effusions of pride on the part of a passing hen, she thought fit to laugh and say:
“She yust laid egg.”
William shuddered. This grossness in the presence of Miss Pratt was unthinkable. His mind
refused to deal with so impossible a situation; he could not accept it as a fact that such words had actually been uttered in such a presence. And yet it was the truth; his incredulous ears still sizzled. “She yust laid egg!” His entire skin became flushed; his averted eyes glazed themselves with shame.
He was not the only person shocked by the ribaldry of the Swedish lady named Anna. Joe Bullitt and Johnnie Watson, on the outskirts of the group, went to Wallace Banks, drew him aside, and, with feverish eloquence, set his responsibilities before him. It was his duty, they urged, to have an immediate interview with this free-spoken Anna and instruct her in the proprieties. Wallace had been almost as horrified as
they by her loose remark, but he declined the office they proposed for him, offering, however, to appoint them as a committee with authority in the matter–whereupon they retorted with unreasonable indignation, demanding to know what he took them for.
Unconscious of the embarrassment she had caused in these several masculine minds, the Swedish lady named Anna led the party onward, continuing her agricultural lecture. William walked mechanically, his eyes averted and looking at no one. And throughout this agony he
was burningly conscious of the blasphemed presence of Miss Pratt beside him.
Therefore, it was with no little surprise, when the party came out of the barn, that William beheld Miss Pratt, not walking at his side, but on the contrary, sitting too cozily with George Crooper upon a fallen tree at the edge of a peach- orchard just beyond the barn-yard. It was Miss Parcher who had been walking beside him, for the truant couple had made their escape at the beginning of the Swedish lady’s discourse.
In vain William murmured to himself, “Flopit love ole friends best.” Purple and black again descended upon his soul, for he could not disguise from himself the damnatory fact that George had flitted with the lady, while he, wretched William, had been permitted to take care of the dog!
A spark of dignity still burned within him. He strode to the barn-yard fence, and, leaning over it, dropped Flopit rather brusquely at his mistress’s feet. Then, without a word even without a look –William walked haughtily away, continuing his stern progress straight through the barn-yard gate, and thence onward until he found himself in solitude upon the far side of a smoke-house, where his hauteur vanished.
Here, in the shade of a great walnut-tree which sheltered the little building, he gave way–not to tears, certainly, but to faint murmurings and little heavings under impulses as ancient as young love itself. It is to be supposed that William considered his condition a lonely one, but if all the seventeen-year-olds who have known such half- hours could have shown themselves to him then, he would have fled from the mere horror of billions. Alas! he considered his sufferings a new invention in the world, and there was now inspired in his breast a monologue so eloquently bitter that it might deserve some such title as A Passion Beside the Smoke-house. During the little time that William spent in this sequestration he passed through phases of emotion which would have kept an older man busy for weeks and left him wrecked at the end of them.
William’s final mood was one of beautiful resignation with a kick in it; that is, he nobly gave her up to George and added irresistibly that George was a big, fat lummox! Painting pictures, such as the billions of other young sufferers before him have painted, William saw
himself a sad, gentle old bachelor at the family fireside, sometimes making the sacrifice of his reputation so that SHE and the children might never know the truth about George; and he gave himself the solace of a fierce scene or two with George: “Remember, it is for them, not you– you THING!”
After this human little reaction he passed to a higher field of romance. He would die for George and then she would bring the little boy she had named William to the lonely headstone– Suddenly William saw himself in his true and fitting character–Sydney Carton! He had lately read A Tale of Two Cities, immediately re-reading until, as he would have said, he “knew it by heart”; and even at the time he had seen resemblances between himself and the appealing figure of Carton. Now that the sympathy between them was perfected by Miss Pratt’s preference for another, William decided to mount the scaffold in place of George Crooper. The scene became actual to him, and, setting one foot upon a tin milk-pail which some one had carelessly left beside the smoke-house, he lifted his eyes to the pitiless blue sky and unconsciously assumed the familiar attitude of Carton on the steps of the guillotine. He spoke aloud those great last words:
“It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to–”
A whiskered head on the end of a long, corrugated red neck protruded from the smoke- house door.
“What say?” it inquired, huskily.
“Nun-nothing!” stammered William.
Eyes above whiskers became fierce. “You take your feet off that milk-bucket. Say! This here’s a sanitary farm. ‘Ain’t you got any more sense ‘n to go an’–”
But William had abruptly removed his foot and departed.
He found the party noisily established in the farm-house at two long tables piled with bucolic viands already being violently depleted. Johnnie Watson had kept a chair beside himself vacant for William. Johnnie was in no frame of mind to sit beside any “chattering girl,” and he had protected himself by Joe Bullitt upon his right and the empty seat upon his left. William took it, and gazed upon the nearer foods with a slight renewal of animation.
He began to eat; he continued to eat; in fact, he did well. So did his two comrades. Not that the melancholy of these three was dispersed– far from it! With ineffaceable gloom they ate chicken, both white meat and dark, drumsticks, wishbones, and livers; they ate corn-on-the-cob, many ears, and fried potatoes and green peas and string-beans; they ate peach preserves and apricot preserves and preserved pears; they ate biscuits with grape jelly and biscuits with crab- apple jelly; they ate apple sauce and apple butter and apple pie. They ate pickles, both cucumber pickles and pickles made of watermelon rind; they ate pickled tomatoes, pickled peppers, also pickled onions. They ate lemon pie.
At that, they were no rivals to George Crooper, who was a real eater. Love had not made his appetite ethereal to-day, and even the attending Swedish lady named Anna felt some apprehension when it came to George and the gravy,
though she was accustomed to the prodigies performed in this line by the robust hands on the farm. George laid waste his section of the table, and from the beginning he allowed himself scarce time to say, “I dunno why it is.” The pretty companion at his side at first gazed dumfounded; then, with growing enthusiasm for what promised to be a really magnificent performance, she began to utter little ejaculations of wonder and admiration. With this music in his ears, George outdid himself. He could not resist the temptation to be more and more astonishing as a heroic comedian, for these humors sometimes come upon vain people at country dinners.
George ate when he had eaten more than he needed; he ate long after every one understood why he was so vast; he ate on and on sheerly as a flourish–as a spectacle. He ate even when he himself began to understand that there was daring in what he did, for his was a toreador spirit so long as he could keep bright eyes fastened upon him.
Finally, he ate to decide wagers made upon his gorging, though at times during this last period his joviality deserted him. Anon his damp brow would be troubled, and he knew moments of thoughtfulness.
XXI
MY LITTLE SWEETHEARTS
When George did stop, it was abruptly, during one of these intervals of sobriety, and he and Miss Pratt came out of the
house together rather quietly, joining one of the groups of young people chatting with after- dinner languor under the trees. However, Mr. Crooper began to revive presently, in the sweet air of outdoors, and, observing some of the more flashing gentlemen lighting cigarettes, he was moved to laughter. He had not smoked since his childhood–having then been bonded through to twenty-one with a pledge of gold–and he feared that these smoking youths might feel themselves superior. Worse, Miss Pratt might be impressed, therefore he laughed in scorn, saying:
“Burnin’ up ole trash around here, I expect!” He sniffed searchingly. “Somebody’s set some ole rags on fire.” Then, as in discovery, he cried, “Oh no, only cigarettes!”
Miss Pratt, that tactful girl, counted four smokers in the group about her, and only one abstainer, George. She at once defended the smokers, for it is to be feared that numbers always had weight with her. “Oh, but cigarettes is lubly smell!” she said. “Untle Georgiecums maybe be too ‘ittle boy for smokings!”
This archness was greeted loudly by the smokers, and Mr. Crooper was put upon his mettle. He spoke too quickly to consider whether or no the facts justified his assertion. “Me? I don’t smoke paper and ole carpets. I smoke cigars!”
He had created the right impression, for Miss Pratt clapped her hands. “Oh, ‘plendid! Light one, Untle Georgiecums! Light one ever ‘n’ ever so quick! P’eshus Flopit an’ me we want see dray, big, ‘normous man smoke dray, big, ‘normous cigar!”
William and Johnnie Watson, who had been hovering morbidly, unable to resist the lodestone, came nearer, Johnnie being just in time to hear his cousin’s reply.
“I–I forgot my cigar-case.”
Johnnie’s expression became one of biting skepticism. “What you talkin’ about, George? Didn’t you promise Uncle George you’d never smoke till you’re of age, and Uncle George said he’d give you a thousand dollars on your twenty- first birthday? What ‘d you say about your `cigar-case’?”
George felt that he was in a tight place, and the lovely eyes of Miss Pratt turned upon him questioningly. He could not flush, for he was already so pink after his exploits with
unnecessary nutriment that more pinkness was impossible. He saw that the only safety for him lay in boisterous prevarication. “A thousand dollars!” he laughed loudly. “I thought that was real money when I was ten years old! It didn’t stand in MY way very long, I guess! Good ole George wanted his smoke, and he went after it! You know how I am, Johnnie, when I go after anything. I been smokin’ cigars I dunno how long!” Glancing about him, his eye became reassured; it was obvious that even Johnnie had accepted this airy statement as the truth, and to clinch plausibility he added: “When I smoke, I smoke! I smoke cigars straight along–light one right on the stub of the other. I only wish I had some with me, because I miss ’em after a meal. I’d give a good deal for something to smoke right now! I don’t mean cigarettes; I don’t want any paper–I want something that’s all tobacco!”
William’s pale, sad face showed a hint of color. With a pang he remembered the package of My Little Sweetheart All-Tobacco Cuban Cigarettes (the Package of Twenty for Ten Cents)
which still reposed, untouched, in the breast pocket of his coat. His eyes smarted a little as he recalled the thoughts and hopes that had accompanied the purchase; but he thought, “What would Sydney Carton do?”
William brought forth the package of My Little Sweetheart All-Tobacco Cuban Cigarettes and placed it in the large hand of George Crooper. And this was a noble act, for William believed that George really wished to smoke. “Here,” he said, “take these; they’re all tobacco. I’m goin’ to quit smokin’, anyway.” And, thinking of the name, he added, gently, with a significance lost upon all his hearers, “I’m sure you ought to have ’em instead of me.”
Then he went away and sat alone upon the fence.
“Light one, light one!” cried Miss Pratt. “Ev’ybody mus’ be happy, an’ dray, big, ‘normous man tan’t be happy ‘less he have his all-tobatto smote. Light it, light it!”
George drew as deep a breath as his diaphragm, strangely oppressed since dinner, would permit, and then bravely lit a Little Sweetheart. There must have been some valiant blood in him, for, as he exhaled the smoke, he covered a slight choking by exclaiming, loudly: “THAT’S good! That’s the ole stuff! That’s what I was lookin’ for!”
Miss Pratt was entranced. “Oh, ‘plendid!” she cried, watching him with fascinated eyes. “Now take dray, big, ‘normous puffs! Take dray, big, ‘NORMOUS puffs!”
George took great, big, enormous puffs.
She declared that she loved to watch men smoke, and William’s heart, as he sat on the distant fence, was wrung and wrung again by the vision of her playful ecstasies. But when he saw her holding what was left of the first Little Sweetheart for George to light a second at its expiring spark, he could not bear it. He dropped from the fence and moped away to be out of sight once more. This was his darkest hour.
Studiously avoiding the vicinity of the smoke- house, he sought the little orchard where he had beheld her sitting with George; and there he sat himself in sorrowful reverie upon the selfsame fallen tree. How long he remained there is uncertain, but he was roused by the sound of music which came from the lawn before the farm- house. Bitterly he smiled, remembering that Wallace Banks had engaged Italians with harp, violin, and flute, promising great things for dancing on a fresh-clipped lawn–a turf floor being no impediment to seventeen’s dancing. Music! To see her whirling and smiling sunnily in the fat grasp of that dancing bear! He would stay in this lonely orchard; SHE would not miss him.
But though he hated the throbbing music and the sound of the laughing voices that came to him, he could not keep away–and when he reached the lawn where the dancers were, he found Miss Pratt moving rhythmically in the thin grasp of Wallace Banks. Johnnie Watson
approached, and spoke in a low tone, tinged with spiteful triumph.
“Well, anyway, ole fat George didn’t get the first dance with her! She’s the guest of honor, and Wallace had a right to it because he did all the work. He came up to ’em and ole fat
George couldn’t say a thing. Wallace just took her right away from him. George didn’t say anything at all, but I s’pose after this dance he’ll be rushin’ around again and nobody else ‘ll have a chance to get near her the rest of the afternoon. My mother told me I ought to invite him over here, out I had no business to do it; he don’t know the first principles of how to act in a town he don’t live in!”
“Where’d he go?” William asked, listlessly, for Mr. Crooper was nowhere in sight.
“I don’t know–he just walked off without sayin’ anything. But he’ll be back, time this dance is over, never you fear, and he’ll grab her again and– What’s the matter with Joe?”
Joseph Bullitt had made his appearance at a corner of the house, some distance from where they stood. His face was alert under the impulse of strong excitement, and he beckoned fiercely. “Come here!” And, when they had obeyed, “He’s around back of the house by a kind of shed,” said Joe. “I think something’s wrong. Come on, I’ll show him to you.”
But behind the house, whither they followed him in vague, strange hope, he checked them. “LOOK THERE!” he said.
His pointing finger was not needed. Sounds of paroxysm drew their attention sufficiently– sounds most poignant, soul-rending, and
lugubrious. William and Johnnie perceived the large person of Mr. Crooper; he was seated upon the ground, his back propped obliquely against the smoke-house, though this attitude was not maintained constantly.
Facing him, at a little distance, a rugged figure in homely garments stood leaning upon a hoe and regarding George with a cold interest. The apex of this figure was a volcanic straw hat, triangular in profile and coned with an open crater emitting reddish wisps, while below the hat were several features, but more whiskers, at the top of a long, corrugated red neck of sterling worth. A husky voice issued from the whiskers, addressing George.
“I seen you!” it said. “I seen you eatin’! This here farm is supposed to be a sanitary farm, and you’d ought of knew better. Go it, doggone you! Go it!”
George complied. And three spectators, remaining aloof, but watching zealously, began to feel their lost faith in Providence returning into them; their faces brightened slowly, and without relapse. It was a visible thing how the world became fairer and better in their eyes during that little while they stood there. And William saw that his Little Sweethearts had been an inspired purchase, after all; they had delivered the final tap upon a tottering edifice. George’s deeds at dinner had unsettled, but Little Sweethearts had overthrown–and now there was awful work among the ruins, to an ironical accompaniment of music from the front yard, where people danced in heaven’s sunshine!
This accompaniment came to a stop, and Johnnie Watson jumped. He seized each of his companions by a sleeve and spoke eagerly, his eyes glowing with a warm and brotherly light. “Here!” he cried. “We better get around there –this looks like it was goin’ to last all afternoon. Joe, you get the next dance with her, and just about time the music slows up you dance her around so you can stop right near where Bill will be standin’, so Bill can get her quick for the dance after that. Then, Bill, you do the same for me, and I’ll do the same for Joe again, and then, Joe, you do it for Bill again, and then Bill for me–and so on. If we go in right now and work together we can crowd the rest out, and there won’t anybody else get to dance with her the whole day! Come on quick!”
United in purpose, the three ran lightly to the dancing-lawn, and Mr. Bullitt was successful, after a little debate, in obtaining the next dance with the lovely guest of the day. “I did promise big Untle Georgiecums,” she said, looking about her.
“Well, I don’t think he’ll come,” said Joe. “That is, I’m pretty sure he won’t.”
A shade fell upon the exquisite face. “No’ty. Bruvva Josie-Joe! The Men ALWAYS tum when Lola promises dances. Mustn’t be rude!”
“Well–” Joe began, when he was interrupted by the Swedish lady named Anna, who spoke to them from the steps of the house. Of the merrymakers they were the nearest.
“Dot pick fella,” said Anna, “dot one dot eats–we make him in a petroom. He holler! He tank he neet some halp.”
“Does he want a doctor?” Joe asked.
“Doctor? No! He want make him in a
amyoulance for hospital!”
“I’ll go look at him,” Johnnie Watson volunteered, running up. “He’s my cousin, and I guess I got to take the responsibility.”
Miss Pratt paid the invalid the tribute of one faintly commiserating glance toward the house. “Well,” she said, “if people would rather eat too much than dance!” She meant “dance with ME!” though she thought it prettier not to say so. “Come on, Bruvva Josie-Joe!” she cried, joyously.
And a little later Johnnie Watson approached her where she stood with a restored and refulgent William, about to begin the succeeding dance. Johnnie dropped into her hand a ring, receiving one in return. “I thought I better GET it,” he said, offering no further explanation. “I’ll take care of his until we get home. He’s all right,” said Johnnie, and then perceiving a sudden advent of apprehension upon the sensitive brow of William, he went on reassuringly: “He’s doin’ as well as anybody could expect; that is– after the crazy way he DID! He’s always been considered the dumbest one in all our relations– never did know how to act. I don’t mean he’s exactly not got his senses, or ought to be watched, anything like that–and of course he belongs to an awful good family–but he’s just kind of the black sheep when it comes to intelligence, or anything like that. I got him as comfortable as a person could be, and they’re givin’ him hot water and mustard and stuff, but what he needs now is just to be kind of quiet. It’ll do him a lot o’ good,” Johnnie concluded, with a spark in his voice, “to lay there the rest of the afternoon and get quieted down, kind of.”
“You don’t think there’s any–” William began, and, after a pause, continued–“any hope –of his getting strong enough to come out and dance afterwhile?”
Johnnie shook his head. “None in the world!” he said, conclusively. “The best we can do for him is to let him entirely alone till after supper, and then ask nobody to sit on the back seat of the trolley-car goin’ home, so we can make him comfortable back there, and let him kind of stretch out by himself.”
Then gaily tinkled harp, gaily sang flute and violin! Over the greensward William lightly bore his lady, while radiant was the cleared sky above the happy dancers. William’s fingers touched those delicate fingers; the exquisite face smiled rosily up to him; undreamable sweetness beat rhythmically upon his glowing ears; his feet moved in a rhapsody of companionship with hers. They danced and danced and danced!
Then Joe danced with her, while William and Johnnie stood with hands upon each other’s shoulders and watched, mayhap with longing, but without spite; then Johnnie danced with her while Joe and William watched–and then William danced with her again.
So passed the long, ineffable afternoon away– ah, Seventeen!
“. . . ‘Jav a good time at the trolley-party?” the clerk in the corner drug-store inquired that evening.
“Fine!” said William, taking his overcoat from the hook where he had left it.
“How j’ like them Little Sweethearts I sold you?”
“FINE!” said William.
XXII
FORESHADOWINGS
Now the last rose had blown; the dandelion globes were long since on the wind;
gladioli and golden-glow and salvia were here; the season moved toward asters and the goldenrod. This haloed summer still idled on its way, yet all the while sped quickly; like some languid lady in an elevator.
There came a Sunday–very hot.
Mr. and Mrs. Baxter, having walked a scorched half-mile from church, drooped thankfully into wicker chairs upon their front porch, though Jane, who had accompanied them, immediately darted away, swinging her hat by its ribbon and skipping as lithesomely as if she had just come forth upon a cool morning.
“I don’t know how she does it!” her father moaned, glancing after her and drying his forehead temporarily upon a handkerchief. “That
would merely kill me dead, after walking in this heat.”
Then, for a time, the two were content to sit in silence, nodding to occasional acquaintances who passed in the desultory after-church procession. Mr. Baxter fanned himself with sporadic little bursts of energy which made his straw hat creak, and Mrs. Baxter sighed with the heat, and gently rocked her chair.
But as a group of five young people passed along the other side of the street Mr. Baxter abruptly stopped fanning himself, and, following the direction of his gaze, Mrs. Baxter ceased to rock. In half-completed attitudes they leaned slightly forward, sharing one of those pauses of parents who unexpectedly behold their offspring.
“My soul!” said William’s father. “Hasn’t that girl gone home YET?”
“He looks pale to me,” Mrs. Baxter murmured, absently. “I don’t think he seems at all well, lately.”
During seventeen years Mr. Baxter had gradually learned not to protest anxieties of this kind, unless he desired to argue with no prospect of ever getting a decision. “Hasn’t she got any HOME?” he demanded, testily. “Isn’t she ever going to quit visiting the Parchers and let people have a little peace?”
Mrs. Baxter disregarded this outburst as he had disregarded her remark about William’s pallor. “You mean Miss Pratt?” she inquired, dreamily, her eyes following the progress of her son. “No, he really doesn’t look well at all.”
“Is she going to visit the Parchers all summer?” Mr. Baxter insisted.
“She already has, about,” said Mrs. Baxter.
“Look at that boy!” the father grumbled. “Mooning along with those other moon-calves– can’t even let her go to church alone! I wonder how many weeks of time, counting it out in hours, he’s wasted that way this summer?”
“Oh, I don’t know! You see, he never goes there in the evening.”
“What of that? He’s there all day, isn’t he? What do they find to talk about? That’s the mystery to me! Day after day; hours and hours– My soul! What do they SAY?”
Mrs. Baxter laughed indulgently. “People are always wondering that about the other ages. Poor Willie! I think that a great deal of the time their conversation would be probably about as inconsequent as it is now. You see Willie and Joe Bullitt are walking one on each side of Miss Pratt, and Johnnie Watson has to walk behind with May Parcher. Joe and Johnnie are there about as much as Willie is, and, of course, it’s often his turn to be nice to May Parcher. He hasn’t many chances to be tete-a-tete with Miss Pratt.”
“Well, she ought to go home. I want that boy to get back into his senses. He’s in an awful state.”
“I think she is going soon,” said Mrs. Baxter. “The Parchers are to have a dance for her Friday night, and I understand there’s to be a floor laid in the yard and great things. It’s a farewell party.”
“That’s one mercy, anyhow!”
“And if you wonder what they say,” she resumed, “why, probably they’re all talking about the party. And when Willie IS alone with her–well, what does anybody say?” Mrs. Baxter interrupted herself to laugh. “Jane, for instance–she’s always fascinated by that darky, Genesis, when he’s at work here in the yard, and they have long, long talks; I’ve seen them from the window. What on earth do you suppose they talk about? That’s where Jane is now. She knew I told Genesis I’d give him something if he’d come and freeze the ice-cream for us to- day, and when we got here she heard the freezer and hopped right around there. If you went out to the back porch you’d find them talking steadily–but what on earth about I couldn’t guess to save my life!”
And yet nothing could have been simpler: as a matter of fact, Jane and Genesis (attended by Clematis) were talking about society. That is to say, their discourse was not sociologic; rather it was of the frivolous and elegant. Watteau prevailed with them over John Stuart Mill–in a word, they spoke of the beau monde.
Genesis turned the handle of the freezer with his left hand, allowing his right the freedom of gesture which was an intermittent necessity when he talked. In the matter of dress, Genesis had always been among the most informal of his race, but to-day there was a change almost unnerving to the Caucasian eye. He wore a balloonish suit of purple, strangely scalloped at pocket and cuff, and more strangely decorated with lines of small parasite buttons, in color blue, obviously buttons of leisure. His bulbous new shoes flashed back yellow fire at the embarrassed sun, and his collar (for he had gone so far) sent forth other sparkles, playing upon a polished surface over an inner graining of soot. Beneath it hung a simple, white, soiled evening tie, draped in a manner unintended by its manufacturer, and heavily overburdened by a green glass medallion of the Emperor Tiberius, set in brass.
“Yesm,” said Genesis. “Now I’m in ‘at Swim–flyin’ roun’ ev’y night wif all lem blue- vein people–I say, `Mus’ go buy me some blue-vein clo’es! Ef I’m go’n’ a START, might’s well start HIGH!’ So firs’, I buy me thishere gol’ necktie pin wi’ thishere lady’s face carved out o’ green di’mon’, sittin’ in the middle all ‘at gol’. ‘Nen I buy me pair Royal King shoes. I got a frien’ o’ mine, thishere Blooie Bowers; he say Royal King shoes same kine o’ shoes HE wear, an’ I walk straight in ‘at sto’ where they keep ’em at. `Don’ was’e my time showin’ me no ole- time shoes,’ I say. `Run out some them big, yella, lump-toed Royal Kings befo’ my eyes, an’ firs’ pair fit me I pay price, an’ wear ’em right off on me!’ ‘Nen I got me thishere suit o’ clo’es –OH, oh! Sign on ’em in window: `Ef you wish to be bes’-dress’ man in town take me home fer six dolluhs ninety-sevum cents.’ ` ‘At’s kine o’ suit Genesis need,’ I say. `Ef Genesis go’n’ a start dressin’ high, might’s well start top!’ ”
Jane nodded gravely, comprehending the reasonableness of this view. “What made you decide to start, Genesis?” she asked, earnestly. “I mean, how did it happen you began to get this way?”
“Well, suh, ‘tall come ’bout right like kine o’ slidin’ into it ‘stid o’ hoppin’ an’ jumpin’. I’z spen’ the even’ at ‘at lady’s house, Fanny, what cook nex’ do’, las’ year. Well, suh, ‘at lady Fanny, she quit privut cookin’, she kaytliss–”
“She’s what?” Jane asked. “What’s that mean, Genesis–kaytliss?”
“She kaytuhs,” he explained. “Ef it’s a man you call him kaytuh; ef it’s a lady, she’s a kaytliss. She does kaytun fer all lem blue-vein fam’lies in town. She make ref’eshmuns, bring waituhs–‘at’s kaytun. You’ maw give big dinnuh, she have Fanny kaytuh, an’ don’t take no trouble ‘tall herself. Fanny take all ‘at trouble.”
“I see,” said Jane. “But I don’t see how her bein’ a kaytliss started you to dressin’ so high, Genesis.”
“Thishere way. Fanny say, `Look here, Genesis, I got big job t’morra night an’ I’m man short, ‘count o’ havin’ to have a ‘nouncer.’ ”
“A what?”
“Fanny talk jes’ that way. Goin’ be big dinnuh-potty, an’ thishere blue-vein fam’ly tell Fanny they want whole lot extry sploogin’; tell her put fine-lookin’ cullud man stan’ by drawin’- room do’–ask ev’ybody name an’ holler out whatever name they say, jes’ as they walk in. Thishere fam’ly say they goin’ show what’s what, ‘nis town, an’ they boun’ Fanny go git ’em a ‘nouncer. `Well, what’s mattuh YOU doin’ ‘at ‘nouncin’?’ Fanny say. `Who–me?’ I tell her. `Yes, you kin, too!’ she say, an’ she say she len’ me ‘at waituh suit yoosta b’long ole Henry Gimlet what die’ when he owin’ Fanny sixteen dolluhs–an’ Fanny tuck an’ keep ‘at waituh suit. She use ‘at suit on extry waituhs when she got some on her hands what ‘ain’t got no waituh suit. `You wear ‘at suit,’ Fanny say, ‘an’ you be good ‘nouncer, ’cause you’ a fine, big man, an’ got a big, gran’ voice; ‘nen you learn befo’ long be a waituh, Genesis, an’ git dolluh an’ half ev’y even’ you waitin ‘, ‘sides all ‘at money you make cuttin’ grass daytime.’ Well, suh, I’z stan’ up doin’ ‘at ‘nouncin’ ve’y nex’ night. White lady an’ ge’l- mun walk todes my do’, I step up to ’em–I step up to ’em thisaway.”
Here Genesis found it pleasant to present the scene with some elaboration. He dropped the handle of the freezer, rose, assumed a stately, but ingratiating, expression, and “stepped up” to the imagined couple, using a pacing and rhythmic gait–a conservative prance, which plainly indicated the simultaneous operation of an orchestra. Then bending graciously, as though the persons addressed were of dwarfish stature, “ ‘Scuse me,” he said, “but kin I please be so p’lite as to ‘quiah you’ name?” For a moment he listened attentively, then nodded, and, returning with the same aristocratic undulations to an imaginary doorway near the freezer, “Misto an’ Missuz Orlosko Rinktum!” he proclaimed, sonorously.
“WHO?” cried Jane, fascinated. “Genesis, ‘nounce that again, right away!”
Genesis heartily complied.
“Misto an’ Missuz Orlosko Rinktum!” he bawled.
“Was that really their names?” she asked, eagerly.
“Well, I kine o’ fergit,” Genesis admitted, resuming his work with the freezer. “Seem like I rickalect SOMEBODY got name good deal like what I say, ’cause some mighty blue-vein names at ‘at dinnuh-potty, yessuh! But I on’y git to be ‘nouncer one time, ’cause Fanny tellin’ me nex’ fam’ly have dinnuh-potty make heap o’ fun. Say I done my ‘nouncin’ GOOD, but say what’s use holler’n’ names jes’ fer some the neighbors or they own aunts an’ uncles to walk in, when ev’y- body awready knows ’em? So Fanny pummote me to waituh, an’ I roun’ right in amongs’ big doin’s mos’ ev’y night. Pass ice-cream, lemonade, lemon-ice, cake, samwitches. `Lemme han’ you li’l’ mo’ chicken salad, ma’am’–` ‘Low me be so kine as to git you f’esh cup coffee, suh’–‘S way ole Genesis talkin’ ev’y even’ ‘ese days!”
Jane looked at him thoughtfully. “Do you like it better than cuttin’ grass, Genesis?” she asked.
He paused to consider. “Yes’m–when ban’ play all lem TUNES! My goo’ness, do soun’ gran’!”
“You can’t do it to-night, though, Genesis,” said Jane. “You haf to be quiet on Sunday nights, don’t you?”
“Yes’m. ‘Ain’ got no mo’ kaytun till nex’ Friday even’.”
“Oh, I bet that’s the party for Miss Pratt at Mr. Parcher’s!” Jane cried. “Didn’t I guess right?”
“Yes’m. I reckon I’m a-go’n’ a see one you’ fam’ly ‘at night; see him dancin’–wait on him at ref’eshmuns.”
Jane’s expression became even more serious than usual. “Willie? I don’t know whether he’s goin’, Genesis.”
“Lan’ name!” Genesis exclaimed. “He die ef he don’ git INvite to ‘at ball!”
“Oh, he’s invited,” said Jane. “Only I think maybe he won’t go.”
“My goo’ness! Why ain’ he goin’?”
Jane looked at her friend studiously before replying. “Well, it’s a secret,” she said, finally, “but it’s a very inter’sting one, an’ I’ll tell you if you never tell.”
“Yes’m, I ain’ tellin’ nobody.”
Jane glanced round, then stepped a little closer and told the secret with the solemnity it deserved. “Well, when Miss Pratt first came to visit Miss May Parcher, Willie used to keep papa’s evening clo’es in his window-seat, an’ mamma wondered what HAD become of ’em. Then, after dinner, he’d slip up there an’ put ’em on him, an’ go out through the kitchen an’ call on Miss Pratt. Then mamma found ’em, an’ she thought he oughtn’t to do that, so she didn’t tell him or anything, an’ she didn’t even tell papa, but she had the tailor make ’em ever an’ ever so much bigger, ’cause they were gettin’ too tight for papa. An’ well, so after that, even if Willie could get ’em out o’ mamma’s clo’es-closet where she keeps ’em now, he’d look so funny in ’em he couldn’t wear ’em. Well, an’ then he couldn’t go to pay calls on Miss Pratt in the evening since then, because mamma says after he started to go there in that suit he couldn’t go without it, or maybe Miss Pratt or the other ones that’s in love of her would think it was pretty queer, an’ maybe kind of expeck it was papa’s all the time. Mamma says she thinks Willie must have worried a good deal over reasons to say why he’d always go in the daytime after that, an’ never came in the evening, an’ now they’re goin’ to have this party, an’ she says he’s been gettin’ paler and paler every day since he heard about it. Mamma says he’s pale SOME because Miss Pratt’s goin’ away, but she thinks it’s a good deal more because, well, if he would wear those evening clo’es just to go CALLIN’, how would it be to go to that PARTY an’ not have any! That’s what mamma thinks–an’, Genesis, you promised you’d never tell as long as you live!”
“Yes’m. _I_ ain’ tellin’,” Genesis chuckled. “I’m a-go’n’ agit me one nem waituh suits befo’ long, myse’f, so’s I kin quit wearin’ ‘at ole Henry Gimlet suit what b’long to Fanny, an’ have me a privut suit o’ my own. They’s a secon’-han’ sto’ ovuh on the avynoo, where they got swaller- tail suits all way f’um sevum dolluhs to nineteem dolluhs an’ ninety-eight cents. I’m a–”
Jane started, interrupting him. “ ‘SH!” she whispered, laying a finger warningly upon her lips.
William had entered the yard at the back gate, and, approaching over the lawn, had arrived at the steps of the porch before Jane perceived him. She gave him an apprehensive look, but he passed into the house absent-mindedly, not even flinching at sight of Clematis–and Mrs. Baxter was right, William did look pale.
“I guess he didn’t hear us,” said Jane, when he had disappeared into the interior. “He acks awful funny!” she added, thoughtfully. “First when he was in love of Miss Pratt, he’d be mad about somep’m almost every minute he was home. Couldn’t anybody say ANYthing to him but he’d just behave as if it was frightful, an’ then if you’d see him out walkin’ with Miss Pratt, well, he’d look like–like–” Jane paused; her eye fell upon Clematis and by a happy inspiration she was able to complete her simile with remarkable accuracy. “He’d look like the way Clematis looks at people! That’s just EXACTLY the way he’d look, Genesis, when he was walkin’ with Miss Pratt; an’ then when he was home he got so quiet he couldn’t answer questions an’ wouldn’t hear what anybody said to him at table or anywhere, an’ papa ‘d nearly almost bust. Mamma
‘n’ papa ‘d talk an’ talk about it, an’ ”–she lowered her voice–“an’ I knew what they were talkin’ about. Well, an’ then he’d hardly ever get mad any more; he’d just sit in his room, an’ sometimes he’d sit in there without any light, or he’d sit out in the yard all by himself all evening, maybe; an’ th’other evening after I was in bed I heard ’em, an’ papa said–well, this is what papa told mamma.” And again lowering her voice, she proffered the quotation from her father in atone somewhat awe-struck: “Papa said, by Gosh! if he ever ‘a’ thought a son of his could make such a Word idiot of himself he almost wished we’d both been girls!”
Having completed this report in a violent whisper, Jane nodded repeatedly, for emphasis, and Genesis shook his head to show that he was as deeply impressed as she wished him to be. “I guess,” she added, after a pause “I guess Willie didn’t hear anything you an’ I talked about him, or clo’es, or anything.”
She was mistaken in part. William had caught no reference to himself, but he had overheard something and he was now alone in his room, thinking about it almost feverishly. “A secon’- han’ sto’ ovuh on the avynoo, where they got swaller-tail suits all way f’um sevum dolluhs to nineteem dolluhs an’ ninety-eight cents.”
. . . Civilization is responsible for certain longings in the breast of man–artificial longings, but sometimes as poignant as hunger and thirst. Of these the strongest are those of the maid for the bridal veil, of the lad for long trousers, and of the youth for a tailed coat of state. To the gratification of this last, only a few of the early joys in life are comparable. Indulged youths, too rich, can know, to the unctuous full, neither the longing nor the gratification; but one such as William, in “moderate circumstances,” is privileged to pant for his first evening clothes as the hart panteth after the water-brook–and sometimes, to pant in vain. Also, this was a crisis in William’s life: in addition to his yearning for such apparel, he was racked by a passionate urgency.
As Jane had so precociously understood, unless he should somehow manage to obtain the proper draperies he could not go to the farewell dance for Miss Pratt. Other unequipped boys could go in their ordinary “best clothes,” but William could not; for, alack! he had dressed too well too soon!
He was in desperate case.
The sorrow of the approaching great departure was but the heavier because it had been so long deferred. To William it had seemed that this flower-strewn summer could actually end no more than he could actually die, but Time had begun its awful lecture, and even Seventeen was listening.
Miss Pratt, that magic girl, was going home.
XXIII
FATHERS FORGET
To the competent twenties, hundreds of miles suggesting no impossibilities, such departures may be rending, but not tragic. Implacable, the difference to Seventeen! Miss Pratt was going home, and Seventeen could not follow; it could only mourn upon the lonely shore, tracing little angelic footprints left in the sand.
To Seventeen such a departure is final; it is a vanishing.
And now it seemed possible that William might be deprived even of the last romantic consolations: of the “last waltz together,” of the last, last “listening to music in the moonlight together”; of all those sacred lasts of the “last evening together.”
He had pleaded strongly for a “dress-suit” as a fitting recognition of his seventeenth birthday anniversary, but he had been denied by his father with a jocularity more crushing than rigor. Since then–in particular since the arrival of Miss Pratt–Mr. Baxter’s temper had been growing steadily more and more even. That is, as affected by William’s social activities, it was uniformly bad. Nevertheless, after heavy brooding, William decided to make one final appeal before he resorted to measures which the necessities of despair had caused him to contemplate.
He wished to give himself every chance for a good effect; therefore, he did not act hastily, but went over what he intended to say, rehearsing it with a few appropriate gestures, and even taking some pleasure in the pathetic dignity of this performance, as revealed by occasional glances at the mirror of his dressing-table. In spite of these little alleviations, his trouble was great and all too real, for, unhappily, the previous rehearsal of an emotional scene does not prove the emotion insincere.
Descending, he found his father and mother still sitting upon the front porch. Then, standing before them, solemn-eyed, he uttered a preluding cough, and began:
“Father,” he said in a loud voice, “I have come to–”
“Dear me!” Mrs. Baxter exclaimed, not perceiving that she was interrupting an intended oration. “Willie, you DO look pale! Sit down, poor child; you oughtn’t to walk so much in this heat.”
“Father,” William repeated. “Fath–”
“I suppose you got her safely home from church,” Mr. Baxter said. “She might have been carried off by footpads if you three boys hadn’t been along to take care of her!”
But William persisted heroically. “Father–” he said. “Father, I have come to–”
“What on earth’s the matter with you?” Mr. Baxter ceased to fan himself; Mrs. Baxter stopped rocking, and both stared, for it had dawned upon them that something unusual was beginning to take place.
William backed to the start and tried it again. “Father, I have come to–” He paused and gulped, evidently expecting to be interrupted, but both of his parents remained silent, regarding him with puzzled surprise. “Father,” he began once more, “I have come–I have come to–to place before you something I think it’s your duty as my father to undertake, and I have thought over this step before laying it before you.”
“My soul!” said Mr. Baxter, under his breath. “My soul!”
“At my age,” William continued, swallowing, and fixing his earnest eyes upon the roof of the porch, to avoid the disconcerting stare of his father–“at my age there’s some things that ought to be done and some things that ought not to be done. If you asked me what I thought OUGHT to be done, there is only one answer: When any- body as old as I am has to go out among other young men his own age that already got one, like anyway half of them HAVE, who I go with, and their fathers have already taken such a step, because they felt it was the only right thing to do, because at my age and the young men I go with’s age, it IS the only right thing to do, because that is something nobody could deny, at my age–” Here William drew a long breath, and, deciding to abandon that sentence as irrevocably tangled, began another: “I have thought over this step, because there comes a time to every young man when they must lay a step before their father before something happens that they would be sorry for. I have thought this undertaking over, and I am certain it would be your honest duty–”
“My soul!” gasped Mr. Baxter. “I thought I knew you pretty well, but you talk like a stranger to ME! What is all this? What you WANT?”
“A dress-suit!” said William.
He had intended to say a great deal more before coming to the point, but, although through nervousness he had lost some threads of his rehearsed plea, it seemed to him that he was getting along well and putting his case with some distinction and power. He was surprised and hurt, therefore, to hear his father utter a wordless shout in a tone of wondering derision.
`I have more to say–” William began.
But Mr. Baxter cut him off. “A dress-suit!” he cried. “Well, I’m glad you were talking about SOMETHING, because I honestly thought it must be too much sun!”
At this, the troubled William brought his eyes down from the porch roof and forgot his rehearsal. He lifted his hand appealingly. “Father,” he said, “I GOT to have one!”
“ `Got to’!” Mr. Baxter laughed a laugh that chilled the supplicant through and through. “At your age I thought I was lucky if I had ANY suit that was fit to be seen in. You’re too young, Willie. I don’t want you to get your mind on such stuff, and if I have my way, you won’t have a dress-suit for four years more, anyhow.”
“Father, I GOT to have one. I got to have one right away!” The urgency in William’s voice was almost tearful. “I don’t ask you to have it made, or to go to expensive tailors, but there’s plenty of good ready-made ones that only cost about forty dollars; they’re advertised in the paper. Father, wouldn’t you spend just forty dollars? I’ll pay it back when I’m in business; I’ll work–”
Mr. Baxter waved all this aside. “It’s not the money. It’s the principle that I’m standing for, and I don’t intend–”
“Father, WON’T you do it?”
“No, I will not!”
William saw that sentence had been passed and all appeals for a new trial denied. He choked, and rushed into the house without more ado.
“Poor boy!” his mother said.
“Poor boy nothing!” fumed Mr. Baxter. “He’s about lost his mind over that Miss Pratt. Think of his coming out here and starting a regular debating society declamation before his
mother and father! Why, I never heard anything like it in my life! I don’t like to hurt his feelings, and I’d give him anything I could afford that would do him any good, but all he wants it for now is to splurge around in at this party before that little yellow-haired girl! I guess he can wear the kind of clothes most of the other boys wear–the kind _I_ wore at parties– and never thought of wearing anything else. What’s the world getting to be like? Seventeen years old and throws a fit because he can’t have a dress-suit!”
Mrs. Baxter looked thoughtful. “But–but suppose he felt he couldn’t go to the dance unless he wore one, poor boy–”
“All the better,” said Mr. Baxter, firmly. “Do him good to keep away and get his mind on something else.”
“Of course,” she suggested, with some timidity, “forty dollars isn’t a great deal of money, and a ready-made suit, just to begin with–”
Naturally, Mr. Baxter perceived whither she was drifting. “Forty dollars isn’t a thousand,” he interrupted, “but what you want to throw it away for? One reason a boy of seventeen
oughtn’t to have evening clothes is the way he behaves with ANY clothes. Forty dollars! Why, only this summer he sat down on Jane’s open paint-box, twice in one week!”
“Well–Miss Pratt IS going away, and the dance will be her last night. I’m afraid it would really hurt him to miss it. I remember once, before we were engaged–that evening before papa took me abroad, and you–”
“It’s no use, mamma,” he said. “We were both in the twenties–why, _I_ was six years older than Willie, even then. There’s no comparison at all. I’ll let him order a dress-suit on his twenty-first birthday and not a minute before. I don’t believe in it, and I intend to see that he gets all this stuff out of his system. He’s got to learn some hard sense!”
Mrs. Baxter shook her head doubtfully, but she said no more. Perhaps she regretted a little that she had caused Mr. Baxter’s evening clothes to be so expansively enlarged–for she looked rather regretful. She also looked rather incomprehensible, not to say cryptic, during the long silence which followed, and Mr. Baxter resumed his rocking, unaware of the fixity of gaze which his wife maintained upon him–a thing the most loyal will do sometimes.
The incomprehensible look disappeared before long; but the regretful one was renewed in the mother’s eyes whenever she caught glimpses of her son, that day, and at the table, where William’s manner was gentle–even toward his heartless father.
Underneath that gentleness, the harried self of William was no longer debating a desperate resolve, but had fixed upon it, and on the following afternoon Jane chanced to be a witness of some resultant actions. She came to her mother with an account of them.
“Mamma, what you s’pose Willie wants of those two ole market-baskets that were down cellar?”
“Why, Jane?”
“Well, he carried ’em in his room, an’ then he saw me lookin’; an’ he said, `G’way from here!’ an’ shut the door. He looks so funny! What’s he want of those ole baskets, mamma?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps he doesn’t even know, himself, Jane.”
But William did know, definitely. He had set the baskets upon chairs, and now, with pale determination, he was proceeding to fill them. When his task was completed the two baskets contained:
One “heavy-weight winter suit of clothes.”
One “light-weight summer suit of clothes.”
One cap.
One straw hat.
Two pairs of white flannel trousers.
Two Madras shirts.
Two flannel shirts.
Two silk shirts.
Seven soft collars.
Three silk neckties.
One crocheted tie.
Eight pairs of socks.
One pair of patent-leather shoes.
One pair of tennis-shoes.
One overcoat.
Some underwear.
One two-foot shelf of books, consisting of several sterling works upon mathematics, in a damaged condition; five of Shakespeare’s plays,
expurgated for schools and colleges, and also damaged; a work upon political economy, and another upon the science of physics; Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary; How to Enter a Drawing- Room and Five Hundred Other Hints; Witty Sayings from Here and There; Lorna Doone; Quentin Durward; The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, a very old copy of Moths, and a small Bible.
William spread handkerchiefs upon the two over-bulging cargoes, that their nature might not be disclosed to the curious, and, after listening a moment at his door, took the baskets, one upon each arm, then went quickly down the stairs and out of the house, out of the yard, and into the alley–by which route he had modestly chosen to travel.
. . . After an absence of about two hours he returned empty-handed and anxious. “Mother, I want to speak to you,” he said, addressing Mrs Baxter in a voice which clearly proved the strain of these racking days. “I want to speak to you about something important.”
“Yes, Willie?”
“Please send Jane away. I can’t talk about important things with a child in the room.”
Jane naturally wished to stay, since he was going to say something important. “Mamma, do I HAF to go?”
“Just a few minutes, dear.”
Jane walked submissively out of the door, leaving it open behind her. Then, having gone about six feet farther, she halted and, preserving a breathless silence, consoled herself for her banishment by listening to what was said, hearing it all as satisfactorily as if she had remained in the room. Quiet, thoughtful children, like Jane, avail themselves of these little pleasures oftener than is suspected.
“Mother,” said William, with great intensity, “I want to ask you please to lend me three dollars and sixty cents.”
“What for, Willie?”
“Mother, I just ask you to lend me three dollars and sixty cents.”
“But what FOR?”
“Mother, I don’t feel I can discuss it any; I simply ask you: Will you lend me three dollars and sixty cents?”
Mrs. Baxter laughed gently. “I don’t think I could, Willie, but certainly I should want to know what for.”
“Mother, I am going on eighteen years of age, and when I ask for a small sum of money like three dollars and sixty cents I think I might be trusted to know how to use it for my own good without having to answer questions like a ch–”
“Why, Willie,” she exclaimed, “you ought to have plenty of money of your own!”
“Of course I ought,” he agreed, warmly. “If you’d ask father to give me a regular allow–”
“No, no; I mean you ought to have plenty left out of that old junk and furniture I let you sell last month. You had over nine dollars!’
“That was five weeks ago,” William explained, wearily.
“But you certainly must have some of it left. Why, it was MORE than nine dollars, I believe! I think it was nearer ten. Surely you haven’t–”
“Ye gods!” cried the goaded William. “A person going on eighteen years old ought to be able to spend nine dollars in five weeks without everybody’s acting like it was a crime! Mother, I ask you the simple question: Will you PLEASE lend me three dollars and sixty cents?”
“I don’t think I ought to, dear. I’m sure your father wouldn’t wish me to, unless you’ll tell me what you want it for. In fact, I won’t consider it at all unless you do tell me.”
“You won’t do it?” he quavered.
She shook her head gently. “You see, dear, I’m afraid the reason you don’t tell me is because you know that I wouldn’t give it to you if I knew what you wanted it for.”
This perfect diagnosis of the case so disheartened him that after a few monosyllabic efforts to continue the conversation with dignity he gave it up, and left in such a preoccupation with despondency that he passed the surprised Jane in the hall without suspecting what she had been doing.
That evening, after dinner, he addressed to his father an impassioned appeal for three dollars and sixty cents, laying such stress of pathos on his principal argument that if he couldn’t have a dress-suit, at least he ought to be given three dollars and sixty CENTS (the emphasis is William’s) that Mr. Baxter was moved in the direction of consent–but not far enough. “I’d like to let you have it, Willie,” he said, excusing himself for refusal, “but your mother felt SHE oughtn’t to do it unless you’d say what you wanted it for, and I’m sure she wouldn’t like me to do it. I can’t let you have it unless you get her to say she wants me to.”
Thus advised, the unfortunate made another appeal to his mother the next day, and, having brought about no relaxation of the situation, again petitioned his father, on the following evening. So it went; the torn and driven William turning from parent to parent; and surely, since the world began, the special sum of three dollars and sixty cents has never been so often mentioned in any one house and in the same space of time as it was in the house of the Baxters during Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday of that oppressive week.
But on Friday William disappeared after breakfast and did not return to lunch.
XXIV
CLOTHES MAKE THE MAN
Mrs. Baxter was troubled. During the
afternoon she glanced often from the open window of the room where she had gone to sew, but the peaceful neighborhood continued to be peaceful, and no sound of the harassed footsteps of William echoed from the pavement. However, she saw Genesis arrive (in his week- day costume) to do some weeding, and Jane immediately skip forth for mingled purposes of observation and conversation.
“What DO they say?” thought Mrs. Baxter, observing that both Jane and Genesis were unusually animated. But for once that perplexity was to be dispersed. After an exciting half-hour Jane came flying to her mother, breathless.
“Mamma,” she cried, “I know where Willie is! Genesis told me, ’cause he saw him, an’ he talked to him while he was doin’ it.”
“Doing what? Where?”
“Mamma, listen! What you think Willie’s doin’? I bet you can’t g–”
“Jane!” Mrs Baxter spoke sharply. “Tell me what Genesis said, at once.”
“Yes’m. Willie’s sittin’ in a lumber-yard that Genesis comes by on his way from over on the avynoo where all the colored people live–an’ he’s countin’ knot-holes in shingles.”
“He is WHAT?”
“Yes’m. Genesis knows all about it, because he was thinkin’ of doin’ it himself, only he says it would be too slow. This is the way it is, mamma. Listen, mamma, because this is just exackly the way it is. Well, this lumber-yard man got into some sort of a fuss because he bought millions an’ millions of shingles, mamma, that had too many knots in, an’ the man don’t want to pay for ’em, or else the store where he bought ’em won’t take ’em back, an’ they got to prove how many shingles are bad shingles, or somep’m, an’ anyway, mamma, that’s what
Willie’s doin’. Every time he comes to a bad shingle, mamma, he puts it somewheres else, or somep’m like that, mamma, an’ every time he’s put a thousand bad shingles in this other place they give him six cents. He gets the six cents to keep, mamma–an’ that’s what he’s been doin’ all day!”
“Good gracious!”
“Oh, but that’s nothing, mamma–just you wait till you hear the rest. THAT part of it isn’t anything a TALL, mamma! You wouldn’t hardly notice that part of it if you knew the other part of it, mamma. Why, that isn’t ANYTHING!” Jane made demonstrations of scorn for the insignificant information already imparted.
“Jane!”
“Yes’m?”
“I want to know everything Genesis told you,” said her mother, “and I want you to tell it as quickly as you can.”
“Well, I AM tellin’ it, mamma!” Jane protested. “I’m just BEGINNING to tell it. I can’t tell it unless there’s a beginning, can I? How could there be ANYTHING unless you had to begin it, mamma?”
“Try your best to go on, Jane!”
“Yes’m. Well, Genesis says– Mamma!” Jane interrupted herself with a little outcry. “Oh! I bet THAT’S what he had those two market- baskets for! Yes, sir! That’s just what he did! An’ then he needed the rest o’ the money an’ you an’ papa wouldn’t give him any, an’ so he began countin’ shingles to-day ’cause to-night’s the night of the party an’ he just HASS to have it!”
Mrs. Baxter, who had risen to her feet, recalled the episode of the baskets and sank into a chair. “How did Genesis know Willie wanted forty dollars, and if Willie’s pawned something how did Genesis know THAT? Did Willie tell Gen–”
“Oh no, mamma, Willie didn’t want forty dollars–only fourteen!”
“But he couldn’t get even the cheapest ready- made dress-suit for fourteen dollars.”
“Mamma, you’re gettin’ it all mixed up!” Jane cried. “Listen, mamma! Genesis knows all about a second-hand store over on the avynoo; an’ it keeps ‘most everything, an’ Genesis says it’s the nicest store! It keeps waiter suits all the way up to nineteen dollars and ninety-nine cents. Well, an’ Genesis wants to get one of those suits, so he goes in there all the time, an’ talks to the man an’ bargains an’ bargains with him, ’cause Genesis says this man is the bargainest man in the wide worl’, mamma! That’s what Genesis says. Well, an’ so this man’s name is One-eye Beljus, mamma. That’s his name, an’ Genesis says so. Well, an’ so this man that Genesis told me about, that keeps the store–I mean One-eye Beljus, mamma–well, One-eye Beljus had Willie’s name written down in a book, an’ he knew Genesis worked for fam’lies that have boys like Willie in ’em, an’ this morning One-eye Beljus showed Genesis Willie’s name written down in this book, an’ One-eye Beljus asked Genesis if he knew anybody by that name an’ all about him. Well, an’ so at first Genesis pretended he was tryin’ to remember, because he wanted to find out what Willie went there for. Genesis didn’t tell any stories, mamma; he just pretended he couldn’t remember, an’ so, well, One-eye Beljus kept talkin’ an’ pretty soon Genesis found out all about it. One-eye Beljus said Willie came in there an’ tried on the coat of one of those waiter suits–”
“Oh no!” gasped Mrs. Baxter.
“Yes’m, an’ One-eye Beljus said it was the only one that would fit Willie, an’ One-eye Beljus told Willie that suit was worth fourteen dollars, an’ Willie said he didn’t have any money, but he’d like to trade something else for it. Well, an’ so One-eye Beljus said this was an awful fine suit an’ the only one he had that had b’longed to a white gentleman. Well, an’ so they bargained, an’ bargained, an’ bargained, an’ BARGAINED! An’ then, well, an’ so at last Willie said he’d go an’ get everything that b’longed to him, an’ One-eye Beljus could pick out enough to make fourteen dollars’ worth, an’ then Willie could have the suit. Well, an’ so Willie came home an’ put everything he had that b’longed to him into those two baskets, mamma–that’s just what he did, ’cause Genesis says he told One-eye Beljus it was everything that b’longed to him, an’ that would take two baskets, mamma. Well, then, an’ so he told One-eye Beljus to pick out fourteen dollars’ worth, an’ One-eye Beljus ast Willie if he didn’t have a watch. Well, Willie took out his watch an’ One-eye Beljus said it was an awful bad watch, but he would put it in for a dollar; an’ he said, `I’ll put your necktie pin in for forty cents more,’ so Willie took it out of his necktie an’ then One-eye Beljus said it would take all the things in the baskets to make I forget how much, mamma, an’ the watch would be a dollar more, an’ the pin forty cents, an’ that would leave just three dollars an’ sixty cents more for Willie to pay before he could get the suit.”
Mrs. Baxter’s face had become suffused with high color, but she wished to know all that Genesis had said, and, mastering her feelings with an effort, she told Jane to proceed–a command obeyed after Jane had taken several long breaths.
“Well, an’ so the worst part of it is, Genesis says, it’s because that suit is haunted.”
“What!”
“Yes’m,” said Jane, solemnly; “Genesis says it’s haunted. Genesis says everybody over on the avynoo knows all about that suit, an’ he says that’s why One-eye Beljus never could sell it before. Genesis says One-eye Beljus tried to sell it to a colored man for three dollars, but the man said he wouldn’t put in on for three hunderd dollars, an’ Genesis says HE wouldn’t, either, because it belonged to a Dago waiter that–that–” Jane’s voice sank to a whisper of unctuous horror. She was having a wonderful time! “Mamma, this Dago waiter, he lived over on the avynoo, an’ he took a case-knife he’d sharpened– AN’ HE CUT A LADY’S HEAD OFF WITH IT!”
Mrs. Baxter screamed faintly.
“An’ he got hung, mamma! If you don’t believe it, you can ask One-eye Beljus–I guess HE knows! An’ you can ask–”
“Hush!”
“An’ he sold this suit to One-eye Beljus when he was in jail, mamma. He sold it to him before he got hung, mamma.”
“Hush, Jane!”
But Jane couldn’t hush now. “An’ he had that suit on when he cut the lady’s head off, mamma, an’ that’s why it’s haunted. They cleaned it all up excep’ a few little spots of bl–”
“JANE!” shouted her mother. “You must not talk about such things, and Genesis mustn’t tell, you stories of that sort!”
“Well, how could he help it, if he told me about Willie?” Jane urged, reasonably.
“Never mind! Did that crazy ch– Did Willie LEAVE the baskets in that dreadful place?”
“Yes’m–an’ his watch an’ pin,” Jane informed her, impressively. “An’ One-eye Beljus wanted to know if Genesis knew Willie, because One-eye Beljus wanted to know if Genesis thought Willie could get the three dollars an; sixty cents, an’ One-eye Beljus wanted to know if Genesis thought he could get anything more out of him besides that. He told Genesis he hadn’t told Willie he COULD have the suit, after all; he just told him he THOUGHT he could, but he wouldn’t say for certain till he brought him the three dollars an’ sixty cents. So Willie left all his things there, an’ his watch an–”
“That will do!” Mrs. Baxter’s voice was sharper than it had ever been in Jane’s recollection. “I don’t need to hear any more–and I
don’t WANT to hear any more!”
Jane was justly aggrieved. “But, mamma, it isn’t MY fault!”
Mrs. Baxter’s lips parted to speak, but she checked herself. “Fault?” she said, gravely. “I wonder whose fault it really is!”
And with that she went hurriedly into William’s room and made a brief inspection of his
clothes-closet and dressing-table. Then, as Jane watched her in awed silence, she strode to the window, and called, loudly:
“Genesis!”
“Yes’m?” came the voice from below.
“Go to that lumber-yard where Mr. William is at work and bring him here to me at once. If he declines to come, tell him–” Her voice broke oddly; she choked, but Jane could not decide with what emotion. “Tell him–tell him I ordered you to use force if necessary! Hurry!”
“YES’M!”
Jane ran to the window in time to see Genesis departing seriously through the back gate.
“Mamma–”
“Don’t talk to me now, Jane,” Mrs. Baxter said, crisply. “I want you to go down in the yard, and when Willie comes tell him I’m waiting for him here in his own room. And don’t come with him, Jane. Run!”
“Yes, mamma.” Jane was pleased with this appointment; she anxiously desired to be the first to see how Willie “looked.”
. . . He looked flurried and flustered and breathless, and there were blisters upon the reddened palms of his hands. “What on earth’s the matter, mother?” he asked, as he stood panting before her. “Genesis said something was wrong, and he said you told him to hit me if I wouldn’t come.”
“Oh NO!” she cried. “I only meant I thought perhaps you wouldn’t obey any ordinary message–”
“Well, well, it doesn’t matter, but please hurry and say what you want to, because I got to get back and–”
“No,” Mrs. Baxter said, quietly, “you’re not going back to count any more shingles, Willie. How much have you earned?”
He swallowed, but spoke bravely. “Thirty- six cents. But I’ve been getting lots faster the last two hours and there’s a good deal of time before six o’clock. Mother–”
“No,” she said. “You’re going over to that horrible place where you’ve left your clothes and your watch and all those other things in the two baskets, and you’re going to bring them home at once.”
“Mother!” he cried, aghast. “Who told you?”
“It doesn’t matter. You don’t want your father to find out, do you? Then get those things back here as quickly as you can. They’ll have to be fumigated after being in that den.”
“They’ve never been out of the baskets,’; he protested, hotly, “except just to be looked at. They’re MY things, mother, and I had a right to do what I needed to with ’em, didn’t I?” His utterance became difficult. “You and father just CAN’T understand–and you won’t do anything to help me–”
“Willie, you can go to the party,” she said, gently. “You didn’t need those frightful clothes at all.”
“I do!” he cried. “I GOT to have ’em! I CAN’T go in my day clo’es! There’s a reason you wouldn’t understand why I can’t. I just CAN’T!”
“Yes,” she said, “you can go to the party.”
“I can’t, either! Not unless you give me three dollars and twenty-four cents, or unless I can get back to the lumber-yard and earn the rest before–”
“No!” And the warm color that had rushed over Mrs. Baxter during Jane’s sensational recital returned with a vengeance. Her eyes flashed. “If you’d rather I sent a policeman for those baskets, I’ll send one. I should prefer to do it–much! And to have that rascal arrested. If you don’t want me to send a policeman you can go for them yourself, but you must start within ten minutes, because if you don’t I’ll telephone headquarters. Ten minutes, Willie, and I mean it!”
He cried out, protesting. She would make him a thing of scorn forever and soil his honor, if she sent a policeman. Mr. Beljus was a fair and honest tradesman, he explained, passionately, and had not made the approaches in this matter. Also, the garments in question, though not entirely new, nor of the highest mode, were of good material and in splendid condition. Unmistakably they were evening clothes, and such a
bargain at fourteen dollars that William would guarantee to sell them for twenty after he had worn them this one evening. Mr. Beljus himself had said that he would not even think of letting them go at fourteen to anybody else, and as for the two poor baskets of worn and useless articles offered in exchange, and a bent scarf- pin and a worn-out old silver watch that had belonged to great-uncle Ben–why, the ten dollars and forty cents allowed upon them was
beyond all ordinary liberality; it was almost charity. There was only one place in town where evening clothes were rented, and the suspicious persons in charge had insisted that William obtain from his father a guarantee to insure the return of the garments in perfect condition. So that was hopeless. And wasn’t it better, also, to wear clothes which had known only one previous occupant (as was the case with Mr. Beljus’s offering) than to hire what chance hundreds had hired? Finally, there was only one thing to be considered and this was the fact that William HAD to have those clothes!
“Six minutes,” said Mrs. Baxter, glancing implacably at her watch. “When it’s ten I’ll telephone.”
And the end of it was, of course, victory for the woman–victory both moral and physical. Three-quarters of an hour later she was
unburdening the contents of the two baskets and putting the things back in place, illuminating these actions with an expression of strong distaste–in spite of broken assurances that Mr. Beljus had not more than touched any of the articles offered to him for valuation.
. . . At dinner, which was unusually early that evening, Mrs. Baxter did not often glance toward her son; she kept her eyes from that white face and spent most of her time in urging upon Mr. Baxter that he should be prompt in dressing for a card-club meeting which he and she were to attend that evening. These admonitions of hers
were continued so pressingly that Mr. Baxter, after protesting that there was no use in being a whole hour too early, groaningly went to dress without even reading his paper.
William had retired to his own room, where he lay upon his bed in the darkness. He heard the evening noises of the house faintly through the closed door: voices and the clatter of metal and china from the far-away kitchen, Jane’s laugh in the hall, the opening and closing of the doors. Then his father seemed to be in distress about something. William heard him complaining to Mrs. Baxter, and though the words were indistinct, the tone was vigorously plaintive. Mrs.
Baxter laughed and appeared to make light of his troubles, whatever they were–and presently their footsteps were audible from the stairway; the front door closed emphatically, and they were gone.
Everything was quiet now. The open window showed as a greenish oblong set in black, and William knew that in a little while there would come through the stillness of that window the distant sound of violins. That was a moment he dreaded with a dread that ached. And as he lay on his dreary bed he thought of brightly lighted rooms where other boys were dressing eagerly faces and hair shining, hearts beating high–boys who would possess this last evening and the “last waltz together,” the last smile and the last sigh.
It did not once enter his mind that he could go to the dance in his “best suit,” or that possibly the other young people at the party would be too busy with their own affairs to notice particularly what he wore. It was the unquestionable and granite fact, to his mind, that the whole derisive World would know the truth about his earlier appearances in his father’s clothes. And that was a form of ruin not to be faced. In the protective darkness and seclusion of William’s bedroom, it is possible that smarting eyes relieved themselves by blinking rather energetically; it is even possible that there was a minute damp spot upon the pillow. Seventeen cannot always manage the little boy yet alive under all the coverings.
Now arrived that moment he had most painfully anticipated, and dance-music drifted on the night;–but there came a tapping upon his door and a soft voice spoke.
“Will-ee?”
With a sharp exclamation William swung his legs over the edge of the bed and sat up. Of all things he desired not, he desired no conversation with, or on the part of, Jane. But he had forgotten to lock his door–the handle turned, and a dim little figure marched in.
“Willie, Adelia’s goin’ to put me to bed.”
“You g’way from here,” he said, huskily. “I haven’t got time to talk to you. I’m busy.”
“Well, you can wait a minute, can’t you?” she asked, reasonably. “I haf to tell you a joke on mamma.”
“I don’t want to hear any jokes!”
“Well, I HAF to tell you this one ’cause she told me to! Oh!” Jane clapped her hand over her mouth and jumped up and down, offering a fantastic silhouette against the light of the Open door. “Oh, oh, OH!”
“What’s matter?”
“She said I mustn’t, MUSTN’T tell that she told me to tell! My goodness! I forgot that!