M., November 11, 1890.
Very few people know that time turned back one hour and a half in order
that the reputation of Tommy McGuffy's tombstone for veracity might be
spotless in the eyes of future generations.
Billy Skidmore, the sexton, arranged to have Rearward time ready for the
sun when it rose upon the following morning.
IX
HE BELIEVED THEM
He was a bachelor, and he owned a little tobacco store in the suburbs.
All the labour, manual and mental, requisite to the continuance of the
establishment, however, was done by the ex-newsboy, to whom the old soldier
paid $4 per week and allowed free tobacco.
He had come into the neighbourhood from the interior of the state shortly
after the war, and for a time there were not ten houses within a block of
his shop. The shop is now the one architectural blemish in a long row of
handsome stores. Miles of streets have been built up around it.
The old soldier used to sit in an antique armchair in the rear of his shop,
smoking, from meal to meal.
"I l'arnt the habit in the army," he would say. "I never teched tobacker
till I went to the war.
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