Suddenly, from among the men by the drug store, a roaring song broke the
evening quiet of the street, and a voice, huge and guttural, brought a
smile to the boy's lips:

"He washed the windows and he swept the floor,
And he polished up the handle of the big front door.
He polished that handle so carefullee,
That now he's the ruler of the queen's navee."

The singer, a short man with grotesquely wide shoulders, wore a long
flowing moustache, and a black coat, covered with dust, that reached to
his knees. He held a smoking briar pipe in his hand, and with it beat time
for a row of men sitting on a long stone under the store window and
pounding on the sidewalk with their heels to make a chorus for the song.
Sam's smile broadened into a grin as he looked at the singer, Freedom
Smith, a buyer of butter and eggs, and past him at John Telfer, the
orator, the dandy, the only man in town, except Mike McCarthy, who kept
his trousers creased. Among all the men of Caxton, Sam most admired John
Telfer and in his admiration had struck upon the town's high light. Telfer
loved good clothes and wore them with an air, and never allowed Caxton to
see him shabbily or indifferently dressed, laughingly declaring that it
was his mission in life to give tone to the town.

John Telfer had a small income left him by his father, once a banker in
the town, and in his youth he had gone to New York to study art, and later
to Paris; but lacking ability or industry to get on had come back to
Caxton where he had married Eleanor Millis, a prosperous milliner. They
were the most successful married pair in Caxton, and after years of life
together they were still in love; were never indifferent to each other,
and never quarrelled; Telfer treated his wife with as much consideration