with the buyers. I can tell the weight of a hog and what he’s worth just by a look at him, and a steer, too. My son-in-law Michael Arnold sits up in the office all day in our plant, dictating letters. His clothes they never stink of the pens like mine do.. . . Now I ain’t saying anything against him, Julie. But I bet my grandson Eugene”—he repeated it, stressing the name so that you sensed his dislike of it—“Eugene, if he comes into the business at all when he grows up, won’t go within smelling distance of the yards. His office I bet will be in a new office building on, say Madison Street, with a view of the lake. Life! You'll be hoggin’ it all yourself and not know it.”
“Don’t pay any attention to him,” Julie interposed. “He goes on like that. Old yards!”
August Hempel bit off the end of a cigar, was about to spit out the speck explosively, thought better of it and tucked it in his vest pocket. “I wouldn’t change places with Mike, not”
“Please don’t call him Mike, Pa.”
“Michael, then. Not for ten million. And I need ten million right now.”
“And I suppose,” retorted Selina, spiritedly, “that when your son-in-law Michael Arnold is your age he’ll be telling Eugene how he roughed it in an office over at the yards in the old days. These will be the old days.”
August Hempel laughed good humouredly. “That can be, Selina. That can be.” He chewed his cigar and settled to the business at hand.
