t it--was not conducive to public
tranquillity. But this element was speedily silenced. The immature
Wilbur drove the thing acceptably, though requiring help on the larger
boxes of merchandise, and Trimble Cushman, still driving horses on his
other truck, was proud of his employee. Moreover, the boy became in high
repute for his knowledge of the inner mysteries of these new mechanisms.
New cars appeared in Newbern every day now, and many of them, developing
ailments of a character more or less alarming to their purchasers, were
brought to his distinguished notice with results almost uniformly
gratifying. He was looked up to, consulted as a specialist, sent for to
minister to distant roadside failures, called in the night, respected
and rewarded.

It was a new Newbern through whose thoroughfares the new motor truck of
Trimble Cushman was so expertly propelled. Farm horses still professed
the utmost dismay at sight of vehicles drawn by invisible horses, and
their owners often sought to block industrial progress by agitation for
a law against these things, but progress was triumphant. The chamber of
commerce recorded immense gains in population. New factories and mills
had gone up beside the little river. New people were on the streets or
living in their new houses. New merchants came to meet the new demand
for goods.

The homy little town was putting on airs of a great city. There was
already a Better Newbern club. The view down River Street from its
junction with State, Masonic Hall on the left and the new five-story
Whipple block on the right, as preserved on the picture postcards sold
by the Cut-Rate Pharmacy, impressed all purchasers with the town's
vitality. The _Advance_ appeared twice a week, outdoing its rival, the
_Star_, by one issue; and Sam Pickering, ever in the van of progress,
was busy with plans for making his journal a daily.

Newbern was coming on, even as boys were coming on from bare feet to
shoes on week-days. Ever and again there were traffic jams on River
Street, a weaving turmoil of farmers' wagons, buggies, delivery carts,
about a noisy, fuming centre of motor vehicles. High in the centre would
be the motor truck of Trimble Cushman, loaded with cases and nursed
through the muddle by a cool, clear-eyed youth, who sat with delicate,
sure hands on a potent wheel. Never did he kill or maim either citizen
or child, to the secret chagrin of Judge Penniman. Traffic jams to him
were a part of the day's