MR Francis J Finn

Cupid of Campion MR Francis J Finn

In which Clarence Esmond places himself in the hands of the Bright-eyed Goddess of Adventure, and is entrusted by that Deity to the care of a Butcher's Boy. On a morning early in September, the sun was shining brightly upon the village of McGregor. Nestled in a coulée between two hills, one rising squarely and rock-ribbed, lacking only the illusion of windows to give it the appearance of a ruined castle, the other to the northwest, sloping gently upwards, and crowned at the summit with a number of villas, McGregor, running down to the Mississippi River, was as pretty a town as Iowa could boast. On this bright particular morning, an overgrown youth was sitting on the boat-landing, his feet dangling above the water, his face glooming darkly. Master Abe Thompson, age sixteen, was troubled in spirit. He was homeless. He had lost his position, that of a butcher's boy, just a little after sunrise. It arose out of a difference of seventy-five cents in the butcher's accounts.