 felt anything it was that he must defend his point of view. 
 
 "Take myself, for instance," he argued. "Now, I'm a 
 salesman for a stationery company. How long do you think 
 I'd hold my job if I didn't bring in business, and how long 
 would I bring in business if I didn't go after it just as hard 
 as any of my competitors? My firm doesn't ask how I get 
 the business. The main thing with them is that I get it." 
 
 "But you can get it on the square, can't you?" asked 
 Dawson. "If your goods are all right, what more is neces- 
 sary?" 
 
 "The quality of your goods isn't always the thing that 
 sells them. A salesman has to establish friendly relations with 
 buyers. He's got to spend money. Now, my firm allows me
 
 i 3 o DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 a certain amount of spending money, and I am supposed to use 
 it where it will do the most good. If I give a little present or 
 a little commission to a purchasing agent, no questions are asked 
 providing I get the order. People don't like to do business with 
 a tightwad, and it's a universal element in human nature that 
 people like to get something for nothing." 
 
 "But they don't get it for nothing," exclaimed Dawson. 
 "All this money is paid by the customer in the long run, isn't it? 
 He may not know it, but sooner or later he has to put up 
 for it." 
 
 Mr. Garvin grinned amiably. 
 
 "Sure," he said, "but what if he does? He takes it out 
 of the next man and so evens up in the end." 
 
 "And the next man is always some poor fellow who can't 
 afford it, isn't he?" 
 
 "Well, that's his fault. If he was in position he would 
 probably soak us just as hard." Mr. Garvin laughed quite 
 audibly. 
 
 "Look out, then, Mr. Garvin, for he's waking up, and I 
 think he's getting ready to soak you." 
 
 "All right, my boy." He looked at his watch. "I must 
 be going now, but in the meantime, my young friend, I wouldn't 
 try to reform the. business methods of the day. Take the good 
 things as they come along, and when you make your pile you 
 can begin your reforming." 
 
 "Thanks, Mr. Garvin," said Dawson. "I'll stick to my
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 131 
 
 code and you stick to yours, if you want to, and we'll see how 
 it works out." 
 
 As they left the restaurant Dawson felt the soft pressure 
 of a hand on his arm, and looked down to see Nell's face shining 
 with pride and approval. A moment later they were on the 
 street, and in the crowd he saw "Scads" Allcott hurrying along 
 with a young woman. They looked as though they were quar- 
 relling. Dawson did not speak of it, but he wondered if Nell 
 had seen.
 
 132 
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 X TELL COURTRIGHT'S little visit to Chicago came to an 
 * ^ end and Dawson saw her safely on board her train. As the 
 tram pulled out he stood on the platform until it had dis- 
 appeared from view, and then slowly turned to face the vast lone- 
 liness of life without her. All the sunshine and music in his soul 
 were gone, and he realised as he never had before how much she 
 meant to him. When he thought of her he was conscious of a 
 feeling like that of being swiftly dropped in an elevator, a faint, 
 gone sensation, which he recognised as love in its most unmis- 
 takable form. He had felt it before In incipient stages, but
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 133 
 
 never like this. It was now like a severe and prolonged attack 
 of stomach ache without the pain. 
 
 "I guess I've got it bad," he thought. "There's no dis- 
 guising that fact. There's nobody in the world like her." 
 
 That night he wrote her a long letter about nothing in 
 particular, but which was meant to express the hope that she had 
 arrived home safely. After it was mailed he became panic 
 stricken. Why had he written ? What possible excuse was there 
 for such a long and idiotic letter? But when, two days later, a 
 very cordial answer came he blessed the impulse that had led 
 him to write. He read her letter over and over again, searching 
 for something that might give him an excuse for writing again, 
 and he finally found one which seemed sufficient. "The trip 
 was uneventful, but oh, why must they keep the cars so close 
 and hot?" she had written, and he answered it at length, telling 
 her why. 
 
 This was the beginning of a correspondence that furnished 
 him two very bright spots each week, one that came with the 
 joy of writing to her and the other that came with the arrival 
 of a letter from her. The name of "Scads" Allcott had never 
 been mentioned by either of them, and Dawson was sure that 
 "Scads" had ceased to be an element of active concern in her 
 life. Consequently Dawson was happy. 
 
 Winter melted into spring, and the trees and shrubs were 
 dappled with tender green. Everywhere nature was stirring. 
 Street pianos were throbbing, birds were singing, and the shrill
 
 i 3 4 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 cries of children resounded from every vacant lot. "It's grand 
 to be alive," thought I5awson, "but oh, how I'd like to be down 
 home these days!" In his mind's eye he could see the radiant 
 transformation of his little home town from the grey winter 
 shabbiness to its fresh spring loveliness. The blossoms and 
 leaves were so much farther along down there, he knew. He 
 could hear the sound of hammering and sawing and carpet 
 beating that always signalises the coming of spring in a small 
 town, and he knew that every barnyard was simmering to the 
 sunny music of clucking hens and peeping little chicks. Calves, 
 and colts, and puppies, and kittens would soon be contributing 
 to the joyousness of life in the country, and Dawson was filled 
 with the vague yearnings and restlessness of spring fever. 
 
 "I'll go down for commencement," he vowed, "if I have to 
 walk, wade, and swim. And if she'll have me I'll take the fatal 
 leap." It was a pleasing thought, and he fairly trod the air 
 as he made his way along the familiar walks in the park. How 
 well he remembered these benches and trees! He shuddered 
 to think of those days of discouragement when he was trying 
 so vainly to get a position. How unhappy and wretched he 
 had been ! 
 
 Unconsciously his steps led him to a bench where upon 
 more than one occasion he had slept through the choking hot 
 nights of last summer. As he approached it he saw a young 
 man sitting where so often he himself had sat. The young man 
 was well dressed, but he was leaning over, staring at the ground,
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 135 
 
 a picture of dejection, strangely out of keeping with all die fresh 
 spring beauty of his surroundings. 
 
 Dawson sat down beside him and put his hand on his 
 shoulder. 
 
 "Hello, 'Scads, 1 " he said. "What's the trouble? 1
 
 136 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 " QCADS" ALLCOTT was the picture of despair as he sat 
 O with Dawson on the bench in the park. 
 
 "Charley," said he wearily, "I'm up against it good 
 and plenty. Little 'Scads' has had his whirl, and it's come up a 
 double o. Luck is against me, and I'm all in. Me for the 
 discard." 
 
 Dawson started to speak, but "Scads" impatiently waved 
 his hand. 
 
 "Don't start on the advice, Charley. I know what you're 
 going to say. I know it's all my own fault. I don't need any-
 
 DAWSON ' 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 137 
 
 body to tefl me that. I got; a running start in the wrong direc- 
 tion, and the harder I tried to catch even the worse off I was. 
 That's afl there is to it." 
 
 "I wasn't going to give you any advice, "Scads,* "* said 
 Dawson. "I only wanted to know exactly how you stand, and 
 what the trouble is, If I can help you, 111 do it." 
 
 "Thanks. That's mighty decent of TOOL,, especially as we 
 haven t been vtfii chummy lately, for one reason or another. 
 Bat that hasn't been your fault. The long and the short of 
 the matter is that I've been a fooL I'm only getting what's 
 iMMig to me, and I don't suppose I ought to holler. Bat, 
 believe me, little "Scads* has learned a lesson or two. and that's 
 
 --, :::." 
 
 "Fire away, "Scads.' Tefl me what the trouble is."" 
 "Scads" lighted a cigarette, inhaled deeply once or twice, 
 and then nervously iecked the ashes off. Then he began speak- 
 ing dispassionately, but with an apparent effort. 
 
 "You know how I was fixed when I came up here last 
 summer to get a job. WeD, we both started even, with the 
 exception that my old man kept me well supplied with coin, 
 and I didn't have to get a job to keep from starving. I guess 
 that was the main trouble. If he'd given me less it would have 
 been better for me. However, that's neither here nor there. 
 I had it, and I wanted to get action on it. The bright lights 
 beckoned, and I was right there with the exact change in my 
 I thought Fd have my fun while I was young, while I
 
 138 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 could enjoy it. Well, I've had it," he added bitterly, "and 
 take it from me, that's no way to get a start in business." 
 
 "Scads" relapsed into gloomy reflection. 
 
 "It seems as though Fate just sat back and let me have 
 all the rope I wanted, knowing that there would be a grim 
 reckoning one of these days. There's something funny about 
 money, Charley especially easy money. It's mighty hard to 
 get along with. You've got to treat it just right or you'll get 
 the worst of it. I suppose it's what they call the law of com- 
 pensation, as the 'prof.' used to say. Fortune gives some of us 
 money, and the money gets us into trouble; other people, who 
 have none, have their troubles getting money. So it's an even 
 break." 
 
 "You're not broke now, are you, 'Scads' ?" asked Dawson 
 quickly. "Because, if you are " 
 
 "Charley, believe me or not, but it's a fact. I'm busted 
 flatter than the traditional pancake." "Scads" smiled grimly. 
 "The 'paternal purse' is closed at last. I went to it just once 
 too often. The governor came up last week, not having heard 
 from loving son for a month or so, and we had a regular third 
 act finale. It was thrilling. Hard-hearted father, spendthrift 
 son. He finally relented, but he warned me that it was the last 
 time. No more money from him." 
 
 "Well, haven't you got any of that left?" asked Dawson. 
 
 "Scads" smiled again. 
 
 "I tried to break Wall Street and failed. J. Pierpont never
 
 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 139 
 
 will know what a close call he had. If I'd won, I'd been called 
 a clever young man ; having lost, I am a sucker. You always 
 lose at that game if you can't afford to lose. Anyway, here 
 I am, busted flat, snarled up with a fairy, and I've simply got to 
 get out of town. Cheerful prospect, eh?" 
 
 "Of course, I'll help you, 'Scads' at least as far as I can 
 go. Let's go over and have a bite to eat some place and tackle 
 the problem from all angles." 
 
 So together they left the park and presently were seated 
 in a neighbouring restaurant.
 
 140 
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 "T\EAR MOTHER: I had dinner with Scads Allcott the 
 **^ other evening, and I'm afraid that Scads is away down 
 on his luck. He was very blue, and very bitter against 
 the luck he's been having. He says his father has refused to 
 give him any more money, so I guess it's a pretty serious 
 case. He was nervous and unstrung and was anxious to 
 get out of town to go some place where he could get a 
 fresh start. "I'm going to cut out all the fooKsh busi-
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 141 
 
 ness," he said, "and try to make something of myself. I've 
 got to get away from the bunch IVe been training with and 
 make a fresh start. I want to rest up some place for a 
 little while, for Fm all shot to pieces then a dean slate and 
 a new deaL" I felt sorry for him. We had a long talk, and 
 when I suggested that he go down home, he said he'd never 
 go home until he had made good. He'd be ashamed to show his 
 face down there under the present circumstances. I let him 
 have some money enough to get him out West, where he swore 
 he'd make good on his own resources or starve. And I'm 
 inclined to think that he will make good if he gets down to brass 
 tacks. The trouble with Scads is that things came too easy 
 for him and he never had to exert himself. He felt that when- 
 ever he wanted money his father would thaw out, so what was 
 the use of working. I wished him good luck and he said he 
 would drop me a line in a few days from out West. I haven't 
 heard from him yet, so I guess he must have gone clear to the 
 coast. 
 
 Please don't breathe a word of this to any one, especially 
 about his condition, or that I let him have any money. There's 
 no use in making it any worse for him. 
 
 I'm planning to come down to commencement, so please 
 invite one of your nicest fried chickens to assist on die reception 
 committee. Things are fine up here and I'm getting along 
 scrumptiously in my new work. At least nobody has kicked,
 
 142 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 so I hope all is well. Love to everything and everybody, with 
 an extra helping for you. 
 
 Your affectionate son, 
 
 CHARLEY. 
 
 After Dawson had mailed this letter, he settled down 
 in the comfortable clasp of the arms of a rocking chair and 
 idly looked over the weekly paper from home. In this way he 
 kept in touch with all the doings of his old neighbours. Among 
 the personal items was one that galvanised him into rigid at- 
 tention. 
 
 "Mr. Scadsworth Allcott of Chicago is visiting his par- 
 ents, Mr. and Mrs. Abner Allcott. 'Scads,' as his friends call 
 him, is now a prosperous business man of the big city. He 
 will remain here for some time to convalesce from a severe 
 attack of the grip. The wiseacres attach a more sentimental 
 significance to his visit" 
 
 When Dawson read this, he saw in his mind's eye the 
 streets of his old town, the arches of green trees, the lilacs 
 in bloom, and all the fresh loveliness of spring in the air. He 
 was stricken with an indefinable attack of the "blues."
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DAWSON had been looking forward with more eagerness 
 and concern than he dared admit even to himself, to the 
 day when his weekly letter from Nell was to arrive. The 
 day came and passed with no letter, but the day following 
 brought a postcard from her. 
 
 "Nearly distracted with amateur entertainment. I now 
 know what it means to be busy, and can sympathise with you 
 poor hard-working men in Chicago. 
 
 "N. C" 
 
 That was all. Dawson read and reread it in the hope 
 that he might construe the words to mean more than they 
 expressed on the surface, but even by a most liberal interpreta- 
 tion he could not distort them into anything sufficiently personal
 
 i 4 4 DAWSON 'n FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 to give him the slightest grain of comfort. He was worried 
 and apprehensive. He wondered if the presence of "Scads" 
 Allcott was responsible for this new note of chilling brevity in 
 her correspondence. It was the first postcard she had written 
 him, and it was the first week that had failed to bring him a 
 cheerful letter of generous proportions. All the energy of an 
 alert imagination was busy conjuring up gloomy pictures, and the 
 pictures persisted in coming no matter how hard he struggled 
 to overcome them with reassuring reflections. "Perhaps she 
 is so terribly busy that she couldn't write a real letter," he ar- 
 gued hopefully, but hot upon the heels of this thought came 
 the grim fact that the first week she had failed to write him a 
 letter was the week that "Scads" was there. 
 
 "I must be fair," he reasoned. "It isn't right to dis- 
 trust a girl who has been as nice to me as she has been." 
 And hot on the heels of this argument came the grim fact 
 that he had never proposed to her and that "Scads" had ac- 
 tually been engaged to her. She was under no obligations to 
 be true to one who had never asked her to marry him, or who 
 had never even told her he loved her. The man who 
 wins a girl is the one who proposes, not the one who doesn't 
 propose. The intentions of the latter may be most excellent, 
 but something more is required to effect an engagement. 
 
 Dawson's frame of mind, which was fast becoming less 
 and less cheerful, was further depressed when he read in the 
 home paper that "Mr. 'Scads' Allcott, who is here for a. visit,
 
 DAWSON 'i i FORTUNE HUNTER 145 
 
 has consented to take part in the forthcoming dramatic enter- 
 tainment to be given for the Samaritan hospital." 
 
 This brief notice was the straw that reduced Dawson to 
 black despair. 
 
 "What license have I to think of winning a girl like Nell 
 Courtright? What chance have I against the son of old Abner 
 Allcott? 'Scads' some day will be worth a half a million, while 
 if I keep on saving ten dollars a week I'll have a hundred 
 thousand dollars in just two hundred years, if my health doesn't 
 break down in the meantime. It means a good deal to a girl 
 to be Mrs. Scadsworth Allcott at least it sounds a lot better 
 in the newspaper down home than to be Mrs. Charles Dawson, 
 wife of a $3<>a-week slave in Chicago. As. Mrs. Allcott, she 
 will have her costume described and ride up in a limousine car; 
 as Mrs. Dawson, she will arrive in a street car. No, it's money 
 that counts nowadays. It doesn't make any difference what 
 the man is, provided his name is a big one and the account of 
 the wedding sounds brilliant. A man's got to have money." 
 
 In this rebellious and gloomy mood he started for a furious 
 walk through the park. 
 
 It was Sunday, and a genial May sun had brought thou- 
 sands of people out to enjoy the fresh spring loveliness of the 
 trees and the flowers. The day was fairly singing with happi- 
 ness. Upon all sides there were cheerful and smiling faces. 
 Nature was purring, and all the world seemed to have put on 
 its most joyous air in honour of the day.
 
 146 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 As Dawson sat on the stone coping of the esplanade, he 
 noted with a dull sense of resentment that humanity had paired 
 off in happy couples. Every young man was side by side with 
 a girl. It was the spirit of spring in its happiest manifestation. 
 To Dawson it seemed that he alone was out of harmony with 
 the picture. 
 
 A pleasant voice brought him out of his somber thoughts, 
 and he looked up to see Sewell, the man who had tried to 
 bribe him to reveal the bids of Morrill & Co. on a big contract. 
 
 "Hello, Dawson," said Sewell. "What's the matter? 
 Aren't your high ideals agreeing with you?" 
 
 Sewell had arrived at the moment when those ideals of 
 honesty were sorely beset as they never had been before. If 
 there ever was a time when the possession of money seemed 
 of vast importance, this was the moment.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 147 
 
 TT7HEN Sewell spoke to Dawson he waited a moment to 
 * see whether his friendly advances would be repelled, and 
 when they were not he sat down on the stone coping 
 beside the disconsolate young man. 
 
 "What's the matter, Dawson? Business, girl, or health? 
 Or just spring fever?" 
 
 "Mostly spring fever, I guess," answered Dawson, smiling 
 dryly. "Spring fever with sentimental complications." 
 
 "So? An affair of the heart, eh? Well, this is the season 
 for such attacks. 'In the spring a young man's fancy/ you 
 know." 
 
 Dawson said nothing, but in his heart he felt vaguely 
 resentful of things in general. Here was Sewell, well dressed,
 
 148 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 prosperous looking, apparently at peace with the world, and 
 yet with a low code of business morals. The memory of their 
 last interview was fresh in his mind, and he recalled how Sewell 
 had attempted to establish a working alliance with him in order 
 to profit at the expense of their respective employers, the rival 
 firms of Dodge & Co. and Morrill & Co. And here was he, 
 Dawson, who had clung to his high ideals, and who now was 
 in the slough of despond because a rival, with no advantages, 
 save the possession of a rich father and a prominent name, 
 supposedly had supplanted him in the affections of a girl. He 
 felt a compunction against discussing an affair of this kind 
 with Sewell, but the desire to talk of it was strong. Sewell's 
 attitude was one of friendly concern and sympathy. 
 
 "How does it happen, Sewell, that you, who make no 
 bones about doing underhanded work for Dodge & Co., are 
 cheerful and good-humored, while I, who won't stand for any- 
 thing that isn't on the square, am just at present somewhat 
 down on my luck? It doesn't seem quite appropriate, does 
 it?" 
 
 Sewell smiled indulgently. He seemed to take no offense 
 at the frank words of the younger man. 
 
 "Well, Dawson, there are a lot of things that you've got 
 to learn before you get along much farther. High ideals are 
 all right I won't quarrel with you on that score but high 
 ideals and business don't always go together. You've got to 
 strike a working average between them. Now, I suppose, you
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 149 
 
 know that I wouldn't steal a cent under any circumstances. 
 I'd rather have my hand cut off. But when it comes to using 
 my brain and my opportunities in other directions I don't allow 
 any grand and lofty scruples to interfere. You can't adjust high 
 ideals with cut-throat business methods, such as exist to-day. 
 For instance, take the successful business men of to-day the 
 big millionaires ; how many of them would be willing to make 
 a clean breast of the methods they used to get their fortunes? 
 Not many, believe me, yours truly. I know." 
 
 Dawson said nothing, and Seweil continued : 
 
 "There are two kinds of honesty business and private. 
 I think I am square in a personal and private way, but when 
 it comes to business I merely do what successful men in the 
 past have done. I use my opportunities, and, in a way, I be- 
 lieve that the end justifies the means. After a man makes a 
 great fortune, people don't concern themselves about the way he 
 made it. The mere fact that he has it is as far as they look. 
 He becomes a philanthropist and a prominent citizen. His name 
 is on all the reception committees when some eminent visitor is 
 to be entertained. Isn't that a fact?" 
 
 Dawson nodded. 
 
 "I suppose there is a good deal of truth in what you say, 
 Seweil, but I've also observed that in the last few years the 
 public is not quite so much dazzled by big names. A lot of 
 prominent millionaires have been getting into trouble. Their 
 unscrupulous but financially successful methods are bobbing up
 
 150 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 to plague them. People don't ask, 'Has he got it?' but 'How 
 did he get it?' They won't stand for crookedness the way 
 they used to. You ,can feel it in the air." 
 
 Sewell smiled in a tolerant way. 
 
 "A few get into hot water, perhaps, but think of the 
 ones that don't. You have to take a gambler's chance on that 
 proposition. It's part of the game. That's where the spice 
 of danger comes in. Now, take our own cases, for example. 
 I am on Easy Street. I make a good salary and three times 
 as much on the side. You are making a fair salary, and, at 
 the usual rate of advancement, you will be a white-haired old 
 octogenarian before you have a fortune if you depend on your 
 salary. Just figure it up yourself." 
 
 Dawson smiled grimly. Here was the old argument, the 
 one that every dishonest young straggler was using to extenuate 
 his moral delinquencies. Sewell misconstrued his silence and 
 continued his argument. 
 
 "Now one of these days you probably will be getting 
 married. And, believe me, your voyage on the matrimonial 
 sea won't be any joy ride at the salary you're getting. Now's 
 the time to get busy on the side. I can put you in the way 
 of making a lot of money if you'll get rid of some of those 
 small town scruples. Get in the game, Dawson, while you're 
 young. You always can reform after you've made your pile, 
 you know. And, in the meantime, you'll stand a lot better 
 show of getting the girl you're after if you've got a. little
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 151 
 
 bunch of money ahead. How about it? With ordinary care, 
 no one will ever 4 tumble to' the game we can work together." 
 
 "No, Sewell, you don't get my point of view at all. It 
 isn't the fear of getting caught that makes me want to keep 
 straight. It's the dread of having to confess to myself that 
 I'm not straight. It isn't what other people may think of me; 
 it's what I would have to think of myself. When I shake 
 hands with a decent person I want to feel that I'm straight and 
 clean. That's the reason I'm trying to be on the square, and 
 why I intend to be, no matter if I don't make a financial suc- 
 cess. I want to keep my own self-respect. As for getting 
 married some day, I don't suppose I shall ever get married, but 
 if I ever should, I think my chances of being happy will be 
 better if I am straight instead of crooked." 
 
 When Dawson returned to his room that day he felt better 
 for having "stuck to his guns." His talk with Sewell had 
 strengthened his determination to be on the square, "no matter 
 what." It would be nice, of course, if he could have included 
 Nell Courtright in his plans for the future, but even if he 
 could not he would have the satisfaction of being straight for 
 his own sake. 
 
 A special delivery letter awaited him. 
 
 "Dear Charley," it read, "No letter from you this week. 
 I do hope you are not ill. Please don't be, because I want 
 you to be sure to come down for commencement next week. 
 Write soon and tell me you will surely come. "NELL."
 
 152 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 DAWSON obtained a two days' leave of absence from the 
 office, and long before train time he boarded the car that 
 was to carry him home. It seemed too good to be true. 
 In a few short hours he should again be among the people 
 he loved so much and whom he had not seen since Thanks- 
 giving time. His eagerness grew as the train sped on, and 
 when at last he saw familiar landmarks by the track, he moved 
 himself and his suitcase up to a seat near the door. He was 
 determined to get every minute out of his visit home. As a 
 final preparation for his triumphant return he carefully brushed
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 153 
 
 his new spring suit, and determined to do all he could to im- 
 press his old neighbours with visible signs of his prosperity. 
 
 The family reunion at the depot was up to all his ex- 
 pectations. Bud even had brought old Shep down to greet 
 the returned traveler, and Dawson's measure of happiness was 
 filled when the venerable dog wagged a demonstrative recog- 
 nition. 
 
 How beautiful everything was! Streets that he last had 
 seen cold and bleak in November were now bowers of deli- 
 cate green; trees that then were gaunt were now triumphal 
 arches of foliage. The air fairly purred with happiness, and 
 Dawson could hardly restrain himself from such exhibitions of 
 joy as would be unbecoming in a dignified man of affairs such 
 as he now was. 
 
 Dinner! All that the wildest dreams had pictured. A 
 feast to make Lucullus stir enviously in his somber mausoleum. 
 It was an epicurean symphony played on the harps of angels ! 
 From time to time Dawson murmured "Gee !" in complete ac- 
 knowledgment of his utter inability to do justice to the dinner 
 in other words. 
 
 After the dinner was over and had taken its honoured 
 place among the notable historic epochs of his life, Dawson 
 discoursed at length on life and politics and business, and at 
 half past eight his mother, with instinctive understanding, asked 
 him if he didn't want to call on some of his friends before it 
 became too late.
 
 154 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 "You'll have plenty of time to visit with us," she said. 
 "Now run along and don't stay too late." 
 
 "Mother's something of a mind-reader," thought Dawson 
 as he left the yard and, by a curious chance, directed his steps 
 unerringly in the direction of Judge Courtright's house. 
 
 The streets were dark, but from all sides came the sounds 
 of voices and music and distant singing. In the dense shadows, 
 cast by heavy foliage under the street lights, there were glimpses 
 of white dresses as young people strolled along under the arch- 
 ing trees. The air was heavy with the fragrance of flowers, 
 and the spirit of spring was weaving a wondrous spell in Daw- 
 son's heart. From each shadowy yard came the murmur of 
 low voices and youthful laughter; at many of the gates he came 
 upon couples suddenly silenced as he passed. Dawson quick- 
 ened his steps until ahead of him rose the old-fashioned home 
 of Nell Courtright. Ever since he could remember, this dig- 
 nified old house had impressed him as no other house in town 
 had ever done. There was a simple dignity about it that ex- 
 pressed the character of Judge Courtright, and Dawson had 
 never passed it without feeling a certain awe of its modest 
 grandeur. This feeling swept over him anew as he opened the 
 gate and walked into the yard. He suddenly felt very in- 
 consequential.
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 '55 
 
 DAWSON pulled the old-fashioned bell knob and a faint 
 tinkle sounded far off in the back of the house. There 
 was a nervous wait, then a hall light was turned up, and 
 a moment later the door was opened by a venerable coloured 
 woman. This was old Aunt Hester, "aunt" by affectionate 
 brevet to every one in town, as well as one of the town's most 
 respected and best known characters. She had been with the 
 Courtrights thirty years and had been with Nell Courtright's 
 mother when the latter was a little girl in the South. Ever since 
 he could remember, Dawson had known her just as she was now 
 with white hair, gold-rimmed glasses, spotless white necker-
 
 156 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 chief and crinkly black silk dress, none of which seemed to 
 change with the passing years. As she walked through the 
 noisy streets of the town sHe always suggested to him an old- 
 time minuet in a ragtime atmosphere. 
 
 Yes, Miss El'nah was in and would Mistah Dawson "rest" 
 himself in the drawin' room for just a moment ? Miss El'nah 
 would be right down. 
 
 As Dawson waited, there presently came to his ears the 
 sound of some one moving quickly about in the room above. 
 There seemed to be a great deal of hurrying back and forth, 
 with mysterious intervals of silence. Dawson's nervousness in- 
 creased. He seemed singularly out of place in the midst of the 
 old-fashioned stateliness of the room in which he sat. The 
 walnut woodwork, darkened with age, and the heavy atmos- 
 phere of surroundings that seemed part of a long-gone and 
 time-honoured past, made him seem very small and inconse- 
 quential. The idea of asking Nell Courtright to give up this 
 old home, where she was in her proper setting, for anything 
 that he could offer ! It was preposterous. He thought of the 
 little flat that would be the most that he could give to replace 
 the venerable and faded glory of the Courtright home. No, it 
 was out of the question. He mustn't expect such a miracle to 
 happen. It wasn't fair. She, the daughter of a distinguished 
 man who was rich only in honours and position, deserved more 
 than he could ever hope to give her. 
 
 And then she came. He found himself shaking her hand
 
 DAWSON f 1 1 FORTUNE HUNTER 157 
 
 and uttering, in a strange far-away voice, a lot of confused 
 words that seemed fearfully commonplace. He had never seen 
 her looking so pretty, her eyes brimming with friendliness and 
 her cheeks flushed with a glow that he thought must have come 
 from her hurry while dressing. He didn't know what he was 
 saying, and it was not until he felt a gentle tug at the hand he 
 held that he realised how long he had been holding it. 
 
 "I couldn't help it, Nell. I'm so glad to see you." Both 
 were blushing furiously, but she was the first to recover her 
 composure. 
 
 "Charley, isn't it dreadfully hot in this stuffy old room? 
 Why in the world did Aunt Hester bring you in here? We 
 always sit on the porch these warm summer nights it's 
 so much cooler out there." And without waiting for a response 
 she fled to the vine-screened porch, where the friendly darkness 
 could hide the betraying confusion in her cheeks. 
 
 Both were overwhelmed by self-consciousness. The air 
 was charged with disturbing electric currents that made their 
 efforts to talk in commonplace terms seem forced and hollow. 
 Their conversation was lame and halting, and each was inten- 
 sely aware of the reason why it was so. 
 
 From the darkness came the thousand sounds of a soft 
 summer night. Insects were chirping and humming, and from 
 all sides came the melody of distant singing and music and 
 laughter. Away off some place in the night some boys were 
 singing college songs; from another direction came the sounds
 
 158 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 
 
 of guitars and mandolins; a man was practising on a clarinet 
 down near the river, and yet nowhere in the heavy shadows of 
 the elms and the maples was a human being to be seen. The 
 air was filled with the fragrance of flowers and the poetry of 
 rustling leaves and soft breezes. It was one of the purple 
 nights that live in memory forever. 
 
 "Isn't it beautiful, Nell?" 
 
 There was no answer. She didn't dare trust her voice. 
 
 "I'd rather be here than any place in the world, Nell." 
 
 There was a long silence and then, in a voice stifled and 
 faint, she managed to frame a reply. 
 
 "We simply adore it, Charley. Father and I love this old 
 yard." 
 
 "You know what I mean, Nell. It isn't the yard and the 
 trees and the music; it's being with you, Nell. I've dreamed of 
 it so often" his voice was trembling in its earnestness "O, 
 you'd never believe how much I've thought of it and how much 
 I've longed to be here with you." He paused. "Or any place 
 with you, Nell. You do believe me, Nell, don't you?" He 
 leaned forward and took her hand, half fearing that the 
 wrath of the heavens would descend and smite him. But it 
 did not. He felt her hand tremble a little and was dimly con- 
 scious that her other hand was pressing a little handkerchief 
 to her burning cheeks. There was a suffocating silence that 
 seemed to last an eternity, and then, suddenly, like a sun that 
 bursts from behind the clouds and floods the world with glory,
 
 DAWSON 'ii FORTUNE HUNTER 159 
 
 came die consciousness that die hand had not been withdrawn. 
 He kissed her, and a moment later was engaged to be married. 
 
 ******* 
 Dawson '11, Fortune Hunter, had found his Fortune.
 
 minium mil 
 
 A 000 021 370 2