Roy Norton

“ When things go dead wrong with me, I just imagine that they're not so bad, after all. Cowards and pessimists are the only ones to whom imagination is a curse. Why—even a crippled dog has dreams of hunting in his sleep, and he wakes up with hope!"
Jimmy's host seemed to ponder over this crude philosophy for a time as if bemused by its possibilities, and then suddenly straightened himself in his chair and leaned forward.
"Do you remember what you said to me in the train one day as to a man's having faith in whatever he sold? And you talked about an automobile called the Sayers car? ”

“ Do you intend to tell Sayers all about it?"
"Of course I do."
"But—but suppose, after he heard the story, he declined to employ you?"
"I can't help that," said Jimmy ruefully. "It wouldn't be fair and honest to take the place unless he knew all about my reputation out there."
"Is it your habit to confide all your mistakes to your employer?" his host asked, as if surprised.
"Of course," asserted Jimmy. "When I work for a man, I'm his and whether he likes it or not he's more or less responsible for what I do. And, what's more, I feel responsible for him. ”

“ It's a long way from MacDougall Alley to Fort George at any time. It is rendered longer when the wind is chill; but Jimmy, no longer the jester, could never remember how he reached there on that wintry afternoon, and its hills, bleak with snow, were no more drab and cold than the dead fires of his dreams. ”

“ Jimmy forgot all about chocolates. Unconsciously he relapsed to his habitual self, and, inasmuch as most any one who is unassuming and entirely natural is entertaining, seemed to keep his companion happy.
"I like it all," she said, in an interval. "I like to look at those in the boxes who came here for nothing else than to be looked at. It makes them happy to see others looking at them. I suppose they must feel for the moment that they are as good as the horses. Some people will make mistakes of that sort, you know, and never learn the truth. And I like the horses for themselves. ”

“ The policeman on the corner grinned, pulled his mustache, winked at himself, jingled the change in his pocket left from that grateful five, and then swung up his hand to caution the taxi driver as the latter turned into the cross street.
"You're a nice one, I must say," she remarked, half petulantly. "You might at least have dropped me a note to ask how I am getting along, and whether I am industrious, and all that rot! But did you? No! You took me to the horse show, and back to the hotel, and then vanished as if you had withdrawn yourself into your musty old shell!" ”

“ As if incredulous, Jimmy stared at him for a full quarter minute and then, recovering his good humor, clapped his hat on his head and assuming a highly melodramatic air in imitation of the Judge's ponderous methods said, "Harold, beware! Beware! I say! It's a long worm that has no turning. ”

“ It was so on the day when, his birthday holiday over, he tripped down the steps throwing a parting joke over his shoulder at his mother, and hastened to the end of the quiet residential street to board a street car; but in the street car and later, in the train, he sat soberly thinking and wondering if there was no way on earth by which he could be at home each day.
"Maw's not getting any younger," he thought to himself. "Every day I'm not with her is one day less on my account that I can never catch up. ”

“ The boy barely caught the tail of the sleigh and thus proved that he might have boarded the train; for Jimmy, not waiting for him, had clutched the lines and stirred the restless nag to action by a surreptitious slap with his hand.
"The shortest road is back the way we come," insisted the boy, as Jimmy drove the horse recklessly across the end of the platform and into a road that appeared fortuitously in front of him. ”

“ She's a social climber. The old man doesn't give a hang about society, or pink teas. He makes automobiles and believes in efficiency. Granger's not the old man's sort at all. Too stuck up. If I were you, I'd wait until the old man finds out that you're the man who played the joke, and when he asks you about the inside of it, tell him the truth just the same as you did me. If you can show him, before then, that you are the man to market the Sayers car, it's my opinion that the Judge, and his likes, or dislikes, will amount to about as much as a tallow candle at an arc-light party. ”

“ Jimmy carried his bag and followed his guide, who stowed him into the depths of a car, threw the switch of an electric starter, deftly let in the clutch, and the smart little machine picked up and slid away. For the first time for hours Jimmy breathed a great sigh of relief; but so apprehensive of accidents was he that while they passed through the town he shrank into his coat as a turtle shrinks modestly into its shell. He was terrified lest the man have some cause to stop in front of a shop. All he craved was the country, and a whole lot of it, with untenanted roads. ”

“ Friends and fellow citizens, we must make the world free for democracy. Let freedom of the seas be that shining shibboleth which through its ulterior meaning, when considerately scrutinized to its utmost and ultimate, and defined as we Americans who are fully cognizant of our grave responsibilities toward humanity and the affairs of other nations, races, and peoples of this globe, which is round—those responsibilities handed down to us by the father of our country, George Washington—interpret as meaning that we wish freedom of the seas. ”

“ You're sore because I look like you. Why shouldn't I get hot under the collar because you look like me? About the only difference between us is that you're a judge and I'm a drummer. That doesn't keep you from being a good sport, does it? I came a long way to get acquainted with you and I like most people. It's not my fault that you look so much like me, is it?"
"Look like you? It's your fault that you look like me!" snapped the Judge as if that fault were an impertinence.
"Phew!" said Jimmy, puffing out his cheeks. ”

“ Martin sat and looked at him admiringly, for a time, and then asked, "But what are you going to do now that all your trade is aware of your predicament, and are afraid to employ you?"
"I'll be hanged if I know!" Jimmy admitted, with an air of gravity. "But—I'll keep on trying. You can bet on that! I'll find some way out of it, even if I have to begin again in some [Pg 205] other line. They all of them have to admit that I'm honest—that's an asset that nobody can dispute. We can't all be brilliant and honest at the same time. Some men are brilliant but fail to gain confidence. ”

“ They seemed to scent the room with a definite and yet elusive fragrance, quite like her personality that was so soon to be but a memory.
"Well, Bill Jones, Pirate, you are late," she said, as she took his hat from his hand, while he removed his overcoat and hung it on the tiny little cloak stand in the corner, thinking as he did so, that there it brushed, honored, against her hanging garments.
"The obsequies of a pirate are best held in late afternoon," he replied. "It's a time-honored form. I'm very formal, as you know."
"I suppose Mary Allen has to die, too, doesn't she? ”

“ A man can not lie about anything he has to sell—if it's nothing bigger than hairpins—and get away with it very long. I never lie about my line—never! I really believe that some of our stuff is the best of its kind made. I say so. I honestly admit it when some other house brings out a certain line that beats ours, and then I hustle back home and put on my spurs, and get out my hammer, and try to get my firm to see it, and to meet the new stuff and if possible to go it one better."
Jimmy had forgotten all about Yimville, now that he was expatiating on a pet hobby of his. ”

“ One never knows. That's the pity of it all. But that's the way it looks to me, and—that's the way communing with a poor old horse taught me, the only game I try to play. It's only when we've lost the true sense of things that we say 'Life's nothing but a horse show—after all!'"
Staring at the arena, and bringing his thoughts back to their surroundings, he waited for her to speak; but for the moment they seemed fixed in a little oasis of silence, embodying but them alone. ”

“ Martin laughed as if delighted by such an absurdity.
"Well," he remarked, "if that's the way you handle your private affairs it doesn't look promising for whoever employs you. No, I'll retract that, and on second thought reverse that judgment. I'll say that if you invariably put your employer's interests before your own your sole chance to succeed is to become a member of any firm you work for. I suggest that you put that up to—Sayers."
"Don't quite get you," said Jimmy, as if puzzled. "You aren't having fun with me, are you?"
"I am not," asserted the shrewd old business man. "I'm in earnest." ”

“ Gollop," and looked up to see his traveling companion.
"Not at all, Mr. Martin," he replied. "Always glad to have good company. I'm a sociable sort of cuss myself. I detest traveling alone, eating alone, or loafing alone. I suppose I'm gregarious."
A troubled, thoughtful shadow chased itself over the elder man's face, as he said, with a half-sigh, "I understand. It's not good for a man to be alone. And the older he becomes, the more he feels lonesomeness, and the more he wants—home!"
The word was the magic one for Jimmy. ”

“ There'll be one combination smoker car filled with yawning farm hands who wear fertilizer on their boots. But it's me for that train!"
Then, recovering his cheerfulness, he sallied out to visit all the confectionary shops; but met with no success and attributed his failure to the hideous goggles and the fact that his customary happy and seductive grin was slightly stiff about the corners as if his face needed oiling. "Hang it all! Nobody but an undertaker could look happy in this town," Jimmy thought after his final effort. "No wonder that old cuss is so solemn. ”

“ I have!" assented Jimmy lugubriously. "I've played the biggest joke of all on myself. By heck! I've joked myself out of my own job, and that's the limit. Joe Miller never did that and Mark Twain, Josh Billings, Bill Nye and George Ade, none of 'em ever reached that height of humor. The only difference between us is that they got cash for their jokes, whereas all the pay I get is the boot and the chance to go yelping down the street with a washboiler tied to my tail. Well, if a fellow puts grease on the front door steps he shouldn't squeal if he forgets and falls down himself." ”

“ He ought to wear whiskers. A Judge without whiskers isn't any good, anyhow, I reckon. So here I am with the biggest chance of my life, and it's all mucked up because I can't get that chap to forget that I helped him out with a single speech I made for him up at Yimville. Why, if he had sense enough to appreciate it, I gave him more free advertising than he ever had before in all his life! That apology of mine should have made more votes for him than he'd ever have grabbed through his own eloquence. I wouldn't harm him for anything and yet he hates me. ”

“ James Gollop did not actually smile again until seven-thirty that evening, when he received a reply to a question addressed to the conductor of the eastbound train.
"Are we over the state line yet?" was the question asked.
"By about thirty miles, I should reckon," was the reply.
"Thank heaven for that!" said Mr. Gollop, resuming a placid mental attitude, and the celebrated Gollop grin. "It's a wise man who knows where he's not welcome. Both celebrity and notoriety are distinctions to be shunned. ”

“ His universe could scarcely note the extinguishment of a sun. He had never paused to analyze it, but had fallen upon the truth that the love of a man of thirty-four makes or breaks far more irrevocably than does the evanescent love of a boy. The latter patient recovers amazingly. The former seeks a hospital alone, and the soul of him dies!
Jimmy found less difficulty in telegraphing an extravagant order for violets to be sent to "Miss Nellie Sturgis, care Martha Putnam Hotel, New York," than he did in the composition of a suitable letter of apology. ”

“ And it was with this feeling that he entered the Engineers' Club and was met in the hallway by Martin, who had just arrived.
"On time, I see—I like that," was the elder man's greeting. "Now, first of all, we shall have lunch, because I'm hungry. I never talk business during meals. I believe in relaxation."
"But—but—what's the use in eating when there's anything more important to do?" asked Jimmy, eager to hear Martin's verdict.
"Nothing is as important as eating when one is hungry," was his host's remark, and Jimmy had to be content. "Hope you had a nice trip out to Princetown?" ”

“ Personally I can't keep a grudge. Life's too short for that. I never try to play, even, in a malicious way. If a man really hurts me, I 'most always think of his side of it, and if I decide I'm in the wrong, go to him and say so. If I think I'm in the right,—just forget him. If he gets the best of me in business, I congratulate him. That's part of the game. This chap Granger really never did me much harm and I think maybe that I, without really intending it, did him quite a lot. So I did the best I could to square it."
"How?" asked Martin with another one of those quizzical glances of his. ”