Читать книгу The Hand-Made Gentleman: A Tale of the Battles of Peace - Irving Bacheller - Страница 21

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HE farmer in whose house I had spent the night was a thrifty man of the name of Ephraim Baker. My hope in Sal having been overthrown, I offered him my services. I had had enough of disappointment and uncertainty.

“You don't look stout,” said he, “but you ought to be able to mow away an' rake after.” Well, I made a bargain with him, and went to work at once. My first task was to lead a great bull to water. He stood in the stable with a ring in his nose, and roared as I took him out. It was like leading a thunder-storm, but I thought of what General Washington would have done, and walked without flinching. I was surprised to see how easily I could handle the big bull with that ring in his nose. After this initiation the harvesters—big, cordy fellows—tried to bury me in the mow. They always did that with a fresh hand, “to see what he was made of.” Well, I kept my head and shoulders above the grain, although they had given me a fork with three corners on the stale. It was a hard pace they set me, and I lay down at night like a wounded soldier.

I slept with the hired man, who had taken me to my room when I arrived, with all my pride upon me. He was a big, friendly fellow with bristling red hair, who bore the proud, sonorous name of Sam. He had forgotten to remove the puppy—so he said—and thought it all an excellent joke.

He indulged in autobiography as I lay yawning—led me through his career to romantic scenes where he first met his girl and “took a shine to her.”

“I wished,” said he, after a moment of silence, “that you'd write a letter for me which I could copy and send to her. I want it worded right up to the mark. You've got learnin', an' will know how to write a good, respectable, high-toned letter.”

I agreed to do my best for him.

Mr. Baker called us at four, and we dressed and went into the garden and dug potatoes until breakfast-time. So each day began, its work continuing in field, mow, and milking-yard until dark.

Next evening, when we went to our room, with pen and ink I sat down to write the letter for him.

“To Miss Fannie Comstock, Summerville, New York,” he dictated, in a whisper. “Dear Miss.”

He sat a moment thinking.

“Tell her I ain't forgot her,” he went on, “and that I am well an' hope you're the same, an' so on an' so forth.”

So I began the letter as follows:

Dear Miss—It is only a month since we parted, but it has been the longest month in my life, and although I am far away it will surprise you to learn that I see you often. I see you in the fields every day and in my dreams every night.

“I don't think that will do,” he demurred, soberly, when I read it to him.

“Why not?” was my query.

“Well, it don't seem as if it was exactly proper an' good sense,” he continued, in all seriousness. “The month ain't had any more 'n thirty-one days in it—that's sure.”

I tried again with better understanding, and this came of it:

Dear Miss—I write these lines to let you know that I am well and that I haven't forgotten you. I hope that you are well and that you haven't forgotten me. I am working on a farm, and am as happy as could be expected.

“That's good,” said he, when I read it to him; and added, proudly, with his finger on the unfinished line, “Wages, thirty dollars a month.”

I did as he wished.

“Now go on,” he suggested. “Throw in a big word once in a while.”

“Aren't you going to say anything about love?” I asked. “A little poem might please her.”

“Go light on that,” he answered, doubtfully. “She's respectable.”

It is a trait of the common clay of which Sam was made to consider love a thing to be reluctantly, if ever, confessed. When the grand passion showed itself in his conduct it was greeted with jeers and rude laughter. It became, therefore, a hidden, timid thing.

“Nonsense!” I exclaimed; “she can't be more respectable than love and poetry. If you love her you ought not to be ashamed of it.”

“Well, throw in a little if you think best,” he yielded, “but do it careful.”

So the letter continued:

Lately I've been saving my money. Perhaps you can guess why. I want a home and some one to help me make it happy, and I believe I've found her. She is good and beautiful, and all that a woman should be. Do you want to know who it is? Well, that's a secret. She's a lady, and that's all I will tell you now. Fannie, you're a friend of mine, and I need your advice. I am a little frightened and don't know just what to say to her, and you could make it easy for me if you would. Please let me know when I can see you.

Sam shook his head and laughed and exclaimed, “That's business!”

“No, it's love,” I objected.

“Well, it ain't foolish or unproper, an' it sounds kind o' comical. She'll want to know all about it. Put in that I'm goin' to take a farm an' be my own boss, an' have as good a horse an' buggy as any one. That makes it kind o' temptin'.”

I did as he wished.

“Now say, 'Yours truly, with respect,'” said he, and so my task was ended.

Three days later he came to me in high spirits, with a letter in his hand.

“I'm goin' to see Fannie to-morrow,” he said, in a whisper. “If Sam Whittemore can do anything for you, I want to know it.”

His opportunity came that evening. I was doing my chores in the barn. Suddenly Sam burst upon me.

“They're after you!” he whispered.

“Who?” I asked.

“Two men in a buggy—they've heard you were here.”

I had told him of my trouble, and now it threatened to engulf me. Would I give myself up and go home with the officers? I could not bear the thought of going home like a felon. It would kill my mother. This all flashed through my brain in a jiffy, while the dusk air seemed to be full of chains and handcuffs. I started to climb a ladder.

“No use,” said he, as he picked up an empty sack. “They know you're here. Get into this sack.”

A wagon stood on the barn floor loaded with potatoes, in big sacks. Sam was holding the empty sack. I stepped into it and sat with my chin between my knees while he stuffed a bundle of straw all around me. Then he cut two holes near the top of the sack, to give me air and an outlook, tied it above my head, and flung me on the load of potatoes. It was all done in the shake of a lamb's tail, as they used to say.

“The old man is going to drive to Sackett's Harbor to-night with these potatoes,” he whispered. “You go on to Summerville; I'll meet you there to-morrow.”

Then he left me, and I lay quietly on the load.

“He isn't in there,” I heard him say, on his way to the house.

Well, they did some searching and tramping about for the next half-hour or so. By-and-by they put the team on the wagon-pole, and we began our journey—the potatoes and I. They nudged me while the wagon rattled over stones in the stable-yard, as if they wished me to move along; but we came soon to smoother going. Darkness had fallen, and through the peep-holes in my sack I could see moonlight and a small section of the Milky Way. My discomfort set me to work planning relief. I drew the new jack-knife, which I had bought in my one day of plenty, and cut two long slits in the bottom of the sack and gave my feet their freedom. With my legs protruding a sense of the dearness of life returned to me. Two more slits in the sack enabled me to put my arms out and to move freely on the load. I lay quietly for an hour or so, and then thought I would try sitting up. So I rose and adjusted my peep-holes and stared about me. My employer sat on one end of the seat, singing. Soon I could hear only the creak of the whiffletrees and the rattle of the wheels. The reins, which were looped over a shoulder, fell limp, and he began to snore.

I could hear the distant roar of a railroad train. It was coming nearer, and where was the crossing? A sense of prudence caused me to climb to the seat and take the reins. I did this gently, and without waking him. I had a fear of falling in with more officers, and kept my sack on me and listened for teams. If I should hear one coming I would resume my place on the load, and draw in my legs and arms like a turtle. Completely taken up with my plans and perils, it never occurred to me that I was one of the most uncanny creatures that ever went abroad in the night. Suddenly I heard a swift movement beside me, and turned my head. My companion had awakened, and was crowding as far away as possible, his mouth and eyes wide open.

He gave a great gasp, and, before I could find words to calm him, shouted: “Land! What's this?” and leaped from the wagon. It was a wonder—the swiftness of him.

“Don't be afraid!” I called, as I checked the horses. “It's I—Cricket Heron. I got away in a potato-sack and came on the load.”

He stood a moment looking up at me, and gasping for breath. “Cricket Heron!” he exclaimed, presently, and stood gazing up at me in silence for half a moment, and supporting himself on a front wheel.

“Say, boy,” said he, in a voice that betrayed his agitation, “excuse me, but you'll have to find other company. You've wore me out.”

He paused half a moment for breath, and went on:

“When a sack o' potatoes sets down beside ye an' opens conversation, it's a little more than I can stan'.” He resumed his seat and took a look at me, and added, with a laugh, “You'd scare the devil.”

In a few words I told my story, and he seemed to believe and to pity me. He put a few queries, and I answered freely.

“You better go home an' tell the truth about it,” he said, as he hurried the horses. “The only thing I don't like about you is your runnin' away. God hates a coward, an' He don't seem to care if a coward suffers. Take that thing off. Be a man; don't be a sack o' potatoes. You'd cheat the man that bought ye for two bushels o' potatoes. They're worth more than a coward.”

He untied the string above my head, and I took off the sack. The lights of the village were just ahead. He drove to a store whose proprietor was awaiting him. There he paid me the sum of six dollars for my work, and I left him and went to a small inn.

So ended the adventure of the potato-sack. It taught me that a man is never so good as the thing he tries to be, whether it is a hero or a sack of potatoes.