Others
stayed for the reason that getting away was impossible. These were
living, visible tragedies--still hopeful, pathetically unaware of
the leading parts they were playing, and still weakly waiting for
a better day or sinking, as by gravity, back to the old trades
they had practised before the boom. A few sturdy souls, the
fittest, survived--undismayed. Logan was there--lawyer for the
railroad and the coal-company. MacFarlan was a judge, and two or
three others, too, had come through unscathed in spirit and
undaunted in resolution--but gone were the young Bluegrass
Kentuckians, the young Tide-water Virginians, the New England
school-teachers, the bankers, real-estate agents, engineers; gone
the gamblers, the wily Jews and the vagrant women that fringe the
incoming tide of a new prosperity--gone--all gone!
Beyond the post-office he turned toward the red-brick house that
sat above the mill-pond. Eagerly he looked for the old mill, and
he stopped in physical pain. The dam had been torn away, the old
wheel was gone and a caved-in roof and supporting walls, drunkenly
aslant, were the only remnants left.
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