Читать книгу In the Midst of Alarms - Robert Barr - Страница 9

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“What’s up? what’s up?” cried Yates drowsily next morning, as a prolonged hammering at his door awakened him.

“Well, you’re not, anyhow.” He recognized the voice of young Hiram. “I say, breakfast’s ready. The professor has been up an hour.”

“All right; I’ll be down shortly,” said Yates, yawning, adding to himself: “Hang the professor!” The sun was streaming in through the east window, but Yates never before remembered seeing it such a short distance above the horizon in the morning. He pulled his watch from the pocket of his vest, hanging on the bedpost. It was not yet seven o’clock. He placed it to his ear, thinking it had stopped, but found himself mistaken.

“What an unearthly hour,” he said, unable to check the yawns. Yates’ years on a morning newspaper had made seven o’clock something like midnight to him. He had been unable to sleep until after two o’clock, his usual time of turning in, and now this rude wakening seemed thoughtless cruelty. However, he dressed, and yawned himself downstairs.

They were all seated at breakfast when Yates entered the apartment, which was at once dining room and parlor.

“Waiting for you,” said young Hiram humorously, that being one of a set of jokes which suited various occasions. Yates took his place near Miss Kitty, who looked as fresh and radiant as a spirit of the morning.

“I hope I haven’t kept you waiting long.” he said.

“No fear,” cried Mrs. Bartlett. “If breakfast’s a minute later than seven o’clock, we soon hear of it from the men-folks. They get precious hungry by that time.”

“By that time?” echoed Yates. “Then do they get up before seven?”

“Laws! what a farmer you would make, Mr. Yates!” exclaimed Mrs. Bartlett, laughing.

“Why, everything’s done about the house and barn; horses fed, cows milked—everything. There never was a better motto made than the one you learned when you were a boy, and like as not have forgotten all about:

“ ‘Early to bed and early to rise

Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.’

I’m sorry you don’t believe in it, Mr. Yates.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” said Yates with some loftiness; “but I’d like to see a man get out a morning paper on such a basis. I’m healthy enough, quite as wealthy as the professor here, and everyone will admit that I’m wiser than he is; yet I never go to bed until after two o’clock, and rarely wake before noon.”

Kitty laughed at this, and young Hiram looked admiringly at the New Yorker, wishing he was as clever.

“For the land’s sake!” cried Mrs. Bartlett, with true feminine profanity, “What do you do up so late as that?”

“Writing, writing,” said Yates airily; “articles that make dynasties tremble next morning, and which call forth apologies or libel suits afterward, as the case may be.”

Young Hiram had no patience with one’s profession as a topic of conversation. The tent and its future position was the burning question with him. He mumbled something about Yates having slept late in order to avoid the hearing of the words of thankfulness at the beginning of the meal. What his parents caught of this remark should have shown them how evil communications corrupt good manners; for, big as he was, the boy had never before ventured even to hint at ridicule on such a subject. He was darkly frowned upon by his silent father, and sharply reprimanded by his voluble mother. Kitty apparently thought it rather funny, and would like to have laughed. As it was, she contented herself with a sly glance at Yates, who, incredible as it may seem, actually blushed at young Hiram’s allusion to the confusing incident of the day before.

The professor, who was a kind-hearted man, drew a herring across the scent.

“Mr. Bartlett has been good enough,” said he, changing the subject, “to say we may camp in the woods at the back of the farm. I have been out there this morning, and it certainly is a lovely spot.”

“We’re awfully obliged, Mr. Bartlett,” said Yates. “Of course Renmark went out there merely to show the difference between the ant and the butterfly. You’ll find out what a humbug he is by and by, Mrs. Bartlett. He looks honest; but you wait.”

“I know just the spot for the tent,” cried young Hiram—“down in the hollow by the creek. Then you won’t need to haul water.”

“Yes, and catch their deaths of fever and ague,” said Mrs. Bartlett. Malaria had not then been invented. “Take my advice, and put your tent—if you will put it up at all—on the highest ground you can find. Hauling water won’t hurt you.”

“I agree with you, Mrs. Bartlett. It shall be so. My friend uses no water—you ought to have seen his bill at the Buffalo hotel. I have it somewhere, and am going to pin it up on the outside of the tent as a warning to the youth of this neighborhood—and what water I need I can easily carry up from the creek.”

The professor did not defend himself, and Mrs. Bartlett evidently took a large discount from all that Yates said. She was a shrewd woman.

After breakfast the men went out to the barn. The horses were hitched to the wagon, which still contained the tent and fittings. Young Hiram threw an ax and a spade among the canvas folds, mounted to his place, and drove up the lane leading to the forest, followed by Yates and Renmark on foot, leaving the farmer in his barnyard with a cheery good-by, which he did not see fit to return.

First, a field of wheat; next, an expanse of waving hay that soon would be ready for the scythe; then, a pasture field, in which some young horses galloped to the fence, gazing for a moment at the harnessed horses, whinnying sympathetically, off the next with flying heels wildly flung in the air, rejoicing in their own contrast of liberty, standing at the farther corner and snorting defiance to all the world; last, the cool shade of the woods into which the lane ran, losing its identity as a wagon road in diverging cow paths. Young Hiram knew the locality well, and drove direct to an ideal place for camping. Yates was enchanted. He included all that section of the country in a sweeping wave of his hand, and burst forth:

“ ‘This is the spot, the center of the grove:

There stands the oak, the monarch of the wood.

In such a place as this, at such an hour,

We’ll raise a tent to ward off sun and shower.’

Shakespeare improved.”

“I think you are mistaken,” said Renmark.

“Not a bit it. Couldn’t be a better camping ground.”

“Yes; I know that. I picked it out two hours ago. But you were wrong in your quotation. It is not by Shakespeare and yourself, as you seem to think.”

“Isn’t it? Some other fellow, eh? Well, if Shake is satisfied, I am. Do you know, Renny, I calculate that, line for line, I’ve written about ten times as much as Shakespeare. Do the literati recognize that fact? Not a bit of it. This is an ungrateful world, Stilly.”

“It is, Dick. Now, what are you going to do toward putting up the tent?”

“Everything, my boy, everything. I know more about putting up tents than you do about science, or whatever you teach. Now, Hiram, my boy, you cut me some stakes about two feet long—stout ones. Here, professor, throw off that coat and négligé manner, and grasp this spade. I want some trenches dug.”

Yates certainly made good his words. He understood the putting up of tents, his experience in the army being not yet remote. Young Hiram gazed with growing admiration at Yates’ deftness and evident knowledge of what he was about, while his contempt for the professor’s futile struggle with a spade entangled in tree roots was hardly repressed.

“Better give me that spade,” he said at length; but there was an element of stubbornness in Renmark’s character. He struggled on.

At last the work was completed, stakes driven, ropes tightened, trenches dug.

Yates danced, and gave the war whoop of the country.

“Thus the canvas tent has risen,

All the slanting stakes are driven,

Stakes of oak and stakes of beechwood:

Mops his brow, the tired professor;

Grins with satisfaction, Hiram;

Dances wildly, the reporter—

Calls aloud for gin and water.

Longfellow, old man, Longfellow. Bet you a dollar on it!” And the frivolous Yates poked the professor in the ribs.

“Richard,” said the latter, “I can stand only a certain amount of this sort of thing. I don’t wish to call any man a fool, but you act remarkably like one.”

“Don’t be mealy-mouthed, Renny; call a spade a spade. By George! young Hiram has gone off and forgotten his—And the ax, too! Perhaps they’re left for us. He’s a good fellow, is young Hiram. A fool? Of course I’m a fool. That’s what I came for, and that’s what I’m going to be for the next two weeks. ‘A fool—a fool, I met a fool i’ the forest’—just the spot for him. Who could be wise here after years of brick and mortar?

“Where are your eyes, Renny,” he cried, “that you don’t grow wild when you look around you? See the dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves; listen to the murmur of the wind in the branches; hear the trickle of the brook down there; notice the smooth bark of the beech and the rugged covering of the oak; smell the wholesome woodland scents. Renmark, you have no soul, or you could not be so unmoved. It is like paradise. It is—Say, Renny, by Jove, I’ve forgotten that jug at the barn!”

“It will be left there.”

“Will it? Oh, well, if you say so.”

“I do say so. I looked around for it this morning to smash it, but couldn’t find it.”

“Why didn’t you ask old Bartlett?”

“I did; but he didn’t know where it was.”

Yates threw himself down on the moss and laughed, flinging his arms and legs about with the joy of living.

“Say, Culture, have you got any old disreputable clothes with you? Well, then, go into the tent and put them on; then come out and lie on your back and look up at the leaves. You’re a good fellow, Renny, but decent clothes spoil you. You won’t know yourself when you get ancient duds on your back. Old clothes mean freedom, liberty, all that our ancestors fought for. When you come out, we’ll settle who’s to cook and who to wash dishes. I’ve settled it already in my own mind, but I am not so selfish as to refuse to discuss the matter with you.”

When the professor came out of the tent, Yates roared. Renmark himself smiled; he knew the effect would appeal to Yates.

“By Jove! old man, I ought to have included a mirror in the outfit. The look of learned respectability, set off with the garments of a disreputable tramp, makes a combination that is simply killing. Well, you can’t spoil that suit, anyhow. Now sprawl.”

“I’m very comfortable standing up, thank you.”

“Get down on your back. You hear me?”

“Put me there.”

“You mean it?” asked Yates, sitting up.

“Certainly.”

“Say, Renny, beware. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I’ll forgive you for once.”

“On your head be it.”

“On my back, you mean.”

“That’s not bad, Renny,” cried Yates, springing to his feet. “Now, it will hurt. You have fair warning. I have spoken.”

The young men took sparring attitudes. Yates tried to do it gently at first, but, finding he could not touch his opponent, struck out more earnestly, again giving a friendly warning. This went on ineffectually for some time, when the professor, with a quick movement, swung around his foot with the airy grace of a dancing master, and caught Yates just behind the knee, at the same time giving him a slight tap on the breast. Yates was instantly on his back.

“Oh, I say, Renny, that wasn’t fair. That was a kick.”

“No, it wasn’t. It is merely a little French touch. I learned it in Paris. They do kick there, you know; and it is good to know how to use your feet as well as your fists if you are set on by three, as I was one night in the Latin Quarter.”

Yates sat up.

“Look here, Renmark; when were you in Paris?”

“Several times.”

Yates gazed at him for a few moments, then said:

“Renny, you improve on acquaintance. I never saw a Bool-var in my life. You must teach me that little kick.”

“With pleasure,” said Renmark, sitting down, while the other sprawled at full length. “Teaching is my business, and I shall be glad to exercise any talents I may have in that line. In endeavoring to instruct a New York man the first step is to convince him that he doesn’t know everything. That is the difficult point. Afterward everything is easy.”

“Mr. Stillson Renmark, you are pleased to be severe. Know that you are forgiven. This delicious sylvan retreat does not lend itself to acrimonious dispute, or, in plain English, quarreling. Let dogs delight, if they want to; I refuse to be goaded by your querulous nature into giving anything but the soft answer. Now to business. Nothing is so conducive to friendship, when two people are camping out, as a definition of the duties of each at the beginning. Do you follow me?”

“Perfectly. What do you propose?”

“I propose that you do the cooking and I wash the dishes. We will forage for food alternate days.”

“Very well. I agree to that.”

Richard Yates sat suddenly upright, looking at his friend with reproach in his eyes. “See here, Renmark; are you resolved to force on an international complication the very first day? That’s no fair show to give a man.”

“What isn’t?”

“Why, agreeing with him. There are depths of meanness in your character, Renny, that I never suspected. You know that people who camp out always object to the part assigned them by their fellow-campers. I counted on that. I’ll do anything but wash dishes.”

“Then why didn’t you say so?”

“Because any sane man would have said ‘no’ when I suggested cooking, merely because I suggested it. There is no diplomacy about you, Renmark. A man doesn’t know where to find you when you act like that. When you refused to do the cooking, I would have said: ‘Very well, then, I’ll do it,’ and everything would have been lovely; but now——”

Yates lay down again in disgust. There are moments in life when language fails a man.

“Then it’s settled that you do the cooking and I wash the dishes?” said the professor.

“Settled? Oh yes, if you say so; but all the pleasure of getting one’s own way by the use of one’s brains is gone. I hate to be agreed with in that objectionably civil manner.”

“Well, that point being arranged, who begins the foraging—you or I?”

“Both, Herr Professor, both. I propose to go to the house of the Howards, and I need an excuse for the first visit; therefore I shall forage to a limited extent. I go ostensibly for bread. As I may not get any, you perhaps should bring some from whatever farmhouse you choose as the scene of your operations. Bread is always handy in the camp, fresh or stale. When in doubt, buy more bread. You can never go wrong, and the bread won’t.”

“What else should I get? Milk, I suppose?”

“Certainly; eggs, butter—anything. Mrs. Bartlett will give you hints on what to get that will be more valuable than mine.”

“Have you all the cooking utensils you need?”

“I think so. The villain from whom I hired the outfit said it was complete. Doubtless he lied; but we’ll manage, I think.”

“Very well. If you wait until I change my clothes, I’ll go with you as far as the road.”

“My dear fellow, be advised, and don’t change. You’ll get everything twenty per cent. cheaper in that rig-out. Besides, you are so much more picturesque. Your costume may save us from starvation if we run short of cash. You can get enough for both of us as a professional tramp. Oh, well, if you insist, I’ll wait. Good advice is thrown away on a man like you.”