Читать книгу The Measure of a Man. A Tale of the Big Woods - Duncan Norman - Страница 11
ОглавлениеIN LOVE WITH A FLOWER
It was near noon of a hazy Sunday morning in the fall of the year. The summer was gone: John Fairmeadow was now known to the lumber-jacks of all those woods from the Divide and the Logosh Reservation to the driving camps of the Big River. A hazy morning: the earth was yellow and languid and sweet to smell. There was balsam—there was tempered sunlight—in the air. A forest smoke, the fragrant mist of the season, was opalescent under a flushed sun. A lazy little breeze flowed over the pines and splashed odorously into the clearing of Swamp's End. It sportively eddied for a bit—an inquisitive little wind, too—and with a song and a sigh idled on to the shadowy forest reaches. In Pale Peter's bar the Saturday night sots—a frowzy crew of lumber-jacks—were stirring on the floor. Dennie the Hump, the sweeper, being wise, had not disturbed them, but would return with his broom and dust-pan when these sleeping dogs had carried their aches and their growling ill humour to the healing out-of-doors; he had left them lie in the litter and slime of the night where they had fallen. A breath of wind came in at the wide door, thrown open to the morning. It paused appalled beyond the threshold and fluttered back to cleaner places to gather resolution. Presently, however, confronted by plain duty, it returned in a dogged little rush: whereupon it swept the bar, and busily nosed the corners clean, and drove all the stale exhalations of debauchery out of the window, escaping disgusted in the wake. And off it whisked, with a sniff and a gasp, to the big odorous forest which encircled the clearing, glad to have this chance business satisfactorily accomplished.
Gingerbread Jenkins awoke.
"What was it I come here for, anyhow?" he wondered.
For a moment no explanation occurred to him; but presently he remembered. The business with which he was concerned was Plain Tom Hitch. There had been rumours about Plain Tom Hitch. Gingerbread Jenkins had come in from the Bottle River camps to investigate them; but he had arrived at the Red Elephant in time—in the nick of time—to participate in certain hilarious proceedings of a sort very much to his taste. The investigation had been delayed. But it was now impending. "Seems t' me, Peter," Gingerbread Jenkins remarked to Pale Peter, before he took the trail for Tom Hitch's cabin, "that if Plain Tom Hitch has got separated and divorced from a bottle o' whiskey, there must be a Livin' Maker o' the World. There's so many dashed queer things goin' on hereabouts these days that I reckon Somebody's behind 'em. It ain't John Fairmeadow, neither. If Plain Tom Hitch has quit treatin' his body an' soul like a poor damned fool, God A'mighty managed it by the Will an' Mercy of Him. Plain Tom Hitch didn't do it; nor no more did John Fairmeadow. Thinks I, I'll take a small squint at Plain Tom Hitch an' find out for myself. An' so, Peter," Gingerbread concluded, "I'm on the way t' Tom Hitch's t' look the ill-bred fightin' beast over with my own eyes."
With that Gingerbread set out.
Plain Tom Hitch lived on a homestead grant—a small clearing in the woods—two miles out of Swamp's End on the Cant-hook trail. He was employed through the week at the Cant-hook cutting; but of a Saturday night it was his custom to return to his little grant of land. His wife was dead. Rowl, the old Bottle River scaler, maintained that she had died of the drink that Tom Hitch drank. But Tom Hitch had a daughter left—a maid of sweet age and looks—she was turning nineteen—to keep the cabin for him. Tom Hitch was now at home. Gingerbread found him sitting in a rocking-chair on the porch of the cabin, with Jinny, dressed out in her Sunday best, looking off at the sunset over the pines, as though waiting, perhaps, for the image of some shy dream to come dressed in heavenly light to her little feet. It was evening, then: the day was near done, and the last breeze was blowing soft and warm.
"Tom Hitch," Gingerbread ejaculated, when he got hold of Tom Hitch's hand, "what in the livin' thunder have you been doin' t' yourself?"
Tom Hitch looked up.
"Why, Tom," Gingerbread ran on, "they'd lie who called you Plain Tom Hitch this day! You're borderin' on the handsome."
"Ain't been doin' nothin' much t' myself," said Plain Tom Hitch; "jus' washed my face."
"Get out!" Gingerbread scorned.
"Don't remember nothin' more," said Tom Hitch.
"Soap an' water do that t' your face?" Gingerbread inquired.
"Didn't use nothin' else, Gingerbread."
"I wouldn't have believed," said Gingerbread Jenkins, "that carbolic acid could accomplish so much on the traces o' sin."
"No," Tom Hitch agreed; "me neither."
"What you got there?"
"I got a flower."
"Thunderation!" Gingerbread ejaculated. "A flower! What in blitherin' thunder are you doin' with a flower?"
"I'm usin' it for a book-mark," Tom replied; "but that ain't what I'm doin' with it."
"No?"
"No," said Tom; "not by no means. I'm really enjoyin' its society."
"Tom Hitch," Gingerbread demanded, "have you lost your mind?"
"No," said Tom; "not by no means. I jus' found out that there is flowers," said he; "an' I'm s'prised, an' I'm pleased. I like 'em: I'm glad I got t' know 'em."
"What you readin'?" Gingerbread inquired.
"I'm readin' my Bible."
"What you doin' that for?"
"I jus' been made acquainted with God."
"Whew!" Gingerbread whistled. "Who done that t' you?"
"John Fairmeadow kindly introduced me," Tom placidly replied, "in the snake-room o' Pale Peter's place, a fortnight ago come Tuesday, in the evenin'. John Fairmeadow introduced me; but I struck up the real friendship for myself. I'm glad I done it, too. I like God: I'm glad I got t' know Him. He's a poor reputation for sociability, 'tis true, especially among the young; but I'm in a position t' say that once you get really well acquainted with Him there's no end t' the sociability He's able for. He's good company. He's grand company. I enjoy His conversation. I'm glad I know Him. I'm glad I got Him for a friend. I tell you, Gingerbread," says he, "I'm almighty fond o' God!"
"What par-tick-a-lar brand o' fool are you, anyhow?" Gingerbread frankly demanded.
"I ain't no fool, at all," Plain Tom Hitch protested. "Not by no means! That's jus' what I ain't."
"Then," said Gingerbread, "what you talkin' like a fool for?"
"I ain't talkin' like a fool."
"You are, too," Gingerbread insisted. "I never heard a real fool do worse."
"I'm not talkin' like a fool, at all," Tom Hitch went on, gravely. "You only think so because you ain't been used t' that style o' conversation. Maybe you don't like the words I use; but if I was you I wouldn't let a little thing like that throw me off the track o' truth. I tell you, Gingerbread, I'm talkin' an almighty big wisdom that I jus' found out about! You think I don't mean what I say? I do mean it. You think I'm a dribblin' fool when I say that I enjoy God's conversation? Why, Gingerbread, that ain't foolishness; that's Truth. It says jus' 'xactly what I mean. It's real. God is my friend. I like Him: I'm wonderful fond of His company. 'Hello, Tom Hitch!' says He, last night, when I was comin' out from Swamp's End in the starlight. 'Goin' home? That's proper. What you been doin'?' says He. 'Lookin' up at all them stars? I wouldn't do that too much, my boy,' says He. 'Them little stars,' says He, 'is a pretty tough proposition for a man like you. You'd find me there, all right, if that's what you was lookin' for; but you might be frightened when you saw me. I'll tell you what you do,' says He. 'It looks t' me, jus' now, as if t'-morrow might be a fine sunny mornin' for this time o' the year. You go out in the woods. I'll be waitin' there; an' you an' me will have a nice quiet time t'gether, lookin' at the flowers I made. I'm proud o' them,' says He. 'They're lovely; an' I'm glad I have the power an' the heart t' think them into life. You'll enjoy yourself all alone in the woods with me,' says He. 'Anyhow,' says He, 'I'll enjoy myself with you.' An' that's how," said Tom Hitch, "I happen t' hold this here little flower in my hand. All day t'-day," he added, "I've had a wonderful good time with the little thing."
"Ye fool!" said Gingerbread Jenkins.
"That's awful funny, Gingerbread," Tom Hitch replied, without resentment. "I look like a fool t' you," he went on, "an' you look like a fool t' me. Funny, ain't it? But I'm satisfied."
"What?" Gingerbread ejaculated. "Satisfied? Where's your bottle o' whiskey, Tom Hitch?"
"I've put my bottle o' whiskey," Tom answered, "where it belonged before I got it."
"Then," said Gingerbread, "it's not far from your gullet."
"It's jus' as far away from here," Tom Hitch insisted, "as anywhere in the world is."
"I hope you've chained it," said Gingerbread, doubtfully; "it might get loose an' bite you."
"It won't be no trouble t' me no more," said Tom Hitch. "Why, Gingerbread," he went on, "my soul is turned towards Light. I've found peace; an' jus' as long as I can fall asleep like a child at night—an' by day walk the open world with neither terror nor shame—I think I'll stand pat with the cards I hold, whatever any man may think the hand I got is worth in the game. Bottle o' whiskey?" said he. "Look!"
He held up the little flower for Gingerbread to see.
"'Tis the handiwork o' my Friend," said Tom Hitch. "This mornin' He made me the gift of it. I love it. You've simply no idea, Gingerbread, how common an' ornery a bottle o' whiskey looks when——"
"When what?" Gingerbread inquired.
"When you've once fell in love with a flower!"
There came a time—and the time was not far distant—when Tom Hitch staggered out to little Jinny from Swamp's End. It was raining, that night. The first big, black drops of a three days' rain had begun to fall. It was a dark November night—black and wet in the woods—with a storm of cold wind coming down from the Northwest. Jinny met him—took him by the hand at the cross-trails by Swamp's End—and led him home by the hand like a child. And three days later John Fairmeadow came in from the Last Chance camps on Ragged Stream, where the news of Tom Hitch had gone. It was a bad day for a man to be abroad in the swamps. It was a worse night to foot the trail from Dead Man's ferry. There was now a rush of rain against the window-panes of Tom Hitch's cabin; there was now the patter of hail on the roof. And the big wind from the Northwest was threshing the forest and crying at the door. John Fairmeadow was wet to the skin. He bled from the wounds of the muskegs: he was splashed to the eyes with the mud and dead leaves of the last trail. It is a matter of thirty miles from the Last Chance camps to Swamp's End. John Fairmeadow had come it that day, God knows how! by the short cut through Cedar Long Swamp. He had come, however; and he came just in time to pass judgment on Plain Tom Hitch and to intervene with his more righteous justice—all of which shall be told in its place.
All this, however, was for the future. On the placid evening when Tom Hitch sat with Gingerbread Jenkins on the porch of his little cabin, it was not in prospect.
"Gingerbread," said Tom Hitch, "you better turn over a new leaf."
Gingerbread pondered.
"Eh?" said Tom Hitch.
"I reckon," Gingerbread replied, "that I'll get married an' settle down."
"You'll—get—married, Gingerbread?" Tom Hitch drawled.
"Sure!" said the confident Gingerbread; "nothin' like a little matrimony t' straighten a man up."
Tom Hitch stared.
"You watch me!" Gingerbread Jenkins declared.
