rarely affected by the unsettling problems of the present day. This talk
about "labour unrest" was ridiculous, he said. If the remainder of the
world was anything like Tinkletown, labour didn't do much except rest.
It was getting so that if a workin'-man had very far to walk to "git" to
his job, he had to step along purty lively if he wanted to arrive there
in plenty of time to eat his lunch and start back home again. And as for
"this here prohibition question," he didn't take any stock in it at all.
Tinkletown had got along without liquor for more than a hundred years
and he guessed it could get along for another century or two without
much trouble, especially as it was only ten miles to Boggs City where
you could get all you wanted to drink any day in the week. Besides, he
argued, loudly and most violently, being so deaf that he had to strain
his own throat in order to hear himself, there wasn't anybody in
Tinkletown except Alf Reesling that ever wanted a drink, and even Alf
wouldn't take it when you offered it to him.
But in spite of Uncle Dad's sage conclusions, it was this very
prohibition question that was disturbing Anderson Crow. He sauntered
into the _Banner_ office late one afternoon in May and planked himself
down in a chair beside the editor's desk. There was a troubled look in
his eyes, which gave way to vexation after he had made three or four
fruitless efforts to divert the writer's attention from the sheet of
"copy paper" on which he was scribbling furiously.
"How do you spell beverage, Anderson?" inquired Mr. Squires abruptly.
"What kind of beverage?" demanded Mr. Crow.
"Any kind, just so it's intoxicating. Never mind, I'll take a chance and
spell it the easiest way. That's the way the dictionary spells it, so I
guess it's all right. Well, sir, what's on your mind?--besides your hat,
I mean. You look worried."
"I am worried. Have you any idee as to the size of the apple crop in
this neighbourhood last summer and fall, Harry?"
"Not the least."
"Well, sir, it was the biggest we've had since 1902, 'specially the fall
pickin."
"What's the idea? Do you want me to put something in the _Banner_ about
Bramble County's bumper crop of pippins?"
"No. I just want to ask you if there's anything in this new prohibition
amendment against apple cider?"
"Not that I'm aware of."
"Well, do you know it's impossible to buy a good eatin' or cookin' apple
in this town today, Harry Squires?"
"You don't say so! In spite of the big crop last fall?"
"You could buy all you wanted last week, by the bushel or peck or
barrel,--finest, juiciest apples you ever laid your eyes on."
"Well, I don't like apples anyway, so it doesn't mean much in my life."
Anderson was silent for a moment or two, contemplating his foot with
singular intentness.
"Was you ever drunk on hard cider?" he inquired at last,--transferring
his gaze to the rapidly moving hand that held the pencil.
The reporter jabbed a period,--or "full stop," as they call it in a
certain form of literature,--in the middle of a sentence, and looked up
with sudden interest.
"Yes," he said, with considerable force. "I'll never forget it. You can
get tighter on hard cider than anything else I know of."
"Well, there you are," exclaimed the Marshal, banging his gnarled fist
on the arm of the chair. "And as far as I c'n make out, there ain't no
law ag'inst cider stayin' in the barrel long enough to get good and
hard, an' what's more, there ain't no law ag'ainst sellin' cider, hard
or sweet, is there?"
"I get your point, Anderson. And I also get your deductions concerning
the mysterious disappearance of all the apples in Tinkletown. Apparently
we are to have a shortage of dried apples this year, with an overflow of
hard cider instead. By George, it's interesting, to say the least. Looks
as though an apple orchard is likely to prove more valuable than a gold
mine, doesn't it?"
"Yes, sir! 'Specially if you've got trees that bear in the fall. Fall
apples make the best cider. They ain't so mushy. And as fer the feller
that owns a cider-press, why, dog-gone it, he ought to be as rich as
Crowsis."
"I seem to recall that you have a cider-press on your farm on Crow's
Mountain,--and a whacking good orchard, too. Are you thinking of
resigning as Marshal of Tinkletown?"
"What say?"
"I see you're not," went on Harry. "Of course you understand you can't
very well manufacture hard cider and sell it and still retain your
untarnished reputation as a defender of the law."
"I'm not figurin' on makin' hard cider," said Anderson, with some
irritation. "You don't _make_ hard cider, Harry. It makes itself. All
you do is to rack the apple juice off into a barrel, or something, with
a little yeast added, and then leave it to do the work. It ferments an'
then, if you want to, you rack it off again an' bottle it an'--well, gee
whiz, how tight you c'n get on it if you ain't got sense enough to let
it alone. But I ain't thinkin' about what I'm goin' to do, 'cause I
ain't to do anything but make applebutter out of my orchard,--an' maybe
a little cider-vinegar fer home consumption. What's worryin' me is what
to do about all these other people around here. If they all take to
makin' cider this fall,--or even sooner,--an' if they bottle or cask it
proper,--we'll have enough hard cider in this township to give the whole
state of New York the delirium trimmins."
"I don't see that you can do anything, Anderson," said Squires, leaning
back in his chair and puffing at his pipe. "You can't keep people from
making cider, you know. And you can't keep 'em from drinking it.
Besides, who's going to take the trouble to ascertain whether it
contains one-half of one percent alcohol? What interests me more than
anything else is the possibility of this township becoming 'wet' in
spite of itself,--an' to my certain knowledge, it has been up to now the
barrenest desert on God's green earth."
"People are so all-fired contrary," Anderson complained. "For the last
fifty years the citizens of this town and its suburbs have been so dead
set ag'inst liquor that if a man went up to Boggs City an' got a little
tipsy he had to run all the way home so's he'd be out of breath when he
got there. Nobody ever kept a bottle of whiskey in his house, 'cause
nobody wanted it an' it would only be in the way. But now look at 'em!
The minute the Government says they can't have it, they begin movin'
things around in their cellars so's to make room fer the barrels they're
going to put in. An' any day you want to drive out in the country you
c'n see farmers an' hired men treatin' the apple-trees as if they was
the tenderest plants a-growin'. I heard this mornin' that Henry
Wimpelmeyer is to put in a cider-press at his tanyard, an' old man
Smock's turnin' his grist mill into an apple-mill. An' everybody is
hoardin' apples, Harry. It beats the Dutch."
"It's up to you to frustrate their nefarious schemes, Mr. Hawkshaw. The
fair name of the Commonwealth must be preserved. I use the word
advisedly. It sounds a great deal better than 'pickled.' Now, do you
want me to begin a campaign in the _Banner_ against the indiscriminate
and mendacious hardening of apple-cider, or am I to leave the situation
entirely in your hands?"
Marshal Crow arose. The fire of determination was in his ancient eye.
"You leave it to me," said he, and strode majestically from the room.
Encountering Deacon Rank in front of the _Banner_ office, he chanced
this somewhat offensive remark:
"Say, Deacon, what's this I hear about you?"
The deacon looked distinctly uneasy.
"You can always hear a lot of things about me that aren't true," he
said.
"I ain't so sure about that," said Anderson, eyeing him narrowly. "Hold
on! What's your hurry?"
"I--I got to step in here and pay my subscription to the _Banner_," said
the deacon.
"Well, that's something nobody'll believe when they hear about it," said
Anderson. "It'll be mighty hard fer the proprieter of the _Banner_ to
believe it after all these years."
"Times have been so dog-goned hard fer the last couple of years, I ain't
really been able to--"
"Too bad about you," broke in Anderson scornfully.
"Everything costs so much in these days," protested the deacon. "I ain't
had a new suit of clothes fer seven or eight years. Can't afford 'em. My
wife was sayin' only last night she needed a new hat,--somethin' she can
wear all the year round,--but goodness knows this ain't no time to be
thinkin' of hats. She--"
"She ain't had a new hat fer ten years," interrupted Anderson. "No
wonder the pore woman's ashamed to go to church."
"What's that? Who says she's ashamed to go to church? Anybody that says
my wife's ashamed to go to church is a--is a--well, he tells a story,
that's all."
"Well, why don't she go to church?"
"'Tain't because she's ashamed of her hat, let me tell you that,
Anderson Crow. It's a fine hat an' it's just as good as new. She's
tryin' to save it, that's what she's tryin' to do. She knows it's got to
last her five or six years more, an' how in tarnation can she make it
last that long if she wears it all the time? Use a little common sense,
can't you? Besides, I'll thank you not to stick your nose in my family
affairs any--"
"What's that you got in your pocket?" demanded Anderson, indicating the
bulging sides of the deacon's overcoat.
"None of your business!"
"Now, don't you get hot. I ask you again, civil as possible,--what you
got in your pocket?"
"I'm a respectable, tax-paying, church-going citizen of this here town,
and I won't put up with any of your cussed insinuations," snapped the
deacon. "You act as if I'd stole something. You--"
"I ain't accusin' you of stealin' anything. I'm only accusin' you of
havin' something in your pocket. No harm in that, is there?"
The deacon hesitated for a minute. Then he made a determined effort to
temporize.
"And what's more," he said, "my wife's hat's comin' back into style
before long, anyhow. It's just as I keep on tellin' her. The styles
kinder go in circles, an' if she waits long enough they'll get back to
the kind she's wearin', and then she'll be the first woman in Tinkletown
to have the very up-to-datest style in hats,--'way ahead of anybody
else,--and it will be as good as new, too, you bet, after the way she's
been savin' it."
"Now I know why you got your pockets stuffed full of things,--eggs,
maybe, or hick'ry nuts, or--whatever it is you got in 'em. It's because
you're tryin' to save a piece of wrappin' paper or a bag, or the wear
and tear on a basket. No wonder you got so much money you don't know how
to spend it."
"And as for me gettin' a new suit of clothes," pursued the deacon,
doggedly, "if times don't get better the chances are I'll have to be
buried in the suit I got on this minute. I never knowed times to be so
hard--"
The marshal interrupted him. "You go in an' pay up what you owe fer the
_Banner_ an' I'll wait here till you come out."
Deacon Rank appeared to reflect. "Come to think of it, I guess I'll stop
in on my way back from the post office. Ten or fifteen minutes--"
He stopped short, a fixed intent look in his sharp little eyes. His gaze
was directed past Anderson's head at some object down the street. Then,
quite abruptly and without even the ceremony of a hasty "good-bye," he
bolted into the _Banner_ office, slamming the door in the marshal's
face.
"Well, I'll be dog-goned!" burst from the lips of the astonished Mr.
Crow. "I never knowed him to change his mind so quick as that in all my
life,--or so often. What the dickens--"
Indignation succeeded wonder at this instant, cutting off his audible
reflections. Snapping his jaws together, he laid a resolute hand on the
doorknob. Just as he turned it and was on the point of stamping in after
the deacon, his eye fell upon an approaching figure--the figure of a
woman. If it had not been for the hat she was wearing, he would have
failed to recognize her at once. But there was no mistaking the hat.
"Hi!" called out the wearer of the too familiar object. Marshal Crow let
go of the door knob and stared at the lady in sheer stupefaction.
Mrs. Rank's well-preserved hat was perched rakishly at a perilous angle
over one ear. A subsequent shifting to an even more precarious position
over the other ear, as the result of a swift, inaccurate sweep of the
lady's hand, created an instant impression that it was attached to her
drab, disordered hair by means of a new-fangled but absolutely
dependable magnet. Never before had Marshal Crow seen that ancient hat
so much as the fraction of an inch out of "plumb" with the bridge of
Mrs. Rank's undeviating nose.
She approached airily. Her forlorn little person was erect, even
soldierly. Indeed, if anything, she was a shade too erect at times. At
such times she appeared to be in some danger of completely forgetting
her equilibrium. She stepped high, as the saying is, and without her
usual precision. In a word, the meek and retiring wife of Deacon Rank
was hilariously drunk!
Pedestrians, far and near, stopped stockstill in their tracks to gaze
open-mouthed at the jaunty drudge; storekeepers peered wide-eyed and
incredulous from windows and doors. If you suddenly had asked any one of
them when the world was coming to an end, he would have replied without
the slightest hesitation.
She bore down upon the petrified Mr. Crow.
"Is zat you, An'erson?" she inquired, coming to an uncertain stop at the
foot of the steps. Where--oh, where! was the subdued, timorous voice of
Sister Rank? Whose--oh, whose! were the shrill and fearless tones that
issued forth from the lips of the deacon's wife?
"For the Lord's sake, Lucy,--wha--what ails you?" gasped the horrified
marshal.
"Nothing ails me, An'erson. Nev' fel' better'n all my lipe--life.
Where's my hush--hushban'?"
She brandished her right hand, and clutched in her fingers an implement
that caused Anderson's eyes to almost start from his head.
"What's that you got in your hand?" he cried out.
"Thish? Thass a hashet. Don't you know whass a hashet is?"
"I--I know it's a hatchet. Lucy,--but, fer heaven's sake, what are you
goin' to do with it?"
"I'm going to cut th' deacon's head off wiz it," she replied blandly.
"What!"
"Yes, shir; thass what I'm goin' cut off. Right smack off,
An'erson,--and you can't stop me, unnerstan', An'erson. I been wannin'
cuttiz 'ead off f'r twenny-fi' year. I--"
"Hey! Stop wavin' that thing around like that, Lucy Rank!"
"You needen be 'fraid, An'erson. I woulden hurt you fer whole United
States. Where's my hussam, An'erson?"
Marshal Crow looked hopelessly at the well-scattered witnesses who were
taking in the scene from a respectful distance. Obviously it was his
duty to do something. Not that he really felt that the deacon's head
should not be cut off by his long-suffering wife, but that it was hardly
the proper thing for her to do it in public. Virtually every man in
Tinkletown had declared, at one time or another, that Mrs. Rank ought to
slit the old skinflint's throat, or poison him, or set fire to him, or
something of the sort, but, even though he agreed with them, the fact
still remained that Marshal Crow considered it his duty to protect the
deacon in this amazing crisis.
"Gimme that hatchet, Lucy Rank," he commanded, with authority. "You
ain't yourself, an' you know it. You gimme that hatchet an' then lemme
take you home an' put you to bed. You'll be all right in the mornin',
an--"
"Didden my hussam go in the Blammer ossif minute ago?" she demanded,
fixing a baleful glare upon the closed door.
"See here, Lucy, you been drinkin'. You're full as a goat. You gimme
that--"
"An'erson Crow, are you tryin' inshult me?" she demanded, drawing
herself up. "Wha' you mean sayin' I'm dunk,--drump? You know I never
touched dropper anything. I'm the bes' frien' your wife's got innis town
an' she--who's 'at lookin' out zat winner? Zat my hussam?"
Before the marshal could interfere, she blazed away at one of the
windows in the _Banner_ office. There was a crash of glass. She was now
empty-handed but the startled guardian of the peace was slow to realize
it. He was still trying to convince himself that it was the gentle,
long-suffering Mrs. Rank who stood before him.
Suddenly, to his intense dismay, she threw her arms around his neck and
began to weep--and wail.
"I--I--love my hussam,--I love my hussam,--an' I didden mean cuttiz 'ead
off--I didden--I didden, An'erson. My hussam's dead. My hussam's head's
all off,--an' I love my hussam--I love my hussam."
The door flew open and Harry Squires strode forth.
"What the devil does this mean--My God! Mrs. Rank! Wha--what's the
matter with her, Anderson?"
The marshal gazed past him into the office. His eyes were charged with
apprehension.
"Where--where's the deacon's head?" he gulped.
The editor did not hear him. He had eyes and ears only for the mumbling
creature who dangled limply from the marshal's neck; her face was hidden
but her hat was very much in evidence. It was bobbing up and down on the
back of her head.
"Let's get her into the office," he exclaimed. "This is dreadful,
Anderson,--shocking!"
A moment later the door closed behind the trio,--and a key was turned in
the lock. This was the signal for a general advance of all observers.
Headed by Mr. Hawkins, the undertaker, they swarmed up the steps and
crowded about the windows. The thoughtful Mr. Squires, however,
conducted Mrs. Rank to the composing-room and the crowd was cheated.
Bill Smith, the printer, looked up from his case and pied half of the
leading editorial. He proved to be a printer of the old school. After a
soft, envious whistle he remarked:
"My God, I'd give a month's pay for one like that," and any one who has
ever come in contact with an old-time printer will know precisely what
he meant.
"Oh, my poor b'loved hussam," murmured Mrs. Rank. "My poor b'loved
hussam whass I have endured f'r twenty-fi' years wiz aller Chrissen
forcitude of--where is my poor hussam?"
She swept the floor with a hazy, uncertain look. Not observing anything
that looked like a head, she turned a bleary, accusing eye upon Bill
Smith, the printer, and there is no telling what she might have said to
him if Harry Squires had not intervened.
"Sit down here, Mrs. Rank,--do. Your husband is all right. He was here a
few minutes ago, and--which way did he go, Bill?"
"Out," said Bill laconically, jerking his head in the direction of an
open window at the rear.
"Didden--didden I cuttiz 'ead off?" demanded Mrs. Rank.
"Not so's you'd notice it," said Bill.
"Well, 'en, whose 'ead did I c'off?"
"Nobody's, my dear lady," said Squires, soothingly. "Everything's all
right,--quite all right. Please--"
"Where's my hashet? Gimme my hashet. I insiss on my hashet. I gotter
cuttiz 'ead off. Never ress in my grave till I cuttiz 'ead off."
Presently they succeeded in quieting her. She sat limply in an
arm-chair, brought from the front office, and stared pathetically up
into the faces of the three perspiring men.
"Can you beat it?" spoke Harry Squires to the beaddled marshal.
"Where do you suppose she got it?" muttered Anderson, helplessly. "Maybe
she had a toothache or something and took a little brandy--"
"Not a bit of it," said Harry. "She's been hitting old man Rank's stock
of hard cider, that's what she's been doing."
"Impossible! He's our leadin' church-member. He ain't got any hard
cider. He's dead-set ag'inst intoxicatin' liquors. I've heard him say it
a hundred times."
"Well, just ask _her_," was Harry's rejoinder.
Mr. Crow drew a stool up beside the unfortunate lady and sat down.
"What have you been drinking, Lucy?" he asked gently, patting her hand.
"You're a liar," said Mrs. Rank, quite distinctly. This was an
additional shock to Anderson. The amazing potency of strong drink was
here being exemplified as never before in the history of Time. A sober
Lucy Rank would no more have called any one a liar than she would have
cursed her Maker. Such an expression from the lips of the meek and
down-trodden martyr was unbelievable,--and the way she said it! Not even
Pat Murphy, the coal-wagon driver, with all his years of practice, could
have said it with greater distinctness,--not even Pat who possessed the
masculine right to amplify the behest with expletives not supposed to be
uttered except in the presence of his own sex.
"She'll be swearing next," said Bill Smith, after a short silence. "I
couldn't stand _that_," he went on, taking his coat from a peg in the
wall.
Mr. Squires took the lady in hand.
"If you will just be patient for a little while, Mrs. Rank, Bill will go
out and find your husband and bring him here at once. In the meantime, I
will see that your hatchet is sharpened up, and put in first-class order
for the sacrifice. Go on, Bill. Fetch the lady's husband." He winked at
the departing Bill. "We've got to humour her," he said in an aside to
Anderson. "These hard-cider jags are the worst in the world. The saying
is that a quart of hard cider would start a free-for-all fight in
heaven. Excuse me, Mrs. Rank, while I fix your nice new hat for you. It
isn't on quite straight--and it's such a pretty hat, isn't it?"
Mrs. Rank squinted at him for a moment in doubtful surprise, and then
smiled.
"My hussam tol' you to shay that," said she, shaking her finger at him.
"Not at all,--not at all! I've always said it, haven't I, Anderson? Say
_yes_, you old goat!" (He whispered the last, and the marshal responded
nobly.) "Now, while we are waiting for Mr. Rank, perhaps you will tell
us just why you want to cut his head off today. What has the old villain
been up to lately?"
She composed herself for the recital. The two men looked down at her
with pity in their eyes.
"He d'sherted me today,--abon--abonimably d'sherted me. For'n Missionary
S'ciety met safternoon at our house. All ladies in S'ciety met our
house. Deac'n tol' me be generous--givvem all the r'fressmens they
wanted. He went down shellar an' got some zat shider he p'up lash Marsh.
He said he wanted to shee whezzer it was any good." She paused, her brow
wrinkled in thought. "Lesh see--where was I?"
"In the parlour?" supplied Anderson, helpfully.
She shook her head impatiently. "I mean where was I talkin' 'bout? Oh,
yesh,--'bout shider. When Woman For'n Missinary S'ciety come I givvem
shider,--lots shider. No harm in shider, An'erson,--so don' look like
that. Deacon shays baby could drink barrel shider an--and sho on an' sho
forth. Well, For'n Missinary S'ciety all havin' splennid time,--singin'
'n' prayin' 'n' sho on 'n' sho forth, an'--an' sho on 'n' sho forth.
Then your wife, An'erson, she jumps up 'n' shays we gotter have
shong-shervice,--reg'ler shong shervice. She--"
"_My_ wife?" exclaimed Anderson. "Was Eva Crow there?"
"Shert'nly. Never sho happy 'n' her life. Couldn't b'lieve my eyes 'n'
ears. And Sister Jones too,--your bosh's wife, Misser Squires. Say,
d'you ever know she could shing bass? Well, she can, all right. She c'n
shing bass an' tenor'n ev'thing else, she can. She--"
"Where--where are they now?" demanded Anderson, with a wild look at
Harry.
"Who? The Woman For'n Missionary S'ciety?"
"Yes. For heaven's sake, don't tell me they're loose on the street!"
"Not mush! Promished me they wait till I capshered my hussam, deader
'live, an' bring 'im 'ome. Didden I tell you my hussam desherted me? He
desherted all of us--all of For'n Missinary S'ciety. I gotter bring 'im
back, deader 'live. Wannim to lead in shong shervice. My hussam's got
loudes' voice in town. Leads shingin' in chursh 'n' prayer meetin' 'n'
ever 'where else. Loudes' voice in town, thass what he is. Prays loudes'
of anybody, too. All ladies waitin' up my house f'r loudes voice in town
to lead 'em in shacred shong. Muss have somebody with loud voice to lead
'em. Lass I heard of 'em they was all shingin' differen' shongs.
Loudes' voice--lou'st voich--lou--"
She slumbered.
The marshal and the editor looked at each other.
"Well, she's safe for the time being," said the latter, wiping his wet
forehead.
"An' so's the deacon," added Anderson. "See here, Harry, I got to hustle
up to the deacon's house an' see what c'n be done with them women. My
lordy! The town will be disgraced if they get out on the street
an'--why, like as not, they'll start a parade or somethin'. You stay
here an' watch her, an' I'll--"
"No, you don't, my friend," broke in Harry gruffly. "You get her out of
this office as quickly as you can."
"Are you afraid to be left alone with that pore, helpless little woman?"
demanded Anderson. "I'll take her hatchet away with me, if that's what
you're afraid of."
"If you'd been attending to your job as a good, competent official of
this benighted town, the poor, helpless little woman wouldn't be in the
condition she's in now. You--"
"Hold on there! What do you mean by that?"