Keeping quiet, I let his visit to the long ago and his reflective feelings linger. I would leave it to him to fill the silence when he was ready to say more. After several moments, he did.
"That tanning yard and saddlery became my school and home after father died and affairs of the estate were settled," he reported.
"So you left your family to apprentice as a saddler?" I asked.
"Yes sir, I was sixteen. Will had his hands full with the others and the farm. Henry was happy as a farmer and good at it. He was near a man, nineteen. Martin pulled his weight at eighteen. Dick was coming along. He was thirteen and Mary's mentor. Portia kept the household in good order. Will cared for and understood me and saw I would be no good as a husband of the soil and tender of stock. He recognized my indifference to agricultural husbandry and knew how entranced I was with town and the Dicksons' vocation.
"Yes, I left my family when barely sixteen and settled thirty miles up river, forty miles across country from father's farm." Mr. Jones recounted his leaving without intense emotion. He expressed more of an expectant quality, reminiscent of the feelings of a sixteen year old with the larger world before him.
"My brothers ventured to see about me and my progress as an apprentice to the Dicksons whenever they came to town, about once a month….Sister and Portia too on occasion. Mr. Dickson loaned me a mount for a two day Christmas holiday in Elkton with my folks each of the six years of my training. Portia's holiday meals were memorable. She was an artisan of cookery." His tone was of a nostalgic appreciation and affirmation.
"The newness of my situation excited me and I took to the tasks, mostly the lowest form of work: cleaning hides, busting wood and building fires to cook the ooze, and stirring the foul smelling concoction. The hides had to soak in different vats of solutions made from tree bark distillations during the leather making. Toting the slimy hides so they could be graded was the worst. I also was attentive and watchfully took in Mr. Rob and Mr. Will'em as they worked.
"After months of menial occupation, they placed me in Cyrus's charge to begin my serious training. Mr. Will'em's hand Cyrus had the primary task at the place, I soon learned, as shaper. A master with a knife and the tools of woodworking, he prepared the saddle trees-mostly from center cut pine pieces." I must have looked puzzled, because he paused in his flow of memories.