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diff --git a/12377-0.txt b/12377-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b6b40b5 --- /dev/null +++ b/12377-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3284 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12377 *** + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 12377-h.htm or 12377-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/3/7/12377/12377-h/12377-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/3/7/12377/12377-h.zip) + + + + + +THE COURT OF BOYVILLE + +By + +William Allen White + +Author Of The Real Issue, etc. + +Illustrated by ORSON LOWELL (with the exception of the first story, +the illustrations for which are by GUSTAV VERBEEK). + +1898 + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + + +PROLOGUE + +THE MARTYRDOM OF "MEALY" JONES + +A RECENT CONFEDERATE VICTORY + +"WHILE THE EVIL DAYS COME NOT" + +JAMES SEARS: A NAUGHTY PERSON + +MUCH POMP AND SEVERAL CIRCUMSTANCES + +"THE HERB CALLED HEARTS-EASE" + + + + + Where is Boyville? By what track + May we trace our journey back; + Up what mountains, thro' what seas + By what meadow-lands and leas, + Must we travel to the bourne + Of the shady rows of corn + That lead down to the Willows + Where the day is always morn? + + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + +"Say, boys, where's its bottle?" + +The three boys were scuffling for the possession of a piece of rope + +He saw Abe catch Jimmy and hold his head under water + +He felt his father's finger under his collar and his own feet shambling + +Mrs. Jones stooped to the floor and took her child by an arm + +His feet hanging out of the back of the wagon that had held the coffin + +His luck was bad + +He withdrew from the game and sat alone against the barn + +As she turned to her turkey-slicing + +The new preacher, for whom the party was made + +The first long dress + +"Dickey, Dickey, for gracious sake, keep still" + +"Did you know my dad was a soldier?" + +During the next two hours the boy wandered on the prairie + +"Mary Pennington, aged two years, three months, and ten days" + +Piggy went to get his flying hat + +She stroked his hand and snuggled closer to him + +Miss Morgan smiled happily at the clouds + +Chased the little girls around the yard with it + +She would not have invited Harold Jones to sit and sing with her +during the opening hour + +Harold Jones + +To study his tastes + +... The comradeship ... was beautiful to see + +The red-headed Pratt girl + +He could only snap chalk in a preoccupied way and listen to his +Heart's Desire + +Piggy was piling up the primary urchins in wiggling, squealing piles + +He watched the teacher's finger crook a signal for the note to be +brought forward + +... fought boys who were three classes above him ... whipped groups of +boys of assorted sizes + +Over his mother's shoulders Piggy saw the hired girl giggle + +Her son ate rapidly in silence + +His cleanliness pleased his mother and she boasted of it to the +mothers of other boys + +A little maid in a black-and-red check + +Piggy sat on the front porch, and reviewed the entire affair + +It began when his Heart's Desire had fluttered into his autograph +album + +At this important bit of repartee + +His heart was full of bitterness + +Throwing sticks in the water to scare the fish + +A crawler, a creeper, a toddler, a stumbler, and a sneaker + +James + +Mrs. Jones came out to take care of the butter + +The sort of boy who would unsex himself by looking at a baby + +Jimmy heard Mrs. Jones tell his little sister Annie that morning that +she was no longer the baby + +His father strutting around town ... bragging of the occurrence that +filled the boy with shame + +He jumped for the slanting boards with his bare feet, and his heart +was glad + +He sat on a log and slowly lifted up his foot, twisting his face into +an agonized knot + +"Spit, spit, spy, tell me whur my chicken is, er I'll hit ye in the +eye" + +"I'll pay for your chicken, I say. Now you keep away from me" + +An irregular circumference that touched his ears and his chin and his +hair + +"Got anything here fit to eat?" + +"What'd you want to take Annie's doll away from her for?" + +She drew him down and kissed his cheek while he pecked at her lips + +Piggy Pennington ... galloped his father's fat delivery horse up and +down the alley + +Mammoth Consolidated Shows + +Oil made by hanging a bottle of angle-worms in the sun to fry + +How many bags of carpet rags went to the ragman + +Brother Baker--a tiptoeing Nemesis + +Dressed-up children were flitting along the side streets, hurrying +their seniors + +The Balloon-Vender wormed his way through the buzzing crowd, leaving +his wares in a red and blue trail behind him + +The Blue Sash about the country girl's waist and the flag in her +Beau's hat + +"One's a trick elephant. You'd die a-laughing if you saw him" + +"It's an awful good one. Can't he go just this once?" + +8 Funny Clowns--count them 8 + +"Well, son, you're a daisy. They generally drop the first kick" + +The other wranglers ... dropped out for heavy repairs + +When Mr. Pennington's eyes fell on Bud, he leaned on a show-case and +laughed till he shook all over + +"Miss Morgan, I just want you to look at my boy" + +"Now, Henry, don't ever have anything to do with that kind of trash +again" + +"Here's a dollar I got for ridin' the trick mule ... I thought it +would be nice for the missionary society" + +"Gee, we're going to have pie, ain't we" + + + + +PROLOGUE + + +We who are passing "through the wilderness of this world" find it +difficult to realize what an impenetrable wall there is around +the town of Boyville. Storm it as we may with the simulation of +light-heartedness, bombard it with our heavy guns, loaded with +fishing-hooks and golf-sticks, and skates and base-balls, and +butterfly-nets, the walls remain. If once the clanging gates of the +town shut upon a youth, he is banished forever. From afar he may peer +over the walls at the games inside, but he may not be of them. Let him +try to join them, and lo, the games become a mockery, and he finds +that he is cavorting still outside the walls, while the good citizens +inside are making sly sport of him. Who, being recently banished from +Boyville, has not sought to return? In vain does he haunt the swimming +hole; the water elves will have none of him. He hushes their laughter, +muffles their calls, takes the essence from their fun, and leaves it +dust upon their lips. + +But we of the race of grown-ups are a purblind people. Otherwise, +when we acknowledge what a stronghold this Boyville is, we the +banished would not seek to steal away the merry townsmen, and bruise +our hearts and theirs at our hopeless task. We have learned many +things in our schools, and of the making of books there has been no +end; so it is odd that we have not learned to let a boy be a boy. Why +not let him feel the thrill from the fresh spring grass under his +feet, as his father felt it before him, and his father's father, even +back to Adam, who walked thus with God! There is a tincture of iron +that seeps into a boys blood with the ozone of the earth, that can +come to him by no other way. Let him run if he will; Heavens air is a +better elixir than any that the alchemist can mix. What if he roams +the woods and lives for hours in the water? What if he prefers the +barn to the parlor? What if he fights? Does he not take the risk of +the scratched face and the bruises? Should he not be in some measure +the judge of the situation before him when the trouble begins? Boys +have an ugly name for one of their kind who discovers suddenly, in a +crisis of his own making, that he is not allowed to fight. And it were +better to see a boy with a dozen claw-marks down his face than to see +him eat that name in peace. + +Now this conclusion may seem barbaric to elders who have to pay for +new clothes to replace the torn ones, And according to their light +perhaps the elders see clearly. But the grown-up people forget that +their wisdom has impaired their vision to see as boys see and to pass +judgment upon things in another sphere. + +For Boyville is a Free Town in the monarchy of the world. Its +citizens mind their own business, and they desire travellers in this +waste to do likewise. The notion that spectacled gentry should come +nosing through the streets and alleys of Boyville, studying +the sanitation, which is not of the best, and objecting to the +constitution and by laws,--which were made when the rivers were dug +and the hills piled up,--the notion of an outsider interfering with +the Divine right of boys to eat what they please, to believe what they +please, and, under loyalty to the monarchy of the world, to do what +they please, is repugnant to this free people. Nor does it better +matters when the man behind the spectacles explains that to eat +sheep-sorrel is deleterious; to feed younkers Indian turnip is cruel; +to suck the sap of the young grapevine in spring produces malaria; to +smoke rattan is depraving, and to stuff one's stomach with paw-paws +and wild-grapes is dangerous in the extreme. + +For does not the first article of the law of this Free Town expressly +state, that boys shall be absolved from obeying any and all laws +regulating the human stomach, and be free of the penalties thereto +attaching? And again when Wisdom says that the boy shall give up his +superstitions, the boy points to hoary tradition, which says that the +snakes tail does not in fact and in truth die till sundown; that if +a boy kills a lucky bug he shall find a nickel; that to cross one's +heart and lie, brings on swift and horrible retribution; that letting +the old cat die causes death in the family; that to kill a toad makes +the cow give bloody milk; that horsehairs in water turn to snakes in +nine days; that spitting on the bait pleases the fish, and that to +draw a circle in the dust around a marble charms it against being hit. +What tradition, ancient and honorable in Boyville, declares is true, +that is the Law everlasting, and no wise mans word shall change the +law one jot nor one tittle. For in the beginning it was written, to +get in the night wood, to eat with a fork at table, to wear shoes on +Sunday, to say "sir" to company, and "thank you" to the lady, to go to +bed at nine to remember that there are others who like gravy, to stay +out of the water in dog days, to come right straight home from school, +to shinny on your own side, and to clean those feet for Heaven's +sake,--that is the whole duty of boys. As it was in the beginning, so +it shall be ever after. + +Now most of us grown-ups do not admit these things, and not being +able to speak the language of the people whose rights we are +seeking to destroy, we will never know how utterly futile are our +conspiracies. But that is immaterial. + +The main point that the gentle reader should bear in mind is this: +The town of Boyville is free and independent; governed only by the +ancient laws, made by the boys of the elder days--by the boys who +found bottom in the rivers that flowed out of Eden; by little Seth, +little Enoch, little Methuselah, and little Noah; by the boys who +threw mud balls from willow withes broken from trees whereon David +hung his harp a thousand years thereafter. For Boyville was old when +Nineveh was a frontier post. + +Boyville hears from afar the buzz about principalities and powers, +the clatter of javelins and the clash of arms, the hubbub of the +"Pride and pomp and circumstance of glorious war." The courtiers of +Boyville cheer for each new hero, and claim fellowship with all "like +gentlemen unafraid." But the Free Town has its own sovereign, makes +its own idols. And the clatter and clash and hubbub that attend the +triumphs of the kingdoms of the earth pass by unconquered Boyville as +the shadow of a dream. + + + + +THE MARTYRDOM OF "MEALY" JONES + + +A WAIL IN B MINOR + + Oh, what has become of the ornery boy, + Who used to chew slip'ry elm, "rosum" and wheat: + And say "jest a coddin'" and "what d'ye soy;" + And wear rolled-up trousers all out at the seat? + + And where is the boy who had shows in the barn, + And "skinned a cat backards" and turned "summersets;" + The boy who had faith in a snake-feeder yarn, + And always smoked grape vine and corn cigarettes? + + Where now is the small boy who spat on his bait, + And proudly stood down near the foot of the class, + And always went "barefooted" early and late, + And washed his feet nights on the dew of the grass? + + Where is the boy who could swim on his back, + And dive and tread water and lay his hair, too; + The boy who would jump off the spring-board ker-whack, + And light on his stomach as I used to do? + + Oh where and oh where is the old-fashioned boy? + Has the old-fashioned boy with his old-fashioned ways, + Been crowded aside by the Lord Fauntleroy,-- + The cheap tinselled make-believe, full of alloy + Without the pure gold of the rollicking joy + Of the old-fashioned boy in the old-fashioned days? + +[Illustration: The Court of Boyville + The Martyrdom of Mealy Jones] + +His mother named him Harold, and named him better than she knew. He +was just such a boy as one would expect to see bearing a heroic name. +He had big, faded blue eyes, a nubbin of a chin, wide, wondering ears, +and freckles--such brown blotches of freckles on his face and neck and +hands, such a milky way of them across the bridge of his snub nose, +that the boys called him "Mealy." And Mealy Jones it was to the end. +When his parents called him Harold in the hearing of his playmates, +the boy was ashamed, for he felt that a nickname gave him equal +standing among his fellows. There were times in his life--when he +was alone, recounting his valorous deeds--that Mealy more than half +persuaded himself that he was a real boy. But when he was with +Winfield Pennington, surnamed "Piggy" in the court of Boyville, and +Abraham Lincoln Carpenter, similarly knighted "Old Abe," Mealy saw +that he was only Harold, a weak and unsatisfactory imitation. He was +handicapped in his struggle to be a natural boy by a mother who had +been a "perfect little lady" in her girlhood and who was moulding her +son in the forms that fashioned her. If it were the purpose of this +tale to deal in philosophy, it would be easy to digress and show that +Mealy Jones was a study in heredity; that from his mother's side of +the house he inherited wide, white, starched collars, and from his +father's side, a burning desire to spit through his teeth. But this is +only a simple tale, with no great problem in it, save that of a boy +working out his salvation between a fiendish lust for suspenders +with trousers and a long-termed incarceration in ruffled waists with +despised white china buttons around his waist-band. + +No one but Piggy ever knew how Mealy Jones learned to swim; and +Harold's mother doesn't consider Piggy Pennington any one, for the +Penningtons are Methodists and the Joneses are Baptists, and Very +hard-shelled ones, too. However, Mealy Jones did learn to swim +"dog-fashion" years and years after the others had become +post-graduates in aquatic lore and could "tread water," "swim +sailor-fashion," and "lay" their hair. Mrs. Jones permitted her son +to go swimming occasionally, but she always exacted from him a solemn +promise not to go into the deep water. And Harold, who was a good +little boy, made it a point not to "let down" when he was beyond the +"step-off." So of course he could not know how deep it was; although +the bad little boys who "brought up bottom" had told him that it was +twelve feet deep. + +One hot June afternoon Mealy stood looking at a druggist's display +window, gazing idly at the pills, absently picking out the various +kinds which he had taken. He had just come from his mother with +the expressed injunction not to go near the river. His eyes roamed +listlessly from the pills to the pain-killer, and; turning wearily +away, he saw Piggy and Old Abe and Jimmy Sears. The three boys were +scuffling for, the possession of a piece of rope. Pausing a moment in +front of the grocery store, they beckoned for Mealy. The lad joined +the group. Some one said,-- + +"Come on, Mealy, and go swimmin'." + +"Aw, Mealy can't go," put in Jimmy; "his ma won't let him." + +"Yes, I kin, _too_, if I want to," replied Mealy, stoutly--but, alas! +guiltily. + +"Then come on," said Piggy Pennington. "You don't dast. My ma don't +care how often I go in--only in dog days." + +[Illustration: _The three boys were scuffling for the possession of a +piece of rope_.] + +After some desultory debate they started--the four boys--pushing one +another off the sidewalk, "rooster-fighting," shouting, laughing, +racing through the streets. Mealy Jones longed to have the other boys +observe his savage behavior. He knew, however, that he was not of +them, that he was a sad make-believe. The guilt of the deed he was +doing, oppressed him. He wondered how he could go into crime so +stolidly. Inwardly he quaked as he recalled the stories he had read of +boys who had drowned while disobeying their parents. His uneasiness +was increased by the ever-present sense that he could not cope with +the other boys at their sports. He let them jostle him, and often +would run, after his self-respect would goad him to jostle back. Mealy +was glad when the group came to the deep shade of the woods and walked +slowly. + +It was three o'clock when the boys reached the swimming-hole. There +the great elm-tree, with its ladder of exposed roots, stretched over +the water. Piggy Pennington, stripped to the skin, ran whooping down +the sloping bank, splashed over the gravel at the water's edge, and +plunged into the deepest water. Old Abe followed cautiously, bathing +his temples and his wrists before sousing all over. Jimmy Sears threw +his shirt high up on the bank as he stood ankle-deep in the stream. +Piggy's exhilaration having worn off by this time, he picked up a +mussel-shell and threw it at Jimmy's feet. The water dashed wide of +its mark and sprinkled Mealy, who was sitting on a log, taking off his +shoes. + +"Here, Piggy, you quit that," said Mealy. + +Jimmy said nothing. He sprang into the air head foremost toward Piggy, +who dived from sight. His pursuer saw the direction Piggy took and +followed him. The boys were a few feet apart when Jimmy came to the +surface, puffing and spouting and shaking the water from his eyes and +hair. He hesitated in his pursuit. Piggy observed the hesitation, and +with a quick overhand movement shot a stinging stream of water from +the ball of his hand into his antagonist's face. Then Piggy turned +on his side and swam swiftly to shallow water, where he stood and +splashed his victim, who was lumbering toward shore with his eyes +shut, panting loudly. With every splash Piggy said, "How's that, Jim?" +or "Take a bite o' this," or "Want a drink?" When Jimmy got where he +could walk on the creek bottom, he made a feint of fighting back, +but he soon ceased, and stood by, gasping for breath, before saying, +"Let's quit." + +Then followed the fun of ducking, the scuffling and the capers of the +young human animals at play--at play even as gods in the elder days. +Mealy saw it all through envious eyes and with a pricking conscience, +as he doggedly fumbled the myriad buttons which his mother had +fastened upon his pretty clothes. He heard Piggy dare Abe across the +creek, and call him a cowardly calf, and say, "Any one't 'ull take a +dare'll steal sheep." Mealy saw Jimmy grin as he cracked rocks under +water while the other boys were diving, and watched Old Abe, as +he made the waves rise under his chin, swimming after the fleeing +culprit. He saw Abe catch Jimmy and hold his head under water until +Mealy's smile faded to a horrified grin. Then he saw the victim and +the victor come merrily to the shallows, laughing as though nothing +unusual had occurred. It was high revel in Boyville, and the satyrs +were in the midst of their joy. + +[Illustration: _He saw Abe catch Jimmy and hold his head under +water_.] + +Then Mealy heard Piggy say, "Aw, come in, Mealy; it won't hurt you." + +"Is it cold?" asked Mealy. + +"Naw," replied Piggy. + +"Naw, course it ain't," returned Jimmy. + +"Warm as dish-water," cried Abe. + +Mealy's ribs shone through his skin. His big milky eyes made him seem +uncanny, standing there shivering in the shade. He hobbled down the +pebbly bank on his tender feet, his bashful grin breaking into a dozen +contortions of pain as he went. The boys stood watching him like +tigers awaiting a Christian martyr. He paused at the water's edge, put +in a toe and jerked it out with a spasm of cold. + +"Aw, that ain't cold," said Piggy. + +"Naw, when you get in you won't mind it," insisted Abe. + +Mealy replied, "Oo, oo! I think that's pretty cold." + +"Wet your legs and you won't get the cramp," advised Jimmy Sears. + +Mealy stooped over to scoop up some water in his hands. He heard the +boys laugh, and the next instant felt a shower of water on his back. +It made the tears come. + +"Uhm-m-m--no fair splashin'," he whined. + +Mealy put one foot in the water and drew it out quickly, gasping, "Oo! +I ain't goin' in. It's too cold for me. It'll bring my measles out." +He started--trembling--up the bank; then he heard a splashing behind +him. + +"Come back here," cried Piggy, whose hands were uplifted; "come back +here and git in this water or I'll muddy you." Piggy's hands were full +of mud. He was about to throw it when the Jones boy pretended to laugh +and giggled, "Oh, I was just a-foolin'." + +But he paused again at the water's edge, and Piggy, who had come up +close enough to touch the rickety lad, reached out a muddy hand and +dabbed the quaking boy's breast. The other boys roared with glee. +Mealy extended a deprecatory hand, and took Piggy's wet, glistening +arm and stumbled nervously into the stream, with an "Oo-oo!" at every +uncertain step. When the water came to Mealy's waist Abe cried, "Duck! +duck, or I'll splash you!" The boy sank down, with his teeth biting +his tongue as he said, "Oo! I wouldn't do you that way." + +When the shock of the tepid water had spent itself, Mealy's grin +returned, and he shivered happily, "Oo--it's good, ain't it?" + +Ten minutes later the boys were diving from the roots of the elm-tree +into the deep water on the other side of the creek. Ten minutes after +that they were sliding down a muddy toboggan which they had revived by +splashing water upon the incline made and provided by the town boys +for scudding. Ten minutes afterward they were covering themselves +with coats of mud, adorned--one with stripes made with the point of a +stick, another with polka-dots, another with checks, and Mealy with +snake-like, curving stripes. Then the whole crew dashed down the path +to the railroad bridge to greet the afternoon passenger train. When it +came they jumped up and down and waved their striped and spotted arms +like the barbarian warriors which they fancied they were. They swam up +the stream leisurely, and, as they rounded the bend that brought their +landing-place into view, the quick eye of Piggy Pennington saw that +some one had been meddling with their clothes. He gave the alarm. The +boys quickened their strokes. When they came to the shallows of the +ford they saw the blue-and-white starched shirt of Mealy Jones lying +in a pool tied into half a dozen knots, with the water soaking them +tighter and tighter. The other boys' clothes were not disturbed. + +"Mealy's got to chaw beef," cried Piggy Pennington. The other boys +echoed Piggy's merriment. Great sorrows come to grown-up people, but +there is never a moment in after-life more poignant with grief than, +that which stabs a boy when he learns that he must wrestle with a +series of water-soaked knots in a shirt. As Mealy sat in the broiling +sun, gripping the knots with his teeth and fingers, he asked himself +again and again how he could explain his soiled shirt to his mother. +Lump after lump rose in his throat, and dissolved into tears that +trickled down his nose. The other boys did not heed him. They were +following Piggy's dare, dropping into the water from the overhanging +limb of the elm-tree. + +They did not see the figure of another boy, in a gingham shirt, blue +overalls, and a torn straw hat, sitting on a stone back of Mealy, +smiling complacently. Not until the stranger walked down to the +water's edge where Mealy sat did the other boys spy him. + +"Who is it?" asked Abe. + +"I never saw him before," replied Jimmy Sears. + +"Oh, I'll tell you who it is," returned Abe, after looking the +stranger over. "It's the new boy. Him an' his old man come to town +yesterday. They say he's a fighter. He licked every boy in the +Mountain Jumpers this mornin'." + +By this time the new boy was standing over Mealy, saying, "How you +gittin' along?" + +Mealy looked up, and said with the petulance of a spoiled child, "Hush +your mouth, you old smartie! What good d't do you to go an' tie my +clo'es?" + +Piggy and Jimmy and Abe came hurrying to the landing. They heard the +new boy retort, "Who said I tied your clo'es?" Mealy made no reply. +The new boy repeated the query. Mealy saw the boys in the water +looking on, and his courage rose; for Mealy was in the primary +department of life, and had not yet learned that one must fight alone. +He answered, "I did," with an emphasis on the "I," as he tugged at the +last knot. The new boy had been looking Mealy over, and he replied +quickly, "You're a liar!" + +There was a pause, during which Mealy looked helplessly for some one +to defend him. He was sure that his companions would not stand there +and see him whipped. One of the boys in the water said diplomatically, +"Aw, Mealy, I wouldn't take that!" + +"You're another," faltered Mealy, who looked supplication and surprise +at his friends, and wondered if they were really going to desert him. +The new boy waded around Mealy, and leaned over him, and said, shaking +his fist in the freckled face, "You're a coward, and you don't dast +take it up and fight it out." + +Mealy's cheeks flushed. He felt anger mantling his frame. He was one +of those most pitiable of mortals whose anger brings tears with it. +The last knot in the shirt was all but conquered, when Mealy bawled in +a scream of passionate sobs,-- + +"When I git this shirt fixed I'll show you who's a coward." + +The new boy sought a level place on the bank for a fight, and sneered, +"Oh, cry baby! cry baby! Say, boys, where's its bottle?" + +[Illustration: "_Say, boys, where's its bottle_?"] + +Mealy rose with a stone in each hand, and hobbled over the pebbles, +trying, "Touch me now! Touch me if you dare!" + +"Aw, you coward! drop them rocks," snarled the new boy. + +Mealy looked at his friends imploringly. He felt lonely, deserted, and +mistreated, but he saw in the faces of his comrades the reflection of +the injunction to put down the stones. He did so, and his anger began +to cool. But he whimpered again, "Well now, touch me if you dare!" + +The new boy came over briskly, and made a feint to slap the naked lad, +who warded off the blow, sniffling, "You just leave me alone. I ain't +hurtin' you." The boys in the water laughed--it seemed to Mealy such +a cruel laugh. Anger enveloped him again, and he struck out blindly +through his tears, hand over hand, striking the new boy in the mouth +and making it bleed, before he realized that the fight had begun. The +new boy tried to clinch Mealy, but the naked body slipped away from +him; and just then the combatants saw the satisfied grin freeze on the +faces of the boys in the water. A step crunched the gravel near them, +and in a moment that flashed vividly with rejoicing that the fight was +ended, then with abject, chattering terror, Mealy Jones saw his +father approaching. Mealy did not run. The uplifted cane and the red, +perspiring face of his father transfixed the lad, yet he felt called +upon to say something. His voice came from a dry throat, and he spoke +through an idiotic grin as he said, "I didn't know you wanted me, pa." + +After the burst of his father's anger ten awful minutes of shame +passed for Mealy while he was putting on his wet clothes. The boys +in the water swam noiselessly upstream to the roots of the elm-tree, +where he saw them looking at his disgrace. During those ten minutes +Mealy realized that his father's deepening silence portended evil; so +he tried to draw his father into a discussion of the merits of the +case by whimpering from time to time, "Well, I guess they ast me to +come," or "Piggy said it wouldn't hurt, 'cause 't ain't in dog days," +or "I wasn't in where it was deep. I was only a-wadin'." The new boy, +who was seated upon a log near by with a stone in his hand, which he +had picked up fearing the elder Jones would join the fray, sniffed +audibly. He called to the other boys derisively, "Say, any of you boys +got the baby's blocks?" It did not lift the mantle of humiliation that +covered Mealy to hear his father reply to the new boy, "That will do +for you, sir." While Mealy wept he wiped away his tears first with one +hand and then with the other, employing the free hand in fastening +his clothes together. He did not fear the punishment that might be in +store for him. He was thinking of the agony of his next meeting with +Piggy Pennington. Mealy fancied that Abe Carpenter, who was a quiet, +philosophical boy, would not tease him, but horror seized him when he +thought of Piggy. + +As Mealy fastened his last button, he felt his father's finger under +his collar, and his own feet shambling blindly over the pebbles, up +the path, into the bushes; he heard the boys in the water laugh with +the new boy, and then--stories differ. The boys say that he howled +lustily, "Oh, pa, I won't do it any more," over and over again. Mealy +Jones says that it didn't hurt a bit. + +[Illustration: _He felt his father's finger under his collar and his +own feet shambling_.] + +This much is certain: that Master Harold Jones walked through the town +that day a few feet ahead of his fathers who tapped the boy's legs +with a hooked cane whenever his steps lagged. At the door of the Jones +home Mrs. Jones stood to welcome the martial procession, which she +saw, and then heard, approaching some time before it arrived. To his +wife, whose face pictured anxious grief, Mr. Jones said, as he +turned the captive over to her: "I found this young gentleman in +swimming--swimming and fighting. I have attended to his immediate +wants, I believe. I leave him to you." + +Harold Jones was but a lad--a good lad whose knowledge of the golden +text was his Sunday-school teacher's pride. Yet he had collected other +scraps of useful information as he journeyed through life. One of +these was a perfectly practical familiarity with the official road map +to his mother's heart. Therefore, when he crossed the threshold of the +Jones home Harold began at once to weep dolefully. + +"Harold Jones, what do you mean by such conduct?" asked his mother. + +The boy stood by the window long enough to see that his father had +turned the corner toward the town. Then he fell on the floor, and +began to bewail his lot, refusing to answer the first question his +mother asked, but telling instead how "all the other boys in this town +can go swimmin' when they want to," hinting that he wouldn't care, if +papa had only just come and brought him home, but that papa--and this +was followed by a vocal cataract of woe that made the dish-pans ring. + +He noted that his mother bent over him and said, "My poor boy;" at +which sign little Harold punctured the levees of his grief again, +and said he "never was goin' to face any of the boys in this town +again"--he "just couldn't bear it." Mrs. Jones paused in her work at +this, put down a potato that she was peeling, and stood up stiffly, +saying in a freezing tone, "Harold Jones, you don't mean to tell me +that your father punished you in front of those other little boys?" + +Her son only sobbed and nodded an affirmative, and gave lusty voice to +the tearful wish that he was dead. Mrs. Jones stooped to the floor and +took her child by an arm, lifting him to his feet. She smoothed his +hair and took him with her to the big chair in the dining-room, where +she raised his seventy pounds to her lap, saying as she did so, +"Mama's boy will soon be too big to hold." At that the spoiled child +only renewed his weeping and clutched her tightly. There, little by +little, he forgot the mishaps of the day. There the anguish lifted +from his heart, and when his mother asked, "Harold, why did you go +into the water when we told you not to?" the child only shook his +head, and, after repeated questioning, his answer came,-- + +"Well, they asked me, mom." + +"Who asked you?" persisted Mrs. Jones. + +"Piggy Pennington and Jimmy Sears," returned the lad. + +[Illustration: _Mrs. Jones stooped to the floor and took her child by +an arm_.] + +To the query, "Well, do you have to do everything they ask you to, +Harold?" the lad's answer was a renewal of the heart-breaking sobs. +These softened the mother's heart, as many and many a woman's heart +has been melted through all the ages. She soothed the truant child and +petted him, until the cramping in his throat relaxed sufficiently to +admit of the passage of an astonishingly large slice of bread and +butter and sugar. After it was disposed of, Harold busied himself by +assorting his old iron scraps on the back porch, and his mother smiled +as she fancied she heard the boy trying to whistle a tune. + +Harold had left the porch before his father came home with the +beefsteak for supper, and Mrs. Jones met her husband with: "Pa Jones, +what could you be thinking of--punishing that boy before the other +children? Do you want to break what little spirit he has? Why, that +child was nearly in hysterics for an hour after you left!" + +Mr. Jones hung up his crooked cane, put a stick of wood in the stove, +scraped his pipe with his knife, and blew through the stem. + +"I guess he wasn't hurt much," replied the father. Then he added, as +he put a live coal in the pipe: "I s'pose you went an' babied him an' +spoiled it all." There was a puffing pause, after which Mr. Jones +added, "If you'd let him go more, an' didn't worry your head off when +he was out of sight, he'd amount to more." + +Mrs. Jones always gave her husband three moves before she spoke. "Yes! +yes! you'd make that boy a regular little rowdy if you had your way, +William Jones." + +In the mean time Harold Jones had heard a long, shrill whistle in the +alley, and, answering it, he ran as rapidly as his spindling legs +would carry him. He knew it was the boys. They were grinning broadly +when he came to them. It was Piggy Pennington who first spoke, "Oh, +pa, I won't do it any more," repeating the phrase several times in a +suppressed voice, and leering impishly at Mealy. + +"Aw, you're makin' that up," answered Mealy in embarrassment. But +Piggy continued his teasing until Abe Carpenter said: "Say, Mealy, we +want you to go to the cave with us to-morrow; can you?" + +The "can you" was an imputation on his personal liberty that Mealy +resented. He replied "Uh-huh! you just bet your bottom dollar I can." +Piggy began teasing again, but Abe silenced him, and the boys sat in +the dirt behind the barn, chattering about the new boy, whose name, +according to the others, was "Bud" Perkins. Mealy entered the +conversation with much masculine pomp--too much, in fact; for when he +became particularly vain-glorious some one in the group was certain to +glance at his shoes--and shoes in June in Boyville are insignia of the +weaker sex, the badges of shame. + +But Mealy did not feel his disgrace. He walked up the ash path to the +kitchen with an excellent imitation of manly pride in his gait. He +kicked at a passing cat, and shook his head bravely, talking to +himself about the way he would have whipped the new boy if his father +had not interrupted the fight. + +As Mrs. Jones heard the boy's step on the porch, she said to his +father, "Now, pa, that boy has been punished enough to-day. Don't you +say a word to him." Harold walked by his father with averted face. At +supper the boy did not look at his father, and when the dishes were +put away, Mr. Jones, who sat in the kitchen smoking, heard his wife +and the child in a front room, chatting cheerily. The lonesome father +smoked his pipe and recalled his youth. The boy's voice brought back +his own shrill treble, and he coughed nervously. After Mrs. Jones had +put the lad to bed, and was in the pantry arranging for breakfast, the +father knocked the ashes from his briar into the stove, and, humming +an old tune, went to the boy's bedroom door. He paused awkwardly on +the threshold. The boy turned his face toward the wall. The action cut +the father to the quick. He walked to the bed and bent over the child, +touching a father's rough-bearded face to the soft cheek. He found the +soft hand--with a father's large hand--under the sheet, and he held +the little hand tightly as he said: + +"Well, Harold"--there he paused for a second. But he continued, "Do +you think you'd a-licked that boy--if--if--I hadn't a-come?" + +Then the two laughed, and a little throb of joyous pain tingled in +their throats--such as only boys may feel. + + + + +A RECENT CONFEDERATE VICTORY + + +A LITTLE DREAM-BOY + + Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn, + And wake up a little man lying forlorn, + Asleep where his life wanders out of the morn. + + Little Boy Blue, blow a merry, sweet note, + Over the pool where the white lilies float,-- + Fill out the sails of a little toy boat. + + Blow on my dream of a little boy there,-- + Blow thro' his little bark-whistle, and snare + Your breath in a tangle of curly brown hair. + + Blow and O blow from your fairy land far, + Blow while my little boy wears a tin star, + And rides a stick-horse to a little boy's war. + + Blow for the brave man my dream-boy would be, + Blow back his tears when he wakes up to see + His knight errant gone and instead--only me. + + Little Boy Blue, come blow your horn, + Blow for a little boy lying forlorn, + Asleep where his life wanders out of the morn. + +[Illustration] + + + + +A RECENT CONFEDERATE VICTORY + + +In a small town, every man who has been in the community long enough +to become thoroughly known to the townsmen has a place in the human +mosaic; that place seldom changes. Occasionally a man is a year in +finding his place. The town of Willow Creek located Calhoun Perkins in +two days. Wednesday he arrived in town with his son, whom he called +"Bud;" Thursday night it was reported that he had been fishing the +second time. That settled it. After that the boasting of Perkins about +his family in Tennessee and his assertion that he expected to go into +business only made the men laugh when Perkins left a group of them. +They were not interested in Perkins by the following Saturday; and +Monday every man in the town felt that his judgment of a man who would +go fishing every day had been handsomely vindicated, when it was +learned that Perkins had served in the Confederate army. When Perkins +had been in the town three years, the anecdotes illustrating his +shiftlessness multiplied, and his name was a synonym for that trait of +character known in the vernacular as "no-'count." In the third spring, +after a winter's tussle with rheumatism, Perkins died. His funeral was +of so little importance that none of the corpulent old ladies in black +alpaca, holding their handkerchiefs carefully folded in their hands, +came panting across the town to attend it. No women came at all. And +the Perkins boy stood by stolidly while the dry clods were rumbling +upon the pine box in the grave. The boy wished to be alone, and he +would not sit on the seat with the driver. He wiped a little moisture +from his eyes, and rode to town with his feet hanging out of the back +of the wagon that had held the coffin. + +[Illustration: _His feet hanging out of the back of the wagon that had +held the coffin_.] + +When the wagon came to the thick of the town, Bud Perkins quietly slid +to the ground, and joined a group of afternoon idlers who were playing +marbles on the south side of a livery barn. Here and there in the +group a boy said: "H'lo, Bud," when the Perkins boy joined the +coterie, but many of the youngsters, being unfamiliar with the +etiquette of mourning, were silent, and played on at their game. When +the opportunity came the Perkins boy put a marble in the ring without +saying a word. He went back to "taws," and "lagged for goes," with +the others. He spoke only when he was addressed. A black sense of +desolation lowered over him, and he could not join in the ejaculations +and responses of the game. His luck was bad, and he lost marble after +marble. In an hour, when the sun was still in the south, he withdrew +from the game and sat alone against the barn, drawing figures on the +earth with a broken piece of hoop-iron. The boy could not fight off +the thought of the empty home waiting for him down by the river. He +saw, as he sat there, all the furniture, his father's clothes hanging +at the foot of the bed, the stove in disorder; and then he realized +that in the whole town not one hand was held out to him. He was a +child, yet the heartlessness of it all cut him to the quick. This +thought overwhelmed him, again and again, each time with more +agonizing force, like an increasing wave, and as one flood washed over +him with fiercer passion than the others, the boy rose hurriedly, ran +around the barn, and flung himself upon a pile of hay. There he gave +way to a storm of sobs. One of the group, who had been watching him +more closely than the others, soon withdrew from the game, and going +in the opposite direction from that taken by Bud Perkins, came +tiptoeing around the haystack. + +[Illustration: _His luck was bad_.] + +[Illustration: _He withdrew from the game and sat alone against the +barn_.] + +The paroxysm of sobs had ceased, and Bud was lying face downward as if +asleep. He heard the step, but pretended not to hear it. He felt some +one pressing the hay beside him. He knew who it was, and the two boys +lay upon the hay without speaking. The Perkins boy turned his head +away from the new-comer; but try as he would, Bud could not keep from +sniffling. In a few moments the other boy tried to roll the Perkins +boy over. It was a vain attempt. Then the sobbing began anew. But it +was a short attack, and, at length, the other boy said: "Bu-ud?" Again +he said, "Bu-ud?" There came no response. "O, Bud--I got somethin' +to tell you!" The sniffling continued, and the other boy kept on +pleading. "Ah, Bud, come on; I got somethin' real good," he said. +Silence answered. The teasing went on: "Say, Bud, I won back all your +marbles." That was repeated twice. Then a hand went over toward the +other boy. He filled it with marbles, and it went back. Another +silence was followed by a rustle of hay, and a dirty face turned over, +and a voice said through a pathetic, apologetic smile: "This old +nicked glassey ain't mine." The two heads nestled together, and four +eyes gazed at the blue sky and the white clouds for a long time. It +was the Perkins boy who spoke: "Say, Piggy, I bet you'd cry, too, if +you was me." + +Piggy wormed his arm under the hay around the Perkins boy's neck, as +he asked, "What you goin' to do to-night, Bud?" + +"I dunno. Why?" replied Bud. + +"Well, I'm comin' out to stay all night. They're goin' to have a party +at our house, and ma said I could." + +Bud drew himself up slowly; then threw himself with a quick spring on +top of Piggy, and the two began to wrestle like kittens in the hay. + +Even while Piggy Pennington and Bud Perkins were sitting at dusk on +the back-porch steps of the Pennington house, eating turkey-wings +which Mrs. Pennington had given to them, and devouring ham sandwiches +which Piggy had taken from the big platterful in the pantry, looking +the hired girl boldly in the face as he did it, even then the +preparations for the Pennington entertainment were progressing +indoors. The parlor, the sitting-room, and the dining-room, which had +been decorated during the warm afternoon with borrowed palms and with +roses from the neighbor's vines, were being ventilated. Windows were +rising, and doors opening. The velvety air of May was fluttering +everywhere. And there was so much life in it, that when Mrs. +Pennington saw the two boys pass out of the alley gate, she saw the +Perkins boy grab her son's hat and run away whooping, while Piggy +followed, throwing clods at his companion's legs and feet. She +thought, as she turned to her turkey-slicing, that the Perkins child +was not taking his father's death "very hard." But she did not know +that the boyish whoop was the only thing that saved him from sobbing, +as he left the home where he saw such a contrast to his own. How could +a woman carrying the responsibilities of the social honor of the +Methodist church in Willow Creek have time to use her second sight? + +[Illustration: _As she turned to her turkey-slicing_.] + +The guests at the Pennington house that evening divided the honors +equally between the new preacher, for whom the party was made, and +Miss Morgan, whose last niece had married and left her but two days +before. Most of the guests had met the new preacher; but none of +them--save one or two of her intimate friends--could know how the +lonely little old woman was faring in the cottage whence one by one +her adopted birds had flown. They called her "little Miss Morgan" in +the town, and the story of her life of devotion to her brothers' and +sisters' children was familiar to every one about her. For ten years +she had lived in Willow Creek caring for her brothers' orphans. +She came to the community from the East, and found what she +brought--culture, friends, and kindness at every turn. The children +whom she had cared for had grown up, filed through the town's real +estate college, and then mating had left the little spinster alone. + +[Illustration: _The new preacher, for whom the party was made_.] + +At the Penningtons' that evening she was cheerful enough--so cheerful, +indeed, in her little bird-like way, that many of those who talked +with her fancied that the resourceful little body was beyond the reach +of petty grief. The modest, almost girlish smile beamed through the +wrinkles of fifty autumns as brightly that evening at the Penningtons' +as the town had ever seen it. From her place in a high-backed chair in +the corner, Miss Morgan, in her shy, self-deprecatory way, shed her +faint benediction about her as she had done for a decade. There was a +sweetness in Miss Morgan's manner that made the old men gallant to her +in a boyish way; and the wives, who loved her, were proud of their +husbands' chivalry. During the evening at the Penningtons' the +conversation found much of its inspiration in the Memorial Day +services on the morrow and in anecdotes about the thriftlessness of +Calhoun Perkins. Memorial Day was one of the holidays which Miss +Morgan kept in her heart. Then she decorated each year a lover's +grave--a grave she had never seen. The day had been sacred in her +heart to the memory of a spring night, and the moon and the lilacs and +the blue uniform of a soldier. Upon other days she waved this memory +away with a gay little sigh, and would have none of it. But on +Memorial Day she bade the vision come into her heart and bide a while. + +But she did not open the door there at the party. They said to one +another, going home that night: "Well, I don't see's she minds it a +bit. Isn't that pluck for you--not lonesome, not grumpy--just the same +little body she was when we first saw her. Well--I know one thing--I +couldn't do it." + +As for Miss Morgan, while she was walking home that night, she was +thinking of the women of her age whom she had just left; the romance +seemed to be gone completely from their lives, their faces seemed a +trifle hard to her, and she was wondering if life would have gone so +with her if there had been no Shiloh. + +The town clock in the schoolhouse was tolling eleven, as Miss Morgan +turned the key in the front door. The night was starry and inviting, +and as her house stood among the trees, somewhat back from the street, +Miss Morgan did not feel afraid to sit in a porch chair, refreshing +herself, before going indoors. The wind brought the odor of the lilacs +from the bush at the house corner, and the woman sat drinking in the +fragrance. She saw a pair of lovers strolling by, who did not observe +her. She could hear the murmur of their voices; she did not try to +catch their words. She sat silently dreaming and wondering. Again and +again her eyes went to the stars in a vain questioning, and her lips +moved. Maybe she was asking "where," maybe she was asking "why." As +the moments slipped by, the years fell away from her. She had carried +her little romance in her heart unsullied by reality. To-night the +talk of Memorial Day had brought it all back, and the thrill of other +days returned with the odor of the lilacs. She yielded to a vague, +crazy notion, and in an impulsive, girlish run she went to the corner +of the porch and broke a sprig from the lilac-tree. + +Then with a short sigh, that had just the hint of a smile in it, she +took the lilac sprig into the house. Perhaps she fancied that no one +would see the flowers but she. Maybe the oppressive stillness of the +empty house burdened her. Certainly something was heavy upon her, for +there was no smile in the sigh that came deeply from her heart, as she +locked the door. It must have seemed lonely for Miss Morgan, coming +from the crowded parlor, and the questions that her friends asked +about her plans may have followed her. Perhaps it was the answer to +these questions that kept her awake. She sat by her window and went +over and over again the question, what should she do. The wedding that +had so recently livened the cottage kept coming to the little old +woman's mind, and with it came the bride. When the other children had +gone away, Miss Morgan let them go with her blessing, and was glad of +their good fortunes. But this last child to go had been Miss Morgan's +pet. As the lonely spinster sat there she recalled how the child had +been moulded by her; how she had fancied the child's heart was hers, +cherishing in it the ideals, the sentiment, the tendernesses that the +older heart had held sacred for a lifetime. Miss Morgan recalled how +she and the girl had mingled their tears over the first long dress +that their hands made, knowing, each of them, that it meant the coming +of the parting. As she looked into the awful vistas of the stars, the +woman knew that she was one of God's creatures, all alone--without one +soul that she might even signal to. + +[Illustration: _The first long dress_.] + +The word "alone" came to her so strangely that she repeated it in a +whisper. Its sound touched some string within her bosom, and she put +her head upon the open window sill and wept, sobbing the word "alone" +until sleep soothed her. + +The morning sunlight helped Miss Morgan to put aside the problems of +the night; she hummed an old war tune as she went about her work, but +it did not lift the silence from the house. The rooms that a few days +before had been vocal with life, were so dead that the clock ticking +in the parlor might be heard in the kitchen. The canary's cheerful +song echoed shrilly through the silent place. Miss Morgan said to him, +"Dickey, Dickey, for gracious sake, keep still--you'll drive me wild." +But her voice only increased the bird's vehemence, and the throbbing +in her ears brought on a headache. When she put a paper over the cage, +the clock annoyed her. She was irritated by a passing boy whistling +"The Girl I Left Behind Me" with all his might, but sadly off the key. +She went to the window and saw Bud Perkins. + +[Illustration: "_Dickey, Dickey, for gracious sake, keep still_."] + +She did not know that the child had just arisen from a cheering +breakfast at the Penningtons'--even if she knew how much a hearty +breakfast cheers up any boy. But the spectacle of the orphan facing +the world so bravely moved Miss Morgan. She felt a sudden wave of +pity, and with it came the conviction of guilt--that she had been +selfish while the boy was suffering. She had heard at the Penningtons' +that the county would probably take charge of him; but she recalled +what she had heard in its full meaning to the child only when she saw +him turn the corner, going toward the centre of the town. There was +a feeling of keen joy in her heart as she realized that she was not +useless in the world, and she went about her morning's work with the +lightest heart in all Willow Creek beating in her breast. + +Bud Perkins had seen but two Memorial Days in Kansas--and upon each of +these days he and his father had gone fishing. The boy knew it was a +soldiers' holiday, and from Piggy Pennington Bud had found out what +were the purposes of the day. He knew that his father had been a +soldier--a soldier on the wrong side. But he did not know that graves +of Confederate soldiers were not included in the day's sacrament. + +"Mornin', Captain," said Bud to a slight, gray-haired old man, +stooping over a basket of flowers in a vacant store-room in the main +street of the town. + +When the man replied kindly the boy took heart to say: "You must be +kind o' runnin' things here, I guess." + +"I'm in charge of the flowers, Bud, just for to-day," replied Captain +Meyers, who did not wish to seem as vain-glorious as he was. + +"Goin' to put flowers on all the soldiers' graves--are you?" queried +Bud. The elder replied that the Post aimed to do so. + +"Did you know my dad was a soldier?" was the boy's next question. + +[Illustration: "_Did you know my dad was a soldier_?"] + +The captain's heart was pricked when he saw what was in Bud's mind. +The captain knew what the next query would be. He was a gentle man and +kind. So, looking about to see if any comrades of a sterner sect than +he were in hearing before replying, he said: "You mustn't feel bad +now, Buddie, but it's only them on the Union side--whose graves we +decorate to-day. I wouldn't mind, if I was you." Captain Meyers was +not a diplomat, and he said the words poorly. + +In an instant the boy's eyes filled with tears. They dried in anger +before they reached his flushed cheek. He clinched his hands, turned, +and walked hotly out of the room. In the door he paused, whirled +around, and cried,-- + + "Yank! Yank! Rick-stick-stank! + High ball, low ball, dirty-faced Yank!" + +[Illustration: _During the next two hours the boy wandered on the +prairie_.] + +Then he ran wildly down the street to escape the infuriated mob which +he believed would pursue him. The knowledge that he was cut off from +the day's festivities made him wince with pain as he ran. Not until +he came out upon the road across the prairie did he stop--breathless, +worn out, crying. During the next two hours the boy wandered on the +prairie and in the woods gathering wild flowers. By the time the +exercises in the Willow Creek opera house were finished and the +procession was formed, Bud Perkins had a heaping armful of field +blossoms. He was coming over the hill to the cemetery when he heard +the band strike up the "Dead March" down in the village. His impulse +was to run away. He checked himself and walked across the place, past +the shafts and monuments, toward his father's grave under the hill +furthest from the town. In the middle of the cemetery the boy stopped. +His eyes were caught by a marble lamb over a child's grave. The +inscription he read was "Mary Pennington, aged two years, three +months, and ten days." The date line upon the stone, told of a year +that had passed before the Perkins boy was born. He gazed at it a +moment, and put there a handful of his choicest flowers. Looking up +he saw some early visitor to the silent place stepping from behind +a monument. Bud had scattered his flowers before he saw that he +was being watched; so he pretended to hunt for stones to throw. He +gathered several, and peppered them at shafts and at birds. + +[Illustration: "_Mary Pennington, aged two years, three months, and +ten days_"] + +Bud Perkins walked to the freshly-made mound where his father lay, and +scattered his posies over it. The village "cornet band" was coming +nearer and nearer to the hill. The boy curbed a temptation to leave. +He walked lazily about the grave until the Memorial Day procession +had entered the big iron gate a hundred yards away. Calhoun Perkins's +grave could not be seen from the plot where the townspeople had +gathered. The boy sat down with his back to the crowd. He did not know +how near the people were to him. He felt that they were staring down, +perhaps laughing, at him. So he tried to assume a careless air. He +picked up clods and tossed them at adjacent objects. Tiring of this, +he chewed the grass stems, and sucked the nectar from the corolla of +wild honeysuckles. But this did not keep the lump out of his throat, +and it did not subdue the turmoil of sorrow in his heart at the +thought that his father was scorned in the town. Once his small frame +shook with a strangled sob, but immediately afterward he threw an +unusually big clod at a post near by. He had been hearing voices and +footsteps on the brow of the hill for several minutes. Occasionally he +picked out a familiar voice, and once he heard Mealy Jones call his +name. He did not answer, but a woman standing a little further up the +hill asked Mealy, "Who is it, Harold?" "Bud," said the youngster. + +"Bud who?" asked the woman's voice. + +The Perkins boy heard the dialogue. He was sitting down, throwing +clods into the air, and catching them as they fell, and this appeared +to be an engrossing task. + +"Bud Perkins. He's settin' down by his pa's grave," replied the boy on +the hill. The child by the fresh mound pictured himself as the other +boy saw him, and his eyes brimmed over with tears. He seemed so +desolate. + +"Why don't you go to him?" insisted the woman, coming nearer. + +"Oh, Miss Morgan," said the boy whom she addressed, lowering his +voice, but not lowering it sufficiently, "Miss Morgan, _you_ don't +know _him_" + +Just then Bud was startled by a footstep at his side. He looked up and +saw Piggy Pennington, who had a big bunch of roses in his hands, +and who, seeing the stained face of his friend, said in embarrassed +confusion: "Ma sent 'em." Piggy put the roses by the new pine +head-board, and lay down--lying across his companion's feet. + +"Get off me," said Bud, when he had treated himself to a long, +trembling sniff, after a painful silence. "I ain't no sidewalk." + +When Piggy went to get his flying hat, he said under his breath +to Bud, "Wipe your face, quick; some one's comin'." Then he stood +awkwardly at Bud's back and shielded him. Piggy spoke first to the +little woman, now only a few paces away. + +[Illustration: _Piggy went to get his flying hat_.] + +"H'lo, Miss Morgan; lookin' for old Tom? He's buried off to the right +yonder." + +"No, my dear. I want to speak to Henry Perkins," replied the woman, +beaming the kindest of smiles into the guardsman's face. He stepped +from the line between Miss Morgan and the Perkins boy, not sure that +the intruder would find a welcome. Bud was glaring steadfastly at the +earth, between his hands and knees. Piggy said, "Bu-ud?" + +"Whut," was the response. + +"Miss Morgan wants to talk with you," replied Piggy. + +"What's she want?" inquired the Perkins boy, with his head still +between his knees. + +Miss Morgan had been coming nearer and nearer to him as the dialogue +had progressed. She was standing in front of Bud when he added, "I +ain't done nothin'." + +Miss Morgan bent down and touched his head with her hands. Piggy was +shaking his head warningly at her with much earnestness. He feared +that such a feminine proceeding would anger his comrade. When Miss +Morgan sat upon the ground beside Bud and took one of his hands, +stroking it without the boy's resisting, Piggy Pennington was dumb +with wonder. He could not hear the gentle breaking of the agonizing +lump in the child's throat. Even little Miss Morgan could not see the +tears that had burst over the brims of the orphan's eyes. His face was +averted. She stroked his hand, and snuggled closer to him. Then she +heard a faint whimper, and her heart could stand the strain no longer; +she leaned upon the child's shoulder, and mourned with him. The +Pennington boy did not comprehend it all; but as he looked politely +away from his friends, he felt the moisture in his eyes. He wiped it +away quickly, glancing to see if his weakness had been detected. +The woman recovered in a few moments, and arose with the boy's hand +gripping hers warmly. He had felt her tears through his thin clothing, +and was conquered. + +[Illustration: _She stroked his hand and snuggled closer to him_.] + +"Come on, Henry; we're going now," said Miss Morgan, and drew the lad +up with her hand. + +"Whur to?" asked Bud, who knew the answer instinctively. + +"Home," replied the little woman, who knew that the boy knew, and who +was sure that he had consented. "Our home--yours and mine." + +The boy arose, still holding her hand, and looked toward the grave +with the flowers strewn over it. He gripped her hand tightly--so +tightly that it pained her--and sobbed, as he faced away from her: "O +pop!" + +Then they walked on in silence, till they came up with Piggy, who had +gone a few steps ahead. It was Bud who spoke first. He said: "You +don't live far from Piggy's, do you, Miss Morgan?" + +And Piggy Pennington pointed his finger at Bud's dripping eyes and +grinned, while Miss Morgan smiled happily at the clouds. + +[Illustration: _Miss Morgan smiled happily at the clouds_.] + + + + +"WHILE THE EVIL DAYS COME NOT" + + +THE RHYME OF MIGNONETTE + + When dandelions fleck the green, + And plum-blooms scent the evening breeze, + And robin's songs throb through the trees; + And when the year is raw thirteen, + And Spring's a gawky hoyden yet, + The season mirrors in its mien + And in its tom-boy etiquette, + Maid Mignonette, my Mignonette. + + When bare-feet lisp along the path, + And boys and jays go whistling by, + And girls and thrushes coyly cry + Their fine joys through the aftermath-- + Then laid ghosts know their amulet + Which fickle siren mem'ry hath; + So laughing comes that sad coquette, + Comes Mignonette,--my Mignonette. + + The wild rose is a conjurer, + It charms the heavy years away, + Unshoes my feet and bids them stray + O'er playgrounds where our temples were. + To some pale star I owe a debt + For harboring the soul of her + With whom I learned love's alphabet-- + With Mignonette, my Mignonette. + + + + +"While the Evil Days come not" + + We duck through the court, reminded a + bit by our feelings of our first love, who hadn't + the cleanest of faces, or the nicest of manners; + but she takes her station in our memory because + we were boys then, and the golden halo + of youth is upon her.--_George Meredith_. + +What little things turn great events! Tragedies swing on such +inconsequential hinges. It is so exasperating to look back over the +path of a calamity and see how easily it might have been averted! If +one man in the little town of Lawrence a generation ago had eaten two +pieces of pie-plant pie instead of three for supper, the night of a +certain party caucus, he would have attended that caucus and another +set of delegates would have gone to the County convention, another +would have been sent to the State Convention, another Governor of +Kansas would have been nominated and elected, and he would have chosen +another United States Senator, who would have voted for, instead of +against, the impeachment of a President of the United States, and the +history of the civilized world would have been an entirely different +affair from the one now in use. Similarly, if Winfield Hancock +Pennington, of the town of Boyville, had slipped his shoes off in the +second block from his home, instead of slipping them off in the first +block, on his way to school, a great shadow that settled over his life +might have been lifted. For if he had not been sitting exactly where +he sat on the curbing of the street, on that bright, beautiful Monday +morning in September, removing his shoes and stockings, he would have +found no garter snake to kill; and not having killed the snake, he +could not have brought it to school on a stick; and not having brought +it to school on a stick, he could not have chased the little girls +around the yard with it before the teacher came. And if he had not +been doing that, he would not have conceived the chivalrous notion +that he might gain the esteem of his Heart's Desire by frightening +her with a snake. And if Winfield Hancock Pennington had not made his +Heart's Desire angry--without giving her a chance to cool off--she +would not have invited Harold Jones to sit and sing with her during +the opening hour. But probably all that happened had to happen in the +course of things; so speculation is idle. But when it did happen, it +seemed to be a hopeless case. Young Mr. Pennington had lived through +the day, a week before, when the teacher changed his seat so that he +could not see his Heart's Desire smile; but he knew that she was sorry +with him, and that helped a little. But when he saw Harold Jones +singing from the same book with his Heart's Desire, he tried in vain +to catch the fragment of a smile from her. Instead of a smile, he +found her threatening to make a face if he persisted. Piggy seemed to +be buried in an avalanche of woe. Then it was that he saw what a small +thing had started the avalanche of calamity thundering down upon him, +and he smarted with remorse. In his anguish he tried to sing alto, +and made a peculiar rasping sound that tore a reproof for him off the +teacher's nerves. + +[Illustration: _Chased the little girls around the yard with it_.] + +[Illustration: _She would not have invited Harold Jones to sit and +sing with her during the opening hour_.] + +From the hour of the Jones boy's triumph, he and Winfield Hancock +Pennington--familiarly known as "Piggy"--became boon companions. A +grown-up outsider might have wondered at such a friendship, for Harold +Jones was a pale, thin youth, with a squeaky voice. His skimmed-milk +eyes popped out over a waste of freckles which blurred his features +and literally weighted down a weak, loosely-wired jaw and kept an +astonished mouth opened for hours at a time. Piggy, on the other hand, +was a sturdy, chunky, blue-eyed boy, who had fought his way up to +glory in the school, and who had run and jumped, and tumbled and +dived, and bantered himself into the right to be King of Boyville. +Chummery between the two boys seemed impossible, yet it was one of the +things which every school expects in a certain crisis. When the affair +is reversed, the two little girls go about breathing undying +hatred for one another. But a boy begins to consume his rival with +politeness, to seek him out from all other beings on earth, to study +his tastes and cater to his humors. And so, while the comradeship +between Piggy Pennington and Mealy Jones was built on ashes, its +growth was beautiful to see. + +[Illustration: _Harold Jones_] + +[Illustration: _To study his tastes_.] + +[Illustration: ... _the comradeship ... was beautiful to see_] + +In all their hours of close communion neither boy mentioned to the +other the name of the little girl in the red shawl and the paint-brush +pig-tails whose fitful fancy had brought on all his trouble. In some +mysterious way each managed to shower her with picture cards, to +compass her about with oranges, to embower her desk with flowers; +but it was all done in stealth, and she who was the object of +this devotion rewarded it openly and--alas for the vanity of her +sex--impartially. All the school watched the battle of the hearts +eagerly. The big boys, who usually know as little about the social +transactions beneath them as the teacher knows, felt an inkling of the +situation. The red-headed Pratt girl became deeply interested in +the affair, though she was never invited to a party in the school's +aristocracy. She did not even get an invitation to Bud Perkins's +surprise party, where every one who had any social standing was +expected. Yet she saw all that went on in the school, and once she all +but smiled sympathetically at Piggy, when she met him slipping away +from his Heart's Desire's desk, in which he had left a flock of Cupids +nestling on a perfumed blotter, and a candy sheep. Mealy Jones would +have snubbed the Pratt girl if she had caught him thus, but Piggy gave +her a wink that made her his partner. After that hour the Pratt girl +became his scout. The next day she blundered. That Friday was burned +into Piggy Pennington's memory with a glowing brand. + +[Illustration: _The red-headed Pratt girl_.] + +The trouble occurred in this way: On the Friday following Piggy's +black Monday, the King of Boyville, decided to resort to an heroic +measure. In his meditative moments Piggy had made up speeches +addressed to his Heart's Desire wherein he had proposed reconciliation +at any sacrifice save that of honor. Twice during those four days he +had stood by his Heart's Desire during recess, while they had looked +out at the play-ground. But the words next to his heart had sputtered +and bubbled into nothing on his lips. He could only snap chalk at +the young gentlemen in the yard below him, in a preoccupied way, +and listen to his Heart's Desire rattle on about the whims of her +fractions and the caprices of her spelling-lesson. Friday noon, +Winfield Hancock Pennington took a header into the Rubicon. In the +deserted school-room, just after the other youngsters had gone to +dinner or to play, Piggy, with much wiggling of his toes, with much +hard breathing, and with many facial contortions, wrote a note. He +gave it to the Pratt girl to deliver. When the first bell was ringing +that noon, Piggy was piling up the primary urchins in wiggling, +squealing piles at "crack the whip." During the fifteen minutes +that followed, he was charging up and down the yard, howling like a +Comanche, at "pull-away." But run as he would, yell as he would, and +wrestle as he would, Piggy could not escape the picture that rose in +his mind of a boy wearing his features and using his body, writing the +note that he had written. When dismembered words and phrases from that +note came to his mind on the play-ground, the quaver of terror that +rose in Piggy's whoop was not dissembled. Sometimes fear froze his +vitals, then a flush of self-abasement burned him with its flames. And +all the time he knew that the Pratt girl had that note. He almost +hoped that an earthquake would swallow her with it before she could +deliver it. When Piggy came straggling in, hot, sweaty, and puffing, +just as the teacher was tapping the tardy-bell, a wave of peace swept +over him. His Heart's Desire was not at her desk. He knew that he +had still a few moments' reprieve. + +[Illustration: _He could only snap chalk in a preoccupied way and +listen to his Heart's Desire_.] + +[Illustration: _Piggy was piling up the primary urchins in wiggling, +squealing piles_.] + +They were singing when his Heart's Desire came in. Piggy's head was +tilted back to give his voice full volume as he shouted, "All his +jewels, precious jewels, His loved and His own." His eyes were +half closed in an ecstasy, and he did not turn his face toward the +paint-brush pig-tails, nor give any sign that he knew of their owner's +presence. Yet when she passed his desk, his voice did not quaver, nor +his eyes blink, nor his countenance redden, as his foot darted out for +her to trip over. She tripped purposely, thereby accepting affection's +tribute, and he was glad. + +To elaborate the tale of how the Pratt girl blundered with Piggy +Pennington's note would be depressing. For it holds in its barbed +meshes a record of one agonizing second in which Piggy saw the folded +paper begin to slip and slide down the incline of his Heart's Desire's +desk, whereon the Pratt girl had dropped it; saw the two girls grab +for it; heard it crash from the seat to the floor with what seemed to +him a deafening roar. Nor is this all that the harrowing tale might +disclose. It might dilate upon the horror that wrenched Piggy's spine +as he watched the teacher's finger crook a signal for the note to be +brought forward. It would be manifestly cruel and clearly unnecessary +to describe the forces which impelled the psychic wave of suggestion +that inundated the school--even to the youth of the "B" class, with +his head under the desk, looking for a pencil--and gave every demon +there gleeful knowledge that the teacher had nabbed a note and would +probably read it aloud. It is enough to submit the plain, but painful, +statement that, when the teacher tapped her pencil for attention, a +red ear, a throbbing red ear, flared out from either side of Piggy +Pennington's Fourth Reader, while not far away a pair of pig-tails +bristled up with rage and humiliation from a desk where a little +girl's head lay buried in her arms. Then the teacher unfolded the +crackling paper and read this note:-- + + FRIEND MARY.--Did you mean anything + by letting Him sing with you. I + dont care if you did but I never don + anything to deserve it, but if you dident + I am very sorry, will tell you bout it at + the partey. Well that is all I can think + of today, from + + Yourse Ever, + + WIN PENNINGTON. + + P.S. If you still meen what you sed + about roses red and vilets blue all right + and so do I. W H P. + +[Illustration: _He watched the teacher's finger crook a signal for the +note to be brought forward_.] + +Piggy waded home through blood that night. The boys could not resist +calling out "Friend Mary" or "Hello, Roses Red," though each boy knew +that his taunt would bring on a fight. Piggy fought boys who were +three classes above him. He whipped groups of boys of assorted sizes +from the lower grades; but the fighting took him away from his +trouble, and in most cases he honored his combatants. He was little +the worse for wear when he chased the last swarm of primary urchins +into his father's cow lot, fastened them in, and went at them one by +one with a shingle. A child living next door to the Penningtons had +brought the news of Piggy's disgrace to the neighborhood, and by +supper-time Mrs. Pennington knew the worst. While the son and heir +of the house was bringing in his wood and doing his chores about the +barn, he felt something in the air about the kitchen which warned him +that new tortures awaited him. + +[Illustration: ... _fought boys who were three classes above him ... +whipped groups of boys of assorted sizes_.] + +A boy would rather take a dozen whippings at school than have the +story of one of them come home; and Piggy thought with inward +trembling that he would rather report even a whipping at home than +face his mother in the dishonor which covered him. At supper Mrs. +Pennington repeated the legend of the note with great solemnity. When +her husband showed signs of laughing, she glared at him. Her son ate +rapidly in silence. Over his mother's shoulders Piggy saw the hired +girl giggle. The only reply that Mrs. Pennington could get to her +questions was, "Aw, that ain't nothin'," or "Aw, gee whiz, ma, you +must think that's somethin'." But she proclaimed, in the presence of +the father, the son, and the hired girl, that if she ever caught a +boy of hers getting "girl-struck" she would "show him," which, being +translated, means much that no dignified young gentleman likes to +contemplate. But when the son was out of hearing, Mrs. Pennington told +her husband, in the repressed tone which she used when expressing her +diplomatic communications, that he would have "to take that boy in +hand." Whereupon the father leaned back in his chair and laughed, +laughed until he grew red in the face, laughed till the pans in the +kitchen rattled, laughed--to use the words of his wife in closing the +incident--"like a natural born simpleton." + +[Illustration: _Her son ate rapidly in silence_.] + +[Illustration: _Over his mother's shoulders Piggy saw the hired girl +giggle_.] + +Alas for Piggy Pennington--he might affect great pride in his amours +when the hired girl teased him; he might put on a brave face and even +lure himself into the belief that this arch tormentor saw him only as +a gay deceiver; but when the lights were out, Piggy covered his head +with the bedclothes, and grew hot and cold by turns, till sleep came +and bore him away from his humiliation. + +All day Saturday, before the Bud Perkins' surprise party, Piggy +Pennington and Mealy Jones were inseparable. And Piggy, who was King +of Boyville, came down from his throne and walked humbly beside Mealy, +the least of all his courtiers. In fact, since the reading of his +note Piggy had become needlessly deferential and considerate of the +feelings of his rival. + +If the two entered a crowd and played "foot and a half" or "slap and +a kick" or "leap-frog," and if Mealy was "it"--and poor Mealy was +generally "it" in any game--Piggy did not jump viciously on Mealy's +wobbly back, nor did he slap hard, nor kick hard, as he would have +slapped and kicked on other days, before he descended from his throne +to dwell with the beasts of the field on that fatal Friday. Pride kept +Mealy on the rack. + +Time and again his little, freckled, milky face hit the moist springy +ground as Bud or Abe or Jim bumped into him at their play. He was glad +when the day ended and he could go home. For Mealy Jones abhorred the +dirt that begrimed his face and soiled his white starched collar. He +liked to play in lukewarm water, to slosh in the suds, and to rub +his soft little hands whiter and whiter in the foam. His cleanliness +pleased his mother, and she boasted of it to the mothers of other +boys--mothers of boys with high-water marks just above their shirt +collars; of boys who had to be yanked back to the roller-towel after +washing to have their ears rubbed; of bad, bad, bad boys who washed +their feet in the dew of the grass at night and told their mothers +that they had washed them in the tub at the pump; of wicked and sinful +boys who killed toads and cried noisily when their warts bled in the +hot water; in fact, to the mothers of nearly all the boys in Boyville. +And thus it came about that Boyville having Mealy Jones set before it +as a model child, contracted a cordial hate for him, and rose against +him when he presumed to contest with Piggy for his Heart's Desire. Yet +all Boyville loved a fight, and all Boyville goaded the King to wrath, +teased him, bantered him, and even pretended to doubt his worth. +Therefore, when Piggy Pennington, the King of Boyville, dressed for +the party that night in his Sunday clothes and his Sunday shoes and +limped down the sidewalk to the Jones's, where the boys and girls were +to meet before descending upon Bud Perkins, there was rancor in the +royal heart and maternal hair-oil on the royal head. But a strange +throb of glad pain in the pit of the royal stomach came at the thought +of the two bright eyes that would soon meet his own. The eyes made him +forget his blistering shoes, and a smile at the door divested his mind +of the serrated collar upon which his head had been pivoting for five +distracted minutes. The last thing of all to go was his pride in the +hair-oil, but it fell before a voice that said: "Well, you got here, +did you?" + +[Illustration: _His cleanliness pleased his mother and she boasted of +it to the mothers of other boys_.] + +That was all. But it was enough to make Piggy Pennington feel the core +of a music-box turning inside him, while outside the company saw the +King of Boyville transformed into a very red and very sweaty youth +holding madly to the back of his cuffs and chuckling deliriously. In a +daze he took off his hat, and put a sack of oranges, his part in the +evening's refreshment, on a table in the next room. When he regained +consciousness, Piggy noticed that Mealy Jones, who had pranced into +the room with much unction, was sitting next to his Heart's Desire. +The children were making merry chatter. Piggy took his place on the +end of a lounge, and turning his back to the guilty pair, gave an +"injin" pinch to Jimmy Sears, with orders to "pass it on." + +Indeed, so unconcerned was Piggy in the progress of the affair behind +him that he began to shove the line of the boys on the lounge; the +shoving grew into a scuffle, and the scuffle into a wrestle, which +ended on the front porch. At length Piggy stalked through the room +where the girls were sitting, saying, when he returned with his +oranges and his hat: "Come on, fellers, everybody's here." + +The boys on the porch followed Piggy's example, and in a minute or two +they stood huddled at the gate calling at the girls in the house to +hurry. When the girls were on the porch, the boys struck out, and the +two groups, a respectful distance apart, walked through the town. +Mealy Jones was enjoying the triumph of his life, walking proudly +between the noisy boys and giggling girls, beside--but why linger over +the details of this instance of man's duplicity and woman's worse than +weakness! + +The young blades of the Court of Boyville waited politely at the gate +before the house where Bud Perkins lived with Miss Morgan, his foster +mother. When the maidens arrived, all the company went trooping up +Miss Morgan's steps. After Piggy had chased Bud from the front door +into a closet, from which the host fought his way gallantly into +the middle of the parlor floor, the essential preliminaries of the +evening's entertainment were over. A little later the games began. +First, there was "forfeits." Then came "tin-tin." "Clap in and clap +out" followed, and finally, after much protestation from the girls, +but at the earnest solicitation of Mealy Jones, "post-office" started. +Piggy did not urge, nor protest. He had gone through the games +listlessly, occasionally breaking into a spasm of gayety that was +clearly hollow, and afterwards sinking into profound indifference. For +how could a well-conditioned boy be gay with a heartache under his +Sunday shirt and the spectacle before his eyes of a freckled human +cock-sparrow darting round and round the bower of his Heart's Desire? +Under such circumstances it was clearly impossible for him to see the +eyes that sought his in vain across the turmoil of the room. Indeed, a +voice pitched a trifle high to carry well spoke for him to hear, but +met deaf ears. A little maid in a black-and-red check which the King +of Boyville once preferred to royal purple, even made her way across +the throng--undesignedly, he thought, but Piggy basked in the joy of +her presence and made no sign to show his pleasure. A little later, in +the shuffle of the game, Piggy and his Heart's Desire were far apart. +Half an hour passed, but still he did not revive. Mealy Jones called +her out in "post-office," and Piggy thought he saw her smile. That was +too much. When the dining-room door closed behind the black-and-red +checked dress, the pitcher that enclosed his woe broke and the wheel +at the cistern of his endurance stopped. Mealy Jones came into the +room, and the boy who kept the "post-office" called out, "Piggy +Pennington." But the slam of the front door was his answer. + +[Illustration: _A little maid in a black-and-red check_.] + +Piggy sat on the front porch, and reviewed the entire affair. It began +when his Heart's Desire had fluttered into his autograph album with a +coy: + + "When this you see + Remember me." + +[Illustration: _Piggy sat on the front porch, and reviewed the entire +affair_.] + +[Illustration: _It began when his Heart's Desire had fluttered into +his autograph album_.] + +He followed the corrugated course of true love, step by step up to its +climax, where, a week before, she had given him his choice of her new +pack of assorted visiting-cards. He rose at the end of five minutes' +sombre meditation, holding the curling gelatine card of his choice +in his warm hand. After venting a heavy sigh, he checked a motion to +throw away the token of his undoing and put it back into his pocket. +While he was plotting dark things against the life and happiness of +Mealy Jones, Piggy heard the sound of the merriment within, and a +mischievous smile spread over his angry countenance. He tiptoed to the +window, and peeped in. He saw his Heart's Desire sitting alone. He +cheered up a little, not much--but sufficiently to reach in his pocket +for his tick-tack. + +Now, it may be clearly proved, if necessary, that the tick-tack was +invented by the devil. Any wise man's son knows that every boy between +the ages of ten and fourteen carries with him at all times a complete +outfit of the mechanical devices on which the devil holds the patent +and demands a royalty. So there is nothing really strange in the +statement that Piggy Pennington took from his Sunday clothes, +beneath a pocketful of Rewards of Merit for regular attendance at +Sunday-school--all dated before the Christmas-tree--a spool with +notched wheels, a lead pencil, and a bit of fishline. The line wound +round the spool. Piggy put the pencil through the hole in the +spool, and held the notched rims of the spool against the window +pane by pressing on the pencil axle. He gave the cord a quick jerk; a +rattle, a wail, and a shriek were successively produced by the notches +whirring on the glass. The company within doors screamed. Everyone +knew it was Piggy, but no one ever lived with nerves strong enough to +withstand the shock of a tick-tack. At the first shock those in-doors +decided to ignore the disturbance. But it occurred twice afterwards, +and a third tick-tack at a party is a dare. So the boys took it up. As +Piggy ran he forgot his hot, heavy shoes; he felt the night wind on +his face and in his hair. He cared nothing for his pursuers; he ran +for the gladness that came with running. Now he slackened his pace +and let the boys catch up with him, and again he spread the mocking +distance between them. He turned down an alley, and eluded the pack. + +All the youngsters at the party, even the girls, had scampered out of +the house to watch the race. When Piggy vaulted the back-yard fence +into Miss Morgan's garden, he heard the pursuers half a block away. He +saw, a hundred feet distant, a bevy of girls standing on the sidewalk. +And he saw, too, as he came skipping down the lot, something that made +him fairly skim over the earth; his Heart's Desire, standing alone, +near the porch, in his path, under an apple-tree. The exhilaration of +the chase had made him forget his trouble. He was so surefooted in the +race that he forgot to be abashed for the moment and came bounding +down by the apple-tree. He was full of pride. When he stopped he +was the King of Boyville and every inch a king. The king--not +Piggy--should be blamed. It was all over in a second--almost before he +had stopped. He aimed at her cheek, but he got her ear. That was the +first that he knew of it. Piggy seemed to return to life then. In +his confusion he felt himself shrivelling up to his normal +size--shrivelling and frying. In an instant he was gone, and Piggy +Pennington ran into the group of girls on the sidewalk and let them +catch him and hold him. The breathless youths went into the house +telling their adventures in the race between gasps. But Piggy did not +dare to look at his Heart's Desire for as much as five minutes--a +long, long time. No one had seen him beneath the apple-tree. He was +not afraid of the teasing, but he was afraid of a withering look from +his Heart's Desire,--a look that he felt with a parching fear in his +throat would throw the universe into an eclipse for him. He observed +that she got up and changed her seat to be rid of Mealy Jones. At +first Piggy thought that was a good sign, but a moment later he +reasoned that the avoidance of Mealy was inspired probably by a +loathing for all boys. He dared not seek her eyes, but he mingled +noisily in the crowd for a while, and then, on a desperate venture, +carelessly snapped a peanut shell and hit his Heart's Desire on +the chin. He seemed to be looking a thousand miles away in another +direction than that which the missile took. He waited nearly a +minute--a long, uncertain minute--for a response. + +Then the shell came back; it did not hit him--but it might have done +so--that was all he could ask. He snapped shells slyly for a quarter +of an hour, and was happy. Once he looked--not exactly looked; perhaps +peeked is the better word; took just the tiniest lightning peek out of +the tail of his eye, and found a smile waiting for him. At supper, if +any one save Piggy had tried to take a chair by his Heart's Desire +when the plates came around, there would have been a fight. Mealy +Jones knew this, and he knew what Piggy did not know, that it would +have been a fight of two against one. So Piggy sat bolt upright in his +chair beside the black-and-red checked dress, and talked to the room +at large; but he spoke no word to the maiden at his side. She noticed +that Piggy kept dropping his knife, and the solicitude of her sex +prompted her to ask: "Are your hands cold, Winfield?" + +And the instinct of his sex to hide a fault with a falsehood made +Piggy nod his head. + +Then she answered: "Cold hands, a warm heart!" + +At this important bit of repartee, the King of Boyville so forgot his +royal dignity that he let an orange-peel drive at Jimmy Sears, and +pretended not to hear her. His only reply was to joggle her arm when +she reached for the cake. Piggy was so exuberant and in such high +spirits that he put his plate on his chair and made Bud Perkins walk +turkey fashion three times around the room. He forgot the disgrace +which his note had brought to him in the school; he forgot the +pretensions of Mealy Jones; he did not wish to forget the episode of +the apple-tree, and for the time Piggy Pennington lived in a most +peculiar world, made of hazel eyes and red-ribboned pig-tails, all +circling around on a background of black-and-red checked flannel. + +[Illustration: _At this important bit of repartee_.] + +After that nothing mattered very much. It didn't matter that Piggy's +bruised feet began to sting like fire. It didn't matter much if Mealy +Jones's mother did come for him with a lantern and break up the party. +It didn't matter if Jimmy Sears did call out, "Hello, Roses Red," when +the boys reached the bed-room where their hats were; for a voice that +Piggy knew cried back from the adjoining room, "You think you're cute, +don't you, old smarty?" Nothing in the world could matter then, for +had not Piggy Pennington five minutes before handed a card to his +Heart's Desire which read: + + _If I may not C U home + may I not sit on the fence + and C U go by_? + +And had not she taken it, and said merrily, "I'm going to keep this"? +What could matter after that open avowal? + +And so it came to pass in a little while that the courtly company, +headed by the King of Boyville, filed gayly down the path. They walked +two by two, and they started on a long, uneven way. But the King of +Boyville was full of joy--a kind of joy so strange that wise men may +not measure it; a joy so rare that even kings are proud of it. + + + + +JAMES SEARS: A NAUGHTY PERSON + + +LITTLE SISTER'S LULLABY + + Zhere, zhere, 'ittul b'o', sistuh 'll wock you to s'eep + Hush-a-bye O, darlene, wock-a-bye, b'o', + An' tell you the stowy about the b'ack sheep-- + Wock-a-bye, my 'ittul b'over. + A boy onct said "b'ack sheep, you dot any wool?" + "Uh-huhm," said the lambie, "I dot free bags full." + An' where Murry went w'y the lamb's sure to doe, + They's mowe of zis stowy--I dess I don' know; + But hush-a-bye O, darlene, wock-a-bye b'o', + Wock-a-bye, my 'ittul b'over. + + O, mama says buddy tomed stwaight down from Dod; + Hush-a-bye O, uh-huhm, wock-a-bye b'o', + At doctuh mans bwunged him, now is n't zhat odd-- + Wock-a-bye, my 'ittul b'over. + For papa says, "doctuhs is thiefs so zhey be." + An' thiefs tain't det up into Heaven you see: + I dess w'en one comes up an' dets sent below, + He's dot to bwing wif him a baby or so; + Hush-a-bye O, uh-huhm, wock-a-bye b'o', + Wock-a-bye, my 'ittul b'over. + + But sistuh loves b'o' anyhow if he's dood, + Hush-a-bye O, sweetie, wock-a-bye b'o', + Better 'n tandy er infalid's food-- + Wock-a-bye, sistuh's own b'over. + An' some day when buddy drows up to a man, + W'y sistuh an' him 'ull 'ist harness ol' Fan, + An dwive off to Heaven the fuist zhing you know, + An' bwing ever' baby back what wants to doe. + Zhen hush-a-bye O, sweetie, wock-a-bye b'o', + Wock-a-bye, sistuh's own b'over. + + + + +James Sears: A Naughty Person + + +A naughty person ... walketh with a forward mouth. + +He winketh with his eyes, he speaketh with his feet, he teacheth with +his fingers;... he deviseth mischief continually;... + +Therefore shall his calamity come suddenly; suddenly shall he be +broken without remedy.--_Proverbs_, vi. 12-15. + +It was morning--the cool of the morning. The pigeons were gossiping +under the barn eaves. In the apple-tree a robin's song thrilled +at intervals, and the jays were chattering incessantly in the +cherry-trees by the fence. The dew was still on the grass that lay in +the parallelogram of shade made by the Sears' dwelling, and in +the twilight of grass-land all the elf-people were whispering and +tittering and scampering about in surreptitious revel. The breeze +of dawn, tired and worn out, was sinking to a fitful doze in the +cottonwood foliage near by. In the lattice of the kitchen porch two +butterflies were chasing the sun flecks in and out among the branches +of the climbing rose. Even the humble burdock weeds and sunflowers +lining the path that led to the gate seemed to be exalted by the +breath of the morning air, and not out of harmony with the fine, high +chord of ecstasy that was stirring the soul of things. And yet in that +hour, James Sears, with a green-checked gingham apron tied about his +neck, stood near a rain-barrel, bobbing up and down on a churn-handle. +His back ached, and his heart was full of bitterness at the scheme of +creation. For it was Saturday morning--his by every law, precedent, or +tradition known or reported in the Court of Boyville. But instead +of inhaling the joys of the new day, James, whose Courtly name was +"Jimmie," looked for yellow granules on the dasher, and promised God +if He would let him grow up that his little boy should never have to +churn. + +[Illustration: _His heart was full of bitterness_.] + +Any boy knows that it is a degrading thing to churn, and he further +knows that to wear a green-checked gingham apron is odious beyond +description; however, if the disgusting thing is tied under a boy's +arms, from whence it may be slipped down over the hips and the knees +to the ground, by a certain familiar twist of the body, the case is +not absolutely hopeless. But Jimmy Sears's apron strings were tied +about his neck; so his despair was black and abysmal. Once in a while +Jimmy's bosom became too heavily freighted, and he paused to sigh. +He cheered himself up on these occasions by slyly licking the +churn-dasher; but the good cheer on the dasher was a stimulant that +left him more miserable than it found him. Ever and anon from some +remote chamber in the house behind him came the faint, gasping cry of +a day-old baby. That cry drowned the cooing of the doves, the song of +the robin, and the chirping of the dwellers in the grass; to Jimmy the +bleat of the little human lamb sounded like the roar of a lion. He +could endure penal servitude on his Saturday, with a patience born of +something approaching a philosophy; he could wear a checked gingham +apron, even as a saint wears an unbecoming halo; but the arrival of +the new baby--the fifth addition to the family in the short period of +years covered by Jimmy Sears's memory--brought a bitter pill of wrath +and dropped it in the youth's brimful cup of woe. As the minutes +dragged wearily along, Jimmy Sears reviewed the story of his thraldom. +He thought of how, in his short-dress days, he had been put to rocking +a cradle; how in his kilted days, there had been ever a baby's calico +dress to consider; how, from his earliest fishing-days, there had been +always a tot tagging after him, throwing sticks and stones in +the water to scare the fish; and how, now in his swimming and +cave-dwelling days, there was a swarm of tow-headed Searses, a +crawler, a creeper, a toddler, a stumbler, and a sneaker to run away +from. + +[Illustration: _Throwing sticks in the water to scare the fish_.] + +[Illustration: +_A crawler, +A creeper, +A toddler, +A stumbler, +and +A sneaker_.] + +As the churn-dasher grew heavier, the wrath in Jimmy's cup began to +sputter, dissolving into that which in his older sister's heart would +have been tears; in Jimmy's heart, it took the form of convulsive +sniffling. The boy could hear his sister clattering the breakfast +dishes in the kitchen. The thing that ground upon his heart was the +firm footfall of Mrs. Jones, a neighbor woman, who was overseeing +the affairs of the household. Jimmy could not remember hearing that +footstep except in times of what seemed to him to be the family's +disgrace. He hated Mrs. Jones because she tried to cool his ire by +describing the superior points of the particular new baby that had +arrived each time she came upon her errands of neighborly mercy. Just +as the yellow granules began to appear in the buttermilk pool on the +churn-top, Jimmy heard a step on the gravel walk behind him. The step +came nearer; when Jimmy lifted his eyes, they glared into the face of +Harold Jones. Choler cooled into surprise, and surprise exploded into +a vapid, grinning "Huh!" which was followed by another "Huh!" that +gurgled out into a real laugh as Jimmy greeted the visitor. The Jones +boy giggled, and Jimmy found his tongue and asked: "Did you ever +churn?" When Harold admitted that he, too, was a slave of the +churn, the freemasonry of Boyville was established. A moment later +Mealy--Harold's title in the Court--was exemplifying the work. When +Mrs. Jones came out of the house to take care of the butter, she saw +her son and Jimmy lying on the grass. Half an hour later the boys in +the barn heard Mrs. Jones's voice calling,-- + +[Illustration: _Mrs. Jones came out to take care of the butter_.] + +"Harold, O Harold, don't you want to come and look at the baby?" Now +James Sears in the twenty-four hours of his new sister's life had not +let the fact of her existence form expression on his lips. Much +less had he lowered his hostile flag to salute her; but he knew +instinctively that Harold Jones was the sort of a boy who would unsex +himself by looking at a baby. When Mealy answered, "Yes'm," and +trotted down the back-yard path to the kitchen, Jimmy Sears scorned +him heartily enough to fancy Mealy in the act of holding the loathsome +thing in his arms. Further contumely was beyond Jimmy's imagination. + +[Illustration: _The sort of boy who would unsex himself by looking at +a baby_.] + +[Illustration: _James_.] + +When Mealy Jones came back, the barn wherein he had left Jimmy was +empty; and only when Mealy had started homeward, and a clod came +whizzing down the alley, hitting him under the ear, did Mealy know how +Jimmy Sears resented an insult. Mealy looked around; no one was in +sight. + +Right here the reader should know that Jimmy Sears was not alone in +his displeasure. There was mutiny in the Sears household. When the +baby came, the four elder of the seven Sears children joined Jimmy +in informal, silent sedition. They looked upon the newcomer as +an intruder. For all who extended sympathy to the pretender, the +insurgents developed a wholesome scorn. This scorn fell most heavily +upon kind Mrs. Jones. The Sears children regarded her familiar +jocularity with undisguised repugnance; and when Jimmy heard Mrs. +Jones tell his little sister Annie that morning that she was no longer +the baby, Jimmy's rage at what he considered a fiendish thrust at the +innocent and forsaken child passed the bounds of endurance. He hurled +a bit of that anger in the clod that hit Mealy Jones, then Jimmy +walked doggedly back to the house. He coaxed the little sister from +the kitchen, took the child's chubby hand and led her to the barn. +There Jimmy nursed his sorrow. He assured the younker as they sat +on the hay that he for one would not desert her, "even if mamma had +forgotten her." He hugged the wondering tot until her ribs hurt, and +in his lamentations referred to the new baby as "that old thing." +The evening before, when Mrs. Jones had marshalled the other Sears +children and had taken them into the bedroom to see their new sister, +Jimmy was not to be found. None of the older children had looked at +the baby. They had turned their heads away deliberately, and had +responded in gutteral affirmatives when they were asked if it were not +a pretty baby. But Jimmy had escaped that humiliation, and since then +he had avoided all snares set to lure him to his mother's bed-side. He +sat there in the barn, fuming as he recalled what he had heard while +Annie was in his mother's room early that morning. + +[Illustration: _Jimmy heard Mrs. Jones tell his little sister Annie +that morning that she was no longer the baby_.] + +"See little sister's hands. Oh, what pretty hands!" Jimmy had +reasoned, and probably correctly, that the pause was filled by the +child's big-eyed astonishment. Mrs. Jones continued,-- + +"Weenty teenty little feets! See little sister's toeses. What little +bitsey toeses. Baby touch little sister's toeses." + +Jimmy had chafed while he listened; but now that the scene came to him +after reflection, he saw how inhuman a thing it was to dupe the child +into an affection for her inevitable enemy. + +"Does baby love little sister?" continued the voice. "Love nice, +pretty little sister! Sweet little sister! Zhere! Zhere! Zhat's right; +love little sister!" As he toyed with a wisp of hay, Jimmy Sears's +blood froze in his veins at the recollection that his own mother had +lent her countenance to this baseness. He knew, and he knew that his +mother knew, that the baby would take all the care due to his toddling +sister. He saw, from the elevation of the hay-cock on which he and +the little one sat, that her throat had been cut in a cowardly manner +while she smiled. It seemed deliberately cruel. A lump of pity for the +child filled his throat. Still, in his heart, he forgave his mother +for her part in the duplicity. He did not feel for her the contempt he +felt for Henry Sears, his father; for the boy knew that Henry Sears +was actually proud of the family's ignominy. Jimmy blushed at the +picture in his mind of his father strutting around town, with his vest +pockets full of cigars, and his thumbs in the armpits, bragging of the +occurrence that filled the boy with shame. Jimmy felt that secretly +his mother did not consider the baby's arrival an occasion for +vainglory. He felt that his mother was merely putting a good face upon +the misfortune. These reflections kept Jimmy quiet for ten minutes. + +[Illustration: _His father strutting around town ... bragging of the +occurrence that filled the boy with shame_.] + +At the end thereof a calamitous fate took him up and made him its toy. +Tragedy is the everlasting piling up of little things. So Jimmy Sears +could not know that an evil destiny had come to guide his steps when +he started townward, for it came so gently. To meet Piggy Pennington +and Bud Perkins and Abe Carpenter coming out of the Pennington yard +was not such a dreadful thing. Jimmy had met them a score of times +before at that particular gate, with no serious consequences. It was +not in the least ominous that the four boys started for the Creek of +the Willows, for Jimmy had gone to the Creek times without number in +that very company. It did not augur evil for Jimmy Sears that the lot +fell to him to go forth and forage a chicken, for the great corn feast +of the Black Feet, a savage tribe of four warriors, among whom Jimmy +was known as the "Bald Eagle." Perhaps there were signs and warnings +in all these things; and then, on the other hand, perhaps Jimmy Sears +was so intent upon escaping from the shadow that lowered over his +family that he did not read the signs, and so rushed into his +misfortunes blindly. These, however, are idle speculations; they are +the materials from which sages spin their dry and ethereal webs. But +this narrative is concerned only with the facts in the case. Therefore +it is necessary to know only that when Jimmy Sears stooped to pick up +his nail-pointed arrow, lying beside a stunned pullet, he heard the +sharp nasal "sping" of a rock whirring near his head. Chicken and bow +and arrow in hand, he began to run, not looking back. + +"Here, here, Jimmy Sears, hold on there!" cried a voice. Jimmy knew +the voice. It and the chicken belonged to the same person. So Jimmy +quickened his speed. He heard the clattering thump of pursuing feet. +It was two hundred yards to the end of the cob-strewn cow lot. The boy +fixed his course toward the lowest length of fence. Then he kept his +eyes upon the ground. He clenched his teeth and skimmed over the +earth. The feathers in his hat--stuck there to satisfy the verities of +his assumed Indian character--caught the breeze; so, rather than lose +his hat, he grabbed it in the hand that held the chicken. He cleared +the fence and plunged into the timber. Looking over his shoulder, he +saw a man's form on the top of the fence; the thud of boots on the sod +and the crash of branches behind him sent terror through the boy's +frame, and he turned towards the creek that flowed sluggishly near by. +He took great bounding strides, throwing his head from side to side +as he ran. The boy knew the path. It led to a rickety fence--a cattle +guard--across the river. Jimmy's heart beat wildly, and the trees +danced by him on the sloping path. But he was not "the champeen +fence-walker of Willow Creek," late of "Pennington & Carpenter's +Circus & Menagerie, price ten pins," without having won his proud +place by prowess. He came to the water's edge with sure feet. He knew +that he could cross. He had crossed the creek there a score of times. +He jumped for the slanting boards with his bare feet, and his heart +was glad. The boy was sure that no man would dare to follow him, even +if the fence would hold a man's weight. He had scurried up the bank +before his pursuer had reached the side Jimmy had leaped from so +lightly. He scooted through the underbrush. Again and again did the +"champeen fence-walker" smile to himself as he slackened his pace +to dodge a volley of rocks, and again and again did James Sears--an +exemplary youth for the most part, who knew his Ten Commandments by +heart--look exultingly at his pullet. He gloried in his iniquity. +Lentulus returning to Capua with victorious legions was not so +proud. But there the evil spirit swooped low upon him--the spirit +of destruction that always follows pride. Jimmy tripped, and lunged +forward; the chicken, the hat, the bow and arrow, and the boy +all parted company. Then Jimmy felt a pain--a sharp pain that he +recognized too well. He feared to make sure of the extent of his +injury. Instinctive knowledge told him he had "stumped" his toe. This +knowledge also brought the sense of certainty that his day's pleasure +was spoiled. He knew that he would go hobbling along, the last brave +in the Indian file. The pain in his foot began to throb as he gathered +up his weapons. He walked for a few moments without looking at the +wound. He felt the oozing blood, and he bent his body and went along, +grunting at every step. Finally coming into a flood of sunlight on the +path, he sat on a log and slowly lifted up his foot, twisting his face +into an agonized knot. He peeked at his toe at first stealthily; then +little by little uncovering it with his nursing hand, he gazed fixedly +at the wound. The flesh on the end of the toe was hanging loosely by +the skin. It was a full minute before the boy could find courage +to press the hanging flesh back to its place. In the mean time the +chicken, which lay behind him under the log, had regained its senses, +squawked hoarsely twice, and walked into the bushes. When Jimmy's mind +turned to his prize, the prize was gone. He had been in the depths as +he sat on the log. But the loss of the pullet brought with it a still +further depression, and Jimmy forgot all about his impersonation of +the "Bald Eagle." He lost his conceit in the red ochre stripes on his +face, and the iridescent feathers in his hat, and the blue-black mud +on his nimble feet. For a few moments he was just a sad-eyed boy who +saw the hand of the whole world raised against him. The cry of the new +baby rang in his ears. The thought of the other boys teasing him about +the number of babies at his house frenzied him; and as his bills of +wrongs grew longer and longer, Jimmy shook his head defiantly at all +the world. For a few hollow moments Jimmy tried to find the straying +chicken. He went through the empty form of spitting in his hand, +saying, before he came down with his index finger,-- + +[Illustration: _He jumped for the slanting boards with his bare feet, +and his heart was glad_.] + +[Illustration: _He sat on a log and slowly lifted up his foot, +twisting his face into an agonized knot_.] + + "Spit, spit, spy, + Tell me whur my chicken is, er I'll hit ye in the eye." + +[Illustration: "_Spit, spit, spy, tell me whur my chicken is, er I'll +hit ye in the eye_."] + +He threw a stick in the direction the chicken might have taken, but +he knew that luck--like all the world--was against him, and he had no +heart in the rites that on another day might have brought fortune to +him. His stubbed toe was hurting him, and the murmur of a ripple in +the stream a few rods below the cattle guard called to him enticingly. +As soon as the boy deemed it safe to venture out of the thicket, he +hobbled down to the water's edge, and sat for a long time in the +shade, with the cooling water laving his bruised feet. He knew that +the other boys would miss him, but he did not care. He was enjoying +the gloom that was settling down upon him. Slowly, and by almost +imperceptible degrees, there rose in his consciousness the conviction +of guilt. At the end of an hour, the feeling that he was a thief swept +over him, covering his sense of personal grievance like a mantle. For +another hour he wrestled with a persistent devil that was tempting him +to strangle his scruples; he won. Jimmy Sears had seventeen cents in +his cast-iron bank at home--the result of a year's careful saving. He +crossed the creek and trudged back to town, and fancied that he was +walking in a sanctified road; for he was full of the resolve to go +straight to the store of the grocer who owned the chicken, and to +offer all his available resources in payment for the wrong he had +done. Only the heel of his left foot touched the ground, and he +progressed slowly. So the afternoon was old when he turned the corner +and trudged into Baker's store. The speech he was going to make, Jimmy +had recited to himself over and over. He intended to walk up to the +counter and say,-- + +"I want to pay for that chicken I took, Mr. Baker." + +To Jimmy that sounded sufficiently humble, and yet it did not seem +completely abject. He fancied the grocer would reply,-- + +"All right, Jimmy; it will be twenty cents." + +To which the boy expected to answer, in a clear, strong voice,-- + +"Well, Mr. Baker, I have seventeen cents at home; you may have that, +and I will bring in the rest as soon as my mushmelons are ripe." + +With that agreement reached, Jimmy saw himself limping out of the +store. He harbored a hope that maybe the grocer, pitying the poor, +lame boy, would call him back, cancel the debt, and perhaps give him +a stick of licorice. Jimmy knew his part by heart. He was sure there +would be no halt nor break in this dialogue. But the demon that was +torturing his destiny that day probably chuckled as Jimmy crossed the +threshold of the grocery store. + +The boy that the grocer saw when he looked up from the pickle barrel +certainly had a badly freckled face; the grocer thought the boy had +bold, mean eyes. The youthful jaw set firmly, and the pain in his foot +engraved ugly lines in his face. The button was off one wristband. A +long tear down the lower part of his trousers' leg revealed a glimpse +of brown, tanned skin. He was not a boy that looked like a creature of +dreams and of high resolve. No boy that amounts to much ever does +look the part, as the actors say. So when Jimmy Sears--ragged and +brazen--stood before the wronged chicken owner, rage flooded the man's +bosom. He rushed around the counter end, mumbling at the boy. The +instinct of fear crowded all the fine speeches out of Jimmy's head. +He backed off, and exclaimed, as he saw the grocer grab a butter +paddle,-- + +"Dern you, don't you touch me; I'll pay for your old chicken. Watch +out now!" + +Two scale weights slipped involuntarily into Jimmy's hands, and he +backed from the counter to the sidewalk. His hands were uplifted as +if to throw the weights. The grocer had not come up to the boy who +shouted in a burst of fear and anger,-- + +"I'll pay for your chicken, I say. Now you keep away from me!" + +[Illustration: "_I'll pay for your chicken, I say. Now you keep away +from me_."] + +The grocer hesitated, dismayed for a second by the threatening weights +in the boy's hand. But pride urged the man on. He stepped up quickly, +and planted a smarting blow on Jimmy's leg. It was well for the grocer +that he ducked his head; for when the paddle struck, the boy did not +flinch, but let drive one weight after another, and cried before each +crash of glass that the flying irons made inside the store, "Yes, you +will!" and again, "Yes, you will!" + +He forgot the ache in his cramped heel and the burning in his bruised +toe as he ran to the middle of the street. + +"You old coward, why don't you pick on some one your size?" + +The tears were rising to his eyes; he had to run to escape from the +tide. Just as he turned, he caught a glimpse of his father joining the +gathering crowd. After that his feet grew wings. + +A freight train stood on the track in front of the boy, a quarter of a +mile away. A mad impulse came to him as he ran, and he yielded to it. +A boy with a grievance, or a boy with a sore toe, or a boy with fear +at his back, cannot fashion his conduct after the beautiful principles +laid down in Mr. Herbert Spencer's "Data of Ethics." So when Jimmy +Sears came to the freight train that blocked his flight, he darted +down the track until he was out of sight of any possible pursuers in +the street. He clambered breathlessly into a coal car, and snuggled +down into a corner inside a little strip of shade, and panted like a +hunted rabbit. A sickening pain throbbed up from his toe. The train +moved slowly at first, and Jimmy knew that he could not hide from the +train men in a coal car. On a banter from Piggy Pennington and Bud +Perkins Jimmy had ridden on the brake-beam while the switch engine was +pulling freight cars about the railroad yards. He had a vague idea +that midway of the train, between two box cars, would be a safe place. +When the train began to increase its speed, Jimmy climbed up the side +of a cattle car and ran along the roof. He had gone three car-lengths +and was about to make his third jump, when he saw the angry face of +his father, who appeared on the depot platform. Instinctively the boy +darted to the other side of the car-roof. His jump fell short. The +father saw his son's head go down, and for an awful minute Henry Sears +heard the lumbering train rumble by. In the first second of that +minute, the frantic man listened for a scream. He heard none. Then +slowly he sank upon a baggage truck. He was helpless. A paralysis of +horror was upon him. Car after car jolted along. At last the yellow +caboose flashed by him. Half of the longest second Henry Sears ever +knew passed before he dared turn his eyes toward the place on the +track where his son went down. Then he looked, and saw only the cinder +track and the shining rails. But an instant later he heard a familiar +whoop, and, staring around, saw Jimmy sitting on a load of wheat that +was standing between the railroad tracks. In this the boy had fallen +after his sidewise jump had thrown him from the moving train. When +Henry Sears saw his son, Jimmy was holding his foot, jiggling it +vigorously and roaring, moved half by the hysteria of fright and half +by the pain of a fresh laceration of his bruised toe. The boy's face +was black with coal-dust and wheat chaff, and tears were striping his +features grotesquely. The palsy of terror loosened its steel bands +from the father's limbs, and he ran to the wheat-wagon. Jimmy Sears, +for all he or his father know, may have floated to the ground from the +wagon bed. But a moment later, in a frenzy wherein anger furnished +only a sub-conscious motor, and joy pumped wildly at the expanding +valves of his blissful heart, Henry Sears took his thirteen-year-old +son across his knee, and spanked him in a delirium of ecstasy; spanked +him merrily, while a heavenly peace glorified his paternal soul; +spanked him, caring not how many times the little body wriggled, and +the little voice howled, and the dirty little fingers foiled his big, +bony hand as it fell. At the end of the felicitous occasion, the +father found his voice,-- + +"Haven't I told you enough, sir, to keep off the cars? Haven't I? +Haven't I? Answer me, sir. Do you hear me? Haven't I?" + +And Jimmy Sears knew by that turn of the conversation that the +episodes of the stolen chicken and of the broken showcases were +forgotten, so he nodded a contrite head, His father returned to earth +by giving his son a few casual cuffs, with, "Will you try that again, +sir?" and continued,-- + +"Now, sir, let me see you walk right straight home. And just you let +me catch you down here again!" + +Jimmy was wise enough to hurry along as fast as his bleeding foot +would take him. He saw the advantage of a motion to adjourn without +further debate, and the motion prevailed. + +An hour later, Jimmy Sears had washed the dirt from the interior of +an irregular circumference that touched his ears and his chin and his +hair. Until the twilight fell he stayed in the conning-tower in the +Penningtons' barn, and watched his home through a crack between two +boards. When he saw his father leave the house for town after supper, +Jimmy hurried down a lane in sight of his father, yet out of his +father's reach. At the close of twilight, Jimmy Sears came up the +hard-beaten path that led to his home, through burdock weeds and +sunflowers. There was a light in the kitchen, and through the window +he could see Mrs. Jones moving about. He observed that the supper +dishes were being put away. He saw his eldest sister, with the tea +towel in her hands, chatting happily with Mrs. Jones. The spectacle +filled him with rage. He felt that the other children had deserted +him, and that, in the war against the new baby, they had left him to +fight unaided. He met a little brother, who greeted him with,-- + +[Illustration: _An irregular circumference that touched his ears and +his chin and his hair_.] + +"Uh-hu, Mr. Jimmy, you just wait till pa gets you!" + +A prolonged and scornful "Aw!" was Jimmy's reply to this welcome. On +the step of the back porch, his favorite little sister sat playing +with the house-cat. She toddled to Jimmy; he let her take his finger, +and they went into the kitchen. + +"Oh, Jimmy!--where--you--been?" demanded the eldest sister. "Mamma's +been asking for you all day. I'd be ashamed if I was you." + +The boy did not deign to speak to Mrs. Jones, and kept his back to her +when he could. He did not answer his sister's question. + +"Got anything here fit to eat?" he asked, as he threw open the +cupboard doors. The insult to Mrs. Jones was not accidental. Jimmy +supposed that she had cooked the supper. He put two or three plates of +food on the table, and drew up a chair, sneering bumptiously, "What's +this?" as he dived into each dish. + +[Illustration: "_Got anything here fit to eat_?"] + +His sister's "Why, Jimmy!" and her warning frowns did not change his +course. Mrs. Jones went to the front of the house, diplomatically +leaving all the doors open behind her, that Mrs. Sears might hear her +son's voice. In a moment the boy caught the faint sound of his mother +calling from the distant bedroom, "Jimmy, Jimmy, come here; I want +you." + +The boy pretended not to hear. She called his name again. "Yes 'm," he +answered. When she repeated her request, he filled his mouth with pie, +and replied, "I'm a-eatin' now." He slipped a piece of ice down the +back of his adoring little sister's dress, who sat near him. When she +wept noisily, he laughed under his breath, and spoke aloud to his +sister at the dish-pan,-- + +"What'd you want to take Annie's doll away from her for? Give it back, +why don't you?" + +[Illustration: "_What'd you want to take Annie's doll away from her +for_?"] + +"Why--Jimmy--Sears!" retorted the girl. Then lifting her voice, +"Mamma, Jimmy's put ice down--" But the lad pressed the ice against +the child's back, pretending to be removing the source of the trouble, +and the child's lusty howls drowned the girl's protest. When he heard +the bedroom door close to shield his mother from the turmoil, Jimmy +knew that he had outwitted Mrs. Jones, so he quelled the disturbance +he had caused. When Mrs. Jones returned to the kitchen, the boy was +sitting on the porch steps with his little sister, telling her about +"raw head and bloody bones," greatly to the child's horror and +delight. + +Jimmy heard his elder sister inquire, "Did Mamma eat her supper?" He +heard Mrs. Jones respond, "Not very much of it; but she will after a +while, I guess. She said to leave it in there." + +"Couldn't she eat any of that nice chicken Mrs. Pennington sent?" + +"No, nor Mrs. Carpenter's lemon jelly." + +"Poor mamma!" sighed the girl. + +But Jimmy had other reflections. Two minutes later he walked past his +mother's open door, and fumbled around in the sitting-room. + +"Is that you, Jimmy?" asked his mother. + +"Yes 'm," rejoined the boy. + +"What are you doing?" + +"Lookin' for my other coat." + +"Won't you come in and see me, Jimmy? I haven't seen you for two whole +days." + +"In a minute," returned Jimmy. + +Standing awkwardly in the doorway, he asked, "What 'd you want?" + +"Come over here, Jimmy," returned the mother. "My poor, neglected +boy!" He would not let his eyes find the new baby. He stood stiffly on +one foot, and gave his mother his hand. She drew him down and kissed +his cheek, while he pecked at her lips. As Jimmy rose, his mother +smiled. + +[Illustration: _She drew him down and kissed his cheek while he pecked +at her lips_.] + +"Are you hungry, Jimmy?" + +The boy nodded a vociferous affirmative. Being a boy, one of the +lowest orders of human creatures in point of intuitions, Jimmy could +not know that his mother understood the rankle in her son's heart. Nor +could he divine that she kept the supper dainties as peace offerings. + +"Won't you have some of my supper?" + +"Don't you want it?" returned the boy, to justify his greed. + +"No, Jimmy; I'm not hungry. I kept it all for you." + +While her son was sitting on the floor, eating off the tray on the +chair by the bed, his mother's hand was in his hair, stroking it +lovingly. His sister and the other children looked in and saw him. +Jimmy knew they were whispering "Hoggy!" but he did not heed them. His +mother avoided mentioning the new baby to him; she made him tell her +about his sore toe, and in return she told him how lonely she had been +without him. + +As his stomach filled, his heart overflowed,--a common coincidence +even with older and better boys than Jimmy, and the tears came to his +eyes. At last, when the plate was cleared, he rose, and went to the +place where the new-comer lay. He bent over the little puff in the +bedclothes, and grinned sheepishly as he lifted the cover from +the sleeping baby's face. He looked at the red features a moment +curiously, and said in his loud, husky, boyish voice,-- + +"Hullo there, Miss Sears; how are you this evenin'?" + +Then he pinched his mother's arm and walked out of the room, his soul +at peace. + +[Illustration] + + + + +MUCH POMP AND SEVERAL CIRCUMSTANCES + + +Back of Pennington's barn, which was the royal castle of the Court of +Boyville, ran a hollow. In the hollow grew a gnarly box-elder tree. +This tree was the courtiers' hunting-lodge. In the crotches of the +rugged branches Piggy Pennington, Abe Carpenter, Jimmy Sears, Bud +Perkins, and Mealy Jones were wont to rest of a summer afternoon, +recounting the morning's adventures in the royal tourney of the +marble-ring, planning for the morrow's chase, meditating upon the +evil approach of the fall school term, and following such sedentary +pursuits as to any member of the court seemed right and proper. +One afternoon late in August the tree was alive with its arboreal +aristocracy. Abe Carpenter sat on the lowest branch, plaiting a +four-strand, square-braided "quirt"; Jimmy Sears was holding the ends. +Piggy was casually skinning cats, hanging by his legs, or chinning on +an almost horizontal limb, as he took his part in the lagging talk. +Hidden by the foliage in the thick of the tree, in a three-pronged +seat, Bud Perkins reclined, his features drawn into a painful grimace, +as his right hand passed to and fro before his mouth, rhythmically +twanging the tongue of a Jew's-harp, upon which he was playing "To My +Sweet Sunny South Take Me Home." He breathed heavily and irregularly. +His eyes were on the big white clouds in the blue sky, and his heart +was filled with the poetry of lonesomeness that sometimes comes to +boys in pensive moods. For the days when he had lived with his father, +a nomad of the creeks that flowed by half a score of waterways into +the Mississippi, were upon the far horizon of his consciousness, and +the memory of those days made him as sad as any memory ever can make a +healthy, care-free boy. He played "Dixie," partly because it was his +dead father's favorite tune, and partly because, being sprightly, it +kept down his melancholy. Later he took out a new mouth-organ, which +his foster mother had given to him, and to satisfy his boyish idea of +justice played "We shall Meet, but We shall Miss Him," because it +was Miss Morgan's favorite. While he played the Jew's-harp his tree +friends flung ribald remarks at him. But when Bud began to waver his +hand for a tremulo upon the mouth-organ as he played "Marsa's in +de Col', Col' Groun'," a peace fell upon the company, and they sat +quietly and heard his repertoire,--"Ol' Shadey," "May, Dearest May," +"Lilly Dale," "Dey Stole My Chile Away," "Ol' Nicodemus," "Sleeping, I +Dream, Love," and "Her Bright Smile." He was a Southern boy--a bird of +passage caught in the North--and his music had that sweet, soothing +note that cheered the men who fought under the Stars and Bars. + +Into this scene rushed Mealy Jones, pell mell, hat in hand, +breathless, bringing war's alarms. "Fellers, fellers," screamed Mealy, +half a block away, "it's a-comin' here! It's goin' to be here in two +weeks. The man's puttin' up the boards now, and you can get a job +passin' bills." + +An instant later the tree was deserted, and five boys were running as +fast as their legs would carry them toward the thick of the town. They +stopped at the new pine bill-board, and did not leave the man with the +paste bucket until they had seen "Zazell" flying out of the cannon's +mouth, the iron-jawed woman performing her marvels, the red-mouthed +rhinoceros with the bleeding native impaled upon its horn and the +fleeing hunters near by, "the largest elephant in captivity," carrying +the ten-thousand dollar beauty, the acrobats whirling through space, +James Robinson turning handsprings on his dapple-gray steed, and, last +and most ravishing of all, little Willie Sells in pink tights on his +three charging Shetland ponies, whose breakneck course in the picture +followed one whichever way he turned. When these glories had been +pasted upon the wall and had been discussed to the point of cynicism, +the Court of Boyville reluctantly adjourned to get in the night wood +and dream of a wilderness of monkeys. + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration] + +During the two weeks after the appearance of the glad tidings on the +bill-boards, the boys of Willow Creek spent many hours in strange +habiliments, making grotesque imitations of the spectacles upon the +boards. Piggy Pennington rolled his trousers far above his knees for +tights, and galloped his father's fat delivery horse up and down the +alley, riding sideways, standing, and backwards, with much vainglory. +To simulate the motley of the tight-rope-walking clown, Jimmy Sears +wore the calico lining of his clothes outside, when he was in the +royal castle beyond his mother's ken. Mealy donned carpet slippers in +Pennington's barn, and wore long pink-and-white striped stockings of +a suspiciously feminine appearance, fastened to his abbreviated shirt +waist with stocking-suspenders, hated of all boys. Abe Carpenter, in a +bathing-trunk, did shudder-breeding trapeze tricks, and Bud Perkins, +who nightly rubbed himself limber in oil made by hanging a bottle of +angle-worms in the sun to fry, wore his red calico base-ball clothes, +and went through keg-hoops in a dozen different ways. In the streets +of the town the youngsters appeared disguised as ordinary boys. They +revelled in the pictured visions of the circus, but were sceptical +about the literal fulfilment of some of the promises made on the +bills. Certain things advertised were eliminated from reasonable +expectation: for instance, the boys all knew that the giraffe would +not be discovered eating off the top of a cocoanut-tree; nor would the +monkeys play a brass band; and they knew that they would not see the +"Human Fly" walk on the ceiling at the "concert." For no boy has ever +saved enough money to buy a ticket to the "concert." Nevertheless, +they gloated over the pictures of the herd of giraffes and the +monkey-band and the graceful "Human Fly" walking upside down "defying +the laws of gravitation;" and they considered no future, however +pleasant, after the day and date on the bills. Thus the golden day +approached, looming larger and larger upon the horizon as it came. In +the interim, how many a druggist bought his own bottles the third and +fourth time, how many a junk-dealer paid for his own iron, how many +bags of carpet rags went to the ragman, the world will never know. + +[Illustration: _Piggy Pennington ... galloped his father's fat +delivery horse up and down the alley_.] + +[Illustration: _Oil made by hanging a bottle of angle-worms in the sun +to fry_.] + +[Illustration: _How many bags of carpet rags went to the ragman_.] + +Now, among children of a larger growth, in festive times hostile +demonstrations cease; animosities are buried; but in Boyville a +North-ender is a North-ender, a South-ender is a South-ender, and a +meeting of the two is a fight. Boyville knows no times of truce. It +asks nor offers quarter. When warring clans come together, be it +workday, holiday, or even circus day, there is a clatter of clods, +a patter of feet, and retreating hoots of defiance. And because the +circus bill-boards were frequented by boys of all kiths and clans, +clashes occurred frequently, and Bud Perkins, who was the fighter of +the South End, had many a call to arms. Indeed, the approaching circus +unloosed the dogs of war rather than nestled the dove of peace. For +Bud Perkins, in a moment of pride, issued an ukase which forbade all +North End boys to look at a certain bill-board near his home. This +ukase and his strict enforcement of it made him the target of North +End wrath. Little Miss Morgan, his foster-mother, who had adopted him +at the death of his father the summer before the circus bills were +posted, could not understand how the lad managed to lose so many +buttons, nor how he kept tearing his clothes. She ascribed these +things to his antecedents and to his deficient training. She did +not know that Bud, whom she called Henry, and whose music on the +mouth-organ seemed to come from a shy and gentle soul, was the Terror +of the South End. Her guileless mind held no place for the important +fact that North End boys generally travelled by her door in pairs +for safety. Such is the blindness of women. Cupid probably got his +defective vision from his mother's side of the house. + +The last half of the last week before circus day seemed a century to +Bud and his friends. Friday and Saturday crept by, and Mealy Jones +was the only boy at Sunday-school who knew the Golden Text, for an +inflammatory rumor that the circus was unloading from the side-track +at the depot swept over the boys' side of the Sunday-school room, and +consumed all knowledge of the fifth chapter of Acts, the day's lesson. +After Sunday-school the boys broke for the circus grounds. There they +feasted their gluttonous eyes upon the canvas-covered chariots, and +the elephants, and the camels, and the spotted ponies, passing from +the cars to the tents. The unfamiliar noises, the sight of the rising +"sea of canvas," the touch of mysterious wagons containing so many +wonders, and the intoxicating smell that comes only with much canvas, +many animals, and the unpacking of Pandora's box, stuffed the boys' +senses until they viewed with utter stoicism the passing dinner hour +and the prospect of finding only cold mashed potatoes and the +necks and backs of chickens in the cupboards. They even affected +indifference to parental scoldings, and lingered about the enchanting +spot until the shadows fell eastward and the day was old. + +When a boy gets on his good behavior he tempts Providence. And the +Providence of boys is frail and prone to yield. So when Bud Perkins, +who was burning with a desire to please Miss Morgan the day before the +circus, went to church that Sunday night, any one can see that he was +provoking Providence in an unusual and cruel manner. Bud did not sit +with Miss Morgan, but lounged into the church, and took a back seat. +Three North End boys came in and sat on the same bench. Then Jimmy +Sears shuffled past the North Enders, and sat beside Bud. After which +the inevitable happened. It kept happening. They "passed it on," and +passed it back again; first a pinch, then a chug, then a cuff, then a +kick under the bench. Heads craned toward the boys occasionally, and +there came an awful moment when Bud Perkins found himself looking +brazenly into the eyes of the preacher, who had paused to glare at the +boys in the midst of his sermon. The faces of the entire congregation +seemed to turn upon Bud automatically. A cherub-like expression of +conscious innocence and impenetrable unconcern beamed through Bud +Perkins's features. The same expression rested upon the countenances +of the four other malefactors. At the end of the third second Jimmy +Sears put his hand to his mouth and snorted between his fingers. And +four young men looked down their noses. In the hush, Brother Baker--a +tiptoeing Nemesis--stalked the full length of the church toward the +culprits. When he took his seat beside the boys the preacher continued +his discourse. Brother Baker's unctuousness angered Bud Perkins. He +felt the implication that his conduct was bad, and his sense of guilt +spurred his temper. Satan put a pin in Bud's hand. Slowly, almost +imperceptibly, Satan moved the boy's arm on the back of the pew, +around Jimmy Sears. Then an imp pushed Bud's hand as he jabbed the pin +into the back of a North Ender. The boy from the North End let out a +yowl of pain. Bud was not quick enough. Brother Baker saw the pin; two +hundred devout Methodists saw him clamp his fingers on Bud Perkins's +ear, and march him down the length of the church and set him beside +Miss Morgan. It was a sickening moment. The North End grinned as one +boy under its skin, and was exceeding glad. So agonizing was it for +Bud that he forgot to imagine what a triumph it was for the North +End--and further anguish is impossible for a boy. + +[Illustration: _Brother Baker--a tiptoeing Nemesis_.] + +Miss Morgan and Bud Perkins left the church with the congregation. Bud +dreaded the moment when they would leave the crowd and turn into their +side street. When they did turn, Bud was lagging a step or two behind. +A boy's troubles are always the fault of the other boy. The North End +boy's responsibility in the matter was so clear--to Bud--that, when he +went to justify himself to Miss Morgan, he was surprised and hurt at +what he considered her feminine blindness to the fact. After she had +passed her sentence she asked: "Do you really think you deserve to go, +Henry?" + +The blow stunned the boy. He saw the visions of two weeks burst like +bubbles, and he whimpered: "I dunno." But in his heart he did know +that to deny a boy the joy of seeing Willie Sells on his three +Shetland ponies, for nothing in the world but showing a North-ender +his place, was a piece of injustice of the kind for which men and +nations go to war. At breakfast Bud kept his eyes on his plate. His +face wore the resigned look of a martyr. Miss Morgan was studiously +gracious. He dropped leaden monosyllables into the cheery flow of her +conversation, and after breakfast put in his time at the woodshed. + +At eight o'clock that morning the town of Willow Creek was in the +thrall of the circus. Country wagons were passing on every side +street. Delivery carts were rattling about with unusual alacrity. +By half-past nine dressed-up children were flitting along the side +streets hurrying their seniors. On the main thoroughfare flags were +flying, and the streams of strangers that had been flowing into town +were eddying at the street corners. The balloon-vender wormed his way +through the buzzing crowd, leaving his wares in a red and blue trail +behind him. The bark of the fakir rasped the tightening nerves of the +town. Everywhere was hubbub; everywhere was the dusty, heated air of +the festival; everywhere were men and women ready for the marvel that +had come out of the great world, bringing pomp and circumstance in its +gilded train; everywhere in Willow Creek the spirit which put the blue +sash about the country girl's waist and the flag in her beau's hat ran +riot, save at the home of Miss Morgan. There the bees hummed lazily +over the old-fashioned flower garden; there the cantankerous jays +jabbered in the cottonwoods; there the muffled noises of the town +festival came as from afar; there Miss Morgan puttered about her +morning's work, trying vainly to croon a gospel hymn; and there Bud +Perkins, prone upon the sitting-room sofa, made parallelograms and +squares and diamonds with the dots and lines on the ceiling paper. +When the throb of the drum and the blare of the brass had set the +heart of the town to dancing, some wave of the ecstasy seeped through +the lilac bushes and into the quiet house. The boy on the sofa started +up suddenly, checked himself ostentatiously, walked to the bird +cage, and began to play with the canary. The wave carried the little +spinster to the window. The circus had a homestead in human hearts +before John Wesley staked his claim, and even so good a Methodist as +Miss Morgan could not be deaf to the scream of the calliope nor the +tinkle of cymbals. + +[Illustration: _Dressed-up children were flitting along the side +streets, hurrying their seniors_.] + +[Illustration: _The Balloon-Vender wormed his way through the buzzing +crowd, leaving his wares in a red and blue trail behind him_.] + +[Illustration: _The Blue Sash about the country girl's waist and the +flag in her Beau's hat_.] + +To emphasize his desolation, Bud left the room, and sat down by a tree +in the yard, with his back to the kitchen door and window. There Miss +Morgan saw him playing mumble-peg in a desultory fashion. When the +courtiers of Boyville came home from the parade they found him; and +because he sat playing a silent, sullen, solitary game, and responded +to their banter only with melancholy grunts, they knew that the worst +had befallen him. Much confab followed, in which the pronoun "she" and +"her" were spoken. Otherwise Miss Morgan was unidentified. For the +conversation ran thus, over and over:-- + +"You ask her." + +"Naw, I've done ast 'er." + +"'T won't do no good for me to ast 'er. She don't like me." + +"I ain't 'fraid to ast 'er." + +"Well, then, why don't you?" + +"Why don't _you_?" + +"Let's all ast 'er." + +"S'pose she will, Bud?" + +"I dunno." + +Then Piggy and Abe and Jimmy and Mealy came trapesing up to Miss +Morgan's kitchen door. Bud sat by the tree twirling his knife at his +game. Piggy, being the spokesman, stood in the doorway. "Miss Morgan," +he said, as he slapped his leg with his hat. + +"Well, Winfield?" replied the little woman, divining his mission, and +hardening her heart against his purpose. + +"Miss Morgan," he repeated, and then coaxed sheepishly, "can't Bud go +to the show with us, Miss Morgan?" + +"I'm afraid not to-day," smiled back Miss Morgan, as she went about +her work. A whisper from the doorstep prompted Piggy to "ask her why;" +whereat Piggy echoed: "Why can't he, Miss Morgan?" + +"Henry misbehaved in church last night, and we've agreed that he shall +stay home from the circus." + +Piggy advanced a step or two inside the door, laughing diplomatically: +"O--no, Miss Morgan; don't you think he's agreed. He's just dyin' to +go." + +Miss Morgan smiled, but did not join in Piggy's hilarity--a bad +sign. Piggy tried again: "They got six elephants, and one's a trick +elephant. You'd die a-laughin' if you saw him." And Piggy went into a +spasm of laughter. + +[Illustration: "_One's a trick elephant. You'd die a-laughing if you +saw him_."] + +But it left Miss Morgan high and dry upon the island of her +determination. + +Piggy prepared for an heroic measure, and stepped over to the kitchen +table, leaning upon it as he pleaded: "This is the last circus this +year, Miss Morgan, and it's an awful good one. Can't he go just this +once?" + +[Illustration: "_It's an awful good one. Can't he go just this +once_?"] + +The debate lasted ten minutes, and at the end four boys walked slowly, +with much manifestation of feeling, back to the tree where the fifth +sat. There was woe and lamentation after the manner of boy-kind. When +the boys left the yard it seemed to Miss Morgan that she could not +look from her work without seeing the lonesome figure of Bud. In +the afternoon the patter of feet by her house grew slower, and then +ceased. Occasionally a belated wayfarer sped by. The music of the +circus band outside of the tent came to Miss Morgan's ears on gusts +of wind, and died away as the wind ebbed. She dropped the dish-cloth +three times in five minutes, and washed her cup and saucer twice. She +struggled bravely in the Slough of Despond for awhile, and then turned +back with Pliable. + +"Henry," she said, as the boy walked past her carrying peppergrass to +the bird, "Henry, what made you act so last night?" + +The boy dropped his head and answered: "I dunno." + +"But, Henry, didn't you know it was wrong?" + +"I dunno." + +"Why did you stick that little boy with the pin?" + +"Well--well--" he gasped, preparing for a defence. "Well--he pinched +me first." + +"Yes, Henry, but don't you know that it's wrong to do those things in +church? Don't you see how bad it was?" + +"I was just a-playin', Miss Morgan; I didn't mean to." + +Bud did not dare to trust his instinctive reading of the signs. He +went on impulsively: "I wanted him to quit, but he just kept right on, +and Brother Baker didn't touch him." + +The wind brought the staccato music of the circus band to the +foster-mother's ears. The music completed her moral decay, for she was +thinking, if Brother Baker would only look after his own children as +carefully as he looked after those of other people, the world would +be better. Then she said: "Now, Henry, if I let you go, just this +once--now just this once, mind you--will you promise never to do +anything like that again?" + +Blackness dropped from the boy's spirit, and by main strength he +strangled a desire to yell. The desire revived when he reached the +alley, and he ran whooping to the circus grounds. + +There is a law of crystallization among boys which enables molecules +of the same gang to meet in whatever agglomeration they may be thrown. +So ten minutes after Bud Perkins left home he found Piggy and Jimmy +and old Abe and Mealy in the menagerie tent. Whereupon the South End +was able to present a bristling front to the North End--a front which +even the pleasings of the lute in the circus band could not break. But +the boys knew that the band playing in the circus tent meant that +the performance in the ring was about to begin. So they cut short +an interesting dialogue with a keeper, concerning the elephant that +remembered the man who gave her tobacco ten years ago, and tried to +kill him the week before the show came to Willow Creek. But when the +pageant in the ring unfolded its tinselled splendor in the Grand +Entry, Bud Perkins left earth and walked upon clouds of glory. His +high-strung nerves quivered with delight as the ring disclosed its +treasures--Willie Sells on his spotted ponies, James Robinson on his +dapple gray, the "8 funny clowns--count them 8," the Japanese jugglers +and tumblers, the bespangled women on the rings, the dancing ponies, +and the performing dogs. The climax of his joy came when Zazell, "the +queen of the air," was shot from her cannon to the trapeze. Bud had +decided, days before the circus, that this feature would please +him most. Zazell's performance was somewhat tame, but immediately +thereafter a really startling thing happened. A clown holding the +trick mule called to the boys near Bud, who nudged him into the +clown's attention. The clown, drawing from the wide pantaloons a +dollar, pantomimed to Bud. He held it up for the boy and all the +spectators to see. Alternately he pointed to the trick mule and to the +coin, coaxing and questioning by signs, as he did so. It took perhaps +a minute for Bud's embarrassment to wear off. Then two motives +impelled him to act. He didn't propose to let the North-enders see +his embarrassment, and he saw that he might earn the dollar for Miss +Morgan's missionary box, thus mitigating the disgrace he had brought +upon her in church. This inspiration literally flashed over Bud, and +before he knew it, he was standing in the ring, with his head cocked +upon one side to indicate his utter indifference to everything in the +world. Of course it was a stupendous pretence. For under his pretty +starched shirt, which Miss Morgan had forced on him in the hurry of +departure, his heart was beating like a little windmill in a gale. As +Bud bestrode the donkey the cheers of the throng rose, but above the +tumult he could hear the North End jeering him. He could hear the +words the North-enders spoke, even their "ho-o-oho-os," and their +"nyayh-nyayh-nyayahs," and their "look--at--old--pretty--boy's," and +their "watch-him-hit-the-roof's," and their "get-a-basket's," and +similar remarks less desirable for publication. As the donkey cantered +off, Bud felt sure he could keep his seat. Once the animal bucked. Bud +did not fall. The donkey ran, and stopped quickly. Bud held on. Then +the donkey's feet twinkled--it seemed to Bud in the very top of the +tent--and Bud slid off the animal's neck to the ring. The clown +brought the boy his hat, and stood over him as he rose. Bud laughed +stupidly into the chalked face of the clown, who handed Bud a dollar, +remarking in a low voice, "Well, son, you're a daisy. They generally +drop the first kick." + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration: "_Well, son, you're a daisy. They generally drop the +first kick_."] + +What passed in the ring as Bud left it, bedraggled and dusty, did not +interest him. He brushed himself as he went. The band was playing +madly, and the young woman in the stiff skirts was standing by her +horse ready to mount. The crowd did not stop laughing; Bud inclined +his head to dust his knickerbockers, and then in a tragic instant he +saw what was convulsing the multitude with laughter. The outer seam of +the right leg of his velveteen breeches was gone, and a brown leg was +winking in and out from the flapping garment as he walked. Wildly he +gathered the parted garment, and it seemed to him that he never would +cover the ground between the ring and the benches. In the course of +several aeons--which the other boys measured by fleeting minutes--the +wave of shame that covered Bud subsided. Pins bound up the wounds in +his clothes. He drew a natural breath, and was able to join the mob +which howled down the man who announced the concert. + +After that the inexorable minutes flew by until the performance ended. +In the menagerie tent Bud and his friends looked thirstily upon the +cool, pink "schooners" of lemonade, and finally, when they had spent +a few blissful moments with the monkeys and had enjoyed a last, long, +lingering look at the elephants, they dragged themselves unwillingly +away into the commonplace of sunshine and trees and blue sky. Only the +romantic touch of the side-show banners and the wonder of the gilded +wagons assured them that their memories of the passing hour were not +empty dreams. + +The boys were standing enraptured before the picture of the fat woman +upon the swaying canvas. Bud had drifted away from them to glut his +eyes upon the picture of the snakes writhing around the charmer. The +North-enders had been following Bud at a respectful distance, waiting +for the opportunity which his separation from his clan gave to them. +They were enforced by a country boy of great reputed prowess in +battle. Bud did not know his danger until they pounced upon him. In an +instant the fight was raging. Over the guy ropes it went, under the +ticket wagon, into the thick of the lemonade stands. And when Piggy +and Abe and Jimmy had joined it, they trailed the track of the storm +by torn hats, bruised, battle-scarred boys, and the wreckage incident +to an enlivening occasion. When his comrades found Bud, the argument +had narrowed down to Bud and the boy from the country, the other +wranglers having dropped out for heavy repairs. The fight, which had +been started to avenge ancient wrongs, particularly the wrongs of the +bill-board, only added new wrongs to the list. The country boy was +striking wildly, and trying to clinch his antagonist, when the town +marshal--the bogie-man of all boys--stopped the fight. But of course +no town marshal can come into the thick of a discussion in Boyville +and know much of the merits of the question. So when the marshal of +Willow Creek saw Bud Perkins putting the finishing touches of a good +trouncing on a strange boy, and also saw Bill Pennington's boy, and +Henry Sears's boy, and Mrs. Carpenter's boy, and old man Jones's boy +dancing around in high glee at the performance, he quietly gathered in +the boys he knew, and let the stranger go. + +[Illustration: _The other 'wranglers ... dropped out for heavy +repair_.] + +Now no boy likes to be marched down the main street of his town with +the callous finger of the marshal under his shirt-band. The spectacle +operates distinctly against the peace and dignity of Boyville for +months thereafter. For passing youths who forget there is a morrow +jibe at the culprits and thus plant the seeds of dissensions which +bloom in fights. It was a sweaty, red-faced crew that the marshal +dumped into Pennington's grocery with, "Here, Bill, I found your boy +and these young demons fightin' down 't the circus ground, and I took +'em in charge. You 'tend to 'em, will you?" + +Mr. Pennington's glance at his son showed that Piggy was unharmed. A +swift survey of the others gave each, save Bud, a bill of health. But +when Mr. Pennington's eyes fell on Bud, he leaned on a show-case and +laughed till he shook all over; for Bud, with a rimless hat upon a +towselled head, with a face scratched till it looked like a railroad +map, with a torn shirt that exposed a dirty shoulder and a freckled +back, with trousers so badly shattered that two hands could hardly +hold them together,--as Mr. Pennington expressed it, Bud looked like a +second-hand boy. The simile pleased Pennington so that he renewed his +laughter, and paid no heed to the chatter of the pack clamoring to +tell all in one breath, the history of the incident that had led to +Bud's dilapidation. Also they were drawing gloomy pictures of the +appearance of his assailants, after the custom of boys in such cases. +Because his son was not involved in the calamity, Piggy's father was +not moved deeply by the story of the raid of the North-enders and +their downfall. So he put the young gentlemen of the Court of Boyville +into the back room of his grocery store, where coal-oil and molasses +barrels and hams and bacon and black shadows of many mysterious +things were gathered. He gave the royal party a cheese knife and a +watermelon, and bade them be merry, a bidding which set the hearts of +Piggy and Abe and Jimmy and Mealy to dancing, while Bud's heart, which +had been sinking lower and lower into a quagmire of dread, beat +on numbly and did not join the joy. As the time for going home +approached, Bud shivered in his soul at the thought of meeting Miss +Morgan. Not even the watermelon revived him, and when a watermelon +will not help a boy his extremity is dire. Still he laughed and +chatted with apparent merriment, but he knew how hollow was his +laughter and what mockery was in his cheer. When the melon was eaten +business took its regular order. + +[Illustration: _When Mr. Pennington's eyes fell on Bud, he leaned on a +show-case and laughed till he shook all over_.] + +"Say, Bud, how you goin' to get home?" asked Abe. + +Bud grinned as he looked at his rags. + +"Gee," said Mealy, "I'm glad it ain't me." + +"Aw, shucks," returned Bud, and he thought of the stricken Ananias in +the Sunday-school lesson leaf as he spoke; "run right through like I +always do. What I got to be 'fraid of?" + +"Yes, Mr. Bud, you can laugh, but you know you'll catch it when you +get home." + +This shaft from Jimmy Sears put in words the terror in Bud's heart. +But he replied: "I'll bet you I don't." + +Bud's instinct piloted him by a circuitous route up the alley to the +kitchen door. Miss Morgan sat on the front porch, waiting for the boy +to return before serving supper. He stood helplessly in the kitchen +for a minute, with a weight of indecision upon him. He feared to go +to the front porch, where Miss Morgan was. He feared to stay in the +kitchen. But when he saw the empty wood-box a light seemed to dawn. +Instinct guided him to the woodpile, and the law of self-preservation +filled his arms with wood, and instinct carried him to the kitchen +wood-box time and again, and laid the wood in the box as gently as if +it had been glass and as softly as if it had been velvet. Not until +the pile had grown far above the wainscoting on the kitchen wall, did +a stick crashing to the floor tell Miss Morgan that Bud was in the +house. + +But there is a destiny that shapes our ends, and just as the falling +wood attracted Miss Morgan's attention, it was diverted by a +belligerent party at her front gate. This belligerent party was +composed of two persons, to wit: one mother from the north end of +Willow Creek, irate to the spluttering point, and one boy lagging as +far behind the mother as his short arm would allow him to lag. The +mother held the short arm, and was literally dragging her son to Miss +Morgan's gate to offer him in evidence as "Exhibit A" in a possible +cause of the State of Kansas vs. Henry Perkins. Exhibit A was black +and blue as to the eyes, torn as to the shirt, bloody as to the nose, +tumbled and dusty as to the hair, and as to the countenance, clearly +and unquestionably sheep-faced. The mother opened the bombardment +with: "Miss Morgan, I just want you to look at my boy." + +[Illustration: "_Miss Morgan, I just want you to look at my boy_."] + +Miss Morgan looked in horror, and exclaimed: "Well, for mercy sakes! +Where on earth's he been?" + +And the leader of the war party returned: "Where's he been? Well, I'll +tell you where he's been. And I just want you to know who done this." +Here Exhibit A got behind a post. The recital of the details of his +catastrophe was humiliating. But the mother continued: "Henry Perkins +done this. I don't believe in stirring up neighborhood quarrels and +all that, but I've just stood this long enough. My boy can't stick his +nose out of the door without that Perkins boy jumpin' on him. If you +can't do anything with that Perkins boy, I'll show him there's a law +in this land." + +Miss Morgan wilted as the speech proceeded. She had voice only to say, +"I'm sure there's some mistake;" and then remembering the crash of the +wood on the kitchen floor, she called: "Henry, come here!" + +As Bud shambled through the house, the spokesman of the belligerents +replied: "No, there isn't no mistake either. My boy is a good little +boy, and just as peaceable a boy as there is in this town. And because +I don't allow him to fight, that Perkins boy picks on him all the +time. I've told him to keep out of his way and not to play with Henry +Perkins, but he can't be runnin' all over this town to keep--" + +And then Exhibit B, with scratched face, tattered raiment, and grimy +features, stood in the doorway. The witness for the State looked in +dumb amazement at the wreck. Miss Morgan saw Bud, and her temper +rose--not at him, but at his adversary. Exhibit A sulkily turned his +face from Exhibit B, and Exhibit B seemed to be oblivious of the +presence of Exhibit A; for the boys it was a scene too shameful for +mutual recognition. Miss Morgan broke the heavy silence with: "Henry, +where on earth have you been?" + +"Been t' the circus," replied the boy. + +"Henry, did you blacken that little boy's eyes, and tear his clothes +that way?" inquired Miss Morgan when her wits returned. + +"Why--no'm--I didn't. But he was one of four fellers that picked on me +comin' home from the circus, and tried to lick me." + +"Willie," demanded the head of the attacking posse, "did you pick a +fight with that Perkins boy?" + +"Oh, no 'm, no 'm! I was just playin' round the tent, me and +another boy, and Bud he come up and jumped on us." And then to add +verisimilitude to his narrative, he appended: "Him and four other +boys." + +"Henry," asked Miss Morgan, as she surveyed the debris of Henry's +Sunday clothes, and her womanly wrath for the destroyer of them began +to boil, "Henry, now tell me honestly, is this little boy telling the +truth? Now, don't you story to me, Henry." + +"Honest injun, Miss Morgan, I cross my heart and hope to drop dead +this minute if I ain't tellin' you the way it was. Him and them +North-enders, why they come along and called me names, and he tried to +hit me, and I just shoved him away like this," and Henry executed a +polite pantomime. "And I was swingin' my arms out to keep 'em all from +hittin' me, and he got in the way, and I couldn't help it. And they +was all a pickin' on me, and I told 'em all the time I didn't want to +fight." + +But Exhibit A kept looking at his mother and shaking his head in +violent contradiction of Bud, as the story was told. + +Miss Morgan asked: "Who scratched your face so, Henry?" + +"Him; he's all the time fightin' me." + +"No, ma, I didn't. You know I didn't." + +Exhibit A and Exhibit B were still back to back. Then Exhibit B +responded: "Miss Morgan, you ast him if he didn't cuss and damn me, +and say he was goin' to pound me to death if I ever come north of +Sixth." + +To which the leader of the raiders returned in great scorn: "The very +idea! Just listen at that! Why, Miss Morgan, that Perkins boy is the +bully of this town. Come on, Willie, your pa will see if there is no +law to protect you from such boys as him." Whereupon the war party +faced about, and walked down the sidewalk and away. + +Miss Morgan and Bud watched the North End woman and her son depart. +Miss Morgan turned to Bud, and spoke spiritedly: "Now, Henry, don't +ever have anything to do with that kind of trash again. Now, you won't +forget, will you, Henry?" + +[Illustration: "_Now, Henry, don't ever have anything to do with that +kind of trash again_."] + +Bud examined his toes carefully, and replied, "No 'm." + +In the threshold she put her hand on the boy's shoulder, and +continued: "Now, don't you mind about it, Henry. They sha'n't touch +you. You come and wash, and we'll have supper." + +When a boy has a woman for a champion, if he is wise, he trusts her to +any length. So Bud went to the kitchen, picked up the water-bucket, +and went to the well, partly to keep from displaying a gathering wave +of affection for his foster-mother, and partly to let the magnificence +of the wood-box burst upon her in his absence. When he returned, he +found Miss Morgan pointing toward the wood-box and beaming upon him. +Bud grinned, and fished in his pocket for the coin. + +[Illustration: "_Here's a dollar I got for ridin' the trick mule.... I +thought it would be nice for the missionary society_."] + +"Here's a dollar I got for ridin' the trick mule," he faltered. "I +thought it would be nice for the missionary society." That he might +check any weak feminine emotions, he turned his attention to the +supper-table, and blurted: "Gee, we're goin' to have pie, ain't we? I +tell you, I'm mighty pie hungry." + +[Illustration: "_Gee, we're going to have pie, ain't we_."] + +The glow of Miss Morgan's melted heart shone upon her face. Through a +seraphic smile she spoke: "It's apple pie, too, Henry--your kind." As +she put the supper upon the table, she asked: "Did you have a good +time at the circus, Henry?" + +The boy nodded vehemently, and said: "You bet!" and then went on, +after a pause, "I guess I tore my pants a little gettin' off of that +mule; but I thought you'd like the dollar." + +It was the finest speech he could make. "I guess I can mend them, +Henry," she answered; and then she asked, with her face in the +cupboard, "Sha'n't we try some of the new strawberry preserves, +Henry?" + +As she was opening the jar she concluded that Henry Perkins was an +angel--a conclusion which, in view of the well-known facts, was +manifestly absurd. + +[Illustration] + + + + +"THE HERB CALLED HEARTS-EASE" + + +Did you hear him? I dare say that boy lives a merrier life and wears +more of the herb called hearts-ease in his bosom than he that is clad +in silk and velvet.--_From the Observations of "Mr. Great Heart_." + +It was dusk in Boyville. The boys at a game of hide-and-seek filled +the air with their calls: + + "Bushel of wheat, and a + Bushel of rye-- + All t' ain't ready + Holler aye. + All in ten feet of my base is caught: All eyes open." + +Or + + "One--two--three for me." + +Or + + "All's out's in free." + +Among the trees they scampered; into hay-stacks they wormed; over +barrels and boxes they wiggled; they huddled under the sunflowers and +the horse-weeds. It was a royal game, but as the moon rose it merged +into pull-away. That game flourished for a while and transformed +itself by an almost imperceptible evolution into a series of races +down the dusty road. But when the moon's silver had marked itself upon +the grass, the boys were lying prone on a hay-cock behind the royal +castle. They chattered idly, and the murmur of their talk rose on +the just-felt breeze that greets the rising moon, like the ripple of +waters. But the chatter was only a seeming. For in truth the boys were +absorbing the glory of the moonlight. And the undertones of their +being were sounding in unison with the gentle music of the hour. Their +souls--fresher from God than are the souls of men--were a-quiver with +joy, and their lips babbled to hide their ecstasies. In Boyville it +is a shameful thing to flaunt the secrets of the heart. As the night +deepened, and the shy stars peeped at the bold moon, the boys let +their prattle ebb into silence. Long they lay looking upward--with the +impulse in their souls that prompted the eternal question that Adam +left unanswered, that David cried in passion across his harp, that the +wise men of the world have left locked in mystery--the question of the +Whence, the Why, and the Whither. + +As the moon climbed high into the arc of the Heavens, the company upon +the hay-cock dispersed, one by one, till a solitary boy remained. + +After he had gazed at the moon awhile a thrill of sheer madness set +him to tumbling, head over heels, upon the fresh hay. Life was full of +gladness for him, and his throat cramped with a delicious longing for +he knew not what. He wondered vaguely if it were not something new +and unimaginably good to eat. It was the nearest he could come to a +defining of the longing. Of course no one can define it. It is that +which quickens the blood of all young creatures--the rosebud, the +meadow-lark, the dragon-fly, the colt, the boy and the maiden, bidding +them glorify God with the show and the example of their comeliness. +The boy rose from the hay and skipped under the trees, over the +fantastic figures of the moon-spun carpet. He waved his arms, and +there came to his throat a simple song, which he chanted croakingly, +lest some one should hear him and laugh. He stopped, and sitting on a +fence looked at a great white cloud that was mounting the western sky. +His soul was listening to the faraway music from the breakers of the +restless rising sea of ambition, and the rush of life and action, that +were flooding into the distant rim of his consciousness. The music +charmed him. Tears came to his eyes, he knew not why. But we, whom +this mighty tide has carried away from that bourne whereon the boy's +feet strayed so happily--we know why the far-seeing angels gave him +tears. + +A dog in some distant farm-yard was baying at the moon. A whining +screech owl sent a faint shudder of superstitious fear over the boy. +For a long time he sat on the fence absorbing the night sounds--the +claque of the frogs, the burring of the crickets, the hum of the water +on the mill-dam far down the valley, and the occasional call of some +human voice, ringing like a golden bell in the hush of the night. It +was after nine and the boy was deep in his trackless revery. A woman +called,-- + +"Win-nee, Win-nee, oh, Winnie." + +The spell upon him was almost too delicious to break; but he roused +himself to reply,-- + +"Yessum. All right." + +Then the mother's voice continued: "Now wash your feet, Winnie, and +wipe 'em dry; don't come to bed with dirty feet." + +Slowly the boy climbed to the earth. He shuffled through dew, but his +feet were still too dirty. He stood in the tub of water by the pump, +rubbing one foot with the other, and his eyes turned moonward. The +thrall of the night caught him again. In a hazy stupor he sat on the +kitchen step drying his feet. When he got up, Piggy Pennington gazed +for a moment at a star--a pale star which hovered timidly over the +chimney of the home which sheltered his Heart's Desire. With the +lunacy upon him, he flung to the star a bashful kiss. Then he grinned +foolishly and came to himself with a grunt, as he ran up stairs to his +room. He was ashamed to face the south breeze that fanned his bed. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12377 *** |