Collected Works of Booth Tarkington

by Booth Tarkington

  The rixual contained the oath, a key to the secret language, or code (devised by Penrod for use in uncertain emergencies) and passwords for admission to the shack, also instructions for recognizing a brother member in the dark, and a rather alarming sketch of the things to be done during the initiation of a candidate.

  This last was employed for the benefit of Master Roderick Magsworth Bitts, Junior, on the Saturday following the flag-raising. He presented himself in Sam’s yard, not for initiation, indeed — having no previous knowledge of the Society of the In-Or-In — but for general purposes of sport and pastime. At first sight of the shack he expressed anticipations of pleasure, adding some suggestions for improving the architectural effect. Being prevented, however, from entering, and even from standing in the vicinity of the sacred building, he plaintively demanded an explanation; whereupon he was commanded to withdraw to the front yard for a time, and the members held meeting in the shack. Roddy was elected, and consented to undergo the initiation.

  He was not the only new member that day. A short time after Roddy had been taken into the shack for the reading of the rixual and other ceremonies, little Maurice Levy entered the Williams’ gate and strolled round to the backyard, looking for Sam. He was surprised and delighted to behold the promising shack, and, like Roddy, entertained fair hopes for the future.

  The door of the shack was closed; a board covered the window, but a murmur of voices came from within. Maurice stole close and listened. Through a crack he could see the flicker of a candle-flame, and he heard the voice of Penrod Schofield:

  “Roddy Bitts, do you solemnly swear?”

  “Well, all right,” said the voice of Roddy, somewhat breathless.

  “How many fingers you see before your eyes?”

  “Can’t see any,” Roddy returned. “How could I, with this thing over my eyes, and laying down on my stummick, anyway?”

  “Then the time has come,” Penrod announced in solemn tones. “The time has come.”

  Whack!

  Evidently a broad and flat implement was thereupon applied to Roddy.

  “OW!” complained the candidate.

  “No noise!” said Penrod sternly, and added: “Roddy Bitts must now say the oath. Say exackly what I say, Roddy, and if you don’t — well, you better, because you’ll see! Now, say ‘I solemnly swear—’”

  “I solemnly swear—” Roddy said.

  “To keep the secrets—”

  “To keep the secrets—” Roddy repeated.

  “To keep the secrets in infadelaty and violate and sanctuary.”

  “What?” Roddy naturally inquired.

  Whack!

  “OW!” cried Roddy. “That’s no fair!”

  “You got to say just what I say,” Penrod was heard informing him. “That’s the rixual, and anyway, even if you do get it right, Verman’s got to hit you every now and then, because that’s part of the rixual, too. Now go on and say it. ‘I solemnly swear to keep the secrets in infadelaty and violate and sanctuary.”’

  “I solemnly swear—” Roddy began.

  But Maurice Levy was tired of being no party to such fascinating proceedings, and he began to hammer upon the door.

  “Sam! Sam Williams!” he shouted. “Lemme in there! I know lots about ‘nishiatin’. Lemme in!”

  The door was flung open, revealing Roddy Bitts, blindfolded and bound, lying face down upon the floor of the shack; but Maurice had only a fugitive glimpse of this pathetic figure before he, too, was recumbent. Four boys flung themselves indignantly upon him and bore him to earth.

  “Hi!” he squealed. “What you doin’? Haven’t you got any SENSE?”

  And, from within the shack, Roddy added his own protest.

  “Let me up, can’t you?” he cried. “I got to see what’s goin’ on out there, haven’t I? I guess I’m not goin’ to lay here all DAY! What you think I’m made of?”

  “You hush up!” Penrod commanded. “This is a nice biznuss!” he continued, deeply aggrieved. “What kind of a ‘nishiation do you expect this is, anyhow?”

  “Well, here’s Maurice Levy gone and seen part of the secrets,” said Sam, in a voice of equal plaintiveness. “Yes; and I bet he was listenin’ out here, too!”

  “Lemme up!” begged Maurice, half stifled. “I didn’t do any harm to your old secrets, did I? Anyways, I just as soon be ‘nishiated myself. I ain’t afraid. So if you ‘nishiate me, what difference will it make if I did hear a little?”

  Struck with this idea, which seemed reasonable; Penrod obtained silence from every one except Roddy, and it was decided to allow Maurice to rise and retire to the front yard. The brother members then withdrew within the shack, elected Maurice to the fellowship, and completed the initiation of Mr. Bitts. After that, Maurice was summoned and underwent the ordeal with fortitude, though the newest brother — still tingling with his own experiences — helped to make certain parts of the rixual unprecedentedly severe.

  Once endowed with full membership, Maurice and Roddy accepted the obligations and privileges of the order with enthusiasm. Both interested themselves immediately in improvements for the shack, and made excursions to their homes to obtain materials. Roddy returned with a pair of lensless mother-of-pearl opera-glasses, a contribution that led to the creation of a new office, called the “warner”. It was his duty to climb upon the back fence once every fifteen minutes and search the horizon for intruders or “anybody that hasn’t got any biznuss around here.” This post proved so popular, at first, that it was found necessary to provide for rotation in office, and to shorten the interval from fifteen minutes to an indefinite but much briefer period, determined principally by argument between the incumbent and his successor.

  And Maurice Levy contributed a device so pleasant, and so necessary to the prevention of interruption during meetings, that Penrod and Sam wondered why they had not thought of it themselves long before. It consisted of about twenty-five feet of garden hose in fair condition. One end of it was introduced into the shack through a knothole, and the other was secured by wire round the faucet of hydrant in the stable. Thus, if members of the order were assailed by thirst during an important session, or in the course of an initiation, it would not be necessary for them all to leave the shack. One could go, instead, and when he had turned on the water at the hydrant, the members in the shack could drink without leaving their places. It was discovered, also, that the section of hose could be used as a speaking-tube; and though it did prove necessary to explain by shouting outside the tube what one had said into it, still there was a general feeling that it provided another means of secrecy and an additional safeguard against intrusion. It is true that during the half-hour immediately following the installation of this convenience, there was a little violence among the brothers concerning a question of policy. Sam, Roddy and Verman — Verman especially — wished to use the tube “to talk through” and Maurice, Penrod and Herman wished to use it “to drink through.” As a consequence of the success of the latter party, the shack became too damp for habitation until another day, and several members, as they went home at dusk, might easily have been mistaken for survivors of some marine catastrophe.

  Still, not every shack is equipped with running water, and exuberance befitted the occasion. Everybody agreed that the afternoon had been one of the most successful and important in many weeks. The Order of the In-Or-In was doing splendidly, and yet every brother felt, in his heart, that there was one thing that could spoil it. Against that fatality, all were united to protect themselves, the shack, the rixual, the opera-glasses and the water-and-speaking tube. Sam spoke not only for himself but for the entire order when he declared, in speeding the last parting guest:

  “Well, we got to stick to one thing or we might as well quit! GEORGIE BASSETT better not come pokin’ around!”

  “No, SIR!” said Penrod.

  CHAPTER VI. GEORGIE BECOMES A MEMBER

  BUT GEORGIE DID. It is difficult to imagine how cause and effect could be more closely and
patently related. Inevitably, Georgie did come poking around. How was he to refrain when daily, up and down the neighbourhood, the brothers strutted with mystic and important airs, when they whispered together and uttered words of strange import in his presence? Thus did they defeat their own object. They desired to keep Georgie at a distance, yet they could not refrain from posing before him. They wished to impress upon him the fact that he was an outsider, and they but succeeded in rousing his desire to be an insider, a desire that soon became a determination. For few were the days until he not only knew of the shack but had actually paid it a visit. That was upon a morning when the other boys were in school, Georgie having found himself indisposed until about ten o’clock, when he was able to take nourishment and subsequently to interest himself in this rather private errand. He climbed the Williams’ alley fence, and, having made a modest investigation of the exterior of the shack, which was padlocked, retired without having disturbed anything except his own peace of mind. His curiosity, merely piqued before, now became ravenous and painful. It was not allayed by the mystic manners of the members or by the unnecessary emphasis they laid upon their coldness toward himself; and when a committee informed him darkly that there were “secret orders” to prevent his coming within “a hundred and sixteen feet” — such was Penrod’s arbitrary language — of the Williams’ yard, “in any direction”, Georgie could bear it no longer, but entered his own house, and, in burning words, laid the case before a woman higher up. Here the responsibility for things is directly traceable to grown people. Within that hour, Mrs. Bassett sat in Mrs. Williams’s library to address her hostess upon the subject of Georgie’s grievance.

  “Of course, it isn’t Sam’s fault,” she said, concluding her interpretation of the affair. “Georgie likes Sam, and didn’t blame him at all. No; we both felt that Sam would always be a polite, nice boy — Georgie used those very words — but Penrod seems to have a VERY bad influence. Georgie felt that Sam would WANT him to come and play in the shack if Penrod didn’t make Sam do everything HE wants. What hurt Georgie most is that it’s SAM’S shack, and he felt for another boy to come and tell him that he mustn’t even go NEAR it — well, of course, it was very trying. And he’s very much hurt with little Maurice Levy, too. He said that he was sure that even Penrod would be glad to have him for a member of their little club if it weren’t for Maurice — and I think he spoke of Roddy Bitts, too.”

  The fact that the two remaining members were coloured was omitted from this discourse which leads to the deduction that Georgie had not mentioned it.

  “Georgie said all the other boys liked him very much,” Mrs. Bassett continued, “and that he felt it his duty to join the club, because most of them were so anxious to have him, and he is sure he would have a good influence over them. He really did speak of it in quite a touching way, Mrs. Williams. Of course, we mothers mustn’t brag of our sons too much, but Georgie REALLY isn’t like other boys. He is so sensitive, you can’t think how this little affair has hurt him, and I felt that it might even make him ill. You see, I HAD to respect his reason for wanting to join the club. And if I AM his mother” — she gave a deprecating little laugh— “I must say that it seems noble to want to join not really for his own sake but for the good that he felt his influence would have over the other boys. Don’t you think so, Mrs. Williams?”

  Mrs. Williams said that she did, indeed. And the result of this interview was another, which took place between Sam and his father that evening, for Mrs. Williams, after talking to Sam herself, felt that the matter needed a man to deal with it. The man did it man-fashion.

  “You either invite Georgie Bassett to play in the shack all he wants to,” the man said, “or the shack comes down.”

  “But—”

  “Take your choice. I’m not going to have neighbourhood quarrels over such—”

  “But, Papa—”

  “That’s enough! You said yourself you haven’t anything against Georgie.”

  “I said—”

  “You said you didn’t like him, but you couldn’t tell why. You couldn’t state a single instance of bad behaviour against him. You couldn’t mention anything he ever did which wasn’t what a gentleman should have done. It’s no use, I tell you. Either you invite Georgie to play in the shack as much as he likes next Saturday, or the shack comes down.”

  “But, PAPA—”

  “I’m not going to talk any more about it. If you want the shack pulled down and hauled away, you and your friends continue to tantalize this inoffensive little boy the way you have been. If you want to keep it, be polite and invite him in.”

  “But—”

  “That’s ALL, I said!”

  Sam was crushed.

  Next day he communicated the bitter substance of the edict to the other members, and gloom became unanimous. So serious an aspect did the affair present that it was felt necessary to call a special meeting of the order after school. The entire membership was in attendance; the door was closed, the window covered with a board, and the candle lighted. Then all of the brothers — except one — began to express their sorrowful apprehensions. The whole thing was spoiled, they agreed, if Georgie Bassett had to be taken in. On the other hand, if they didn’t take him in, “there wouldn’t be anything left.” The one brother who failed to express any opinion was little Verman. He was otherwise occupied.

  Verman had been the official paddler during the initiations of Roddy Bitts and Maurice Levy; his work had been conscientious, and it seemed to be taken by consent that he was to continue in office. An old shingle from the woodshed roof had been used for the exercise of his function in the cases of Roddy and Maurice; but this afternoon he had brought with him a new one that he had picked up somewhere. It was broader and thicker than the old one and, during the melancholy prophecies of his fellows, he whittled the lesser end of it to the likeness of a handle. Thus engaged, he bore no appearance of despondency; on the contrary, his eyes, shining brightly in the candlelight, indicated that eager thoughts possessed him, while from time to time the sound of a chuckle issued from his simple African throat. Gradually the other brothers began to notice his preoccupation, and one by one they fell silent, regarding him thoughtfully. Slowly the darkness of their countenances lifted a little; something happier and brighter began to glimmer from each boyish face. All eyes remained fascinated upon Verman.

  “Well, anyway,” said Penrod, in a tone that was almost cheerful, “this is only Tuesday. We got pretty near all week to fix up the ‘nishiation for Saturday.”

  And Saturday brought sunshine to make the occasion more tolerable for both the candidate and the society. Mrs. Williams, going to the window to watch Sam when he left the house after lunch, marked with pleasure that his look and manner were sprightly as he skipped down the walk to the front gate. There he paused and yodelled for a time. An answering yodel came presently; Penrod Schofield appeared, and by his side walked Georgie Bassett. Georgie was always neat; but Mrs. Williams noticed that he exhibited unusual gloss and polish to-day. As for his expression, it was a shade too complacent under the circumstances, though, for that matter, perfect tact avoids an air of triumph under any circumstances. Mrs. Williams was pleased to observe that Sam and Penrod betrayed no resentment whatever; they seemed to have accepted defeat in a good spirit and to be inclined to make the best of Georgie. Indeed, they appeared to be genuinely excited about him — it was evident that their cordiality was eager and wholehearted.

  The three boys conferred for a few moments; then Sam disappeared round the house and returned, waving his hand and nodding. Upon that, Penrod took Georgie’s left arm, Sam took his right, and the three marched off to the backyard in a companionable way that made Mrs. Williams feel it had been an excellent thing to interfere a little in Georgie’s interest.

  Experiencing the benevolent warmth that comes of assisting in a good action, she ascended to an apartment upstairs, and, for a couple of hours, employed herself with needle and thread in sartorial repairs on behalf
of her husband and Sam. Then she was interrupted by the advent of a coloured serving-maid.

  “Miz Williams, I reckon the house goin’ fall down!” this pessimist said, arriving out of breath. “That s’iety o’ Mist’ Sam’s suttenly tryin’ to pull the roof down on ow haids!”

  “The roof?” Mrs. Williams inquired mildly. “They aren’t in the attic, are they?”

  “No’m; they in the celluh, but they REACHIN’ fer the roof! I nev’ did hear no sech a rumpus an’ squawkin’ an’ squawlin’ an’ fallin’ an’ whoopin’ an’ whackin’ an’ bangin’! They troop down by the outside celluh do’, n’en — bang! — they bus’ loose, an’ been goin’ on ev’ since, wuss’n Bedlun! Ef they anything down celluh ain’ broke by this time, it cain’ be only jes’ the foundashum, an’ I bet THAT ain’ goin’ stan’ much longer! I’d gone down an’ stop ’em, but I’m ‘fraid to. Hones’, Miz Williams, I’m ‘fraid o’ my life go down there, all that Bedlun goin’ on. I thought I come see what you say.”

  Mrs. Williams laughed.

  “We have to stand a little noise in the house sometimes, Fanny, when there are boys. They’re just playing, and a lot of noise is usually a pretty safe sign.”

  “Yes’m,” Fanny said. “It’s yo’ house, Miz Williams, not mine. You want ’em tear it down, I’m willin’.”

  She departed, and Mrs. Williams continued to sew. The days were growing short, and at five o’clock she was obliged to put the work aside, as her eyes did not permit her to continue it by artificial light. Descending to the lower floor, she found the house silent, and when she opened the front door to see if the evening paper had come, she beheld Sam, Penrod and Maurice Levy standing near the gate engaged in quiet conversation. Penrod and Maurice departed while she was looking for the paper, and Sam came thoughtfully up the walk.

  “Well, Sam,” she said, “it wasn’t such a bad thing, after all, to show a little politeness to Georgie Bassett, was it?”