Sewell Ford

“ The whole world has placed this famous Religious-Historical Romance on a height of pre-eminence which no other novel of its time has reached. The clashing of rivalry and the deepest human passions, the perfect reproduction of brilliant Roman life, and the tense, fierce atmosphere of the arena have kept their deep fascination. ”

“ Mr. Hooker, pullin’ the Dummy up by the sleeve, “is what happens. This boy went to work in your glass factory when he was thirteen. He was red cheeked, clear eyed, then, and he had a normal brain. He held his job six years. Then he was discharged. Why? Because he wasn’t of any more use. He was all in, the juice sapped out of him, as dry as a last year’s cornhusk. Look at him! Any doubt about his being used up? And what happened to him is happening to thousands of other boys. So I have come here to ask you, Mr. Rankin, if you are proud of turning out such products? ”

“ He comes shufflin’ in, luggin’ a scrub pail in one hand, and draggin’ a mop in the other, and he looks about as cheerful as a worn-out hearse that’s been turned into an ash wagon.
“Heiney,” says I, “you’re just in time. Still lookin’ for a nice, comfortable place to die in, are you?”
Heiney shrugs his shoulders and lifts his eyebrows in a lifeless sort of style. He does most of his conversin’ that way; but he can say more with a few shrugs than Swifty Joe can by usin’ both sides of his mouth. What Heiney means is that one place is as good as another, and he don’t care how soon he finds it. ”

“ We’ve got a whole squad of husky, two-handed, soft spoken gents who don’t have anything else to do, and our champeen ruction extinguisher is Danny Reardon. To see him strollin’ through the café, you might think he was a corporation lawyer studyin’ how to spend his next fee; but let some ambitious wine opener put on the loud pedal, or have Danny get his eye on some Bridgeport dressmaker drawin’ designs of the latest Paris fashions in the tea room, and you’ll see him wake up. Nothing seems to get by him. ”

“ His first move after the ladies have sailed is to smoke until his tongue feels like a pussycat’s back, eat his lonesome meals at lunch-counter clip, and work himself into a mild bilious state. That makes him a little cranky with the help, and, as there’s no one around to smooth ’em out, the cook and half a dozen maids leaves in a bunch. His head coachman goes off on a bat, the housekeeper skips out to Ohio to bury an aunt, and the domestic gear at Blenmont gets 203 to runnin’ about as smooth as a flat wheel trolley car on a new roadbed. ”

“ Ever seen a great, grown man play the baby act? Talk about a woman in a cryin’ spell! That ain’t a marker to watchin’ a six-foot, one hundred and eighty-pound free citizen droop his mouth corners and slump his shoulders over nothin’ at all. Course, I don’t always feel like a hickey boy myself, and I’ll admit there are times when the rosy tints get a little clouded up; but I has my own way of workin’ out of such 202 spells before the mullygrubs turns my gray matter into curdled milk. But Jarvis, he’s as blue as a rainy Monday with the wash all in soak. ”

“ We goes four blocks before we shakes out the last of our ammunition, and by that time the Mallory brougham looks like a poultry wagon after a busy day at the market, while Aunt Elvira has cut loose with the mirth so hard that the velvet bonnet is hangin’ under her chin, and 293 Bismarck is out of breath. It’s a wonder we wa’n’t pinched for breakin’ the speed laws; but the traffic cops is so busy watchin’ the feather blizzard that they forgets to hold us up. Dyke wants to know if I’ll come in for a cup of tea, or ride back with Jerry. ”

“ Honest, I never expected to feel lonesome right at home entertainin’ guests! but I was gettin’ acquainted with the sensation. There’s no musical doings, no happy groups and gay laughter about the house; nothing but now and then a whisper from dark corners, or the creak of the porch swings.
“Gee! but they’re takin’ their spoonin’ serious, ain’t they?” says I to Sadie. “And how popular we are with ’em! Makes me feel almost like I ought to put on a gag and sit down cellar in the coalbin.”
“Pooh!” says Sadie, makin’ a bluff she didn’t mind. “Do let them enjoy themselves in their own way.” ”

“ All Bob pulls out is a couple of thousand a year, even that being handled first by Brother DeLancey, who cops all the rest of the pile as a reward for always having gone in strong for charity and the perfectly good life.
It’s a case where virtue shows up strong from the first tap of the bell. Course, Bob can look back on some years of vivid joy, when he was makin’ a record as a quart opener, buyin’ stacks of blues at Daly’s, or over at Monte Carlo bettin’ where the ball would stop. ”

“ Now, I don’t claim any seventh-son powers; but I only has to take one look at Toodle to guess that he’s some sort of a phony article. No reg’lar pill distributor would wear around that mushy look that he has on. He’s a good sized, wide shouldered duck, with a thick crop of long hair that just clears his coat collar, and one of these smooth, soft, sentimental faces the women folks go nutty over,—you know, big nose, heavy chin, and sagged mouth corners. His get-up is something between a priest’s and an actor’s,—frock coat, smooth front black vest, and a collar buttoned behind. ”

“ Look at Phemey; she’s a native.”
Well, we looked at Phemey. Couldn’t help it. Euphemia don’t seem to mind. She don’t even grin; but just goes on workin’ her jaws and lookin’ placid.
“Out in Dobie that would pass for hysterics,” says Maizie. “The only way they could account for me was by saying that I was born crazy in another State. I’ve had a good many kinds of hard luck; but being born in Dobie wasn’t one of the varieties. Now can you stand the story of my life?”
“Miss Blickens,” says I, “I’m willin’ to pay you by the hour.” ”

“ The eighth man is a practical stone mason who is bossing the job. It’s a good stone wall they’re building, too. We expect to run it along our entire frontage.”
“Got ’em mesmerized?” says I.
“Not at all,” says Tutwater. “It’s part of the treatment. McWade’s idea, you know. The vocational cure, we call it, and it works like a charm. Mr. Fargo is practically a well man now and could return to his home next week if he wished. As it is, he’s so much interested in finishing that first section of the wall that he will probably stay the month out. You can see for yourself what they are doing.” ”

“ Bunched the way we are, all up and down seventeen stories, with every cubic foot accounted for, we don’t cut much of a figure except on the checkbooks. You hear about the Perzazzer only when some swell gives a fancy blow-out, or a guest gets frisky in the public dining room. ”

“ And I was just wonderin’ how I could relieve my feelin’s without eatin’ a fuzzy worm, like the small boy that nobody loved, when I hears footsteps approachin’ through the shrubb’ry. I looks up, to find myself bein’ inspected by a weedy, long legged youth. He’s an odd lookin’ kid, with dull reddish hair, so many freckles that his face looks rusty, and a pair of big purple black eyes that gazes at me serious. ”

“ Don’t ever talk to me about chins again, either! Hermy has chin enough for a trust buster; but that’s all the good it seems to do him.
“You ain’t cast the hypnotic spell over him, have you, Snick?” says I.
“Hypnotic nothing!” says Snick. “That ain’t a man; it’s only a music box!”
“A which?” says I.
“Barytone,” says Snick. “Say, did you ever hear Bonci or Caruso or any of that mob warble? No? Well, then I’ll have to tell you. Look at Hermy there. Take a good long gaze at him. And—sh-h-h! After he’s had one show at the Metropolitan he’ll have that whole bunch carryin’ spears.” ”

“ I haven’t begun on the brokers and bankers yet; but you will be in good company.”
“Ye-e-es?” says I, runnin’ my eye over the firm names. “But I don’t know much about this scheme of yours, Miss Colliver.”
“Why, it is for working girls,” says she, “who are victims of the white plague. We take them up to Piny Crest and cure them.”
“Of working?” says I.
“Of the plague,” says she. “It is going to be the grandest thing I’ve done yet. And I have the names of such a lot of the most interesting cases; poor creatures, you know, who are suffering in the most wretched quarters. ”

“ Now, doing things for other folks ain’t one of Pinckney’s strong points, as a rule. Not that he wouldn’t if he thought of it and could find the time; but gen’rally he has too many other things on his schedule to indulge much in the little deeds of kindness game. When he does start out to do good, though, he makes a job of it. But look who he picks out!
Course, I knew why. He’s explained all that to me more’n once. ”

“ I don’t go to London and Paris and pay fancy salaries. I find my attractions first hand, sign’ em up on long contracts, and take the velvet that comes in myself. That’s my way, and I guess I’ve made good.”
“Maybe you have,” says I; “but I’m guessin’ this is where you stub your toe. Hot line that’ll be for the head of a bill, won’t it—an accordion player? Think you can get that across?”
“Think!” says Chunk, gettin’ indignant as usual, because someone suggests he can fall down on anything. “Why, I’m going to put that over twice a day, to twelve hundred-dollar houses! No, I don’t think; I know!” ”

“ Now, usually Snick’s a fancy dresser, no matter who he owes for it. He’ll quit eatin’ any time, or do the camel act, or even give up his cigarettes; but if the gents’ furnishing shops are showin’ something new in the line of violet socks or alligator skin vests, Snick’s got to sport the first ones sprung on Broadway.
So, seein’ him show up with fringes on his cuffs, a pair of runover tan shoes, and wearin’ his uniform cap off duty, I can’t help feelin’ some shocked, or wonderin’ how much more’n a five-spot I’ll be out by the time he leaves. ”

“ You’d most think, livin’ in an out of the way, forsaken place like that, that most any native would be glad to stop work long enough to look over a hot lookin’ bunch like ours.
This one don’t seem inclined that way, though. He keeps his back bent and his head down and his hands busy. Now, whenever I’ve been out in a machine, and we’ve had any kind of trouble, there’s always been a gawpin’ committee standin’ around, composed of every human being in sight at the time of the casualty, includin’ a few that seemed to pop up out of the ground. ”

“ Marston, ain’t exactly novel; but didn’t it ever occur to you that some folks get theirs by workin’ for it?”
“I know,” says he, tryin’ to seem good natured again; “but I’m not that kind. I’m an idler. As some poet has put it, ‘Useless I linger, a cumberer here.’”
“You’re a cucumber, all right,” says I; “but why not, just for a change, make a stab at gettin’ a job?”
“I’ve had several,” says he, “and never could hold one more than a week. Too monotonous, for one thing; and then, in these offices, one is thrown among so many ill bred persons, you know.” ”

“ There’s plenty, though. Also there’s a lot of industry on view. Over by the light shaft window is Mrs. Tiscott, pumpin’ a sewin’ machine like she was entered in a twenty-four-hour endurance race, with a big bundle of raw materials at one side. In front of her is the oldest girl, sewin’ buttons onto white goods; while the three younger kids, includin’ the four-year-old boy, are spread out around the table in the middle of the room, pickin’ nut meat into the dishpan. ”

“ Hermy has most got to the final spasm, and it’s about all over, when, as a last straw, some sort of disturbance breaks out in the front hall. First off I thought it must be Snick Butters throwin’ a fit; but then I hears a voice that ain’t his, and as I glances out I sees the Purdy-Pell butler havin’ a rough house argument with a black whiskered gent in evenin’ clothes and a Paris model silk lid. Course, everyone hears the rumpus, and there’s a grand rush, some to get away, and others to see what’s doin’. ”

“ To look at Jens you wouldn’t have thought he could have been taught the difference between a can of salmon and a patent corn planter; but say, Uncle Hen had him trained to make short change and weigh his hand with every piece of salt pork, almost as slick as he could do it himself. ”

“ They can’t seem to help gettin’ that way, any more’n other folks can dodge havin’ bad dreams, or boils on the neck. And I ain’t any mind specialist; so when it comes to sayin’ what’ll soften up a man’s brain, or whether he couldn’t sidestep it if he tried, I passes the make.
Now look at this dippy move of Mr. Jarvis’s. Guess you don’t remember him. I’d ’most forgot him myself, it’s so long since he was around; but he’s the young chap that owns that big Blenmont place, the gent that Swifty and I helped out with the fake match when he——Well, never mind that yarn. He got the girl, all right ”