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DAVID HARUM
A Story of American Life
by
EDWARD NOYES WESTCOTT
New York
D. Appleton and Company
1899
Copyright, 1898,
By D. Appleton and Company.
INTRODUCTION.
The's as much human nature in some folks as th' is in others, if
not more.--DAVID HARUM.
One of the most conspicuous characteristics of our contemporary native
fiction is an increasing tendency to subordinate plot or story to the
bold and realistic portrayal of some of the types of American life and
manners. And the reason for this is not far to seek. The extraordinary
mixing of races which has been going on here for more than a century has
produced an enormously diversified human result; and the products of
this "hybridization" have been still further differentiated by an
environment that ranges from the Everglades of Florida to the glaciers
of Alaska. The existence of these conditions, and the great literary
opportunities which they contain, American writers long ago perceived;
and, with a generally true appreciation of artistic values, they have
created from them a gallery of brilliant _genre_ pictures which to-day
stand for the highest we have yet attained in the art of fiction.
Thus it is that we have (to mention but a few) studies of Louisiana and
her people by Mr. Cable; of Virginia and Georgia by Thomas Nelson Page
and Joel Chandler Harris; of New England by Miss Jewett and Miss
Wilkins; of the Middle West by Miss French (Octave Thanet); of the great
Northwest by Hamlin Garland; of Canada and the land of the _habitans_ by
Gilbert Parker; and finally, though really first in point of time, the
Forty-niners and their successors by Bret Harte. This list might be
indefinitely extended, for it is growing daily, but it is long enough as
it stands to show that every section of our country has, or soon will
have, its own painter and historian, whose works will live and become a
permanent part of our literature in just the degree that they are
artistically true. Some of these writers have already produced many
books, while others have gained general recognition and even fame by the
vividness and power of a single study, like Mr. Howe with The Story of a
Country Town. But each one, it will be noticed, has chosen for his field
of work that part of our country wherein he passed the early and
formative years of his life; a natural selection that is, perhaps, an
unconscious affirmation of David Harum's aphorism: "Ev'ry hoss c'n do a
thing better 'n' spryer if he's ben broke to it as a colt."
In the case of the present volume the conditions are identical with
those just mentioned. Most of the scenes are laid in central New York,
where the author, Edward Noyes Westcott, was born, September 24, 1847,
and where he died of consumption, March 31, 1898. Nearly all his life
was passed in his native city of Syracuse, and although banking and not
authorship was the occupation of his active years, yet his sensitive and
impressionable temperament had become so saturated with the local
atmosphere, and his retentive memory so charged with facts, that when at
length he took up the pen he was able to create in David Harum a
character so original, so true, and so strong, yet withal so
delightfully quaint and humorous, that we are at once compelled to admit
that here is a new and permanent addition to the long list of American
literary portraits.
The book is a novel, and throughout it runs a love story which is
characterized by sympathetic treatment and a constantly increasing
interest; but the title rôle is taken by the old country banker,
David Harum: dry, quaint, somewhat illiterate, no doubt, but possessing
an amazing amount of knowledge not found in printed books, and holding
fast to the cheerful belief that there is nothing wholly bad or useless
in this world. Or, in his own words: "A reasonable amount of fleas
is good for a dog--they keep him f'm broodin' on bein' a dog."
This horse-trading country banker and reputed Shylock, but real
philanthropist, is an accurate portrayal of a type that exists in the
rural districts of central New York to-day. Variations of him may be
seen daily, driving about in their road wagons or seated in their "bank
parlors," shrewd, sharp-tongued, honest as the sunlight from most points
of view, but in a horse trade much inclined to follow the rule laid down
by Mr. Harum himself for such transactions: "Do unto the other feller
the way he'd like to do unto you--an' do it fust."
The genial humor and sunny atmosphere which pervade these pages are in
dramatic contrast with the circumstances under which they were written.
The book was finished while the author lay upon his deathbed, but,
happily for the reader, no trace of his sufferings appears here. It was
not granted that he should live to see his work in its present completed
form, a consummation he most earnestly desired; but it seems not
unreasonable to hope that the result of his labors will be appreciated,
and that David Harum will endure.
FORBES HEERMANS.
SYRACUSE, N.Y., _August 20, 1898._
DAVID HARUM.
CHAPTER I.
David poured half of his second cup of tea into his saucer to lower its
temperature to the drinking point, and helped himself to a second cut of
ham and a third egg. Whatever was on his mind to have kept him unusually
silent during the evening meal, and to cause certain wrinkles in his
forehead suggestive of perplexity or misgiving, had not impaired his
appetite. David was what he called "a good feeder."
Mrs. Bixbee, known to most of those who enjoyed the privilege of her
acquaintance as "Aunt Polly," though nieces and nephews of her blood
there were none in Homeville, Freeland County, looked curiously at her
brother, as, in fact, she had done at intervals during the repast; and
concluding at last that further forbearance was uncalled for, relieved
the pressure of her curiosity thus:
"Guess ye got somethin' on your mind, hain't ye? You hain't hardly said
aye, yes, ner no sence you set down. Anythin' gone 'skew?"
David lifted his saucer, gave the contents a precautionary blow, and
emptied it with sundry windy suspirations.
"No," he said, "nothin' hain't gone exac'ly wrong, 's ye might say--not
yet; but I done that thing I was tellin' ye of to-day."
"Done what thing?" she asked perplexedly.
"I telegraphed to New York," he replied, "fer that young feller to come
on--the young man General Wolsey wrote me about. I got a letter from him
to-day, an' I made up my mind 'the sooner the quicker,' an' I
telegraphed him to come 's soon 's he could."
"I forgit what you said his name was," said Aunt Polly.
"There's his letter," said David, handing it across the table. "Read it
out 'loud."
"You read it," she said, passing it back after a search in her pocket;
"I must 'a' left my specs in the settin'-room."
The letter was as follows:
"DEAR SIR: I take the liberty of addressing you at the
instance of General Wolsey, who spoke to me of the matter of your
communication to him, and was kind enough to say that he would
write you in my behalf. My acquaintance with him has been in the
nature of a social rather than a business one, and I fancy that he
can only recommend me on general grounds. I will say, therefore,
that I have had some experience with accounts, but not much
practice in them for nearly three years. Nevertheless, unless the
work you wish done is of an intricate nature, I think I shall be
able to accomplish it with such posting at the outset as most
strangers would require. General Wolsey told me that you wanted
some one as soon as possible. I have nothing to prevent me from
starting at once if you desire to have me. A telegram addressed to
me at the office of the Trust Company will reach me promptly.
"Yours very truly,
"JOHN K. LENOX."
"Wa'al," said David, looking over his glasses at his sister, "what do
you think on't?"
"The' ain't much brag in't," she replied thoughtfully.
"No," said David, putting his eyeglasses back in their case, "th' ain't
no brag ner no promises; he don't even say he'll do his best, like most
fellers would. He seems to have took it fer granted that I'll take it
fer granted, an' that's what I like about it. Wa'al," he added, "the
thing's done, an' I'll be lookin' fer him to-morrow mornin' or evenin'
at latest."
Mrs. Bixbee sat for a moment with her large, light blue, and rather
prominent eyes fixed on her brother's face, and then she said, with a
slight undertone of anxiety, "Was you cal'latin' to have that young man
from New York come here?"
"I hadn't no such idee," he replied, with a slight smile, aware of what
was passing in her mind. "What put that in your head?"
"Wa'al," she answered, "you know the' ain't scarcely anybody in the
village that takes boarders in the winter, an' I was wonderin' what he
would do."
"I s'pose he'll go to the Eagle," said David. "I dunno where else,
'nless it's to the Lake House."
"The Eagil!" she exclaimed contemptuously. "Land sakes! Comin' here from
New York! He won't stan' it there a week."
"Wa'al," replied David, "mebbe he will an' mebbe he won't, but I don't
see what else the' is for it, an' I guess 'twon't kill him for a spell
The fact is--" he was proceeding when Mrs. Bixbee interrupted him.
"I guess we'd better adjourn t' the settin'-room an' let Sairy clear off
the tea-things," she said, rising and going into the kitchen.
"What was you sayin'?" she asked, as she presently found her brother in
the apartment designated, and seated herself with her mending-basket in
her lap.
"The fact is, I was sayin'," he resumed, sitting with hand and forearm
resting on a round table, in the centre of which was a large kerosene
lamp, "that my notion was, fust off, to have him come here, but when I
come to think on't I changed my mind. In the fust place, except that
he's well recommended, I don't know nothin' about him; an' in the
second, you'n I are pretty well set in our ways, an' git along all right
just as we be. I may want the young feller to stay, an' then agin I may
not--we'll see. It's a good sight easier to git a fishhook in 'n 'tis to
git it out. I expect he'll find it putty tough at first, but if he's a
feller that c'n be drove out of bus'nis by a spell of the Eagle Tavern,
he ain't the feller I'm lookin' fer--though I will allow," he added with
a grimace, "that it'll be a putty hard test. But if I want to say to
him, after tryin' him a spell, that I guess me an' him don't seem likely
to hitch, we'll both take it easier if we ain't livin' in the same
house. I guess I'll take a look at the Trybune," said David, unfolding
that paper.
Mrs. Bixbee went on with her needlework, with an occasional side glance
at her brother, who was immersed in the gospel of his politics. Twice
or thrice she opened her lips as if to address him, but apparently some
restraining thought interposed. Finally, the impulse to utter her mind
culminated. "Dave," she said, "d' you know what Deakin Perkins is sayin'
about ye?"
David opened his paper so as to hide his face, and the corners of his
mouth twitched as he asked in return, "Wa'al, what's the deakin sayin'
now?"
"He's sayin'," she replied, in a voice mixed of indignation and
apprehension, "thet you sold him a balky horse, an' he's goin' to hev
the law on ye." David's shoulders shook behind the sheltering page, and
his mouth expanded in a grin.
"Wa'al," he replied after a moment, lowering the paper and looking
gravely at his companion over his glasses, "next to the deakin's
religious experience, them of lawin' an' horse-tradin' air his strongest
p'ints, an' he works the hull on 'em to once sometimes."
The evasiveness of this generality was not lost on Mrs. Bixbee, and she
pressed the point with, "Did ye? an' will he?"
"Yes, an' no, an' mebbe, an' mebbe not," was the categorical reply.
"Wa'al," she answered with a snap, "mebbe you call that an answer. I
s'pose if you don't want to let on you won't, but I do believe you've
ben playin' some trick on the deakin, an' won't own up. I do wish," she
added, "that if you hed to git rid of a balky horse onto somebody you'd
hev picked out somebody else."
"When you got a balker to dispose of," said David gravely, "you can't
alwus pick an' choose. Fust come, fust served." Then he went on more
seriously: "Now I'll tell ye. Quite a while ago--in fact, not long
after I come to enjoy the priv'lidge of the deakin's acquaintance--we
hed a deal. I wasn't jest on my guard, knowin' him to be a deakin an'
all that, an' he lied to me so splendid that I was took in, clean over
my head, he done me so brown I was burnt in places, an' you c'd smell
smoke 'round me fer some time."
"Was it a horse?" asked Mrs. Bixbee gratuitously.
"Wa'al," David replied, "mebbe it _had_ ben some time, but at that
partic'lar time the only thing to determine that fact was that it wa'n't
nothin' else."
"Wa'al, I declare!" exclaimed Mrs. Bixbee, wondering not more at the
deacon's turpitude than at the lapse in David's acuteness, of which she
had an immense opinion, but commenting only on the former. "I'm 'mazed
at the deakin."
"Yes'm," said David with a grin, "I'm quite a liar myself when it comes
right down to the hoss bus'nis, but the deakin c'n give me both bowers
ev'ry hand. He done it so slick that I had to laugh when I come to think
it over--an' I had witnesses to the hull confab, too, that he didn't
know of, an' I c'd 've showed him up in great shape if I'd had a mind
to."
"Why didn't ye?" said Aunt Polly, whose feelings about the deacon were
undergoing a revulsion.
"Wa'al, to tell ye the truth, I was so completely skunked that I hadn't
a word to say. I got rid o' the thing fer what it was wuth fer hide an'
taller, an' stid of squealin' 'round the way you say he's doin', like a
stuck pig, I kep' my tongue between my teeth an' laid to git even some
time."
"You ort to 've hed the law on him," declared Mrs. Bixbee, now fully
converted. "The old scamp!"
"Wa'al," was the reply, "I gen'all prefer to settle out of court, an' in
this partic'lar case, while I might 'a' ben willin' t' admit that I hed
ben did up, I didn't feel much like swearin' to it. I reckoned the time
'd come when mebbe I'd git the laugh on the deakin, an' it did, an'
we're putty well settled now in full."
"You mean this last pufformance?" asked Mrs. Bixbee. "I wish you'd quit
beatin' about the bush, an' tell me the hull story."
"Wa'al, it's like this, then, if you _will_ hev it. I was over to
Whiteboro a while ago on a little matter of worldly bus'nis, an' I seen
a couple of fellers halter-exercisin' a hoss in the tavern yard. I stood
'round a spell watchin' 'em, an' when he come to a standstill I went an'
looked him over, an' I liked his looks fust rate.
"'Fer sale?' I says.
"'Wa'al,' says the chap that was leadin' him, 'I never see the hoss that
wa'n't if the price was right.'
"'Your'n?' I says.
"'Mine an' his'n,' he says, noddin' his head at the other feller.
"'What ye askin' fer him?' I says.
"'One-fifty,' he says.
"I looked him all over agin putty careful, an' once or twice I kind o'
shook my head 's if I didn't quite like what I seen, an' when I got
through I sort o' half turned away without sayin' anythin', 's if I'd
seen enough.
"'The' ain't a scratch ner a pimple on him,' says the feller, kind o'
resentin' my looks. 'He's sound an' kind, an' 'll stand without
hitchin', an' a lady c'n drive him 's well 's a man."'
"'I ain't got anythin' agin him,' I says, 'an' prob'ly that's all true,
ev'ry word on't; but one-fifty's a consid'able price fer a hoss these
days. I hain't no pressin' use fer another hoss, an', in fact,' I says,
'I've got one or two fer sale myself.'
"'He's wuth two hunderd jest as he stands,' the feller says. 'He hain't
had no trainin', an' he c'n draw two men in a road-wagin better'n
fifty.'
"Wa'al, the more I looked at him the better I liked him, but I only
says, 'Jes' so, jes' so, he may be wuth the money, but jest as I'm fixed
now he ain't wuth it to _me_, an' I hain't got that much money with me
if he was,' I says. The other feller hadn't said nothin' up to that
time, an' he broke in now. 'I s'pose you'd take him fer a gift, wouldn't
ye?' he says, kind o' sneerin'.
"'Wa'al, yes,' I says, 'I dunno but I would if you'd throw in a pound of
tea an' a halter.'
"He kind o' laughed an' says, 'Wa'al, this ain't no gift enterprise, an'
I guess we ain't goin' to trade, but I'd like to know,' he says, 'jest
as a matter of curios'ty, what you'd say he _was_ wuth to ye?'
"'Wa'al,' I says, 'I come over this mornin' to see a feller that owed me
a trifle o' money. Exceptin' of some loose change, what he paid me 's
all I got with me,' I says, takin' out my wallet. 'That wad's got a
hunderd an' twenty-five into it, an' if you'd sooner have your hoss an'
halter than the wad,' I says, 'why, I'll bid ye good-day.'
"'You're offerin' one-twenty-five fer the hoss an' halter?' he says.
"'That's what I'm doin',' I says.
"'You've made a trade,' he says, puttin' out his hand fer the money an'
handin' the halter over to me."
"An' didn't ye suspicion nuthin' when he took ye up like that?" asked
Mrs. Bixbee.
"I did smell woolen some," said David, "but I had the _hoss_ an' they
had the _money_, an', as fur 's I c'd see, the critter was all right.
Howsomever, I says to 'em: 'This here's all right, fur 's it's gone, but
you've talked putty strong 'bout this hoss. I don't know who you fellers
be, but I c'n find out,' I says. Then the fust feller that done the
talkin' 'bout the hoss put in an' says, 'The' hain't ben one word said
to you about this hoss that wa'n't gospel truth, not one word.' An' when
I come to think on't afterward," said David with a half laugh, "it mebbe
wa'n't _gospel_ truth, but it was good enough _jury_ truth. I guess this
ain't over 'n' above interestin' to ye, is it?" he asked after a pause,
looking doubtfully at his sister.
"Yes, 'tis," she asserted. "I'm lookin' forrered to where the deakin
comes in, but you jest tell it your own way."
"I'll git there all in good time," said David, "but some of the point of
the story'll be lost if I don't tell ye what come fust."
"I allow to stan' it 's long 's you can," she said encouragingly,
"seein' what work I had gettin' ye started. Did ye find out anythin'
'bout them fellers?"
"I ast the barn man if he knowed who they was, an' he said he never seen
'em till the yestiddy before, an' didn't know 'em f'm Adam. They come
along with a couple of hosses, one drivin' an' t'other leadin'--the one
I bought. I ast him if they knowed who I was, an' he said one on 'em
ast him, an' he told him. The feller said to him, seein' me drive up:
'That's a putty likely-lookin' hoss. Who's drivin' him?' An' he says to
the feller: 'That's Dave Harum, f'm over to Homeville. He's a great
feller fer hosses,' he says."
"Dave," said Mrs. Bixbee, "them chaps jest laid fer ye, didn't they?"
"I reckon they did," he admitted; "an' they was as slick a pair as was
ever drawed to," which expression was lost upon his sister. David rubbed
the fringe of yellowish-gray hair which encircled his bald pate for a
moment.
"Wa'al," he resumed, "after the talk with the barn man, I smelt woolen
stronger'n ever, but I didn't say nothin', an' had the mare hitched an'
started back. Old Jinny drives with one hand, an' I c'd watch the new
one all right, an' as we come along I begun to think I wa'n't stuck
after all. I never see a hoss travel evener an' nicer, an' when we come
to a good level place I sent the old mare along the best she knew, an'
the new one never broke his gait, an' kep' right up 'ithout 'par'ntly
half tryin'; an' Jinny don't take most folks' dust neither. I swan!
'fore I got home I reckoned I'd jest as good as made seventy-five
anyway."