"They missed their chance when it came," Kay repeated.
"We won't miss ours. A chance like the Hub
won't come twice." A year of disagreeable, uncongenial
work and then--success! Retire! Off to the primeval
woods, canoes, Indians, camp fires, books ... a dozen
dreams flamed up.
Within a month we had completed the purchase, and the Hub opened with flying colours and high hopes; the newspapers gave us what they called a "send off"; both "House of Lords" and "House of Commons" were packed; the cash-registers clicked and rang all day, and the Hub, swept and garnished, fairly sparkled with the atmosphere of success, congratulations, and promise of good business. Billy Bingham's association with it was a thing of the past; it became the most respectable place of its kind in the whole town.
All day long the shoal of customers flocked in and rattled their money across the busy counters. Each individual wanted a word with the proprietors. Buyers and brewery agents poured in too, asking for orders, and newspaper reporters took notes for descriptive articles which duly appeared next morning. The dining-room did a roaring trade and every stool at the long lunch counter had its occupant. How easy it all seemed! And no one the worse for liquor! Everybody was beaming, and, as a partner in the Hub Wine Company, I already felt that my failure in the dairy farm was forgotten, an unlucky incident at most; a boyish episode due to inexperience, but now atoned for.
Lord Dufferin, a few years before, had been Governor-General of Canada, and a huge framed photograph of him hung above the cold meat, game pies and salads of the lunch counter. A connexion of my father's, the newspapers had insisted upon a closer relationship, and while some thought he would do better as a first cousin, others preferred him as my uncle. As an exceedingly popular Governor-General, his place above the good Canadian food seemed appropriate at any rate, and the number of customers,
both known and unknown, who congratulated me
