Page:Man's Country (1923).pdf/152

 MORRIS—GAS ENGINES," it still proclaimed, though rather drunkenly, and the paint was nearly weathered from that wooden insert which had borne once in sharp black letters the single word: "Automobiles."

"That's where we began," he said; and could not altogether keep a strain of emotion out of his voice.

"Imagine!" commented Fay; and then they started out to the Judson-Morris Motor Works. She stood before its long fagade in reverence. To her it became a magic—the creation of an schoolboy.

In her heart was awe of the achievement and awe of the man, as they stepped through the open portal into this clanging, screeching, cavernous jungle of wheels and belts and pulleys and strange shapes of roaring machines that somehow suggested gnashing, prehistoric monsters. And to think that this dynamic, steaming crater was the real den of the lion whom she had been using so freely and satisfactorily as a riding, dancing, golfing-partner! She was suddenly conscience-stricken and ashamed of her wilful vanity that had been mean enough to glory in compelling his attendance at her side when perhaps he should have been here.

From that hour she saw George Judson no longer as a mere romantic figure of business. She saw him instead as a sort of vulcan at the