CHAPTER III
THE FIRST JOB
When Mary Ford died the heart of the home went with her. "The house was like a watch without a mainspring," her son says. William Ford did his best, but it must have been a pathetic attempt, that effort of the big, hardworking farmer to take a mother's place to the four children.
For a time a married aunt came in and managed the household, but she was needed in her own home and soon went back to it. Then Margaret, Henry's youngest sister, took charge, and tried to keep the house in order and superintend the work of "hired girls" older than herself. She was "capable"—that good New England word so much more expressive than "efficient"—but no one could take Mary Ford's place in that home.
There was now nothing to hold Henry on the farm. He had learned how to do the farm work, and the little attraction it had had for him was gone; thereafter every task was merely a repetition. His father did not need his help; there were always the hired men. I suppose any need William Ford may have felt for the companionship of his second son was unexpressed. In mat-
