Parnassus on Wheels (4 page)

"The best of it is," he went on, "I have such a darn good time.
Peg and Bock (that's the dog) and I go loafing along the road on
a warm summer day, and by and by we'll fetch up alongside some
boarding-house and there are the boarders all rocking off their
lunch on the veranda. Most of 'em bored to death—nothing good to
read, nothing to do but sit and watch the flies buzzing in the sun
and the chickens rubbing up and down in the dust. First thing you
know I'll sell half a dozen books that put the love of life into
them, and they don't forget Parnassus in a hurry. Take O. Henry, for
instance—there isn't anybody so dog-gone sleepy that he won't enjoy
that man's stories. He understood life, you bet, and he could write
it down with all its little twists. I've spent an evening reading O.
Henry and Wilkie Collins to people and had them buy out all their
books I had and clamour for more."

"What do you do in winter?" I asked—a practical question, as most
of mine are.

"That depends on where I am when bad weather sets in," said Mr.
Mifflin. "Two winters I was down south and managed to keep Parnassus
going all through the season. Otherwise, I just lay up wherever I
am. I've never found it hard to get lodging for Peg and a job for
myself, if I had to have them. Last winter I worked in a bookstore
in Boston. Winter before, I was in a country drugstore down in
Pennsylvania. Winter before that, I tutored a couple of small boys
in English literature. Winter before that, I was a steward on a
steamer; you see how it goes. I've had a fairly miscellaneous
experience. As far as I can see, a man who's fond of books never
need starve! But this winter I'm planing to live with my brother in
Brooklyn and slog away at my book. Lord, how I've pondered over that
thing! Long summer afternoons I've sat here, jogging along in the
dust, thinking it out until it seemed as if my forehead would burst.
You see, my idea is that the common people—in the country, that
is—never have had any chance to get hold of books, and never have
had any one to explain what books can mean. It's all right for
college presidents to draw up their five-foot shelves of great
literature, and for the publishers to advertise sets of their
Linoleum Classics, but what the people need is the good, homely,
honest stuff—something that'll stick to their ribs—make them laugh
and tremble and feel sick to think of the littleness of this popcorn
ball spinning in space without ever even getting a hot-box! And
something that'll spur 'em on to keep the hearth well swept and the
wood pile split into kindling and the dishes washed and dried and
put away. Any one who can get the country people to read something
worth while is doing his nation a real service. And that's what
this caravan of culture aspires to.... You must be weary of this
harangue! Does the Sage of Redfield ever run on like that?"

"Not to me," I said. "He's known me so long that he thinks of me as
a kind of animated bread-baking and cake-mixing machine. I guess he
doesn't put much stock in my judgment in literary matters. But he
puts his digestion in my hands without reserve. There's Mason's
farm over there. I guess we'd better sell them some books—hadn't
we? Just for a starter."

We turned into the lane that runs up to the Mason farmhouse. Bock
trotted on ahead—very stiff on his legs and his tail gently
wagging—to interview the mastiff, and Mrs. Mason who was sitting
on the porch, peeling potatoes, laid down the pan. She's a big,
buxom woman with jolly, brown eyes like a cow's.

"For heaven's sake, Miss McGill," she called out in a cheerful
voice—"I'm glad to see you. Got a lift, did you?"

She hadn't really noticed the inscription on Parnassus, and thought
it was a regular huckster's wagon.

"Well, Mrs. Mason," I said, "I've gone into the book business. This
is Mr. Mifflin. I've bought out his stock. We've come to sell you
some books."

She laughed. "Go on, Helen," she said, "you can't kid me! I bought
a whole set of books last year from an agent—'The World's Great
Funeral Orations'—twenty volumes. Sam and I ain't read more'n the
first volume yet. It's awful uneasy reading!"

Mifflin jumped down, and raised the side flap of the wagon. Mrs.
Mason came closer. I was tickled to see how the little man perked
up at the sight of a customer. Evidently selling books was meat
and drink to him.

"Madam," he said, "'Funeral Orations' (bound in sackcloth, I
suppose?) have their place, but Miss McGill and I have got some real
books here to which I invite your attention. Winter will be here
soon, and you will need something more cheerful to beguile your
evenings. Very possibly you have growing children who would profit
by a good book or two. A book of fairy tales for the little girl I
see on the porch? Or stories of inventors for that boy who is about
to break his neck jumping from the barn loft? Or a book about road
making for your husband? Surely there is something here you need?
Miss McGill probably knows your tastes."

That little red-bearded man was surely a born salesman. How he
guessed that Mr. Mason was the road commissioner in our township,
goodness only knows. Perhaps it was just a lucky shot. By this
time most of the family had gathered around the van, and I saw Mr.
Mason coming from the barn with his twelve-year-old Billy.

"Sam," shouted Mrs. Mason, "here's Miss McGill turned book pedlar
and got a preacher with her!"

"Hello, Miss McGill," said Mr. Mason. He is a big, slow-moving man
of great gravity and solidity. "Where's Andrew?"

"Andrew's coming home for roast pork and apple sauce," I said, "and
I'm going off to sell books for a living. Mr. Mifflin here is
teaching me how. We've got a book on road mending that's just what
you need."

I saw Mr. and Mrs. Mason exchange glances. Evidently they thought me
crazy. I began to wonder whether we had made a mistake in calling on
people I knew so well. The situation was a trifle embarrassing.

Mr. Mifflin came to the rescue.

"Don't be alarmed, sir," he said to Mr. Mason. "I haven't kidnapped
Miss McGill." (As he is about half my size this was amusing.) "We
are trying to increase her brother's income by selling his books for
him. As a matter of fact, we have a wager with him that we can sell
fifty copies of 'Happiness and Hayseed' before Hallowe'en. Now I'm
sure your sporting instinct will assist us by taking at least one
copy. Andrew McGill is probably the greatest author in this State,
and every taxpayer ought to possess his books. May I show you a
copy?"

"That sounds reasonable," said Mr. Mason, and he almost smiled.
"What do you say, Emma, think we better buy a book or two? You know
those 'Funeral Orations.'..." "Well," said Emma, "you know we've
always said we ought to read one of Andrew McGill's books but we
didn't rightly know how to get hold of one. That fellow that sold us
the funeral speeches didn't seem to know about 'em. I tell you what,
you folks better stop and have dinner with us and you can tell us
what we'd ought to buy. I'm just ready to put the potatoes on the
stove now."

I must confess that the prospect of sitting down to a meal I hadn't
cooked myself appealed to me strongly; and I was keen to see what
kind of grub Mrs. Mason provided for her house-hold; but I was
afraid that if we dallied there too long Andrew would be after us. I
was about to say that we would have to be getting on, and couldn't
stay; but apparently the zest of expounding his philosophy to new
listeners was too much for Mifflin. I heard him saying:

"That's mighty kind of you, Mrs. Mason, and we'd like very much to
stay. Perhaps I can put Peg up in your barn for a while. Then we can
tell you all about our books." And to my amazement I found myself
chiming in with assent.

Mifflin certainly surpassed himself at dinner. The fact that
Mrs. Mason's hot biscuits tasted of saleratus gave me far less
satisfaction than it otherwise would, because I was absorbed in
listening to the little vagabond's talk. Mr. Mason came to the table
grumbling something about his telephone being out of order—(I
wondered whether he had been trying to get Andrew on the wire; he
was a little afraid that I was being run away with, I think)—but
he was soon won over by the current of the little man's cheery wit.
Nothing daunted Mifflin. He talked to the old grandmother about
quilts; offered to cut off a strip of his necktie for her new
patchwork; and told all about the illustrated book on quilts that he
had in the van. He discussed cookery and the Bible with Mrs. Mason;
and she being a leading light in the Greenbriar Sunday School, was
pleasantly scandalized by his account of the best detective stories
in the Old Testament. With Mr. Mason he was all scientific farming,
chemical manures, macadam roads, and crop rotation; and to little
Billy (who sat next him) he told extraordinary yarns about Daniel
Boone, Davy Crockett, Kit Carson, Buffalo Bill, and what not.
Honestly I was amazed at the little man. He was as genial as a
cricket on the hearth, and yet every now and then his earnestness
would break through. I don't wonder he was a success at selling
books. That man could sell clothes pins or Paris garters, I guess,
and make them seem romantic.

"You know, Mr. Mason," he said, "you certainly owe it to these
youngsters of yours to put a few really good books into their hands.
City kids have the libraries to go to, but in the country there's
only old Doc Hostetter's Almanac and the letters written by ladies
with backache telling how Peruna did for them. Give this boy and
girl of yours a few good books and you're starting them on the
double-track, block-signal line to happiness. Now there's 'Little
Women'—that girl of yours can learn more about real girlhood and
fine womanhood out of that book than from a year's paper dolls in
the attic."

"That's right, Pa," assented Mrs. Mason. ("Go on with your meal,
Professor, the meat'll be cold.") She was completely won by the
travelling bookseller, and had given him the highest title of honour
in her ken. "Why, I read that story when I was a girl, and I still
remember it. That's better readin' for Dorothy than those funeral
speeches, I reckon. I believe the Professor's right: we'd ought to
have more books laying around. Seems kind of a shame, with a famous
author at the next farm, not to read more, don't it, now?"

So by the time we got down to Mrs. Mason's squash pie (good pie,
too, I admit, but her hand is a little heavy for pastry), the whole
household was enthusiastic about books, and the atmosphere was
literary enough for even Dr. Eliot to live in without panting. Mrs.
Mason opened up her parlour and we sat there while Mifflin recited
"The Revenge" and "Maud Muller."

"Well, now, ain't that real sweet!" said Emma Mason. "It's
surprising how those words rhyme so nicely. Seems almost as though
it was done a-purpose! Reminds me of piece day at school. There
was a mighty pretty piece I learned called the 'Wreck of the
Asperus.'" And she subsided into a genteel melancholy.

I saw that Mr. Mifflin was well astride his hobby: he had started to
tell the children about Robin Hood, but I had the sense to give him
a wink. We had to be getting along or surely Andrew might be on us.
So while Mifflin was putting Pegasus into the shafts again I picked
out seven or eight books that I thought would fit the needs of the
Masons. Mr. Mason insisted that "Happiness and Hayseed" be included
among them, and gave me a crisp five-dollar bill, refusing any
change. "No, no," he said, "I've had more fun than I get at a grange
meeting. Come round again, Miss McGill; I'm going to tell Andrew
what a good show this travelling theayter of yours gives! And you,
Professor, any time you're here about road-mending season, stop in
an' tell me some more good advice. Well, I must get back to the
field."

Bock fell in under the van, and we creaked off down the lane.
Mifflin filled his pipe and was chuckling to himself. I was a little
worried now for fear Andrew might overtake us.

"It's a wonder Sam Mason didn't call up Andrew," I said. "It must
have looked mighty queer to him for an old farm hand like me to be
around, peddling books."

"He would have done it straight off," said Mifflin, "but you see, I
cut his telephone wire!"

I gazed in astonishment at the wizened little rogue. Here was a
new side to the amiable idealist! Apparently there was a streak of
fearless deviltry in him besides his gentle love of books. I'm bound
to say that now, for the first time, I really admired him. I had
burnt my own very respectable boats behind me, and I rather enjoyed
knowing that he, too, could act briskly in a pinch.

"Well!" I said. "You are a cool hand! It's a good job for you that
you didn't stay a schoolmaster. You might have taught your pupils
some fine deviltries! And at your age, too!"

I'm afraid my raillery goes a little too far sometimes. He flushed
a bit at my reference to his age, and puffed sharply at his pipe.

"I say," he rejoined, "how old do you think I am, anyway? Only
forty-one, by the bones of Byron! Henry VIII was only forty-one
when he married Anne Boleyn. There are many consolations in history
for people over forty! Remember that when you get there.

"Shakespeare wrote 'King Lear' at forty-one," he added, more
humorously; and then burst out laughing. "I'd like to edit a series
of 'Chloroform Classics,' to include only books written after forty.
Who was that doctor man who recommended anaesthetics for us at that
age? Now isn't that just like a medico? Nurse us through the
diseases of childhood, and as soon as we settle down into permanent
good health and worldly wisdom, and freedom from doctors' fees, why
he loses interest in us! Jove! I must note that down and bring it
into my book."

He pulled out a memorandum book and jotted down "Chloroform
Classics" in a small, neat hand.