The farmer waited until Smoky Pete had gone back to his house
and, when he saw a light in the kitchen, and fancied he could also see his
neighbor cooking food at a stove, he went again into his own house. He had
himself never quarreled with Smoky Pete and was glad. He was glad also that
the field at the back of his house had been sold. He intended to sell the
rest of his farm and move west to Illinois. "The man's crazy," he told
himself. "Who but a crazy man would talk that way in the darkness? I
suppose I ought to report him and get him locked up, but I guess I'll
forget what I heard. A man who would talk like that about nice respectable
people would do anything. He might set fire to my house some night or
something like that. I guess I'll just forget what I heard."
BOOK FOUR
CHAPTER XII
After the success of his corn cutting machine and the apparatus for
unloading coal cars that brought him a hundred thousand dollars in cash,
Hugh could not remain the isolated figure he had been all through the first
several years of his life in the Ohio community. From all sides men reached
out their hands to him: and more than one woman thought she would like to
be his wife. All men lead their lives behind a wall of misunderstanding
they themselves have built, and most: men die in silence and unnoticed
behind the walls. Now and then a man, cut off from his fellows by the
peculiarities of his nature, becomes absorbed in doing something that is
impersonal, useful, and beautiful.
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