Owing to the circumspect behavior of the new boy, the commotions on the school grounds came to nothing. He was often asked, “Kin you lick him?” And he invariably replied, “I dun’no’.” This idea of waging battle with the entire world appalled him.
A war for complete supremacy of the tribe which had been headed by Willie Dalzel was fought out in the country of the tribe. It came to pass that a certain half-dime blood-and-thunder pamphlet had a great vogue in the tribe at this particular time. This story relates the experience of a lad who began his career as cabin-boy on a pirate ship. Throughout the first fifteen chapters he was rope’s-ended from one end of the ship to the other end, and very often he was felled to the deck by a heavy fist. He lived through enough hardships to have killed a battalion of Turkish soldiers, but in the end he rose upon them. Yes, he rose upon them. Hordes of pirates fell before his intrepid arm, and in the last chapters of the book he is seen jauntily careering on his own hook as one of the most gallous pirate captains that ever sailed the seas.
Naturally, when this tale was thoroughly understood by the tribe, they had to dramatize it, although it was a dramatization that would gain no royalties for the author. Now it was plain that the urchin who was cast for the cabin-boy’s part would lead a life throughout the first fifteen chapters which would attract few actors. Willie Dalzel developed a scheme by which some small lad would play cabin-boy during this period of misfortune and abuse, and then, when the cabin-boy came to the part where he slew all his enemies and reached his zenith, that he, Willie Dalzel, should take the part.
This fugitive and disconnected rendering of a great play opened in Jimmie Trescott’s back garden. The path between the two lines of gooseberry-bushes was elected unanimously to be the ship. Then Willie Dalzel insisted that Homer Phelps should be the cabin-boy. Homer tried the position for a time, and then elected that he would resign in favor of some other victim. There was no other applicant to succeed him, whereupon it became necessary to press some boy. Jimmie Trescott was a great actor, as is well known, but he steadfastly refused to engage for the part. Ultimately they seized upon little Dan Earl, whose disposition was so milky and docile that he would do whatever anybody asked of him. But Dan Earl made the one firm revolt of his life after trying existence as cabin-boy for some ten minutes. Willie Dalzel was in despair. Then he suddenly sighted the little brother of Johnnie Hedge, who had come into the garden, and in a poor-little-stranger sort of fashion was looking wistfully at the play. When he was invited to become the cabin-boy he accepted joyfully, thinking that it was his initiation into the tribe. Then they proceeded to give him the rope’s end and to punch him with a realism which was not altogether painless. Directly he began to cry out. They exhorted him not to cry out, not to mind it, but still they continued to hurt him.
There was a commotion among the gooseberry-bushes, two branches were swept aside, and Johnnie Hedge walked down upon them. Every boy stopped in his tracks. Johnnie was boiling with rage.
“Who hurt him?” he said, ferociously. “Did you?” He had looked at Willie Dalzel.
Willie Dalzel began to mumble: “We was on’y playin’. Wasn’t nothin’ fer him to cry fer.”
The new boy had at his command some big phrases, and he used them. “I am goin’ to whip you within an inch of your life. I am goin’ to tan the hide off’n you.” And immediately there was a mixture — an infusion of two boys which looked as if it had been done by a chemist. The other children stood back, stricken with horror. But out of this whirl they presently perceived the figure of Willie Dalzel seated upon the chest of the Hedge boy.
“Got enough?” asked Willie, hoarsely.
“No,” choked out the Hedge boy. Then there was another flapping and floundering, and finally another calm.
“‘WHO HURT HIM?’ HE SAID FEROCIOUSLY”
“Got enough?” asked Willie.
“No,” said the Hedge boy. A sort of war-cloud again puzzled the sight of the observers. Both combatants were breathless, bloodless in their faces, and very weak.
“Got enough?” said Willie.
“No,” said the Hedge boy. The carnage was again renewed. All the spectators were silent but Johnnie Hedge’s little brother, who shrilly exhorted him to continue the struggle. But it was not plain that the Hedge boy needed any encouragement, for he was crying bitterly, and it has been explained that when a boy cried it was a bad time to hope for peace. He had managed to wriggle over upon his hands and knees. But Willie Dalzel was tenaciously gripping him from the back, and it seemed that his strength would spend itself in futility. The bear cub seemed to have the advantage of the working model of the windmill. They heaved, uttered strange words, wept, and the sun looked down upon them with steady, unwinking eye.
Peter Washington came out of the stable and observed this tragedy of the back garden. He stood transfixed for a moment, and then ran towards it, shouting: “Hi! What’s all dish yere? Hi! Stopper dat, stopper dat, you two! For lan’ sake, what’s all dish yere?” He grabbed the struggling boys and pulled them apart. He was stormy and fine in his indignation. “For lan’ sake! You two kids act like you gwine mad dogs. Stopper dat!” The whitened, tearful, soiled combatants, their clothing all awry, glared fiercely at each other as Peter stood between them, lecturing. They made several futile attempts to circumvent him and again come to battle. As he fended them off with his open hands he delivered his reproaches at Jimmie. “I’s s’prised at you! I suhtainly is!”
“Why?” said Jimmie. “I ‘ain’t done nothin’. What have I done?”
“Y-y-you done ‘courage dese yere kids ter scrap,” said Peter, virtuously.
“Me?” cried Jimmie. “I ‘ain’t had nothin’ to do with it.”
“I raikon you ‘ain’t,” retorted Peter, with heavy sarcasm. “I raikon you been er-prayin’, ‘ain’t you?” Turning to Willie Dalzel, he said, “You jest take an’ run erlong outer dish yere or I’ll jest nachually take an’ damnearkill you.” Willie Dalzel went. To the new boy Peter said: “You look like you had some saince, but I raikon you don’t know no more’n er rabbit. You jest take an’ trot erlong off home, an’ don’ lemme caitch you round yere er-fightin’ or I’ll break yer back.” The Hedge boy moved away with dignity, followed by his little brother. The latter, when he had placed a sufficient distance between himself and Peter, played his fingers at his nose and called out:
“‘NIG-GER-R-R! NIG-GER-R-R!’”
“Nig-ger-r-r! Nig-ger-r-r!”
Peter Washington’s resentment poured out upon Jimmie.
“‘Pears like you never would understan’ you ain’t reg’lar common trash. You take an’ ‘sociate with an’body what done come erlong.”
“Aw, go on,” retorted Jimmie, profanely. “Go soak your head, Pete.”
The remaining boys retired to the street, whereupon they perceived Willie Dalzel in the distance. He ran to them.
“I licked him!” he shouted, exultantly. “I licked him! Didn’t I, now?”
From the Whilomville point of view he was entitled to a favorable answer. They made it. “Yes,” they said, “you did.”
“I run in,” cried Willie, “an’ I grabbed ‘im, an’ afore he knew what it was I throwed ‘im. An’ then it was easy.” He puffed out his chest and smiled like an English recruiting-sergeant. “An’ now,” said he, suddenly facing Jimmie Trescott, “whose side were you on?”
The question was direct and startling. Jimmie gave back two paces. “He licked you once,” he explained, haltingly.
“He never saw the day when he could lick one side of me. I could lick him with my left hand tied behind me. Why, I could lick him when I was asleep.” Willie Dalzel was magnificent.
A gate clicked, and Johnnie Hedge was seen to be strolling towards them.
“You said,” he remarked, coldly, “you licked me, didn’t you?”
Willie Dalzel stood his ground. “Yes,” he said, stoutly.
“Well, you’re a liar,” said the Hedge boy.
�
�You’re another,” retorted Willie.
“No, I ain’t, either, but you’re a liar.”
“You’re another,” retorted Willie.
“Don’t you dare tell me I’m a liar, or I’ll smack your mouth for you,” said the Hedge boy.
“Well, I did, didn’t I?” barked Willie. “An’ whatche goin’ to do about it?”
“I’m goin’ to lam you,” said the Hedge boy.
He approached to attack warily, and the other boys held their breaths. Willie Dalzel winced back a pace. “Hol’ on a minute,” he cried, raising his palm. “I’m not—”
“ONE APPROACHING FROM BEHIND LAID HOLD OF HIS EAR”
But the comic windmill was again in motion, and between gasps from his exertions Johnnie Hedge remarked, “I’ll show — you — whether — you kin — lick me — or not.”
The first blows did not reach home on Willie, for he backed away with expedition, keeping up his futile cry, “Hol’ on a minute.” Soon enough a swinging fist landed on his cheek. It did not knock him down, but it hurt him a little and frightened him a great deal. He suddenly opened his mouth to an amazing and startling extent, tilted back his head, and howled, while his eyes, glittering with tears, were fixed upon this scowling butcher of a Johnnie Hedge. The latter was making slow and vicious circles, evidently intending to renew the massacre.
But the spectators really had been desolated and shocked by the terrible thing which had happened to Willie Dalzel. They now cried out: “No, no; don’t hit ‘im any more! Don’t hit ‘im any more!”
Jimmie Trescott, in a panic of bravery, yelled, “We’ll all jump on you if you do.”
The Hedge boy paused, at bay. He breathed angrily, and flashed his glance from lad to lad.
They still protested: “No, no; don’t hit ‘im any more. Don’t hit ‘im no more.”
“I’ll hammer him until he can’t stand up,” said Johnnie, observing that they all feared him. “I’ll fix him so he won’t know hisself, an’ if any of you kids bother with me—”
Suddenly he ceased, he trembled, he collapsed. The hand of one approaching from behind had laid hold upon his ear, and it was the hand of one whom he knew.
The other lads heard a loud, iron-filing voice say, “Caught ye at it again, ye brat, ye.” They saw a dreadful woman with gray hair, with a sharp red nose, with bare arms, with spectacles of such magnifying quality that her eyes shone through them like two fierce white moons. She was Johnnie Hedge’s mother. Still holding Johnnie by the ear, she swung out swiftly and dexterously, and succeeded in boxing the ears of two boys before the crowd regained its presence of mind and stampeded. Yes, the war for supremacy was over, and the question was never again disputed. The supreme power was Mrs. Hedge.
A LITTLE PILGRIMAGE
ONE November it became clear to childish minds in certain parts of Whilomville that the Sunday-school of the Presbyterian church would not have for the children the usual tree on Christmas eve. The funds free for that ancient festival would be used for the relief of suffering among the victims of the Charleston earthquake.
The plan had been born in the generous head of the superintendent of the Sunday-school, and during one session he had made a strong plea that the children should forego the vain pleasures of a tree and, in glorious application of the Golden Rule, refuse a local use of the fund, and will that it be sent where dire pain might be alleviated. At the end of a tearfully eloquent speech the question was put fairly to a vote, and the children in a burst of virtuous abandon carried the question for Charleston. Many of the teachers had been careful to preserve a finely neutral attitude, but even if they had cautioned the children against being too impetuous they could not have checked the wild impulses.
But this was a long time before Christmas.
Very early, boys held important speech together. “Huh! you ain’t goin’ to have no Christmas tree at the Presbyterian Sunday-school.”
Sullenly the victim answered, “No, we ain’t.”
“Huh!” scoffed the other denomination, “we are goin’ to have the all-firedest biggest tree that you ever saw in the world.”
The little Presbyterians were greatly downcast.
It happened that Jimmie Trescott had regularly attended the Presbyterian Sunday-school. The Trescotts were consistently undenominational, but they had sent their lad on Sundays to one of the places where they thought he would receive benefits. However, on one day in December, Jimmie appeared before his father and made a strong spiritual appeal to be forthwith attached to the Sunday-school of the Big Progressive church. Doctor Trescott mused this question considerably. “Well, Jim,” he said, “why do you conclude that the Big Progressive Sunday-school is better for you than the Presbyterian Sunday-school?”
“Now — it’s nicer,” answered Jimmie, looking at his father with an anxious eye.
“How do you mean?”
“Why — now — some of the boys what go to the Presbyterian place, they ain’t very nice,” explained the flagrant Jimmie.
Trescott mused the question considerably once more. In the end he said: “Well, you may change if you wish, this one time, but you must not be changing to and fro. You decide now, and then you must abide by your decision.”
“Yessir,” said Jimmie, brightly. “Big Progressive.”
“All right,” said the father. “But remember what I’ve told you.”
On the following Sunday morning Jimmie presented himself at the door of the basement of the Big Progressive church. He was conspicuously washed, notably raimented, prominently polished. And, incidentally, he was very uncomfortable because of all these virtues.
A number of acquaintances greeted him contemptuously. “Hello, Jimmie! What you doin’ here? Thought you was a Presbyterian?”
Jimmie cast down his eyes and made no reply. He was too cowed by the change. However, Homer Phelps, who was a regular patron of the Big Progressive Sunday-school, suddenly appeared and said, “Hello, Jim!” Jimmie seized upon him. Homer Phelps was amenable to Trescott laws, tribal if you like, but iron-bound, almost compulsory.
“Hello, Homer!” said Jimmie, and his manner was so good that Homer felt a great thrill in being able to show his superior a new condition of life.
“You ‘ain’t never come here afore, have you?” he demanded, with a new arrogance.
“No, I ‘ain’t,” said Jimmie. Then they stared at each other and manœuvred.
“You don’t know my teacher,” said Homer.
“No, I don’t know her” admitted Jimmie, but in a way which contended, modestly, that he knew countless other Sunday-school teachers.
“Better join our class,” said Homer, sagely. “She wears spectacles; don’t see very well. Sometimes we do almost what we like.”
“All right,” said Jimmie, glad to place himself in the hands of his friends. In due time they entered the Sunday-school room, where a man with benevolent whiskers stood on a platform and said, “We will now sing No. 33—’Pull for the Shore, Sailor, Pull for the Shore.’” And as the obedient throng burst into melody the man on the platform indicated the time with a fat, white, and graceful hand. He was an ideal Sunday-school superintendent — one who had never felt hunger or thirst or the wound of the challenge of dishonor; a man, indeed, with beautiful flat hands who waved them in greasy victorious beneficence over a crowd of children.
Jimmie, walking carefully on his toes, followed Homer Phelps. He felt that the kingly superintendent might cry out and blast him to ashes before he could reach a chair. It was a desperate journey. But at last he heard Homer muttering to a young lady, who looked at him through glasses which greatly magnified her eyes. “A new boy,” she said, in an oily and deeply religious voice.
“Yes’m,” said Jimmie, trembling. The five other boys of the class scanned him keenly and derided his condition.
“We will proceed to the lesson,” said the young lady. Then she cried sternly, like a sergeant, “The seventh chapter of Jeremiah!”
There was a swift
fluttering of leaflets. Then the name of Jeremiah, a wise man, towered over the feelings of these boys. Homer Phelps was doomed to read the fourth verse. He took a deep breath, he puffed out his lips, he gathered his strength for a great effort. His beginning was childishly explosive. He hurriedly said:
“Trust ye not in lying words, saying The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, are these.”
“Now,” said the teacher, “Johnnie Scanlan, tell us what these words mean.” The Scanlan boy shamefacedly muttered that he did not know. The teacher’s countenance saddened. Her heart was in her work; she wanted to make a success of this Sunday-school class. “Perhaps Homer Phelps can tell us,” she remarked.
Homer gulped; he looked at Jimmie. Through the great room hummed a steady hum. A little circle, very near, was being told about Daniel in the lion’s den. They were deeply moved. At the moment they liked Sunday-school.
“Why — now — it means,” said Homer, with a grand pomposity born of a sense of hopeless ignorance—”it means — why it means that they were in the wrong place.”
“No,” said the teacher, profoundly; “it means that we should be good, very good indeed. That is what it means. It means that we should love the Lord and be good. Love the Lord and be good. That is what it means.”
“THE PROFESSIONAL BRIGHT BOY OF THE CLASS SUDDENLY AWOKE”
The little boys suddenly had a sense of black wickedness as their teacher looked austerely upon them. They gazed at her with the wide-open eyes of simplicity. They were stirred again. This thing of being good — this great business of life — apparently it was always successful. They knew from the fairy tales. But it was difficult, wasn’t it? It was said to be the most heart-breaking task to be generous, wasn’t it? One had to pay the price of one’s eyes in order to be pacific, didn’t one? As for patience, it was tortured martyrdom to be patient, wasn’t it? Sin was simple, wasn’t it? But virtue was so difficult that it could only be practised by heavenly beings, wasn’t it?
Complete Works of Stephen Crane Page 137
