Repository: UIHistories Project: Book - Banks of the Boneyard (Charles Kiler) [PAGE 69]

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On the Banks of the Boneyard

by the name of Yates, who loved to quote Shakespeare. Jeff Orr had just recovered from a long sick spell, and when I told Mr. Yates that Mr. Orr was one of my customers he dramatically exclaimed, "Richard is himself again!" Pittsfield was good to me and I moved over to Griggsville with regret, but I sold some memberships in that town, and remember Dr. Stoner who had a boy at an eastern school, and argued that $3 a day was too much to pay any working man. When I delivered the copies of Tennyson's poems in Pittsfield and Griggsville and made my collections, I had done much better than in Hannibal, and kept all I took in. Then I spent a day at my home in Urbana—and was I glad to get there. Homesickness had almost thrown me for a loss while I was away, but a few hours with my family set the world in order again. I went to Chicago, called on my company, and was given a ticket to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. They didn't give me a berth in a sleeper, so I sat up all night in the hottest day coach imaginable, and was sick and disgusted when I reached Harrisburg. Train sickness had me down all the way east. When that train was going around Horseshoe Bend, death would have been a blessed relief. But I located a good clean place to live, and soon felt better. The boarders were kindly and interested in me to such extent that I felt new encouragement. My company made a big point of the sales value of having big names at the head of the list. I had been taught to go after the most important people in the city. The boarders all said that General Beaver, the Governor of Pennsylvania, was the most popular man in Harrisburg as well as in the entire state. Next to the Governor stood the Bishop of Harrisburg. I went over to the state house to call on the Governor. The private secretary sized me up as an undesirable citizen and persisted in asking embarrassing questions. The door to the Governor's office was wide open and just as I feared I was losing my argument with the private secretary, a commanding voice boomed, "Jerry, who is that boy who wants to see me ?" I beat the important secretary to the door o f the office, and the kindly though commanding voice said, "Come on in and tell me your story." The instant I laid eyes on the Governor I knew we would get along. He had lost one leg, had a pair of old-fashioned crutches, was in his shirt sleeves, whiskers all over his face, and rather long hair. I noticed at once that he chewed