Uncle Jim

“ Maybe Uncle Jim would have bored me just as much. Of course you always taught me to love dad when I was little. I simply had to, you might say. You used to say he never had any time to play with me. But when you come to think of it, he had loads more time than ever Uncle Jim did. He was only here sometimes, when he came to see grandma. But some way, when I look back at it, it seems as if he played with me for years, almost."
"Well, of course he did play with you whenever he came. He said it was a rest for him. He was always tired. He enjoyed fooling about with you." ”

“ Uncle Jim was certainly not a handsome person. He was short, shorter than Mr. Polly, with long arms and lean big hands, a thin and wiry neck stuck out of his grey flannel shirt and supported a big head that had something of the snake in the convergent lines of its broad knotty brow, meanly proportioned face and pointed chin. His almost toothless mouth seemed a cavern in the twilight. ”

“ His uncle Jim's handsome face glowed with the conventional poetry of recaptured boyhood, with delight in the photographs which he tinted artistically with transparent water colors, with pride in the analogies which had been suggested to him in the north and which would serve him in many private conversations if not in sermons.
Alwyn's father, on the other hand, talked by the hour of exaggerated dangers and mystifying sensations of danger where there was none; of men who lost their compasses and strayed in circles and were found half dead; of timber wolves baying up and down the darkness ”

“ Uncle Billy started to his feet, but Uncle Jim caught his arm. "Don't leave the cards! It's only the wind; sit down," he said in a low awe-hushed voice, "it's your deal; you were two before, and two now, that makes you four; you've only one point to make to win the game. Go on."
They both poured out a cup of whiskey, smiling vaguely, yet with a certain terror in their eyes. Their hands were cold; the cards slipped from Uncle Billy's benumbed fingers; when he had shuffled them he passed them to his partner to shuffle them also, but did not speak. ”

“ The times are bad. He is worried.
Imagine Uncle Jim economical!"
"Incredible."
"Yes. He told me that his talk with Colonel Beauregard had made him despair of a peaceful ending, and usually he is hopeful."
"Well, don't make me talk politics. We rarely do. Isn't this outlook beautiful? People rarely come here and it often gives me a chance to be alone and to think."
"And what do you think about, John?" She was again curious.
"Oh, many things, big and little. Uncle Jim, Aunt Ann, Mr. Rivers,
Dixy—hornets, muskrats," he laughed. She noted the omission of Leila
Grey. ”

“ When the watchers looked at me in amazement I repeated, "Uncle Jim is not dead! He is only sleeping."
Mrs. Rhodes looked compassionately at me, and by a meaning glance at the others said as plainly as if she had spoken, "His mind is affected."
She and Mr. Newberry, the neighbor whom I had first met, gently led me from the room. I was, myself dumfounded at the words I had uttered, nor could I find a reason for them.
My uncle was undoubtedly dead, at least as far as this physical world was concerned. ”

“ His old partner had accepted his visit to San Francisco without question, and had alluded to a renewal of their old intimacy. For Uncle Billy, with all his trustful simplicity, had been tortured by two harrowing doubts: one, whether Uncle Jim in his new-fledged smartness as a "city" man—such as he saw in the streets—would care for his rough companionship; the other, whether he, Uncle Billy, ought not to tell him at once of his changed fortune. ”

“ He extended his hand.
"I'm in," said Uncle Billy, radiantly grasping Uncle Jim's. But his smile faded, and his clear simple brow wrinkled in two lines.
Happily Uncle Jim did not notice it. "Now, then, old pard," he said brightly, "we'll have a gay old time to-night—one of our jamborees! I've got some whisky here and a deck o' cards, and we'll have a little game, you understand, but not for 'keeps' now! No, siree; we'll play for beans."
A sudden light illuminated Uncle Billy's face again, but he said, with a grim desperation, "Not to-night! I've got to go into town. ”

“ The gold-spectacled gentleman, as if inspired, came down the wooden steps again, seized the tablecloth of the jam and egg party, lugged it from under the crockery with inadequate precautions against breakage, and advanced with compressed lips, curious lateral crouching movements, swift flashings of his glasses, and a general suggestion of bull-fighting in his pose and gestures. Uncle Jim was kept busy, and unable to plan his retreat with any strategic soundness. ”

“ If there is still a chance for me I am going to stay and fight for it. If I have no chance"—he dropped into a chair—"then I'll go back with you, Uncle Jim."
James Greenfield's face flushed hotly at the younger man's words and then, in the silence that followed, grew pale and stern while his fingers gripped his pencil nervously. "Very well, Willard," he said at last. "You are a man and your own master. If your love for me cannot influence you—"
"Uncle Jim!" The engineer's cry was a protest and an appeal, but the other continued as though he had not heard: "I can urge no other consideration. ”

“ He laid down his cards and gazed mysteriously at his companion. Uncle Jim knew perfectly that Uncle Billy had regularly once a week for many years declared his final determination to go over to Angel's and prospect his claim, yet nevertheless he half responded to his partner's suggestion of mystery, and a look of fatuous wonder crept into his eyes. But he contented himself by saying cautiously, "You spoke of it first."
"That's the more sing'lar," said Uncle Billy confidently. "And I've been thinking about it, and kinder seeing myself thar all day. It's mighty queer!" ”

“ Two or three times when the old man kind o' lagged behind, it looked like she waited for him to ketch up, and when she got through and Uncle Jim was lumberin' on the last note, she folded her hands and set there lookin' out the winder where the sun was shinin' on the silver poplar trees, jest as peaceful as a angel, and the rest of us as mad as hornets. Milly Amos set back of Uncle Jim, and his red bandanna handkerchief was lyin' over his shoulders where he'd been shooin' the flies away. ”

“ It's just to please Aunt Ann. She said, 'No, James, I don't want any one.' He wished to please her. She really thinks of nothing but the war and Uncle Jim, and when Uncle Jim is away she will spend an hour alone over his maps. She has—what do you call it—?"
"Is obsession the word you want?"
"Yes—that's it."
"Now, Leila, neither you nor I nor Mark Rivers can help those two people we love. Don't cry, Leila; or cry if it will help you. When you marry, be sure to ask, 'what are your politics, Jeremiah?'" His diversion answered his purpose. ”

“ The middle classes serving only themselves, bringing up sons in the interest of the family fortunes, seducing the sons of others if they had none of their own—the Fieldings were people of that sort. He thought of his uncle Jim among them, as timid as the last heir of a branch of deposed royalty—ashamed of its poverty and fanaticism, himself without either heirs or pretensions—in their grudgingly hospitable, merchant prince's palace. ”

“ But when Uncle Billy awoke the next morning he saw it was late; for the sun, piercing the crack of the closed door, was sending a pencil of light across the cold hearth, like a match to rekindle its dead embers. His first thought was of his strange luck the night before, and of disappointment that he had not had the dream of divination that he had looked for. He sprang to the floor, but as he stood upright his glance fell on Uncle Jim's bunk. It was empty. Not only that, but his BLANKETS—Uncle Jim's own particular blankets—WERE GONE! ”

“ And an highway shall be there, and it shall be called the way of holiness—wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein. No lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast. Sorrow and sighing shall flee away."
Alwyn had never seen nor heard so moving a man. He compared him with the family minister, his uncle Jim; but almost in shame, he wished that he were beside the latter in the great, odious city mansion, rather than where he was; and suddenly thought of him not only with a certain lack of respect but with profound gratitude—he scarcely knew why. ”

“ He would have to make some sort of peace between the fruitless pride of the one and the creative vanity of the other.
There would also have to be a compromise between his talent for poverty and his love of wealth; not, he hoped, the one his uncle Jim had made. He wondered at the fact that he was most deeply indebted to that one of his relatives who conformed to his standards, appealed to his imagination, the least. He felt for his uncle at once a vaguely disdainful pity and that admiration which, even against one's better judgment, often follows gratitude. ”

“ Uncle Jimmie spoke dryly.
“We’ve got to be in New York to-morrow afternoon,” explained Aunt Edie. “We’ll have to start at crack of dawn, but don’t bother about breakfast for us, Mrs. Gildersleeve. We can get something at the hotel in the next big town. We have to rush—we’ve booked passage on the Crespic that sails on Saturday—and there’s rafts of things to do in New York. Jim has to see people. He’s going over for the Government, you know.”
She gazed at her Jim proudly. Jacqueline stood with Aunt Eunice’s arm about her (Aunt Eunice who, she knew, would rather she were Caroline!) ”

“ For two or three days Uncle Billy was staggered and bewildered; in his profound simplicity he wondered if his extraordinary good fortune that night had made him deaf to some explanation of his partner's, or, more terrible, if he had shown some “low” and incredible intimation of taking his partner's extravagant bet as REAL and binding. In this distress he wrote to Uncle Jim an appealing and apologetic letter, albeit somewhat incoherent and inaccurate, and bristling with misspelling, camp slang, and old partnership jibes. ”

“ I came upon men with ropes and guns. Uncle Jim was tied, and a rope was round his neck. Mother Jane was lying on the ground. I thought she was dead until I heard her moan. I was not afraid. I screamed and flew at Uncle Jim to tear the ropes off him. The men held me back. They called me a pretty cat. Then they talked together, and some were for hanging Lassiter—that was the first time I ever knew any name for him but Uncle Jim—and some were for leaving him in the valley. Finally they decided to hang him. But Mother Jane pleaded so and I screamed and fought so that they left off. ”

“ When at last the once sturdy, ambitious man struggled back to life he was only the wreck of what he had been.
Jim returned to school when his father was out of danger, as his uncle thought he ought to finish the term. He was very much subdued, but his companions appreciated his manliness, and gave him a warm welcome.
"He has lots of pluck," said Carl warmly; "he was as anxious to go to college as any of us, but he doesn't say a word about it now—says he is going to work this summer."
"I wish you would tell him how pleased I am with him," said Aunt Zélie. ”

“ Rising to his feet, he said, "Uncle Jim does not agree with you, and Aunt Ann and her brother, Henry Grey, think that Mr. Buchanan will bring all our troubles to an end. Of course, sir, I don't know, but"—and his voice rose—"if there ever should be such a war, I am on Uncle Jim's side, and being out of West Point would not keep me out of the fight."
Rivers shook his head. "It will come, John. Few men think as I do, and your uncle considers me, I suspect, to be governed by my unhappy way of seeing the dark side of things. He says that I am a bewildered pessimist about politics. ”

“ They even got to resemble each other, after the fashion of old married couples, or, rather, as in matrimonial partnerships, were subject to the domination of the stronger character; although in their case it is to be feared that it was the feminine Uncle Billy—enthusiastic, imaginative, and loquacious—who swayed the masculine, steady-going, and practical Uncle Jim. They had lived in the camp since its foundation in 1849; there seemed to be no reason why they should not remain there until its inevitable evolution into a mining-town. ”

“ We kin keep it here, comfortable, for evenings. It's mighty soothin' arter a man's done a hard day's work on the river-bar. Take one."
Uncle Jim gravely took a pill and swallowed it, and handed the box back to his partner.
"We'll leave it on the table, sociable like, in case any of the boys come in," said Uncle Billy, taking up the cards. "Well. How de we stand?"
Uncle Jim consulted the memorandum-book. "You were owin' me sixty-two thousand dollars on the last game, and the limit's seventy-five thousand!"
"Je whillikins!" ejaculated Uncle Billy. "Let me see." ”

“ You've heard o' children bein' born kickin'. Well, Uncle Jim must 'a' been born singin'. I've seen people that said they didn't like the idea o' goin' to heaven and standin' around a throne and singin' hymns for ever and ever; but you couldn't 'a' pleased Uncle Jim better than to set him down in jest that sort o' heaven. Wherever there was a chance to get in some singin', there you'd be sure to find Uncle Jim. Folks used to say he enjoyed a funeral a heap better than he did a weddin', 'cause he could sing at the funeral, and he couldn't at the weddin' ”

“ John began to be a little impatient. "Let us talk of something else than horses. I got a good dose of advice yesterday from Uncle Jim. I am afraid that you will be sent to school in the fall. I hate schools. You'll have no riding and snowballing, and I shall miss you. You see, I was never friends with a girl before."
"Uncle Jim would never let me go."
"But Aunt Ann?" he queried. "I heard her tell Mr. Rivers that you must go. She said that you were too old, or would be, for snowballing and rough games and needed the society of young ladies."
"Young ladies!" said Leila scornfully. ”