Sharon's Choice
Under Providence, a man may achieve the making of many things--ships,books, fortunes, himself even, quite often enough to encourageothers; but let him beware of creating a town. Towns mostly happen. Noreal-estate operator decided that Rome should be. Sharon was an intendedtown; a one man's piece of deliberate manufacture; his whim, his pet,his monument, his device for immortally continuing above ground. Heplanned its avenues, gave it his middle name, fed it with his railroad.But he had reckoned without the inhabitants (to say nothing of nature),and one day they displeased him. Whenever you wish, you can see Sharonand what it has come to as I saw it when, as a visitor without localprejudices, they asked me to serve with the telegraph-operator and theticket-agent and the hotel-manager on the literary committee ofjudges at the school festival. There would be a stage, and flags,and elocution, and parents assembled, and afterwards ice-cream withstrawberries from El Paso.
"Have you ever awarded prizes for school speaking?" inquired thetelegraph-operator, Stuart.
"Yes," I told him. "At Concord in New Hampshire."
"Ever have a chat afterwards with a mother whose girl did not get theprize?"
"It was boys," I replied. "And parents had no say in it."
"It's boys and girls in Sharon," said he. "Parents have no say in ithere, either. But that don't seem to occur to them at the moment. We'llall stick together, of course."
"I think I had best resign." said I. "You would find me no hand atpacifying a mother."
"There are fathers also," said Stuart. "But individual parents are smalltrouble compared with a big split in public opinion. We've missed thatso far, though."
"Then why have judges? Why not a popular vote?" I inquired.
"Don't go back on us," said Stuart. "We are so few here. And you knoweducation can't be democratic or where will good taste find itself?Eastman knows that much, at least." And Stuart explained that Eastmanwas the head of the school and chairman of our committee. "He is fromMassachusetts, and his taste is good, but he is total abstinence. Won'tallow any literature with the least smell of a drink in it, not evenin the singing-class. Would not have 'Here's a health to King Charles'inside the door. Narrowing, that; as many of the finest classics speakof wine freely. Eastman is useful, but a crank. Now take 'Lochinvar.'We are to have it on strawberry night; but say! Eastman kicked about it.Told the kid to speak something else. Kid came to me, and I--"
A smile lurked for one instant in the corner of Stuart's eye, anddisappeared again. Then he drew his arm through mine as we walked.
"You have never seen anything in your days like Sharon," said he. "Youcould not sit down by yourself and make such a thing up. Shakespearemight have, but he would have strained himself doing it. Well, Eastmansays 'Lochinvar' will go in my expurgated version. Too bad Sir Waltercannot know. Ever read his Familiar Letters, Great grief! but he was agood man. Eastman stuck about that mention of wine. Remember?
'So now am I come with this lost love of mine To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.'
'Well,' thought I, 'Eastman would agree to water. Water and daughterwould go, but is frequently used, and spoils the meter.' So I fiddledwith my pencil down in the telegraph office, and I fixed the thing up.How's this?
'So now am I come with this beautiful maid To lead but one measure, drink one lemonade.'
Eastman accepts that. Says it's purer. Oh, it's not all sadness here!"
"How did you come to be in Sharon?" I asked my exotic acquaintance.
"Ah, how did I? How did all our crowd at the railroad? Somebody has gotto sell tickets, somebody has got to run that hotel, and telegraphs havegot to exist here. That's how we foreigners came. Many travellers changecars here, and one train usually misses the other, because the twocompanies do not love each other. You hear lots of language, especiallyin December. Eastern consumptives bound for southern California get lefthere, and drummers are also thick. Remarks range from 'How provoking!'to things I would not even say myself. So that big hotel and depot hasto be kept running, and we fellows get a laugh now and then. Our lot isbetter than these people's." He made a general gesture at Sharon.
"I should have thought it was worse," said I. "No, for we'll betransferred some day. These poor folks are shipwrecked. Though it istheir own foolishness, all this."
Again my eye followed as he indicated the town with a sweep of his hand;and from the town I looked to the four quarters of heaven. I may haveseen across into Old Mexico. No sign labels the boundary; the vacuumof continent goes on, you might think, to Patagonia. Symptoms ofneighboring Mexico basked on the sand heaps along Sharon's spaciousavenues--little torpid, indecent gnomes in sashes and open rags, withcrowning-steeple straw hats, and murder dozing in their small blackeyes. They might have crawled from holes in the sand, or hatched outof brown cracked pods on some weeds that trailed through the brokenbottles, the old shoes, and the wire fences. Outside these rampartsbegan the vacuum, white, gray, indigo, florescent, where all the yearthe sun shines. Not the semblance of any tree dances in the heat; onlyrocks and lumps of higher sand waver and dissolve and reappear in theshaking crystal of mirage. Not the scar of any river-bed furrows thevoid. A river there is, flowing somewhere out of the shiny violetmountains to the north, but it dies subterraneously on its way toSharon, misses the town, and emerges thirty miles south across thesunlight in a shallow, futile lake, a cienaga, called Las Palomas. Thenit evaporates into the ceaseless blue sky.
The water you get in Sharon is dragged by a herd of wind-wheels fromthe bowels of the sand. Over the town they turn and turn--Sharon's upperstory--a filmy colony of slats. In some of the homes beneath them youmay go up-stairs--in the American homes, not in the adobe Mexicancaves of song, woman, and knives; and brick and stone edifices occur.Monuments of perished trade, these rise among their flatter neighborscubical and stark; under-shirts, fire-arms, and groceries for salein the ground-floor, blind dust-windows above. Most of the mansions,however, squat ephemerally upon the soil, no cellar to them, and nostaircase, the total fragile box ready to bounce and caracole should thewind drive hard enough. Inside them, eating, mending, the newspaper, andmore babies, eke out the twelvemonth; outside, the citizens loiter totheir errands along the brief wide avenues of Sharon that empty intospace. Men, women, and children move about in the town, sparse andcasual, and over their heads in a white tribe the wind-wheels on theirrudders veer to the breeze and indolently revolve above the gapingobsoleteness. Through the dumb town the locomotive bell tollspervadingly when a train of freight or passengers trundles in from thehorizon or out along the dwindling fence of telegraph poles. No matterwhere you are, you can hear it come and go, leaving Sharon behind, anairy carcass, bleached and ventilated, sitting on the sand, with the sunand the hot wind pouring through its bones.
This town was the magnate's child, the thing that was to keep his memorygreen; and as I took it in on that first walk of discovery, Stuart toldme its story: how the magnate had decreed the railroad shops should behere; how, at that, corner lots grew in a night; how horsemen gallopedthe streets, shooting for joy, and the hasty tents rose while thehouses were hammered together; how they had song, dance, cards, whiskey,license, murder, marriage, opera--the whole usual thing--regular as theclock in our West, in Australia, in Africa, in every virgin cornerof the world where the Anglo-Saxon rushes to spend his animalspirits--regular as the clock, and in Sharon's case about fifteenminutes long. For they became greedy, the corner-lot people. They ranup prices for land which the railroad, the breath of their nostrils,wanted. They grew ugly, forgetting they were dealing with a magnate, andthat a railroad from ocean to ocean can take its shops somewhere elsewith appalling ease. Thus did the corner lots become sand again in anight. "And in the words of the poet," concluded Stuart, "Sharon has animmense future behind it."
Our talk was changed by the sight of a lady leaning and calling over afence.
"Mrs. Jeffries," said she. "Oh, Mrs. Jeffries!"
"Well?" called a voice next door
.
"I want to send Leola and Arvasita into your yard."
"Well?" the voice repeated.
"Our tool-house blew over into your yard last night. It's jammed behindyour tank."
"Oh, indeed!"
A window in the next house was opened, a head put out, and thisoccasioned my presentation to both ladies. They were Mrs. Matternand Mrs. Jeffries, and they fell instantly into a stiff caution ofdeportment; but they speedily found I was not worth being cautiousover. Stuart whispered to me that they were widows of high standing, andmothers of competing favorites for the elocution prize; and I hastenedto court their esteem. Mrs. Mattern was in body more ample, standinghigh and yellow and fluffy; but Mrs. Jeffries was smooth and small, andbehind her spectacles she had an eye.
"You must not let us interrupt you, ladies," said I, after somecivilities. "Did I understand that something was to be carriedsomewhere?"
"You did," said Mrs. Jeffries (she had come out of her house); "and I ampleased to notice no damage has been done to our fence--this time."
"It would have been fixed right up at my expense, as always, Mrs.Jeffries," retorted her neighbor, and started to keep abreast of Mrs.Jeffries as that lady walked and inspected the fence. Thus the twomarched parallel along the frontier to the rear of their respectiveterritories.
"You'll not resign?" said Stuart to me. "It is 'yours till death,' ain'tit?"
I told him that it was.
"About once a month I can expect this," said Mrs. Jeffries, returningalong her frontier.
"Well, it's not the only case in Sharon, Mrs. Jeffries," said Mrs.Mattern. "I'll remind you of them three coops when you kept poultry, andthey got away across the railroad, along with the barber's shop."
"But cannot we help you get it out?" said I, with a zealous wish forpeace.
"You are very accommodating, sir," said Mrs. Mattern.
"One of the prize-awarding committee," said Stuart. "An elegant judge oforatory. Has decided many contests at Concord, the home of Emerson."
"Concord, New Hampshire," I corrected; but neither lady heard me.
"How splendid for Leola!" cried Mrs. Mattern, instantly. "Leola! Oh,Leola! Come right out here!"
Mrs. Jeffries has been more prompt. She was already in her house, andnow came from it, bringing a pleasant-looking boy of sixteen, itmight be. The youth grinned at me as he stood awkwardly, brought inshirtsleeves from the performance of some household work.
"This is Guy," said his mother. "Guy took the prize last year. Guyhopes--"
"Shut up, mother," said Guy, with entire sweetness. "I don't hopetwice--"
"Twice or a dozen times should raise no hard feelings if my son isSharon's best speaker," cried Mrs. Jeffries, and looked across the fenceviciously.
"Shut up, mother; I ain't," said Guy.
"He is a master of humor recitations," his mother now said to me."Perhaps you know, or perhaps you do not know, how high up that isreckoned."
"Why, mother, Leola can speak all around me. She can," Guy added to me,nodding his head confidentially.
I did not believe him, I think because I preferred his name to that ofLeola.
"Leola will study in Paris, France," announced Mrs. Mattern, arrivingwith her child. "She has no advantages here. This is the gentleman,Leola."
But before I had more than noted a dark-eyed maiden who would not lookat me, but stood in skirts too young for her figure, black stockings,and a dangle of hair that should have been up, her large parent hadthrust into my hand a scrap-book.
"Here is what the Santa Fe Observer says;" and when I would have read,she read aloud for me. "The next is the Los Angeles Christian Home. Andhere's what they wrote about her in El Paso: 'Her histrionic genius forone so young'--it commences below that picture. That's Leola." I nowrecognized the black stockings and the hair. "Here's what a literarylady in Lordsburg thinks," pursued Mrs. Mattern.
"Never mind that," murmured Leola.
"I shall." And the mother read the letter to me. "Leola has spoke infive cultured cities," she went on. "Arvasita can depict how she wasencored at Albuquerque last Easter-Monday."
"Yes, sir, three recalls," said Arvasita, arriving at our group by thefence. An elder sister, she was, evidently. "Are you acquainted with'Camill'?" she asked me, with a trifle of sternness; and upon myhesitating, "the celebrated French drayma of 'Camill'," she repeated,with a trifle more of sternness. "Camill is the lady in it who dies ofconsumption. Leola recites the letter-and-coughing scene, Act Third. Mr.Patterson of Coloraydo Springs pronounces it superior to Modjeska."
"That is Leola again," said Mrs. Mattern, showing me another newspapercut--hair, stockings, and a candle this time.
"Sleep-walking scene, 'Macbeth,'" said Arvasita. "Leola's great nightat the church fair and bazar, El Paso, in Shakespeare's acknowledgedmasterpiece. Leola's repetwar likewise includes 'Catherine the Queenbefore her Judges,' 'Quality of Mercy is not Strained,' 'Death of LittleNell,' 'Death of Paul Dombey,' 'Death of the Old Year,' 'Burial of SirJohn Moore,' and other standard gems suitable for ladies."
"Leola," said her mother, "recite 'When the British Warrior Queen' tothe gentleman."
"No, momma, please not," said Leola, and her voice made me look at her;something of appeal sounded in it.
"Leola is that young you must excuse her," said her mother--and Ithought the girl winced.
"Come away, Guy," suddenly snapped little Mrs. Jeffries. "We are wastingthe gentleman's time. You are no infant prodigy, and we have no picturesof your calves to show him in the papers."
"Why, mother!" cried the boy, and he gave a brotherly look to Leola.
But the girl, scarlet and upset, now ran inside the house.
"As for wasting time, madam," said I, with indignation, "you are wastingyours in attempting to prejudice the judges."
"There!" said Guy.
"And, Mrs. Mattern," continued, "if I may say so without offense,the age (real or imaginary) of the speakers may make a difference inAlbuquerque, but with our committee not the slightest."
"Thank you, I'm sure," said Mrs. Mattern, bridling.
"Eastern ideas are ever welcome in Sharon," said Mrs. Jeffries."Good-morning." And she removed Guy and herself into her house, whileMrs. Mattern and Arvasita, stiffly ignoring me, passed into their owndoor.
"Come have a drink," said Stuart to me. "I am glad you said it. OldMother Mattern will let down those prodigy skirts. The poor girl hasbeen ashamed of them these two years, but momma has bulldozed her intostaying young for stage effect. The girl's not conceited, for a wonder,and she speaks well. It is even betting which of the two widows you havemade the maddest."
Close by the saloon we were impeded by a rush of small boys. They ranbefore and behind us suddenly from barrels and unforeseen places, andwedging and bumping between us, they shouted: "Chicken-legs! Ah, look atthe chicken-legs!"
For a sensitive moment I feared they were speaking of me; but thefolding slat-doors of the saloon burst open outward, and a giantbarkeeper came among the boys and caught and shook them to silence.
"You want to behave," was his single remark; and they dispersed like aSunday-school.
I did not see why they should thus describe him. He stood and nodded tous, and jerked big thumb towards the departing flock. "Funny how a boywill never think," said he, with amiability. "But they'll grow up to beabout as good as the rest of us, I guess. Don't you let them monkey withyou, Josey!" he called.
"Naw, I won't," said a voice. I turned and saw, by a barrel, a youth inknee-breeches glowering down the street at his routed enemies. Hewas possibly eight, and one hand was bound in a grimy rag. This wasChickenlegs.
"Did they harm you, Josey?" asked the giant.
"Naw, they didn't."
"Not troubled your hand any?"
"Naw, they didn't."
"Well, don't you let them touch you. We'll see you through." And aswe followed him in towards our drink through his folding slat-doors hecontinued discoursing to me, the newcomer. "I am against inter
feringwith kids. I like to leave 'em fight and fool just as much as they seefit. Now them boys ain't malicious, but they're young, you see, they'reyoung, and misfortune don't appeal to them. Josey lost his father lastspring, and his mother died last month. Last week he played with afreight car and left two of his fingers with it. Now you might thinkthat was enough hardship."
"Indeed yes," I answered.
"But the little stake he inherited was gambled away by his stinking oldaunt."
"Well!" I cried.
"So we're seeing him through."
"You bet," said a citizen in boots and pistol, who was playingbilliards.
"This town is not going to permit any man to fool with Josey," statedhis opponent in the game.
"Or women either," added a lounger by the bar, shaggy-bearded and alsowith a pistol.
"Mr. Abe Hanson," said the barkeeper, presenting me to him. "Josey'sfather's partner. He's took the boy from the aunt and is going to seehim through."
"How 'r' ye?" said Mr. Hanson, hoarsely, and without enthusiasm.
"A member of the prize-awarding committee," explained Stuart, and waveda hand at me.
They all brightened up and came round me.
"Heard my boy speak?" inquired one. "Reub Gadsden's his name."
I told him I had heard no speaker thus far; and I mentioned Leola andGuy.
"Hope the boy'll give us 'The Jumping Frog' again," said one. "I nearbust."
"What's the heifer speakin' this trip?" another inquired.
"Huh! Her!" said a third.
"You'll talk different, maybe, this time," retorted the other.
"Not agin 'The Jumping Frog,' he won't," the first insisted. "I nearbust," he repeated.
"I'd like for you to know my boy Reub," said Mr. Gadsden to me,insinuatingly.
"Quit fixing' the judge, Al," said Leola's backer. "Reub forgets hiswords, an' says 'em over, an' balks, an' mires down, an' backs out, anstarts fresh, en' it's confusin' to foller him."
"I'm glad to see you take so much interest, gentlemen," said I.
"Yes, we're apt to see it through," said the barkeeper. And Stuart and Ibade them a good-morning.
As we neared the school-master's house, where Stuart was next taking me,we came again upon the boys with Josey, and no barkeeper at hand to "seehim through." But Josey made it needless. At the word "Chicken-legs" heflew in a limber manner upon the nearest, and knocking him immediatelyflat, turned with spirit upon a second and kicked him. At this they setup a screeching and fell all together, and the school-master came out ofhis door.
"Boys, boys!" said he. "And the Sabbath too!"
As this did not immediately affect them, Mr. Eastman made a charge, andthey fled from him then. A long stocking of Josey's was torn, and hungin two streamers round his ankles; and his dangling shoe-laces weretrodden to fringe.
"If you want your hand to get well for strawberry night--" began Mr.Eastman.
"Ah, bother strawberry night!" said Josey, and hopped at one of hisplaymates. But Mr. Eastman caught him skilfully by the collar.
"I am glad his misfortunes have not crushed him altogether," said I.
"Josey Yeatts is an anxious case, sir," returned the teacher. "Severalinfluences threaten his welfare. Yesterday I found tobacco on him.Chewing, sir."
"Just you hurt me," said Josey, "and I'll tell Abe."
"Abe!" exclaimed Mr. Eastman, lifting his brow. "He means a man oldenough to be his father, sir. I endeavor to instill him with some fewnotions of respect, but the town spoils him. Indulges him completely, Imay say. And when Sharon's sympathies are stirred sir, it will espouse acause very warmly--Give me that!" broke off the schoolmaster, and therefollowed a brief wrestle. "Chewing again to-day, sir," he added to me.
"Abe lemme have it," shrieked Josey. "Lemme go, or he'll come over andfix you."
But the calm, chilly Eastman had ground the tobacco under his heel. "Youcan understand how my hands are tied," he said to me.
"Readily," I answered.
"The men give Josey his way in everything. He has a--I may say anunworthy aunt."
"Yes," said I. "So I have gathered."
At this point Josey ducked and slid free, and the united flock vanishedwith jeers at us. Josey forgot they had insulted him, they forgot he hadbeaten them; against a common enemy was their friendship cemented.
"You spoke of Sharon's warm way of espousing causes," said I to Eastman.
"I did, sir. No one could live here long without noticing it."
"Sharon is a quiet town, but sudden," remarked Stuart. "Apt to besudden. They're beginning about strawberry night," he said to Eastman."Wanted to know about things down in the saloon."
"How does their taste in elocution chiefly lie?" I inquired.
Eastman smiled. He was young, totally bald, the moral dome of his skullrising white above visionary eyes and a serious auburn beard. Hewas clothed in a bleak, smooth slate-gray suit, and at any climax ofemphasis he lifted slightly upon his toes and relaxed again, shuttinghis lips tight on the finished sentence. "Your question," said he, "hasoften perplexed me. Sometimes they seem to prefer verse; sometimes prosestirs them greatly. We shall have a liberal crop of both this year. I amproud to tell you I have augmented our number of strawberry speakers bynearly fifty per cent."
"How many will there be?" said I.
"Eleven. You might wish some could be excused. But I let them speak tostimulate their interest in culture. Will you not take dinner with me,gentlemen? I was just sitting down when little Josey Yeatts brought meout."
We were glad to do this, and he opened another can of corned beef forus. "I cannot offer you wine, sir," said he to me, "though I am aware itis a general habit in luxurious homes." And he tightened his lips.
"General habit wherever they don't prefer whiskey," said Stuart.
"I fear so," the school-master replied, smiling. "That poison shallnever enter my house, gentlemen, any more than tobacco. And as I cannotreform the adults of Sharon, I am doing what I can for their children.Little Hugh Straight is going to say his 'Lochinvar' very pleasingly,Mr. Stuart. I went over it with him last night. I like them to be wordperfect," he continued to me, "as failures on exhibition night elicitunfavorable comment."
"And are we to expect failures also?" I inquired.
"Reuben Gadsden is likely to mortify us. He is an earnest boy, butnervous; and one or two others. But I have limited their length. ReubenGadsden's father declined to have his boy cut short, and he will giveus a speech of Burke's; but I hope for the best. It narrows down, itnarrows down. Guy Jeffries and Leola Mattern are the two."
"The parents seem to take keen interest," said I.
Mr. Eastman smiled at Stuart. "We have no reason to suppose they havechanged since last year," said he. "Why, sir," he suddenly exclaimed,"if I did not feel I was doing something for the young generationhere, I should leave Sharon to-morrow! One is not appreciated, notappreciated."
He spoke fervently of various local enterprises, his failures, hishopes, his achievements; and I left his house honoring him, butamazed--his heart was so wide and his head so narrow; a man who wouldpurify with simultaneous austerity the morals of Lochinvar and ofSharon.
"About once a month," said Stuart, "I run against a new side he is blindon. Take his puzzlement as to whether they prefer verse or prose. Queerand dumb of him that, you see. Sharon does not know the differencebetween verse and prose."
"That's going too far," said I.
"They don't," he repeated, "when it comes to strawberry night. If thepiece is about something they understand, rhymes do not help or hinder.And of course sex is apt to settle the question."
"Then I should have thought Leola--" I began.
"Not the sex of the speaker. It's the listeners. Now you take women.Women generally prefer something that will give them a good cry. We menwant to laugh mostly."
"Yes," said I; "I would rather laugh myself, I think."
"You'd know you'd rather if you had to live in Sharon. The laugh is oneof the
big differences between women and men, and I would give you myviews about it, only my Sunday-off time is up, and I've got to go totelegraphing."
"Our ways are together," said I. "I'm going back to the railroad hotel."
"There's Guy," continued Stuart. "He took the prize on 'The JumpingFrog.' Spoke better than Leola, anyhow. She spoke 'The Wreck ofthe Hesperus.' But Guy had the back benches--that's where the mensit--pretty well useless. Guess if there had been a fire, some ofthe fellows would have been scorched before they'd have got strengthsufficient to run out. But the ladies did not laugh much. Said they sawnothing much in jumping a frog. And if Leola had made 'em cry good andhard that night, the committee's decision would have kicked up more of afuss than it did. As it was, Mrs. Mattern got me alone; but I worked usaround to where Mrs. Jeffries was having her ice-cream, and I left themto argue it out."
"Let us adhere to that policy," I said to Stuart; and he repliednothing, but into the corner of his eye wandered that lurking smilewhich revealed that life brought him compensations.
He went to telegraphing, and I to revery concerning strawberry night.I found myself wishing now that there could have been two prizes; Idesired both Leola and Guy to be happy; and presently I found the matterwould be very close, so far at least as my judgment went. For boy andgirl both brought me their selections, begging I would coach them, andthis I had plenty of leisure to do. I preferred Guy's choice--the storyof that blue-jay who dropped nuts through the hole in a roof, expectingto fill it, and his friends came to look on and discovered the hole wentinto the entire house. It is better even than "The Jumping Frog"--betterthan anything, I think--and young Guy told it well. But Leola brought apotent rival on the tearful side of things. "The Death of Paul Dombey"is plated pathos, not wholly sterling; but Sharon could not know this;and while Leola most prettily recited it to me I would lose my recentopinion in favor of Guy, and acknowledge the value of her performance.Guy might have the men strong for him, but this time the women weregoing to cry. I got also a certain other sort of entertainment out ofthe competing mothers. Mrs. Jeffries and Mrs. Mattern had a way of beingin the hotel office at hours when I passed through to meals. They nevercame together, and always were taken by surprise at meeting me.
"Leola is ever so grateful to you," Mrs. Mattern would say.
"Oh," I would answer, "do not speak of it. Have you ever heard Guy's'Blue-Jay' story?"
"Well, if it's anything like that frog business, I don't want to." Andthe lady would leave me.
"Guy tells me you are helping him so kindly," said Mrs. Jeffries.
"Oh yes, I'm severe,"' I answered, brightly. "I let nothing pass. I onlywish I was as careful with Leola. But as soon as she begins 'Paul hadnever risen from his little bed,' I just lose myself listening to her."
On the whole, there were also compensations for me in these mothers, andI thought it as well to secure them in advance.
When the train arrived from El Paso, and I saw our strawberries and ourice-cream taken out, I felt the hour to be at hand, and that whateverour decision, no bias could be laid to me. According to his prudenthabit, Eastman had the speakers follow each other alphabetically. Thishappened to place Leola after Guy, and perhaps might give her the lastword, as it were, with the people; but our committee was there, andsuperior to such accidents. The flags and the bunting hung gay aroundthe draped stage. While the audience rustled or resoundingly trod toits chairs, and seated neighbors conferred solemnly together over theprogramme, Stuart, behind the bunting, played "Silver Threads among theGold" upon a melodeon.
"Pretty good this," he said to me, pumping his feet.
"What?" I said.
"Tune. Sharon is for free silver."
"Do you think they will catch your allusion?" I asked him.
"No. But I have a way of enjoying a thing by myself." And he pumpedaway, playing with tasteful variations until the hall was full and thesinging-class assembled in gloves and ribbons.
They opened the ceremonies for us by rendering "Sweet and Low" veryhappily; and I trusted it was an omen.
Sharon was hearty, and we had "Sweet and Low" twice. Then the speakingbegan, and the speakers were welcomed, coming and going, with mild andfriendly demonstrations. Nothing that one would especially mark wentwrong until Reuben Gadsden. He strode to the middle of the boards, andthey creaked beneath his tread. He stood a moment in large glitteringboots and with hair flat and prominently watered. As he straightenedfrom his bow his suspender-buttons came into view, and remained so forsome singular internal reason, while he sent his right hand down intothe nearest pocket and began his oratory.
"It is sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France," hesaid, impressively, and stopped.
We waited, and presently he resumed:
"It is sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France." Hetook the right hand out and put the left hand in.
"It is sixteen or seventeen years," said he, and stared frowning at hisboots.
I found the silence was getting on my nerves. I felt as if it weremyself who was drifting to idiocy, and tremulous empty sensations beganto occur in my stomach. Had I been able to recall the next sentence, Ishould have prompted him.
"It is sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France," saidthe orator, rapidly.
And down deep back among the men came a voice, "Well, I guess it mustbe, Reub."
This snapped the tension. I saw Reuben's boots march away; Mr. Eastmancame from behind the bunting and spoke (I suppose) words of protest. Icould not hear them, but in a minute, or perhaps two, we grew calm, andthe speaking continued.
There was no question what they thought of Guy and Leola. He conqueredthe back of the room. They called his name, they blessed him withendearing audible oaths, and even the ladies smiled at his pleasant,honest face--the ladies, except Mrs. Mattern. She sat near Mrs.Jeffries, and throughout Guy's "Blue-Jay" fanned herself, exhibiting awell-sustained inattention. She might have foreseen that Mrs. Jeffrieswould have her turn. When the "Death of Paul Dombey" came, andhandkerchiefs began to twinkle out among the audience, and variousnoises of grief were rising around us, and the men themselves murmuredin sympathy, Mrs. Jeffries not only preserved a suppressed-hilaritycountenance, but managed to cough twice with a cough that visibly bitinto Mrs. Mattern's soul.
But Leola's appealing cadences moved me also. When Paul was dead,she made her pretty little bow, and we sat spellbound, then gave herapplause surpassing Guy's. Unexpectedly I found embarrassment of choicedazing me, and I sat without attending to the later speakers. Was notsuccessful humor more difficult than pathos? Were not tears more cheaplyraised than laughter? Yet, on the other hand, Guy had one prize, andwhere merit was so even--I sat, I say, forgetful of the rest of thespeakers, when suddenly I was aware of louder shouts of welcome, and Iawaked to Josey Yeatts bowing at us.
"Spit it out, Josey!" a large encouraging voice was crying in the backof the hall. "We'll see you through."
"Don't be scared, Josey!" yelled another.
Then Josey opened his mouth and rhythmically rattled the following:
"I love little pussy her coat is so warm And if I don't hurt her she'lldo me no harm I'll sit by the fi-yer and give her some food And pussywill love me because I am good."
That was all. It had come without falter or pause, even for breath.Josey stood, and the room rose to him.
"Again! again!" they roared. "He ain't a bit scared!" "Go it, Josey!""You don't forgit yer piece!" And a great deal more, while they poundedwith their boots.
"I love little pussy," began Josey.
"Poor darling!" said a lady next me. "No mother."
"I'll sit by the fi-yer."
Josey was continuing. But nobody heard him finish. The room was a Babel.
"Look at his little hand!" "Only three fingers inside them rags!""Nobody to mend his clothes any more." They all talked to each other,and clapped and cheered, while Josey stood, one leg slightly advancedand proudly stiff, somewhat after the manner of tho
se militaryengravings where some general is seen erect upon an eminence at themoment of victory.
Mr. Eastman again appeared from the bunting, and was telling us, I haveno doubt, something of importance; but the giant barkeeper now shoutedabove the din, "Who says Josey Yeatts ain't the speaker for this night?"
At that striking of the common chord I saw them heave, promiscuous andunanimous, up the steps to the stage. Josey was set upon Abe Hanson'sshoulder, while ladies wept around him. What the literary committeemight have done I do not know, for we had not the time even to resign.Guy and Leola now appeared, bearing the prize between them--a picture ofWashington handing the Bible out of clouds to Abraham Lincoln--and veryimmediately I found myself part of a procession. Men and women we were,marching about Sharon. The barkeeper led; four of Sharon's fathersfollowed him, escorting Josey borne aloft on Abe Hanson's shoulder,and rigid and military in his bearing. Leola and Guy followed with thepicture; Stuart walked with me, whistling melodies of the war--Dixieand others. Eastman was not with us. When the ladies found themselvesconducted to the saloon, they discreetly withdrew back to theentertainment we had broken out from. Josey saw them go, and shrillyspoke his first word:
"Ain't I going to have any ice-cream?"
This presently caused us to return to the ladies, and we finished theevening with entire unity of sentiment. Eastman alone took the incidentto heart; inquired how he was to accomplish anything with hands tied,and murmured his constant burden once more: "One is not appreciated, notappreciated."
I do not stop over in Sharon any more. My ranch friend, whose presencethere brought me to visit him, is gone away. But such was my virginexperience of the place; and in later days fate led me to be concernedwith two more local competitions--one military and one civil--whichgreatly stirred the population. So that I never pass Sharon on my longtravels without affectionately surveying the sandy, quivering, bleachedtown, unshaded by its twinkling forest of wind-wheels. Surely the heartalways remembers a spot where it has been merry! And one thing I shouldlike to know--shall know, perhaps: what sort of citizen in our republicJosey will grow to be. For whom will he vote? May he not himself come tosit in Washington and make laws for us? Universal suffrage holds so manypossibilities.