Collected Works of Booth Tarkington

by Booth Tarkington

  Mrs. Williams’s cat was content upon a strange floor and in the confining enclosure of a strange box. She purred for a time, then trustfully fell asleep. ’Twas well she slumbered; she would need all her powers presently.

  She slumbered, and dreamed not that she would wake to mingle with events that were to alter her serene disposition radically and cause her to become hasty-tempered and abnormally suspicious for the rest of her life.

  Meanwhile, Penrod appeared to reach a doubtful solution of his problem. His expression was still somewhat clouded as he brought from the storeroom of the stable a small fragment of a broken mirror, two paint brushes and two old cans, one containing black paint and the other white. He regarded himself earnestly in the mirror; then, with some reluctance, he dipped a brush into one of the cans, and slowly painted his nose a midnight black. He was on the point of spreading this decoration to cover the lower part of his face, when he paused, brush halfway between can and chin.

  What arrested him was a sound from the alley — a sound of drumming upon tin. The eyes of Penrod became significant of rushing thoughts; his expression cleared and brightened. He ran to the alley doors and flung them open.

  “Oh, Verman!” he shouted.

  Marching up and down before the cottage across the alley, Verman plainly considered himself to be an army. Hanging from his shoulders by a string was an old tin wash-basin, whereon he beat cheerily with two dry bones, once the chief support of a chicken. Thus he assuaged his ennui.

  “Verman, come on in here,” Penrod called. “I got sumpthing for you to do you’ll like awful well.”

  Verman halted, ceased to drum, and stared. His gaze was not fixed particularly upon Penrod’s nose, however, and neither now nor later did he make any remark or gesture referring to this casual eccentricity. He expected things like that upon Penrod or Sam Williams. And as for Penrod himself, he had already forgotten that his nose was painted.

  “Come on, Verman!”

  Verman continued to stare, not moving. He had received such invitations before, and they had not always resulted to his advantage. Within that stable things had happened to him the like of which he was anxious to avoid in the future.

  “Oh, come ahead, Verman!” Penrod urged, and, divining logic in the reluctance confronting him, he added, “This ain’t goin’ to be anything like last time, Verman. I got sumpthing just SPLENDUD for you to do!”

  Verman’s expression hardened; he shook his head decisively.

  “Mo,” he said.

  “Oh, COME on, Verman?” Penrod pleaded. “It isn’t anything goin’ to HURT you, is it? I tell you it’s sumpthing you’d give a good deal to GET to do, if you knew what it is.”

  “Mo!” said Verman firmly. “I mome maw woo!”

  Penrod offered arguments.

  “Look, Verman!” he said. “Listen here a minute, can’t you? How d’you know you don’t want to until you know what it is? A person CAN’T know they don’t want to do a thing even before the other person tells ’em what they’re goin’ to get ’em to do, can they? For all you know, this thing I’m goin’ to get you to do might be sumpthing you wouldn’t miss doin’ for anything there is! For all you know, Verman, it might be sumpthing like this: well, f’rinstance, s’pose I was standin’ here, and you were over there, sort of like the way you are now, and I says, ‘Hello, Verman!’ and then I’d go on and tell you there was sumpthing I was goin’ to get you to do; and you’d say you wouldn’t do it, even before you heard what it was, why where’d be any sense to THAT? For all you know, I might of been goin’ to get you to eat a five-cent bag o’ peanuts.”

  Verman had listened obdurately until he heard the last few words; but as they fell upon his ear, he relaxed, and advanced to the stable doors, smiling and extending his open right hand.

  “Aw wi,” he said. “Gi’m here.”

  “Well,” Penrod returned, a trifle embarrassed, “I didn’t say it WAS peanuts, did I? Honest, Verman, it’s sumpthing you’ll like better’n a few old peanuts that most of ‘em’d prob’ly have worms in ’em, anyway. All I want you to do is—”

  But Verman was not favourably impressed; his face hardened again.

  “Mo!” he said, and prepared to depart.

  “Look here, Verman,” Penrod urged. “It isn’t goin’ to hurt you just to come in here and see what I got for you, is it? You can do that much, can’t you?”

  Surely such an appeal must have appeared reasonable, even to Verman, especially since its effect was aided by the promising words, “See what I got for you.” Certainly Verman yielded to it, though perhaps a little suspiciously. He advanced a few cautious steps into the stable.

  “Look!” Penrod cried, and he ran to the stuffed and linked stockings, seized the leading-string, and vigorously illustrated his further remarks. “How’s that for a big, long, ugly-faced horr’ble black ole snake, Verman? Look at her follow me all round anywhere I feel like goin’! Look at her wiggle, will you, though? Look how I make her do anything I tell her to. Lay down, you ole snake, you — See her lay down when I tell her to, Verman? Wiggle, you ole snake, you! See her wiggle, Verman?”

  “Hi!” Undoubtedly Verman felt some pleasure.

  “Now, listen, Verman!” Penrod continued, hastening to make the most of the opportunity. “Listen! I fixed up this good ole snake just for you. I’m goin’ to give her to you.”

  “HI!”

  On account of a previous experience not unconnected with cats, and likely to prejudice Verman, Penrod decided to postpone mentioning Mrs. Williams’s pet until he should have secured Verman’s cooperation in the enterprise irretrievably.

  “All you got to do,” he went on, “is to chase this good ole snake around, and sort o’ laugh and keep pokin’ it with the handle o’ that rake yonder. I’m goin’ to saw it off just so’s you can poke your good ole snake with it, Verman.”

  “Aw wi,” said Verman, and, extending his open hand again, he uttered a hopeful request. “Peamup?”

  His host perceived that Verman had misunderstood him. “Peanuts!” he exclaimed. “My goodness! I didn’t say I HAD any peanuts, did I? I only said s’pose f’rinstance I DID have some. My goodness! You don’t expeck me to go round here all day workin’ like a dog to make a good ole snake for you and then give you a bag o’ peanuts to hire you to play with it, do you, Verman? My goodness!”

  Verman’s hand fell, with a little disappointment.

  “Aw wi,” he said, consenting to accept the snake without the bonus.

  “That’s the boy! NOW we’re all right, Verman; and pretty soon I’m goin’ to saw that rake-handle off for you, too; so’s you can kind o’ guide your good ole snake around with it; but first — well, first there’s just one more thing’s got to be done. I’ll show you — it won’t take but a minute.” Then, while Verman watched him wonderingly, he went to the can of white paint and dipped a brush therein. “It won’t get on your clo’es much, or anything, Verman,” he explained. “I only just got to—”

  But as he approached, dripping brush in hand, the wondering look was all gone from Verman; determination took its place.

  “Mo!” he said, turned his back, and started for outdoors.

  “Look here, Verman,” Penrod cried. “I haven’t done anything to you yet, have I? It isn’t goin’ to hurt you, is it? You act like a little teeny bit o’ paint was goin’ to kill you. What’s the matter of you? I only just got to paint the top part of your face; I’m not goin’ to TOUCH the other part of it — nor your hands or anything. All I want—”

  “MO!” said Verman from the doorway.

  “Oh, my goodness!” moaned Penrod; and in desperation he drew forth from his pocket his entire fortune. “All right, Verman,” he said resignedly. “If you won’t do it any other way, here’s a nickel, and you can go and buy you some peanuts when we get through. But if I give you this money, you got to promise to wait till we ARE through, and you got to promise to do anything I tell you to. You goin’ to promise?”

  The
eyes of Verman glistened; he returned, gave bond, and, grasping the coin, burst into the rich laughter of a gourmand.

  Penrod immediately painted him dead white above the eyes, all round his head and including his hair. It took all the paint in the can.

  Then the artist mentioned the presence of Mrs. Williams’s cat, explained in full his ideas concerning the docile animal, and the long black snake, and Della and her friend, Mrs. Cullen, while Verman listened with anxiety, but remained true to his oath.

  They removed the stocking at the end of the long black snake, and cut four holes in the foot and ankle of it. They removed the excelsior, placed Mrs. Williams’s cat in the stocking, shook her down into the lower section of it; drew her feet through the four holes there, leaving her head in the toe of the stocking; then packed the excelsior down on top of her, and once more attached the stocking to the rest of the long, black snake.

  How shameful is the ease of the historian! He sits in his dressing-gown to write: “The enemy attacked in force—” The tranquil pen, moving in a cloud of tobacco smoke, leaves upon the page its little hieroglyphics, serenely summing up the monstrous deeds and sufferings of men of action. How cold, how niggardly, to state merely that Penrod and the painted Verman succeeded in giving the long, black snake a motive power, or tractor, apparently its own but consisting of Mrs. Williams’s cat!

  She was drowsy when they lifted her from the box; she was still drowsy when they introduced part of her into the orifice of the stocking; but she woke to full, vigorous young life when she perceived that their purpose was for her to descend into the black depths of that stocking head first.

  Verman held the mouth of the stocking stretched, and Penrod manipulated the cat; but she left her hearty mark on both of them before, in a moment of unfortunate inspiration, she humped her back while she was upside down, and Penrod took advantage of the concavity to increase it even more than she desired. The next instant she was assisted downward into the gloomy interior, with excelsior already beginning to block the means of egress.

  Gymnastic moments followed; there were times when both boys hurled themselves full-length upon the floor, seizing the animated stocking with far-extended hands; and even when the snake was a complete thing, with legs growing from its unquestionably ugly face, either Penrod or Verman must keep a grasp upon it, for it would not be soothed, and refused, over and over, to calm itself, even when addressed as, “Poor pussy!” and “Nice ‘ittle kitty!”

  Finally, they thought they had their good ole snake “about quieted down”, as Penrod said, because the animated head had remained in one place for an unusual length of time, though the legs produced a rather sinister effect of crouching, and a noise like a distant planing-mill came from the interior — and then Duke appeared in the doorway. He was still feeling lively.

  CHAPTER XX. THE DEPARTING GUEST

  BY THE TIME Penrod returned from chasing Duke to the next corner, Verman had the long, black snake down from the rafter where its active head had taken refuge, with the rest of it dangling; and both boys agreed that Mrs. Williams’s cat must certainly be able to “see SOME, anyway”, through the meshes of the stocking.

  “Well,” said Penrod, “it’s gettin’ pretty near dark, what with all this bother and mess we been havin’ around here, and I expeck as soon as I get this good ole broom-handle fixed out of the rake for you, Verman, it’ll be about time to begin what we had to go and take all this trouble FOR.”

  .... Mr. Schofield had brought an old friend home to dinner with him: “Dear old Joe Gilling,” he called this friend when introducing him to Mrs. Schofield. Mr. Gilling, as Mrs. Schofield was already informed by telephone, had just happened to turn up in town that day, and had called on his classmate at the latter’s office. The two had not seen each other in eighteen years.

  Mr. Gilling was a tall man, clad highly in the mode, and brought to a polished and powdered finish by barber and manicurist; but his colour was peculiar, being almost unhumanly florid, and, as Mrs. Schofield afterward claimed to have noticed, his eyes “wore a nervous, apprehensive look”, his hands were tremulous, and his manner was “queer and jerky” — at least, that is how she defined it.

  She was not surprised to hear him state that he was travelling for his health and not upon business. He had not been really well for several years, he said.

  At that, Mr. Schofield laughed and slapped him heartily on the back.

  “Oh, mercy!” Mr. Gilling cried, leaping in his chair. “What IS the matter?”

  “Nothing!” Mr. Schofield laughed. “I just slapped you the way we used to slap each other on the campus. What I was going to say was that you have no business being a bachelor. With all your money, and nothing to do but travel and sit around hotels and clubs, no wonder you’ve grown bilious.”

  “Oh, no; I’m not bilious,” Mr. Gilling said uncomfortably. “I’m not bilious at all.”

  “You ought to get married,” Mr. Schofield returned. “You ought—” He paused, for Mr. Gilling had jumped again. “What’s the trouble, Joe?”

  “Nothing. I thought perhaps — perhaps you were going to slap me on the back again.”

  “Not this time,” Mr. Schofield said, renewing his laughter. “Well, is dinner about ready?” he asked, turning to his wife. “Where are Margaret and Penrod?”

  “Margaret’s just come in,” Mrs. Schofield answered. “She’ll be down in a minute, and Penrod’s around somewhere.”

  “Penrod?” Mr. Gilling repeated curiously, in his nervous, serious way. “What is Penrod?”

  And at this, Mrs. Schofield joined in her husband’s laughter. Mr. Schofield explained.

  “Penrod’s our young son,” he said. “He’s not much for looks, maybe; but he’s been pretty good lately, and sometimes we’re almost inclined to be proud of him. You’ll see him in a minute, old Joe!”

  Old Joe saw him even sooner. Instantly, as Mr. Schofield finished his little prediction, the most shocking uproar ever heard in that house burst forth in the kitchen. Distinctly Irish shrieks unlimited came from that quarter — together with the clashing of hurled metal and tin, the appealing sound of breaking china, and the hysterical barking of a dog.

  The library door flew open, and Mrs. Cullen appeared as a mingled streak crossing the room from one door to the other. She was followed by a boy with a coal-black nose and between his feet, as he entered, there appeared a big long, black, horrible snake, with frantic legs springing from what appeared to be its head; and it further fulfilled Mrs. Cullen’s description by making a fizzin’ noise. Accompanying the snake, and still faithfully endeavouring to guide it with the detached handle of a rake, was a small black demon with a gassly white forehead and gasslier white hair. Duke evidently still feeling his bath, was doing all in his power to aid the demon in making the snake step lively. A few kitchen implements followed this fugitive procession through the library doorway.

  The long, black snake became involved with a leg of the heavy table in the centre of the room. The head developed spasms of agility; there were clangings and rippings, then the foremost section of the long, black snake detached itself, bounded into the air, and, after turning a number of somersaults, became, severally, a torn stocking, excelsior, and a lunatic cat. The ears of this cat were laid back flat upon its head and its speed was excessive upon a fairly circular track it laid out for itself in the library. Flying round this orbit, it perceived the open doorway; passed through it, thence to the kitchen, and outward and onward — Della having left the kitchen door open in her haste as she retired to the backyard.

  The black demon with the gassly white forehead and hair, finding himself in the presence of grown people who were white all over, turned in his tracks and followed Mrs. Williams’s cat to the great outdoors. Duke preceded Verman. Mrs. Cullen vanished. Of the apparition, only wreckage and a rightfully apprehensive Penrod were left.

  “But where,” Mrs. Schofield began, a few minutes later, looking suddenly mystified— “where — where—”
>
  “Where what?” Mr. Schofield asked testily. “What are you talking about?” His nerves were jarred, and he was rather hoarse after what he had been saying to Penrod. (That regretful necromancer was now upstairs doing unhelpful things to his nose over a washstand.) “What do you mean by, ‘Where, where, where?’” Mr. Schofield demanded. “I don’t see any sense to it.”

  “But where is your old classmate?” she cried. “Where’s Mr. Gilling?”

  She was the first to notice this striking absence.

  “By George!” Mr. Schofield exclaimed. “Where IS old Joe?”

  Margaret intervened. “You mean that tall, pale man who was calling?” she asked.

  “Pale, no!” said her father. “He’s as flushed as—”

  “He was pale when I saw him,” Margaret said. “He had his hat and coat, and he was trying to get out of the front door when I came running downstairs. He couldn’t work the catch for a minute; but before I got to the foot of the steps he managed to turn it and open the door. He went out before I could think what to say to him, he was in such a hurry. I guess everything was so confused you didn’t notice — but he’s certainly gone.”

  Mrs. Schofield turned to her husband.

  “But I thought he was going to stay to dinner!” she cried.

  Mr. Schofield shook his head, admitting himself floored. Later, having mentally gone over everything that might shed light on the curious behaviour of old Joe, he said, without preface:

  “He wasn’t at all dissipated when we were in college.”

  Mrs. Schofield nodded severely. “Maybe this was just the best thing could have happened to him, after all,” she said.