I wiped away my tears and went to the door . Joseph P. Nelson was standing there , and he said , without wasting any words -- it was easy to see how that man managed to get railroads built where nobody else could manage it -- that he had called to see me on a little matter of business . He took just ten minutes to make it clear to me , and when I saw the whole project I was the happiest woman in Carleton or out of it . He said he had never eaten such a Thanksgiving dinner as mine , and that I was the woman he 'd been looking for for years . He said that he had a few business friends who had been brought up on a down-east farm like himself , and never got over their hankering for old-fashioned cookery . `` That is something we ca n't get here , with all our money , '' he said . `` Now , Miss Porter , my nephew tells me that you wish to remain in Carleton , if you can find some way of supporting yourself . I have a proposition to make to you . These aforesaid friends of mine and I expect to spend most of our time in Carleton for the next few years . In fact we shall probably make it our home eventually . It 's going to be the city of the west after awhile , and the centre of a dozen railroads . Well , we mean to equip a small private restaurant for ourselves and we want you to take charge of it . You wo n't have to do much except oversee the business and arrange the bills of fare . We want plain , substantial old-time meals and cookery . When we have a hankering for doughnuts and apple pies and cranberry tarts , we want to know just where to get them and have them the right kind . We 're all horribly tired of hotel fare and fancy fol-de-rols with French names . A place where we could get a dinner such as you served yesterday would be a boon to us . We 'd have started the restaurant long ago if we could have got a suitable person to take charge of it . '' He named the salary the club would pay and the very sound of it made me feel rich . You may be sure I did n't take long to decide .
That was a year ago , and today the Doughnut Club , XXXXX they call themselves , is a huge success , and the fame of it has gone abroad in the land , although they are pretty exclusive and keep all their good things close enough to themselves .
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