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By Root 1428 0

what he was going to sell, and when he told them that he was not going to sell anything but just take in money, they went home and told their parents that John Ingledew was playing with rocks and some of the rocks had gotten into his head. But all six of John’s sons helped him with the masonry, and from time to time a lodgebrother from T.G.A.O.T.U. would stop by to help out, and the building was finished just in time to install the steel door with combination lock shipped from St. Louis. The vault was constructed of the same masonry as the building itself, and was bonded to it; it took six men to lift the steel door and hold it in place while it was bolted to the vault. Then John went to Jasper, where a job printing outfit was operated as a sideline to the Jasper Disaster, and ordered the printing of his deposit slips, checks, savings books and other forms.

The printer was also the editor of the Disaster, and he interviewed John and ran a front page story under the headline, NEW FINANCIAL EMPORIUM TO DEBUT AT STAY MORE. The article mentioned that a gala ribbon cutting and grand opening would feature refreshments on the house to all comers. John went all the way to Harrison just to get the lemons to make lemonade with, to serve to the womenfolk and children; to the men, of course, he would serve the best corn that could be found. Sirena and her daughter Lola were kept busy for a week baking pies and cakes.

The festivities lasted all day on the Second Tuesday of the Month, and were enjoyed by all present in downtown Stay More. John wished that Eli Willard was there to photograph the whole shebang. He waited until late afternoon, when most of the men were pleasantly plastered, to make his speech. Then he stood on the porch of his bank and addressed his townsmen, with an air of civic pride, telling them how glad he was to be able to contribute this handsome stone edifice to the Main Street skyline, a rugged building that would last forever, that all of us gathered here together can boast of to our great-great-grandchildren that we were present on the day it was first opened, a building solemnly dedicated to the preservation and protection of our hard-earned pennies and nickels, so that we may sleep better at night secure in the knowledge our riches are sealed away in a vault behind a door that took six men to lift, dedicated to the proposition that this great land of ours is a society of free enterprise wherein a man may work to earn capital and possess his capital in the form of cash and coins, and deposit his capital into the firm and powerful safekeeping of the Swains Creek Bank and Trust Company and hold up his head before all other men, the line forms right over here.

The line did not form. The men and women looked at one another, waiting to see who would go first, but nobody went. The city women had all brought their savings with them to deposit, but they would not move until the natives did. John Ingledew overheard a Swain woman saying to her husband, “Homer, d’ye reckon that loose stone in the chimley-hearth is the best place to keep it?” “Sshh, hush, old woman,” he replied, but it was too late; the people around them had heard her. In another part of the crowd, a Plowright woman remarked to her husband, “It does kinder make a lump under the mattress,” while a Chism woman said to hers, “The rats might chew it if you keep on leavin it under the barn,” while a Duckworth woman said to hers, “I don’t mind ye stashin it in the peeanner, but it keeps some a the notes from soundin.” Before long, just about everybody had an idea of where everybody else was keeping their money, so they all went home and lifted rocks and mattresses and reached under barns and into pianos, and brought their money to deposit in John Ingledew’s bank, and the city women deposited their savings.

John collected almost five thousand dollars. His hands shook just from touching that much money, but he gathered it all up and carried it to his vault. The steel door on the vault, however, would not open. It had a little dial set into it with numbers from