Mr. Petersen

“ The former speaker grinned.
"Ja! Pretty soft. Aye bet Aye have good tam dis trip. Yust vait. You don't know how purty is Ponatah. She—"
Petersen's listeners waited. They are waiting yet, for the mail-man never completed his admiring recital of the Indian girl's charms, owing to the fact that the genial Mr. ”

“ A more unexcited inspection showed us, too, that their numbers were not as great nor their size as large as some of us had been disposed to « 76 » fancy at first. In a word, I was satisfied that they were natives of the country; and, calling Petersen from his bunk to be my interpreter, I proceeded unarmed, and waving my open hands, toward a stout figure who made himself conspicuous, and seemed to have a greater number near him than the rest. He evidently understood the movement, for he at once, like a brave fellow, leaped down upon the floe and advanced to meet me fully half-way. ”

“ When everything was tidy Peters sat down and drank his tea, and thought about his ambitions.
Now, Mr Peters, as will have been gathered, was as ignorant as a child of the manner in which promotion takes place in a solicitor's office, and of the fact that he had no chance whatever. He was conscientious and patient, and could do mechanical work; he was quite regular. Some men can do a thing one day which they cannot do on the next, but Peters was never unexpected. ”

“ Then tell me who called here to-day."
"Oh, there was the postman; and a neighbor who called to borrow a pie-plate—and Petersen who came to ask something of Christina."
"Indeed! And who is this Petersen?"
"A neighbor, Mijnheer; a night-watchman; my master knows him well."
"Yes," said Balthazar, addressing the sergeant, "he is a poor devil who lost his wife a month ago, and his two little children are both sick. We help the poor fellow from time to time."
"And this Petersen was in the house to-day?"
"No, Mijnheer," replied Gudule; "he only spoke to Christina from the sidewalk." ”

“ Plants, Bill—squirmy red plants with long feelers that can twist around a man and devour him. Half animal, they are, and the feelers break loose and crawl by themselves. Multiplying like nothing you ever saw. Millions of them in an hour."
"What?" Petersen stared incredulously as his motor roared into life. Then he gave his attention to the business of taking off. He jerked the thumb of his free hand toward the radio.
an's expert fingers manipulated the switches and dials of the portable apparatus, and its vacuum tubes glowed into life. "2BXX calling 2TIM," he droned into the microphone. ”

“ Mr. Peterson. No.
Mr. Specter. Did you talk to him?
Mr. Peterson. I think I did. Yes; I did talk to him. That is why I remember. I’m trying to think.
Mr. Specter. To the best of your recollection tell me specifically what you said to him and what he said to you?
Mr. Peterson. Well, just wanted to know—let me see. Was it there or was it at the hotel? They wanted a—Time, I think it was Time, or Life, because the man in Life is located in Dallas. He just wanted to know if we had any pictures with Jack Ruby or anything we had done for a story. I told him we did not have anything. ”

“ He shot a seal, which they devoured, and which, under Providence, saved their lives. Petersen is a good ice pilot, knows all these coasts as well as, or better than, any man living, and, from long experience and habits of observation, is almost unerring in his prognostications of the weather. Besides his great value to us as interpreter, few men are better adapted for Arctic work—an ardent sportsman, an agreeable companion, never at a loss for occupation or amusement, and always contented and sanguine. But we have, happily, many such dispositions in the Fox. ”

“ Peterson has been the president of Franconia since its incorporation. In 1869 he married Miss Ingur Johnson, daughter of Eric Johnson, a pioneer of St. Peter, Minnesota, and is the father of two children, Axel, a promising son, who died in February, [Pg 321] 1885, at fourteen years of age, and Maria, now a student in the Ladies' Seminary at Faribault, who is developing marked ability as a pencil artist. Mr. Peterson owns one of the finest houses in the valley, romantically situated, which is supplied with pure spring water. It is a pride to the village and attracts general attention. ”

“ That's d' finish. As I states d' foist dash out of d' box, it's d' dandy hard luck story of d' year. D' whole Petersen push is wiped out, same as that bar-keep would swab off his bar. On d' dead! it's all too many for me! What's d' use of folks bein' born at all, if dey's goin' to get yanked in like that—t'ree at a clatter, an' all young!
“Do dey have re-latiffs? Some in d' old country, I takes it. There's a note d' Petersen woman leaves for me Rag, astin' her to write d' hist'ry of d' last round an' wind-up to d' folks at home, an' givin' d' address. ”

“ Max, moving off a little to one side, followed, and reached Peterson's side just as Grady, his hat pushed back on his head and his feet apart, was beginning to talk.
"I had a little conversation with you the other day, Mr. Peterson. I called to see you in the interests of the men, the men that are working for you—working like galley slaves they are, every man of them. It's shameful to a man that's seen how they've been treated by the nigger drivers that stands over them day and night." ”

“ Peterkin, "for I think I felt a drop of rain." So they made the best of their way to Grandfather's.
At the moment they reached the door of the house, a party of young people whom Elizabeth Eliza knew came by in sleighs. She had met them all when visiting at her grandfather's.
"Come along with us," they shouted; "we are all going down to the sugar festival."
"That is what we have come for," said Mr. Peterkin.
"Where is it?" asked Solomon John.
"It is down your way," was the reply.
"It is in your own New Hall," said another. "We have sent down all our syrup. ”

“ Ah, here's Peters," he added as the hermit entered through the dining-room door at the side of the stairs.
"All finished, gentlemen?" he asked, coming forward. "Now, this is solid comfort, ain't it? I reckon when you get a few days of this, you'll all become hermits, and build yourselves shacks on the mountain. Solid comfort. No woman to make you put on overshoes when you go out, or lecture you about the effects of alcohol on the stomach. Heaven, I call it."
"Peters," said Mr. Magee, "we have been wondering if you will stay on here and cook for us. We need you. ”

“ And then they would say to each other, that they supposed he was looking for a perfect boy, and in their opinion, he would look a good while before he found one. Not that there were not plenty of boys—as many as a dozen used sometimes to appear in the course of a morning, trying for the situation. Mr. Peters was said to be rich and boys were very anxious to try to suit him. "All he wants is a fellow to run of errands; it must be easy work and sure pay." This was the way they talked to each other. But Mr. Peters wanted more than a boy to run of errands. ”

“ Mr. Atwood met them at the porch. “I beg pardon,” he said. “I hope you have found it comfortable here, and shall be glad to have you stay till Mr. Peters’ family comes.”
At this moment wheels were heard. Mr. Sylvester had arrived, with an open wagon, to take the Peterkins to the “Old Farm.”
Martha was waiting within the door, and said to Elizabeth Eliza, “Beg pardon, miss, for thinking you was one of the inmates, and putting you in that room. We thought it so kind of Mrs. Peters to take you off every day with the other gentlemen, that looked so wandering.” ”

“ I’ve never had a girl frien’ who was as touchy as you are. I didn’t really tell Mister Felman anything about you ’cept that you was rowmantic, an’ that’s nothin’ to be ashamed about.”
“See here, stop all this quarrelin’,” said Petersen, to whom the speech of women was always an ignorance that assailed the patience of masculine wisdom. “You women can talk for ten hours about nothin’! I didn’t bring my friend down to have him lissen to your squabblin’. Cut it out, I tell ya.”
This storm in an earthen jar was amusing to Carl. ”

“ Petersen openly charged them, as they stood upon the shore, with the theft. They all threw up their hands with expressions of injured innocence. "My people never steal!" exclaimed the affronted chief.
One fellow was so loud in his protestations of innocence that Petersen suspected him. The Dane approached him with a flash of anger in his [119] eye, which told its own story. The Esquimo stepped back, stooped, picked up the hatchet, on which he had been standing, and gave it to Petersen with one hand, and with the other presented him a pair of mittens as a peace-offering. ”

“ The earliest life of Peters is that by William Yonge, M.D.—England's Shame, or the unmasking of a politic Atheist, being a full and faithful relation of the life and death of that grand impostor Hugh Peters, 12mo, 1663. This is a scurrilous collection of fabrications. The first attempt at an impartial biography was an historical and critical account of Hugh Peters after the manner of Mr. Bayle, published anonymously by Dr. William Harris in 1751, 4to, reprinted, in 1814, in his Historical and Critical Account of the Lives of James I, Charles I, &c., 5 vols, 8vo. ”

“ Peterssen will reward you. You are mistaken. He has promised you a sum of money for misleading us. You will not get a penny of it. You fool! Better for you to have trusted straightforward gentlemen who had the means, and had the will, to richly reward you, than a scoundrel like your master, who has used you as a tool. You are to report the success of your treachery to him personally. Where? In London? Go to him there, go to the address he gave you, and try and find him. As he has rogued others, he has rogued you. ”

“ Frank A. Peterson is likewise a man cut out for frontier life where energy and strong arms are required. He is a native of Sweden, but came to South Dakota in his early days, stayed there for some years, and in 1886 landed in Seattle, and two years later joined his countrymen at Cedarhome. He has been awake to the interest of the public schools and the welfare of the community in general; for years he has been a member of the school board. His brother John is also a good citizen.
[Pg 180]
Mr. ”

“ He fought in all the battles of 1812 on the Niagara frontier, and was wounded at Lundy’s Lane and Chippewa, and carried two bullets in his body till his death in 1863. He was out again in 1837, on the Tory side, raising a troop of cavalry which he commanded. Mr. Peterson was educated partly at a common school in Stamford, and partly by private tuition, preparatory to entering the Toronto University in the engineering course. ”

“ And I'll tell him I left you well. Good-bye, Petersen; you're a handy man. Tell him he's a handy man in his own langwidge, and I'll take it kindly.”
Captain Cable shook hands, and clattered out of the cabin in his great sea-boots.
Half an hour later the Olaf was alone on that shallow sea, which seemed lonelier and more silent than ever; for when a strong man quits a room he often bequeaths a sudden silence to those he leaves behind.
IV TWO OF A TRADE
“His face reminds one of a sunny graveyard,” a witty Frenchwoman had once said of a man named Paul Deulin. ”

“ For the first time in the memory of man, Peterson became imbued with a combative spirit. He knocked the man down, and kicked him until a crowd gathered and dragged him off. The fact that a prison cell circumscribed the freedom of his move- ments shortly after the affray with the stranger did not disturb the sullen equanimity of Peter- son’s mind, and when Henry Fogle, the wiliest lawyer on the western frontier, entered his apartment, he took no more notice of him than if it had been his jailer bearing his evening meal. ”

“ I am sorry my husband is out. I have taken the opportunity, Dr. Peterson, of consulting you—”
She moved towards the window, graceful, well poised, and unembarrassed. The specialist stood aside, his face a sympathetic blank, a birdlike and inquisitive alertness visible in his eyes.
“You have noticed my face, Dr. Peterson?”
She stood before him unflinchingly, a woman of distinction and of charm of manner despite her great disfigurement. The fingers of Dr. Peterson’s right hand were fidgeting with his watch-chain. It was wholly improper for a London consultant to appear embarrassed. ”

“ Mr. Herman says that Arab could be ridden easier by a lady than by a gentleman; I suppose it’s because, like all well-born cavaliers, he is chivalrous to the weaker sex.”
“Pray,” said the Major, smiling, and turning to Mrs. Warren, “who is the Mr. Herman that your niece has mentioned thus twice in the space of five minutes? I suppose,” he continued, glancing at Kate, “I dare not ask herself.”
“Mr. Herman?” replied the aunt, slowly. “O! that’s the old farmer who was such a friend of my late brother. An excellent man, Major Gordon, though not blessed with many of this world’s goods.” ”

“ Mr. Peterkin, indeed, saw it would be impossible to make their way through the throng that filled every side street which they crossed. Mrs. Peterkin looked out of the back window for Agamemnon and Solomon John. They were walking side by side, behind the carriage, taking off their hats, and bowing to the people cheering on either side.
"They are at the head of a long row of men, walking two by two," said Mrs. Peterkin.
"They are part of the procession," said Elizabeth Eliza.
"We are part of the procession," Mr. Peterkin answered. ”