Richard Edward Connell

“ Monsieur Pettipon had begun to tremble; tiny moist drops bedewed his expanse of brow; to lose his job would be tragedy enough; but this—this would be worse than tragedy; it would be disgrace. His artistic reputation was at stake. His career was tottering on a hideous brink. All Paris, all France would know, and would laugh at him.
"Give me the little devil," he said humbly. "I, myself, personally, will see to it that he troubles you no more. He shall perish at once, monsieur; he shall die the death. You will have fresh bedding, fresh carpet, fresh everything. ”

“ Like a burglar, he crept along the beach to the bushy promontory that hid the cove where the foot-prints were, he wiggled through the bush, he slid down to the third beach, and crouched behind a large rock. The beach seemed deserted; the muttering of the ocean was the only sound Mr. Pottle heard. Another rock, a dozen feet away, seemed to offer better concealment, and he stepped out toward it, and then stopped short. Mr. Pottle stood face to face with a naked, brown savage.
Mr. Pottle's feet refused to take him away; a paralysis such as one has in nightmares rooted him to the spot. ”

“ Get what is coming to you! Nobody will bring it on a platter; you've got to step up and grab it. When you have an impulse, think it over. If it looks like the real goods, obey it. Get me? Obey it! Nobody will bite you. Think all you like, but for heaven's sake, act!" [Pg 139]
It was for such talks that Mr. Cowan was famous. Even Horace Nimms forgot his impending fall as the efficiency expert extraordinary declaimed the gospel of action and boldness.
But when the meeting was over, silent misery came into the heart of the little cashier and like an automaton he stumbled into the Subway. ”

“ Mr. Pottle, vaguely apprehensive of sharks, pitched his pup-tent far up on the beach; to-morrow would be time enough to look for cannibals.
He lay smoking and thinking. He was happy. The realization of a life's ambition lay, so to speak, just around the corner. To-morrow he could turn that corner—if he wished.
He squirmed as something small nibbled at his hip-bone, and he wondered why writers of books on the South Seas make such scant mention of the insects. Surely they must have noticed the little creatures, which had, he discovered, a way of making their presence felt. ”

“ And Thérèse would pick a nonexistent hair from the worn collar of his coat and remark, "Oh, if you were only a steward of the first class, my Alphonse!"
"Patience, my dear Thérèse, patience," he would say, secretly glowing as men do when their life ambition is touched on.
"Patience? Patience, indeed!" she would exclaim. "Have you not crossed on the Voltaire a hundred and twenty-seven times? Has a speck of dust ever been found in one of your cabins? You should have been promoted long ago. You are being done a dirtiness, Monsieur Pettipon." ”

“ His voice had a soft sweet note in it, not at all like the sharp staccato of Hydeman's crisp business New Yorkese.
"He's making fun of me," said Tidbury, and the spirit of Terrible Battling Epps wholly possessed him.
"You thought I was a dead one, eh?" remarked Mr. Epps. "Well, I'm going to show you that sometimes the quiet ones come to life and——"
The other eyed him sternly.
"Young man," he said, "I fear that you are er—a bit—er—under the weather. I fear you are not one of us."
"Not one of you?" roared Tidbury with passion mounting. ”

“ To be in love for the first time at twenty is passably thrilling; but to be in love for the first time at thirty-six is exquisitely excruciating.
Mr. Pottle found Mrs. Gallup in her living room, a basket of undarned stockings on her lap. With a pretty show of confusion and many embarrassed murmurings she thrust them behind the piano, he protesting that this intimate domesticity delighted him. ”

“ For the pig is as necessary to truffle-hunting as the beagle is to beagling.
A pig, by dint of patient training, can be taught to scent the buried truffle with his sensitive snout, and to point to its hiding place, as immobile as a cast-iron setter on a profiteer's lawn, until its proud owner exhumes the prize. An experienced pointing pig, with a creditable record, brings an enormous price in the markets of Montpont.
At the head of the procession that kindly Sunday marched Monsieur Bonticu and Monsieur Pantan, with the decisive but leisurely tread of men of affairs. ”

“ It is a matter to be settled between you, personally."
As he said the words, Monsieur Pantan commenced to dig furiously. Monsieur Bonticu dropped to his knees and also dug, like some great, green, panic-stricken beaver. Mounds of dirt flew up. At the same second they spied the truffle, a monster of its tribe. At the same second the plump fingers of Monsieur Bonticu and the thin fingers of Monsieur Pantan closed on it. Cries of dismay rose from the gallery.
"It is the largest of truffles," called voices. "Don't break it. Broken ones don't count." ”

“ For a long time Cowdin did not reply, but stood rubbing his chin and smiling pityingly at Croly Addicks, until Croly, his nerves tense, wanted to scream. Then Cowdin measuring his words spoke loud enough for the others in the room to hear.
"Mr. Addicks," he said, "that job needs a man with a punch. And you haven't a punch, Mr. Addicks. Mr. Addicks, that job requires a fighter. And you're not a fighter, Mr. Addicks. Mr. Addicks, that job requires a man with a jaw on him. ”

“ Ten minutes later Samuel Cowdin swiveled round in his chair to face a young man with a pale, grim face and an oversized jaw.
"Well?" demanded Cowdin.
"Mr. Cowdin," said Croly Addicks, holding his tremors in check by a great effort of will, "I understand you need a man in the purchasing department. I want the job."
Cowdin shot him a puzzled look. The chief purchasing agent's countenance wore the expression of one who says "Where have I seen that face before?"
"We do need a man," Cowdin admitted, staring hard at Croly, "though I don't know how you knew it. Who are you?" ”

“ Blottom Pottle née Gallup, if you ask me, that precious animal of yours, that noble creature is the muttiest mutt that ever——"
"Ambrose!" Her edged voice clipped his oration short. "You've been drinking!"
"Well," said Mr. Pottle in a bellowing voice, "I guess a hound like that is enough to drive a person to drink. G'night, Blottom. I'm going to sleep in the flower bed. Frozen petunias will be my pillow. When I'm dead and gone, be kind to little Pershing for my sake."
"Ambrose! Stop. Think of the neighbors. Think of your health. Come into the house this minute." ”

“ Pottle tossing uneasily in his share of the bed, and with wide-open, worried eyes doing sums on the moonlit ceiling. He waited the morrow with numb pessimism. For, though he had combed the town and borrowed every cent he could squeeze from friend or foe, though he had pawned his favorite case of razors, he was three hundred dollars short of the needed amount. Three hundred dollars is not much compared to all the money in the world, but to Mr. Pottle, on his bed of anxiety, it looked like the Great Wall of China. ”

“ When he had been working diligently in the training school for three months lacking a day, the great moment came when he was given a chance to put theory into practice, by being sent forth, in a uniform slightly too large for him, to patrol a beat in the company of a veteran officer, so that he might observe, at first hand, how an expert handled the many and varied duties of the police job. Except that he had no shield, no night stick, and no revolver, Peter looked exactly like any of the other guardians of law. ”

“ Pottle, "you cannot wear pants. Spirits never do. That settles it. Not another word, Ambrose. Haven't I trouble enough without my own husband adding to it?"
She pressed her brow as if it ached. Piles of costumes, mostly tinsel and cheese-cloth, shields, tomahawks, bridles and bits of scenery were strewn about the Pottle parlor. She sank into a Morris chair, and stitched fiercely at an angel's wing. Her eyes were the eyes of one at bay.
"It's been one thing after another," she declaimed. "Those Gulicks are making my life miserable. ”

“ Mr. Epps debouched from a bus in Washington Square and started westward along West Fourth Street with the cautious but determined tread of an explorer penetrating a trackless and cannibal-infested jungle. He glanced apprehensively to right and left, his eyes wide for the sight of painted sirens, his ears agape for gusts of ribald merriment. At each corner he paused expectantly, anticipating that he might come upon a delirious party of art students gamboling about a model. He traversed two blocks without seeing so much as a smock ”

“ On this day, when Croly Addicks had finished his modest lunch, the spotter was lurking near the exit. Several husky-looking young men passed him, and brazenly reported totals of twenty cents, when it was obvious that persons of their brawn would not be content with a lunch costing less than seventy-five; but the spotter noting their bull necks and bellicose air let them pass. But when Croly approached the desk and reported forty-five the spotter pounced on him. Experience had taught the spotter the type of man one may pounce on without fear of sharp words or resentful blows. ”

“ Monsieur Bonticu was aflame with a great, seething wrath, but he had sufficient control of his sense of [Pg 245] insult to jerk at the leash of Anastasie and say, in a tone all Montpont could hear:
"Come, Anastasie. I once did Monsieur Pantan the honor of considering him your equal. I must revise my estimate. He is not your sort of pig at all."
Monsieur Pantan's eyes were blazing dangerously, but he retained a slipping grip on his emotions long enough to say:
"Come, Clotilde. Do not demean yourself by breathing the same air as Monsieur and Madame Bonticu." ”

“ I assure Messieurs that nothing would give me more exquisite pleasure than to grant this gentleman"—he stressed this word—"the satisfaction that his honor"—he also stressed this word—"appears to demand. However, it is impossible."
The seconds and Monsieur Pantan looked at Monsieur Bonticu and at each other.
"But this is monstrous," exclaimed the chief second. "Is it that Monsieur refuses to fight?"
Monsieur Bonticu's slowly shaken head indicated most poignant regret.
"But no, Messieurs," he said. "I do not refuse. Is it not a question of honor? Am I not a sportsman? ”

“ Darkness and dinnertime had come before Croly had finished.
"Flagstead," said Old Cephas Langdon, turning to the president, "haven't I always told you that what we needed in the purchasing department was a man with a chin on him? Just drop a note to Cowdin to-morrow, will you, and tell him he needn't come back?"
He turned toward Croly and twisted his leathery old face into what passed for a smile.
"Young man," he said, "don't let anything happen to that jaw of yours. One of these bright days it's going to be worth twenty-five thousand dollars a year to you." ”

“ But Tidbury, deaf to all things but battle, had buried his other fist so violently in his opponent's soft center that the mask popped from the man's face. It was the round, pink, frightened face of a total stranger.
With a yelp of dismay Tidbury turned to flee, but the outraged parishioners had pounced on him, torn off his mask, and were proving, at his expense, that there is still such a thing as militant, muscular Christianity in the world. As they bore him, kicking and struggling, to the door, he saw in all the blur of excited faces one face with staring, unbelieving eyes. ”

“ Peter stood still. He was not thinking of the yeggs, or of Gaffney. He was hearing Kondorman ask, "Where is the Tropic of Capricorn?" He was hearing Kondorman say, "You've failed." Something had him tight. Something was asking him, "Why go in that house? Why risk your life? You're not a cop. You'll never be a cop. They threw you out. They made a fool of you for a trifle."
Peter started back from the open door; he looked down; the street light fell on the brass buttons of his uniform; the words of the old policeman darted across his brain: "A cop never runs away when needed." ”

“ For the rest, Horace Nimms was slightly bald, wore convict eye-glasses—the sort you shackle to your head with a chain—kept his cuffs up with lavender sleeve garters, carried a change purse, kept a small red pocket expense book, thought his company the greatest in the world and its president, Oren Hammer, the greatest man, was devoted to a wife and two growing daughters, dreamed of a cottage on Long Island with a few square yards of beets and beans and, finally, earned forty dollars a week. ”

“ The blond stenographer drew herself up regally, as she had seen some one do in the movies, and chilled Croly with an icy stare.
"Don't get so fresh!" she said coldly. "To whom do you think you're speaking to?"
"You gotta crust," observed the brunette, outdoing her companion in crushing hauteur. "Just take yourself and your baby scarer away, Mister Masher, and get yourself a job posing for animal crackers."
They swept on as majestically as tight skirts and French heels would permit, and Croly, confused, subsided back on his bench again. ”

“ Croly Addicks, inwardly full of red revolution, outwardly merely flustered and intimidated, rustled among the piles of invoices and forms on his desk, and tried desperately to concentrate on his task as assistant to the assistant purchasing agent of the Pierian Piano Company, a vast far-flung enterprise that boasted, with only slight exaggeration, "We bring melody to a million homes." He hated Cowdin at all times, and particularly when he called him "Mr. Addicks." That "Mister" hurt worse than a slap on a sunburned shoulder. ”

“ Monsieur Pantan looked up from a long draught.
"Does your wife scold and your children scream?" he asked. [Pg 259]
"Alas, but too often," answered Monsieur Bonticu.
"You should hear my Rosalie," sighed Monsieur Pantan. "I too seek consolation as you do. I talk with my Clotilde."
Monsieur Bonticu nodded, sympathetically.
"My wife is always nagging me for more money," he said with a sudden burst of confidence. "And the undertaking business, my dear Pantan, is not what it was."
"Do I not know?" said Pantan. "When folks are well we both suffer."
"I stagger beneath my load," sighed Bonticu. ”

“ Pottle's free hand went to his own face, smooth as steel and art could make it.
"Blossom," he began huskily, "have you ever thought of marrying again?"
"I have," she answered, blushing—his hand on hers tightened—"and I haven't," she finished.
"Oh, Blossom——" he began once more.
"If I do marry again," she interrupted, "it will be a literary man."
"A literary man?" His tone was aghast. "A writing fella?"
"Oh, not necessarily a writer," she said. "They usually live in garrets, and I shouldn't like that. ”