; Captain Thad's profanity impregnated the air with
brimstone. But they had solemnly sworn to the agreement and Mrs.
Busteed had witnessed it, and an oath is an oath. Besides, Mrs.
Winslow was inclined to think the whole matter guided by Fate, and,
being superstitious as well as romantic, feared dire calamity if
Fate was interfered with. It ended in a compromise and, a
fortnight later, the Reverend Clarence, keeping his countenance
with difficulty, christened a red-faced and protesting infant
"Jedidah Edgar Wilfred Winslow."

Jedidah Edgar Wilfred grew up. At first he was called "Edgar" by
his father and "Wilfred" by his mother. His teachers, day school
and Sunday school, called him one or the other as suited their
individual fancies. But his schoolmates and playfellows, knowing
that he hated the name above all else on earth, gleefully hailed
him as "Jedidah." By the time he was ten he was "Jed" Winslow
beyond hope of recovery. Also it was settled locally that he was
"queer"--not "cracked" or "lacking," which would have implied that
his brain was affected--but just "queer," which meant that his ways
of thinking and acting were different from those of Orham in
general.

His father, Captain Thaddeus, died when Jed was fifteen, just
through the grammar school and ready to enter the high. He did not
enter; instead, the need of money being pressing, he went to work
in one of the local stores, selling behind the counter. If his
father had lived he would, probably, have gone away after finishing
high school and perhaps, if by that time the mechanical ability
which he possessed had shown itself, he might even have gone to
some technical school or college. In that case Jed Winslow's
career might have been very, very different. But instead he went
to selling groceries, boots, shoes, dry goods and notions for Mr.
Seth Wingate, old Jedidah's younger brother.

As a grocery clerk Jed was not a success, neither did he shine as a
clerk in the post office, nor as an assistant to the local
expressman. In desperation he began to learn the carpenter's trade
and, because he liked to handle tools, did pretty well at it. But
he continued to be "queer" and his absent-minded dreaminess was in
evidence even then.

"I snum I don't know what to make of him," declared Mr. Abijah
Mullett, who was the youth's "boss." "Never know just what he's
goin' to do or just what he's goin' to say. I says to him
yesterday: 'Jed,' says I, '