City Boy

by Herman Wouk

  “Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me—”

  A slender rod that came straight down into the valley from the sky was in his hand, pulling him gently forward, guiding his steps.…

  Herbie opened his eyes and was actually startled to see the lake, the rows of children, and Mr. Gauss. It was like waking from a dream. The music stopped, and the camp owner hurried through the last lines of the Psalm, though Herbie could have begged him to go more slowly, perhaps for the first time since he had become familiar with Mr. Gauss's oratorical manner. Reluctantly he felt the magic fade. He tried to renew, to cling to the strange trance, but the world was looking more and more like itself again.

  “Boys and girls,” said Mr. Gauss, “here we are again at dear old Camp Manitou. How nice it is to get away from the hot, dirty city and commune in the bosom of nature once more, by the side of our beautiful lake nestled amid the Berkshire Mountains.”

  “At only three hundred bucks apiece,” whispered Ted, “payable in advance.”

  Herbie covered his mouth and laughed. He glanced across at Lucille and boldly winked. For a moment she looked arch, then she winked back and chuckled quietly. Things were thoroughly normal again, and Herbie found himself glad of it.

  The effect of the passing seizure was no more than a slight exhilaration that lasted the evening. Thinking back on the peculiar brief ecstasy, he decided that if it had gone on any longer it might have become painful, and certainly would have made him behave like a halfwit. With this conclusion he forgot about it. Nothing like it ever happened to him again that summer, for the services became a matter of routine like everything else, incapable of surprising or stirring him.

  But Mr. Gauss, though he undoubtedly hadn't the least idea of what he was doing, had fulfilled one of his promises in the booklet. With a little help from David, King of Israel, he had effected in Herbie Bookbinder a tiny, temporary, but unmistakable religious improvement.

  FOURTEEN

  The Coming of Clever Sam

  The summer wore on. It quickly became established that Lennie Krieger was one of the leading lights of the camp, and that Herbie Bookbinder was a negligible fellow. Every team that included Lennie was a mighty engine; the Ipanas, the Oldsmobiles, the John Barrymores, and the Palmolives each led their leagues. The Intermediates actually beat the Seniors at basketball, an event unheard of in Manitou records, and Lennie scored thirty of his team's thirty-six points. Within two weeks a new election was held in Bunk Thirteen, and Lennie added this captaincy to his other honors. It was soon agreed that as a citizen of Manitou, Lennie stood second in distinction only to the massive Super-senior Yishy Gabelson.

  Herbie, on the other hand, was known as a dead loss. Among the Juniors he might have passed as a mediocre player, but as an Intermediate he was undersize, overweight, and slow as a snail. When he ran from one base to another, he appeared to his raging teammates to be wading through mud. When a basketball was thrown to him, it often as not knocked him down. In track meets his efforts to run and jump were not only comical but dangerous. His first try at the high jump brought down the bar and both its supporting poles in a heap, one of the poles hitting Uncle Sid on the head and stretching him on the ground. After a couple of weeks of such performances, he found himself a universal substitute on all teams. He seldom appeared on the field, but presumably was ready to relieve any boy who was injured or who dropped dead. The rate of accidents and fatalities being low, he took to wandering away from the fields as soon as games started, picking up a book somewhere, and spending the athletic period reading under a tree. He would have preferred not to bother with the hot hike out to the field, which was simply a waste of a good half hour, but the conscience of the counselor in charge usually balked at this. No, Herbie had to go through the rite of marching out to the baseball diamond or handball court. Once there, he would take the first exciting moment of the game as his cue to disappear quietly, and the Uncle in charge either didn't see him go or pretended that he didn't. This arrangement soon became a settled thing, and suited Herbie well enough. He would rather, of course, have been a hero like Lennie, but it was obvious to him that he was marked for obscurity.

  His cousin Cliff was considered an ordinary boy, neither very very bad nor very good. A single shot-put in the first track meet was his main distinction. He had thrust the iron shot so far that the judges had measured the distance three times before announcing the result with wonder. But the excitement that sprang up around Cliff died quickly when it turned out that he was unable to do it again. Cliff was powerful but awkward, and only by chance could he co-ordinate his movements to put forth strength. Once in a baseball game a week later he astounded both teams by throwing the ball from deep left field to home plate. But again, he was unable to do it a second time. Casually, in the heat of a moment, Cliff could perform these incredible stunts, as Herbie knew. On the whole, he was regarded as a good-natured, quiet, second-rate camper.

  He was so regarded, that is, until the coming of Clever Sam.

  Horseback riding was one of the delights promised in the booklets. Although Herbie had never ridden a horse, the paragraph of Mr. Gauss's fine prose describing this kingly sport at Manitou had set him dreaming of gallops through forest and meadow, up mountainsides and across shallow streams, in company with other dashing horsemen resembling the extras in an English hunting movie. This vision had been deflated in a talk on the train with Ted. It had developed that the Gauss stables consisted of one ancient beast named Baby, who was so old and stiff that a ride on her resembled (so Ted said) walking on four stilts. The disillusionment went further when the boys arrived at camp and found the stable empty. Baby, it appeared, had died and been buried by the caretaker in May.

  Once dead, Baby took on a new aspect in the memories of old campers like Ted. She had been, so they now maintained, a “swell” horse, a swift, gentle, yet fiery steed, the only good thing in the whole camp, and so forth. Dark rumors went around that Mr. Gauss had sold her. Three old campers swore that they had seen her, alive and full of fire, pulling a farmer's wagon in a near-by village. Now, this was a malicious untruth, for Baby was as dead as Julius Caesar, but the boys were ready to believe anything evil of Mr. Gauss. The murmuring reached Uncle Sandy's ears. At a parade-ground speech he first denounced the slanderers of “the Skipper” (nobody else ever referred to Mr. Gauss by any sobriquet but “Uncle Gussie,” but his official nickname, selected after an essay contest in the first year, was “the Skipper,” and Uncle Sandy was compelled to use it). Next, he proudly proclaimed that, disregarding expense, the Skipper had advertised for a horse in the local papers, so that the noble saddle sport would be restored to Camp Manitou in a day or two. He concluded by advising all slanderers and skeptics to consult the bulletin board of the camp, nailed to a pole at the foot of Company Street. With unconscious humor the entire camp crowded around the board as soon as the speech was over. There they saw this newspaper clipping from the Panksville Observer:

  WANTED—to purchase—one horse for riding purposes in children's camp. Must be gentle and inexpensive. Call 913-R, Mr. Gauss.

  Thus the murmurers were mostly silenced, though one or two held to the theory that the advertisement was a Gauss trick to cover his tracks in the crime of selling the magnificent Baby. These die-hards—Ted was one of them—offered to bet “a million dollars” that no horse would ever be bought. But nobody appeared sufficiently interested in winning a million dollars and the controversy languished.

  The very next morning, the injustice of such prejudices was proved, when Mr. Gauss bought a horse—under circumstances which are worth describing.

  The camp owner was sitting in an easy chair on the veranda of the guest house, going over the kitchen accounts with the chef and wondering how much money he could save by eliminating the children's desserts at lunch time, when the handy man, a slow-talking, slow-moving young rustic named Elmer Bean shambled up the steps of the porch and announced, “Feller with a hoss at the gate, Mist' Gauss.”

/>   “Ah, yes.” Mr. Gauss closed the account book. “Does it look like a good horse?”

  “Nope.”

  At this reply Mr. Gauss might have been expected to dismiss the matter. He didn't, though. He nodded with satisfaction, and pushed himself out of the easy chair.

  “Why? What's wrong with it?”

  “Dunno. But it don't look good,” said Elmer, and went away.

  Mr. Gauss walked to the camp gate behind the guest house. He made a picturesque figure: flapping straw sandals, bare thin legs burned pink by the sun, khaki-colored shorts stretched over his wide, round stomach and wider, rounder stem, green sun glasses, and peeling bald head. Mr. Gauss never became tan and never looked in the least countrified, no matter how he varied his costume. Had he been found unconscious and naked in a forest, he would have been identified at once as a New York City school principal who owned a summer camp.

  A Negro was standing at the gate, holding a rope which was affixed to the bridle of a horse. The horse, a rusty black creature, was cropping grass.

  “I'm Mr. Gauss,” said the camp owner. “Is that the animal for sale?”

  “Yas, suh.”

  “Hmm. Is he a good horse?”

  “No, suh.”

  Mr. Gauss, somewhat taken aback at such frankness, regarded the animal critically. He certainly did not look like a good horse. He had a swollen belly, spindly legs, a queerly stretched neck, and a long, sad, gnarled face.

  “Why do you come to me with a horse that isn't good?”

  “He cheap, suh.”

  “How cheap?”

  “Five dollars, suh.”

  Even Mr. Gauss, bargain hunter that he was, was staggered.

  “Five dollars for a horse?”

  “Yas, suh.”

  Mr. Gauss looked again at the beast. It was obviously alive, and, even dead, could hardly be worth less than five dollars.

  “Where did you get him?”

  “He ain't mine, suh. He b'long Camp Arcadia. Ah wuk in de stable dah.”

  Camp Arcadia was a summer place for adults near by, and Mr. Gauss was slightly acquainted with the proprietor.

  “I see. How old is this horse?”

  “Dunno.”

  “What's his name?”

  “Clevuh Sam, suh.”

  The camp owner glanced askance at the animal that bore this strange, slightly ominous name. The horse, having eaten bare the ground around the Negro, began devouring a clump of poison ivy near the gate. Mr. Gauss was troubled, but he noticed that the Negro saw the act and made no move to stop it.

  “He's eating poison ivy.”

  “Yas, suh. He hungry.”

  “When was he fed last?”

  “Don' matter none, suh. Clevuh Sam he just hungry.”

  “Wait here, please.”

  Mr. Gauss flapped his way back to the guest house and telephoned the proprietor of Camp Arcadia, a Mr. Zasi.

  “Oh yes,” said Mr. Zasi to his inquiry, “how are you, Gauss? Do you want the horse?”

  “I'd like to ask you a question or two about him, if you don't mind.”

  “I'm rather busy, but go ahead.”

  “Is he broken to the saddle?”

  “Of course. That's what you advertised for.”

  “Gentle?”

  “I guarantee he won't hurt anybody.”

  “Sick?”

  “Don't make me laugh. That horse'll outlive you and me.”

  “How old is he?”

  “I don't know. Old.”

  “Why is he called Clever Sam?”

  There was a slight hesitation before Mr. Zasi answered. “Well, I think you'll find he is pretty clever.”

  Somehow this answer did not reassure Mr. Gauss.

  “In what way is he clever?”

  “Look, Gauss, this whole deal means very little to me,” said the other camp owner irritably. “I'm not going to spend the day on the telephone discussing a five-dollar transaction. If you don't want the horse, send him back. His carcass would be worth more than the price.”

  “Yes, yes, I know. Just routine inquiries, you understand.”

  “I understand. Good-by.”

  On the way back to the gate, Mr. Gauss puzzled and puzzled over a possible catch in the bargain, and could detect none. So, with an indefinable misgiving, he counted out five single bills to the Negro and was handed the rope that symbolized possession of Clever Sam. The Negro heaved a happy sigh.

  “Thank you, suh. Good-by, you rusty ol'——,” he said, slapping the horse on the rump and using an extremely unprintable word. And he ambled off down the road, alternately whistling and laughing.

  In view of these suspicious proceedings, Mr. Gauss was prepared for anything on the part of Clever Sam. Very cautiously he tugged at the rope. “Come on, Clever Sam, into the stable with you,” he said.

  To his amazement, the horse raised his head and followed him like a lamb to the barn.

  This book is in no sense a mystery story, so it should be said now that the reason for the absurd price of the horse was simply the tender-heartedness of Mr. Zasi's wife. The owner of Camp Arcadia wanted to be rid of the beast for reasons which will soon be evident, but his lady, who formed warm attachments for all four-footed creatures, would accept no solution which involved the slaying or ill treatment of Clever Sam. He had therefore boarded in Mr. Zasi's stable, an unwanted guest, for a year. Mr. Gauss's advertisement was a lucky opportunity.

  The campers had their first inkling of the arrival of a horse when Uncle Sandy strode into Bunk Thirteen in the evening during letter-writing period.

  “Say, Uncle Sid,” he said, sitting on Ted's cot to a screech of protesting metal, “what do you know about horses?”

  “Horses?” said Uncle Sid mildly. He looked up from the score of The Mikado, which he had been cutting down for performance in twenty minutes.

  “Yes, horses. Ever done any riding?”

  “As a matter of fact,” Uncle Sid answered with a modest smile, “quite a bit. I seldom miss my Sunday morning canter in Central Park in the spring and fall. Of course I don't do jumps—”

  “Well, that won't be necessary. Will you take Uncle Irish's bunk and your own in a riding class tomorrow? We've just gotten a horse.”

  The boys jumped and cheered.

  “Hey, Uncle Sandy, is it a good horse?” said Ted.

  Uncle Sandy gave him a genial wink that meant exactly nothing.

  “Why, I'll be happy to,” said Uncle Sid, and so it was decided.

  Quickly the word of the renewal of riding spread through the camp, and it was the general opinion that somebody should sneak up to the stable at once and inspect the new steed. However, a marshmallow roast was to take place after letter writing, and the marshmallow supply was known to be limited. Some boys claimed they had found the fingerprints of Mr. Gauss on marshmallows at previous roasts, proving that he counted every one. Nobody would risk missing his marshmallows, and so Clever Sam was not seen that night.

  Next morning at the parade ground Uncle Sandy announced, “Bunks Twelve and Thirteen”—dramatic pause—“horseback riding!” This brought forth a cheer, partly derisive and partly genuine, from the campers. When the boys of the two bunks wended up the hill a few minutes later, led by Uncle Sid in a handsomely tailored riding habit, there was no denying that they were envied.

  They came upon Clever Sam tethered in the middle of a weedy clearing that bore obscure traces of having once been a riding ring. A sad ruin of gray boards in one comer suggested a jumping hurdle in the way that a small skeleton on the road suggests a cat; there is no resemblance, yet only the dissolution of the one could produce the other. There was also a belt of weeds around the edge of the clearing slightly different in size and color from the rest—the remains of the trotting path.

  Clever Sam had eaten away the greenery close to the tether and was moving slowly in a widening circle, cropping as he went. A saddle and bridle were on him. Elmer Bean sat on a fence at the far side of the clearing
, chewing a wooden match and watching the horse absently.

  “Hey, Elmer!” shouted Ted as the riding party approached the ring. “Is he a good horse?”

  The handy man looked at Ted, but said nothing. He eased himself off the fence, strolled to the animal, and untethered him. Clever Sam kept munching.

  “All ready for you, mister,” said the handy man to Uncle Sid.

  The music counselor looked Clever Sam over with a wry face. He had not seen such a decrepit, queerly shaped horse before. His experience in horseflesh, to tell the truth, was not wide, being limited to polite Sunday trots along city bridle paths in the company of a lady music teacher toward whom he was lovingly inclined, but who thought Uncle Sid too fat for romance. She had persuaded him to take up riding, and he had grown rather proud of his horsemanship. The stables near Central Park, however, housed glossy, pretty beasts; a camel would have resembled them as much as Clever Sam did. He was a long-faced quadruped, and equipped to be ridden on; that was the extent of the similarity.

  “Have you—have you been on him?” he inquired of the handy man.

  “That ain't my job, mister, that's yours,” said Elmer Bean. “You got him now. His name's Clever Sam.” He passed the reins into Uncle Sid's hands, walked off, and hoisted himself up on the fence again to watch what would follow.

  The music counselor took a deep breath and vaulted ponderously but neatly onto the horse's back. Clever Sam took no notice whatever of the circumstance, and continued to feed, his neck stretching here and there for tasty purple thistles.

  “Ride 'im, Uncle Sid,” came a voice from a group of breathless boys—a voice sounding very much like Lennie's.

  “All right, Clever Sam, let's go!” cried Uncle Sid heartily. He gave the animal the sort of light kick in the ribs to which the well-trained, well-fed young horses in Central Park responded. Clever Sam was of a different school. He ignored Uncle Sid with majestic indifference, and grazed on. Not knowing quite what to do about a horse whose neck seemed to slant permanently downward, Uncle Sid braced himself against the stirrups, gave a tremendous heave on the reins, and pulled the horse's head up into a normal position.