The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories

by Owen Wister

  "How many will there be?" said I.

  "Eleven. You might wish some could be excused. But I let them speak to stimulate their interest in culture. Will you not take dinner with me, gentlemen? I was just sitting down when little Josey Yeatts brought me out."

  We were glad to do this, and he opened another can of corned beef for us. "I cannot offer you wine, sir," said he to me, "though I am aware it is a general habit in luxurious homes." And he tightened his lips.

  "General habit wherever they don't prefer whiskey," said Stuart.

  "I fear so," the school-master replied, smiling. "That poison shall never enter my house, gentlemen, any more than tobacco. And as I cannot reform the adults of Sharon, I am doing what I can for their children. Little Hugh Straight is going to say his 'Lochinvar' very pleasingly, Mr. Stuart. I went over it with him last night. I like them to be word perfect," he continued to me, "as failures on exhibition night elicit unfavorable comment."

  "And are we to expect failures also?" I inquired.

  "Reuben Gadsden is likely to mortify us. He is an earnest boy, but nervous; and one or two others. But I have limited their length. Reuben Gadsden's father declined to have his boy cut short, and he will give us a speech of Burke's; but I hope for the best. It narrows down, it narrows down. Guy Jeffries and Leola Mattern are the two."

  "The parents seem to take keen interest," said I.

  Mr. Eastman smiled at Stuart. "We have no reason to suppose they have changed since last year," said he. "Why, sir," he suddenly exclaimed, "if I did not feel I was doing something for the young generation here, I should leave Sharon to-morrow! One is not appreciated, not appreciated."

  He spoke fervently of various local enterprises, his failures, his hopes, his achievements; and I left his house honoring him, but amazed—his heart was so wide and his head so narrow; a man who would purify with simultaneous austerity the morals of Lochinvar and of Sharon.

  "About once a month," said Stuart, "I run against a new side he is blind on. Take his puzzlement as to whether they prefer verse or prose. Queer and dumb of him that, you see. Sharon does not know the difference between verse and prose."

  "That's going too far," said I.

  "They don't," he repeated, "when it comes to strawberry night. If the piece is about something they understand, rhymes do not help or hinder. And of course sex is apt to settle the question."

  "Then I should have thought Leola—" I began.

  "Not the sex of the speaker. It's the listeners. Now you take women. Women generally prefer something that will give them a good cry. We men want to laugh mostly."

  "Yes," said I; "I would rather laugh myself, I think."

  "You'd know you'd rather if you had to live in Sharon. The laugh is one of the big differences between women and men, and I would give you my views about it, only my Sunday-off time is up, and I've got to go to telegraphing."

  "Our ways are together," said I. "I'm going back to the railroad hotel."

  "There's Guy," continued Stuart. "He took the prize on 'The Jumping Frog.' Spoke better than Leola, anyhow. She spoke 'The Wreck of the Hesperus.' But Guy had the back benches—that's where the men sit—pretty well useless. Guess if there had been a fire, some of the fellows would have been scorched before they'd have got strength sufficient to run out. But the ladies did not laugh much. Said they saw nothing much in jumping a frog. And if Leola had made 'em cry good and hard that night, the committee's decision would have kicked up more of a fuss than it did. As it was, Mrs. Mattern got me alone; but I worked us around to where Mrs. Jeffries was having her ice-cream, and I left them to argue it out."

  "Let us adhere to that policy," I said to Stuart; and he replied nothing, but into the corner of his eye wandered that lurking smile which revealed that life brought him compensations.

  He went to telegraphing, and I to revery concerning strawberry night. I found myself wishing now that there could have been two prizes; I desired both Leola and Guy to be happy; and presently I found the matter would be very close, so far at least as my judgment went. For boy and girl both brought me their selections, begging I would coach them, and this I had plenty of leisure to do. I preferred Guy's choice—the story of that blue-jay who dropped nuts through the hole in a roof, expecting to fill it, and his friends came to look on and discovered the hole went into the entire house. It is better even than "The Jumping Frog"—better than anything, I think—and young Guy told it well. But Leola brought a potent rival on the tearful side of things. "The Death of Paul Dombey" is plated pathos, not wholly sterling; but Sharon could not know this; and while Leola most prettily recited it to me I would lose my recent opinion in favor of Guy, and acknowledge the value of her performance. Guy might have the men strong for him, but this time the women were going to cry. I got also a certain other sort of entertainment out of the competing mothers. Mrs. Jeffries and Mrs. Mattern had a way of being in the hotel office at hours when I passed through to meals. They never came together, and always were taken by surprise at meeting me.

  "Leola is ever so grateful to you," Mrs. Mattern would say.

  "Oh," I would answer, "do not speak of it. Have you ever heard Guy's 'Blue-Jay' story?"

  "Well, if it's anything like that frog business, I don't want to." And the lady would leave me.

  "Guy tells me you are helping him so kindly," said Mrs. Jeffries.

  "Oh yes, I'm severe,"' I answered, brightly. "I let nothing pass. I only wish I was as careful with Leola. But as soon as she begins 'Paul had never risen from his little bed,' I just lose myself listening to her."

  On the whole, there were also compensations for me in these mothers, and I thought it as well to secure them in advance.

  When the train arrived from El Paso, and I saw our strawberries and our ice-cream taken out, I felt the hour to be at hand, and that whatever our decision, no bias could be laid to me. According to his prudent habit, Eastman had the speakers follow each other alphabetically. This happened to place Leola after Guy, and perhaps might give her the last word, as it were, with the people; but our committee was there, and superior to such accidents. The flags and the bunting hung gay around the draped stage. While the audience rustled or resoundingly trod to its chairs, and seated neighbors conferred solemnly together over the programme, Stuart, behind the bunting, played "Silver Threads among the Gold" upon a melodeon.

  "Pretty good this," he said to me, pumping his feet.

  "What?" I said.

  "Tune. Sharon is for free silver."

  "Do you think they will catch your allusion?" I asked him.

  "No. But I have a way of enjoying a thing by myself." And he pumped away, playing with tasteful variations until the hall was full and the singing-class assembled in gloves and ribbons.

  They opened the ceremonies for us by rendering "Sweet and Low" very happily; and I trusted it was an omen.

  Sharon was hearty, and we had "Sweet and Low" twice. Then the speaking began, and the speakers were welcomed, coming and going, with mild and friendly demonstrations. Nothing that one would especially mark went wrong until Reuben Gadsden. He strode to the middle of the boards, and they creaked beneath his tread. He stood a moment in large glittering boots and with hair flat and prominently watered. As he straightened from his bow his suspender-buttons came into view, and remained so for some singular internal reason, while he sent his right hand down into the nearest pocket and began his oratory.

  "It is sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France," he said, impressively, and stopped.

  We waited, and presently he resumed:

  "It is sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France." He took the right hand out and put the left hand in.

  "It is sixteen or seventeen years," said he, and stared frowning at his boots.

  I found the silence was getting on my nerves. I felt as if it were myself who was drifting to idiocy, and tremulous empty sensations began to occur in my stomach. Had I been able to recall the next sentence, I should have pr
ompted him.

  "It is sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France," said the orator, rapidly.

  And down deep back among the men came a voice, "Well, I guess it must be, Reub."

  This snapped the tension. I saw Reuben's boots march away; Mr. Eastman came from behind the bunting and spoke (I suppose) words of protest. I could not hear them, but in a minute, or perhaps two, we grew calm, and the speaking continued.

  There was no question what they thought of Guy and Leola. He conquered the back of the room. They called his name, they blessed him with endearing audible oaths, and even the ladies smiled at his pleasant, honest face—the ladies, except Mrs. Mattern. She sat near Mrs. Jeffries, and throughout Guy's "Blue-Jay" fanned herself, exhibiting a well-sustained inattention. She might have foreseen that Mrs. Jeffries would have her turn. When the "Death of Paul Dombey" came, and handkerchiefs began to twinkle out among the audience, and various noises of grief were rising around us, and the men themselves murmured in sympathy, Mrs. Jeffries not only preserved a suppressed-hilarity countenance, but managed to cough twice with a cough that visibly bit into Mrs. Mattern's soul.

  But Leola's appealing cadences moved me also. When Paul was dead, she made her pretty little bow, and we sat spellbound, then gave her applause surpassing Guy's. Unexpectedly I found embarrassment of choice dazing me, and I sat without attending to the later speakers. Was not successful humor more difficult than pathos? Were not tears more cheaply raised than laughter? Yet, on the other hand, Guy had one prize, and where merit was so even—I sat, I say, forgetful of the rest of the speakers, when suddenly I was aware of louder shouts of welcome, and I awaked to Josey Yeatts bowing at us.

  "Spit it out, Josey!" a large encouraging voice was crying in the back of the hall. "We'll see you through."

  "Don't be scared, Josey!" yelled another.

  Then Josey opened his mouth and rhythmically rattled the following:

  "I love little pussy her coat is so warm And if I don't hurt her she'll do me no harm I'll sit by the fi-yer and give her some food And pussy will love me because I am good."

  That was all. It had come without falter or pause, even for breath. Josey stood, and the room rose to him.

  "Again! again!" they roared. "He ain't a bit scared!" "Go it, Josey!" "You don't forgit yer piece!" And a great deal more, while they pounded with their boots.

  "I love little pussy," began Josey.

  "Poor darling!" said a lady next me. "No mother."

  "I'll sit by the fi-yer."

  Josey was continuing. But nobody heard him finish. The room was a Babel.

  "Look at his little hand!" "Only three fingers inside them rags!" "Nobody to mend his clothes any more." They all talked to each other, and clapped and cheered, while Josey stood, one leg slightly advanced and proudly stiff, somewhat after the manner of those military engravings where some general is seen erect upon an eminence at the moment of victory.

  Mr. Eastman again appeared from the bunting, and was telling us, I have no doubt, something of importance; but the giant barkeeper now shouted above the din, "Who says Josey Yeatts ain't the speaker for this night?"

  At that striking of the common chord I saw them heave, promiscuous and unanimous, up the steps to the stage. Josey was set upon Abe Hanson's shoulder, while ladies wept around him. What the literary committee might have done I do not know, for we had not the time even to resign. Guy and Leola now appeared, bearing the prize between them—a picture of Washington handing the Bible out of clouds to Abraham Lincoln—and very immediately I found myself part of a procession. Men and women we were, marching about Sharon. The barkeeper led; four of Sharon's fathers followed him, escorting Josey borne aloft on Abe Hanson's shoulder, and rigid and military in his bearing. Leola and Guy followed with the picture; Stuart walked with me, whistling melodies of the war—Dixie and others. Eastman was not with us. When the ladies found themselves conducted to the saloon, they discreetly withdrew back to the entertainment we had broken out from. Josey saw them go, and shrilly spoke his first word:

  "Ain't I going to have any ice-cream?"

  This presently caused us to return to the ladies, and we finished the evening with entire unity of sentiment. Eastman alone took the incident to heart; inquired how he was to accomplish anything with hands tied, and murmured his constant burden once more: "One is not appreciated, not appreciated."

  I do not stop over in Sharon any more. My ranch friend, whose presence there brought me to visit him, is gone away. But such was my virgin experience of the place; and in later days fate led me to be concerned with two more local competitions—one military and one civil—which greatly stirred the population. So that I never pass Sharon on my long travels without affectionately surveying the sandy, quivering, bleached town, unshaded by its twinkling forest of wind-wheels. Surely the heart always remembers a spot where it has been merry! And one thing I should like to know—shall know, perhaps: what sort of citizen in our republic Josey will grow to be. For whom will he vote? May he not himself come to sit in Washington and make laws for us? Universal suffrage holds so many possibilities.

  Napoleon Shave-Tail

  Augustus Albumblatt, young and new and sleek with the latest book-knowledge of war, reported to his first troop commander at Fort Brown. The ladies had watched for him, because he would increase the number of men, the officers because he would lessen the number of duties; and he joined at a crisis favorable to becoming speedily known by them all. Upon that same day had household servants become an extinct race. The last one, the commanding officer's cook, had told the commanding officer's wife that she was used to living where she could see the cars. She added that there was no society here "fit for man or baste at all." This opinion was formed on the preceding afternoon when Casey, a sergeant of roguish attractions in G troop, had told her that he was not a marrying man. Three hours later she wedded a gambler, and this morning at six they had taken the stage for Green River, two hundred miles south, the nearest point where the bride could see the cars.

  "Frank," said the commanding officer's wife, "send over to H troop for York."

  "Catherine," he answered, "my dear, our statesmen at Washington say it's wicked to hire the free American soldier to cook for you. It's too menial for his manhood."

  "Frank, stuff!"

  "Hush, my love. Therefore York must be spared the insult of twenty more dollars a month, our statesmen must be re-elected, and you and I, Catherine, being cookless, must join the general mess."

  Thus did all separate housekeeping end, and the garrison began unitedly to eat three times a day what a Chinaman set before them, when the long-expected Albumblatt stepped into their midst, just in time for supper.

  This youth was spic-and-span from the Military Academy, with a top-dressing of three months' thoughtful travel in Germany. "I was deeply impressed with the modernity of their scientific attitude," he pleasantly remarked to the commanding officer. For Captain Duane, silent usually, talked at this first meal to make the boy welcome in this forlorn two-company post.

  "We're cut off from all that sort of thing here," said he. "I've not been east of the Missouri since '69. But we've got the railroad across, and we've killed some Indians, and we've had some fun, and we're glad we're alive—eh, Mrs. Starr?"

  "I should think so," said the lady.

  "Especially now we've got a bachelor at the post!" said Mrs. Bainbridge. "That has been the one drawback, Mr. Albumblatt."

  "I thank you for the compliment," said Augustus, bending solemnly from his hips; and Mrs. Starr looked at him and then at Mrs. Bainbridge.

  "We're not over-gay, I fear," the Captain continued; "but the flat's full of antelope, and there's good shooting up both canyons."

  "Have you followed the recent target experiments at Metz?" inquired the traveller. "I refer to the flattened trajectory and the obus controversy."

  "We have not heard the reports," answered the commandant, with becoming gravity. "But we own a mountain howitzer."


  "The modernity of German ordnance—" began Augustus.

  "Do you dance, Mr. Albumblatt?" asked Mrs. Starr.

  "For we'll have a hop and all be your partners," Mrs. Bainbridge exclaimed.

  "I will be pleased to accommodate you, ladies."

  "It's anything for variety's sake with us, you see," said Mrs. Starr, smoothly smiling; and once again Augustus bent blandly from his hips.

  But the commanding officer wished leniency. "You see us all," he hastened to say. "Commissioned officers and dancing-men. Pretty shabby—"

  "Oh, Captain!" said a lady.

  "And pretty old."

  "Captain!" said another lady.

  "But alive and kicking. Captain Starr, Mr. Bainbridge, the Doctor and me. We are seven."

  Augustus looked accurately about him. "Do I understand seven, Captain?"

  "We are seven," the senior officer repeated.

  Again Mr. Albumblatt counted heads. "I imagine you include the ladies, Captain? Ha! ha!"

  "Seven commissioned males, sir. Our Major is on sick-leave, and two of our Lieutenants are related to the President's wife. She can't bear them to be exposed. None of us in the church-yard lie—but we are seven."

  "Ha! ha, Captain! That's an elegant double entendre on Wordsworth's poem and the War Department. Only, if I may correct your addition—ha! ha!—our total, including myself, is eight." And Augustus grew as hilarious as a wooden nutmeg.

  The commanding officer rolled an intimate eye at his wife.

  The lady was sitting big with rage, but her words were cordial still: "Indeed, Mr. Albumblatt, the way officers who have influence in Washington shirk duty here and get details East is something I can't laugh about. At one time the Captain was his own adjutant and quartermaster. There are more officers at this table to-night than I've seen in three years. So we are doubly glad to welcome you at Fort Brown."

  "I am fortunate to be on duty where my services are so required, though I could object to calling it Fort Brown." And Augustus exhaled a new smile.

  "Prefer Smith?" said Captain Starr.