A shiver ran over
his body. Into his mind came the sickening fear that the telegraph operator
at Pickleville was not an inventor at all. The town was full of tales, and
in the bank he had taken advantage of that fact to make an impression;
but what proof had he? No one had seen one of the inventions supposed to
have been worked out by the mysterious stranger from Missouri. There had
after all been nothing but whispered suspicions, old wives' tales, fables
invented by men who had nothing to do but loaf in the drug-store and make
up stories.
The thought that Hugh McVey might not be an inventor overpowered him and he
put it quickly aside. He had something more immediate to think about. The
story of the bluff he had just made in the bank would be found out and the
whole town would rock with laughter at his expense. The young men of the
town did not like him. They would roll the story over on their tongues.
Ribald old fellows who had nothing else to do would take up the story with
joy and would elaborate it. Fellows like the cabbage farmer, Ezra French,
who had a talent for saying cutting things would exercise it. They would
make up imaginary inventions, grotesque, absurd inventions. Then they would
get young fellows to come to him and propose that he take them up, promote
them, and make every one rich. Men would shout jokes at him as he went
along Main Street. His dignity would be gone forever.
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