Page:Caroline Lockhart--The Fighting Shepherdess.djvu/305

 in sight in the vicinity to polish the brass trimmings of the world's navies, if a '* live wire " could be induced to take hold of its development. A miniature monument of rock faintly stained with copper rose in the center of the window, and a buffalo skull lent a note of historic interest.

The walls inside were decorated with the Club's slogan, " Boost for Prouty." The undertaker's chairs were still doing duty, since there was so much truth in that person's plaintive wail that " the climate was so damned healthy that nobody ever died," there was seldom other use for them.

There was a pine table upon a raised platform, behind which Hiram Butefish remained, as before, the Club's honored President.

In the corner was a stove which had been donated by the Methodist minister, because, presumably, of a refractory grate which it was found impossible to operate without profanity.

Into these comfortable and spacious quarters, a goodly number of Prouty's representative citizens came singly and in squads upon the occasion of this important meeting.

Each member had kept his own solution of Prouty's problem closely guarded, so no man knew what his neigh- bor had to offer until that one's turn came to divulge it. In truth, it had been a long time since a meeting of such piquancy and interest had been called.

After some little preliminary business, Hiram Butefish, with a candor which never before had distinguished his public utterances upon this subject, declared flatly that Prouty was in a precarious, not to say desperate, condition. The county treasury was empty, the town treasury was empty, and the warrants of either had little more value than the stock certificates of an abandoned gold mine. What were they going to do about it? Should they sit