The Mysterious Stranger Manuscripts (Literature) (29 page)

They stepped outside, now. As they walked past Bascom he
suddenly thrust out his foot, to trip Forty-four. But the foot was no
obstruction, it did not interrupt Forty-four's stride, Necessarily,
then, Bascom was himself tripped. He fell heavily, and everybody
laughed privately. He got up, all a-quiver with passion, and cried
out-

"Off with your coat, Knowit-all-you're going to fight or eat dirt,
one or t'other. Form a ring, fellows!"

I le threw off his coat. The ring was formed.

"May I keep my coat on? Do the rules allow it?"

"Don't!" said Tom; "it's a disadvantage. Pull it off."

"Keep it on, you wax doll, if you want to," said I "it won't
du you any good either way. Time!"

Forty-four took position, with his fists up, and stood without
moving, while the lithe and active Bascom danced about him,
danced up toward him, feinted with his right, feinted with his left,
danced away again, danced forward again--and so-on and so-on,
Tom and others putting in frequent warnings for Forty-four: "Look
out for him-look o-u-t!" At last Forty-four opened his guard for an
instant, and in that instant Henry plunged, and let drive with all his force; but Forty-four stepped lightly aside, and Henry's impulse
and a slip on the ice carried him to the ground. He got up lame but
eager, and began his dance again; he presently lunged again, hit
vacancy and got another fall. After that he respected the slippery
ground, and lunged no more, and danced cautiously; he fought
with energy, interest and smart judgment, and delivered a sparkling
rain of blows, but none of them got home-some were dodged by a
sideward tilt of the head, the others were neatly warded. He was
getting winded with his violent exercise, but the other boy was still
fresh, for he had done no dancing, he had struck no blows, and had
had no exercise of consequence. Henry stopped to rest and pant,
and Forty-four said-

"Let us not go on with it. What good can come of it?"

The boys murmured dissent; this was an election for Bully; they
were personally interested, they had hopes, and their hopes were
getting the color of certainties. Henry said-

"You'll stay where you are, Miss Nancy. You don't leave this
ground till I know who wears the belt."

"Ah, but you already know-or ought to; therefore, where is the
use of going on? You have not struck me, and I have no wish to
strike you."

"Oh, you haven't, haven't you? How kind! Keep your benevolences to yourself till somebody asks you for them. Time!"

The new boy began to strike out, now; and every time he struck,
Henry went down. Five times. There was great excitement among
the boys. They recognised that they were going to lose a tyrant and
perhaps get a protector in his place. In their happiness they lost
their fears and began to shout-

"Give it him, Forty-four! Let him have it! Land him again!
Another one! Give it him good!"

Henry was pluck. He went down time after time, but got patiently up and went at his work again, and did not give up until his
strength was all gone. Then he said-

"The belt's yours-but I'll get even with you, yet, girly, you see
if I don't." Then he looked around upon the crowd, and called eight
of them by name, ending with Huck Finn, and said: "You're spotted, you see. I heard you. To-morrow I'll begin on you, and I'll
lam the daylights out of you."

For the first time, a flash of temper showed in the new boy's eye.
It was only a flash; it was gone in a moment; then lie said, without
passion-

"I will not allow that."

"You won't allow it! Who's asking you? Who cares what you
allow and what you don't allow? To show you how much I care, I'll
begin on them now."

"I cannot have it. You must not be foolish. I have spared you, till
now; I have struck you only lightly. If you touch one of the boys, I
will hit you hard."

But Henry's temper was beyond his control. He jumped at the
nearest boy on his black-list, but he did not reach him; he went
down under a sounding slap from the flat of the new boy's hand,
and lay motionless where he fell.

"I saw it! I saw that!" This shout was from Ilenry's father, the
nigger-trader-an unloved man, but respected for his muscle and
his temper. He came running from his sleigh, with his whip in his
hand and raised to strike. The boys fell hack out of his way, and as
he reached Forty-four he brought down the whip with an angry
"I'll learn you!" Forty-four dodged deftly out of its course and
seized the trader's wrist with his right hand. There was a sound of
crackling bones and a groan, and the trader staggered away, saying-

"Name of God, my wrist is crushed!"

Henry's mamma arrived from the sleigh, now and broke into
frenzies of lamentation over her collapsed son and her crippled
husband, while the schoolboys looked on, dazed, and rather frightened at the woman's spectacular distress, but fascinated with the
show and glad to be there and see it. It absorbed their attention so
entirely that when Mrs. Bascom presently turned and demanded
the extradition of Forty-four so that she might square accounts with
him they found that he had disappeared without their having
noticed it.

ITHIN an hour afterward people began to drop in at the
Hotchkiss house; ostensibly to make a friendly call, really to get
sight of the miraculous boy. The news they brought soon made the
I proud of their prize and glad that they had caught
him. Mr. fIotchkiss's pride and joy were frank and simple; every
new marvel that any comer added to the list of his lodger's great
deeds made him a prouder and happier man than lie was before, he
being a person substantially without jealousies and by nature addicted to admirations. Indeed he was a broad man in many ways;
hospitable to new facts and always seeking them; to new ideas, and
always examining them; to new opinions and always adopting
them; a man ready to meet any novelty half way and give it a
friendly trial. lie changed his principles with the moon, his politics
with the weather, and his religion with his shirt. fie was recognized
as being limitlessly good-hearted, quite fairly above the village
average intellectually, a diligent and enthusiastic seeker after truth,
and a sincere believer in his newest belief, but a man who had
missed his vocation-he should have been a weather-vane. I Ic was
tall and handsome and courteous, with winning ways, and expressive eyes, and had a white head which looked twenty years older
than the rest of him.

Ilis good Presbyterian wife was as steady as an anvil. She was
not a creature of change. When she gave shelter to an opinion she
did not make a transient guest of it, but a permanency. She was
fond and proud of her husband, and believed he would have been
great if he had had a proper chance-if he had lived in a metropolis, instead of a village; if his merits had been exposed to the world
instead of being hidden under a bushel. She was patient with his
excursions after the truth. She expected him to be saved-thought
she knew that that would happen, in fact. It could only be as a
Presbyterian, of course, but that would come-come of a certainty.
All the signs indicated it. He had often been a Presbyterian; he was periodically a Presbyterian, and she had noticed with comfort that his period was almost astronomically regular. She could take the almanac and calculate its return with nearly as much confidence as other astronomers calculated an eclipse. I Mohammedan period, his Methodist period, his Buddhist period, his Baptist period, his Parsi period, his Roman Catholic period, his Atheistic periodthese were all similarly regular, but she cared nothing for that. She knew there was a patient and compassionate providence watching over him that would see to it that he died in his Presbyterian period. The latest thing in religions was the Fox-girl Rochester rappings; so he was a Spiritualist for the present.

I I exulted in the wonders brought by the visitors, and the more they brought the happier she was in the possession of that boy; but she was very human in her make-up, and she felt a little aggravated over the fact that the news had to come from the outside; that these people should know these things about her lodger before she knew them herself; that she must sit and do the wondering and exclaiming when in all fairness she ought to be doing the telling and they the applauding; that they should be able to contribute all the marvels and she none. Finally the widow Dawson remarked upon the circumstance that all the information was being furnished from the one side; and added-

"Didn't he do anything out of the common here, sister
* I kiss-last night or this morning?"

Ilannah was ashamed of her poverty. The only thing she was able to offer was colorless compared with the matters which she had been listening to.

"Well, no-I can't say that he did; unless you consider that we couldn't understand his language but did understand his signs about as easy as if they had been talk. We were astonished at it, and spoke of it afterwards."

l ler young niece, Annie Fleming, spoke up and said-

"Why, auntie, that wasn't all. The dog doesn't allow a stranger to come to the door at night, but he didn't bark at the boy; he acted as if he was ever so glad to see him. You said, yourself, that that never
happened with a stranger before."

"It's true, as sure asvI live; it had passed out of my mind, child."

She was happier, now. Then her husband made a 'contribution-

"I call to mind, now, that just as we stepped into his room to
show him its arrangements I knocked my elbow against the wardrobe and the candle fell and went out, and-"

"Certainly!" exclaimed Hannah, "and the next moment he had
struck a match and was lighting-"

"Not the stub I had dropped," cried Hotchkiss, "but a whole
candle! Now the marvel is that there was only one whole candle in
the room-"

"And it was clear on the other side of the room," interrupted
Hannah, "and moreover only just the end of it was showing, where
it lay on the top of the bookcase, and he had noticed it with that
lightning eye of his-"

"Of course, of course!" exclaimed the company, with admiration.

"-and gone right to it in the dark without disturbing a chair.
Why, sister Dawson, a cat couldn't have done it any quicker or
better or surer! Just think of it!"

A chorus of rewarding astonishment broke out which made
Hannah's whole constitution throb with pleasure; and when sister
Dawson laid her hand impressively upon Hannah's hand, and then
walled her eyes toward the ceiling, as much as to say, "it's beyond
words, beyond words!" the pleasure rose to ecstasy.

"Wait!" said Mr. Hotchkiss, breaking out with the kind of laugh
which in the back settlements gives notice that something humorous is coming, "I can tell you a wonder that beats that to piecesbeats anything and everything that has been told about him up to
date. He paid four weeks' board in advance-cash down! Petersburg can believe the rest, but you'll never catch it taking that
statement at par."

The joke had immense success; the laugh was hearty all around.
Then Hotchkiss issued another notifying laugh, and added-

"And there's another wonder on top of that; I tell you a little at a
time, so as not to overstrain you. He didn't pay in wildcat at twentyfive discount, but in a currency you've forgotten the look of
-minted gold! Four yellow eagle-birds-and here they are, if you
don't believe me."

This was too grand and fine to be humorous; it was impressive,
almost awe-inspiring. The gold pieces were passed from hand to
hand and contemplated in mute reverence. Aunt Rachel, elderly
slave woman, was passing cracked nuts and cider. She offered a
contribution, now.

"Now, den, dat 'splain it! I uz a wonderin' 'bout dat cannel. You
is right, Miss Hannah, dey uz only one in de room, en she uz on top
er de bookcase. Well, she dah yit-she hain't been tetched."

"Not been touched?"

"No, m'am; she hain't been tetched. A ornery po' yaller taller
cannel, ain't she?"

"Of course."

"Yes'm. I mould' dat cannel myself. Kin we 'ford wax cannelshalf a dollar a pound?"

"Wax! The idea!"

"Dat new cannel's wax!"

"Oh, come!"

"Fo' Gawd she is. White as Miss Guthrie's store-teeth."

A delicate flattery-shot, neatly put. The widow Guthrie, 56 and
dressed for 25, was pleased, and exhibited a girlish embarrassment
that was very pretty. She was excusably vain of her false teeth, the
only ones in the town; a costly luxury, and a fine and showy
contrast with the prevailing mouth-equipment of both old and
young-the kind of sharp contrast which whitewashed palings
make with a charred stump-fence.

Everybody wanted to see the wax candle; Annie Fleming was
hurried away to fetch it, and aunt Rachel resumed-

"Miss Hannah, dey's sump'n pow'ful odd 'bout our young gentman. In de fust place, he ain't got no baggage. Ain't dat so?"

"It hasn't come yet, but I reckon it's coming. I've been expecting
it all day, of course."

'Well, don't you give yourself no mo' trouble 'bout it, honey. In
my opinion he ain't got no baggage, en none ain't a-coming."

"What makes you think that, Rachel?"

"Gaze he ain't got no use for it, Miss Hannah."

'Why?"

"I's gwyne tell you. Warn't he dress' beautiful when he come?"

"Yes." Then she added-to the company: "Plain, but of finer
materials than anybody here is used to. Nicely made, too, and spick
and span new."

"You's got it down 'cording to de facts. Now den, I went to his
room dis mawnin to fetch his clo'es so Jeff could bresh 'em en black
his boots, en dey warn't no clo'es dah. Nary a rag. En no boots en
no socks, nuther. He uz soun' asleep, en I search de place all over.
Tuck his breakfus after you-all uz done-didn't he?"

"Yes."

"Prim en slick en combed up nice as a cat, warn't he?"

"Yes. I think so. I had only a glimpse of him."