But a few miles from the city here, and on the
sloping banks of the stream noted more for its
plenitude of "chubs" and "shiners" than the gamier
two- and four-pound bass for which, in season, so
many credulous anglers flock and lie in wait, stands
a country residence, so convenient to the stream,
and so inviting in its pleasant exterior and
comfortable surroundings--barn, dairy, and spring-
house--that the weary, sunburned, and disheartened
fisherman, out from the dusty town for a day of
recreation, is often wont to seek its hospitality.
The house in style of architecture is something of
a departure from the typical farmhouse, being
designed and fashioned with no regard to symmetry
or proportion, but rather, as is suggested, built to
conform to the matter-of-fact and most sensible
ideas of its owner, who, if it pleased him, would
have small windows where large ones ought to be,
and vice versa, whether they balanced properly to
the eye or not. And chimneys--he would have as
many as he wanted, and no two alike, in either
height or size. And if he wanted the front of the
house turned from all possible view, as though
abashed at any chance of public scrutiny, why, that
was his affair and not the public's; and, with like
perversity, if he chose to thrust his kitchen under the public's
very nose, what should the generally
fagged-out, half-famished representative of that
dignified public do but reel in his dead minnow,
shoulder his fishing-rod, clamber over the back
fence of the old farmhouse and inquire within, or
jog back to the city, inwardly anathematizing that
particular locality or the whole rural district
in general. That is just the way that farmhouse
looked to the writer of this sketch one week ago--
so individual it seemed--so liberal, and yet so
independent. It wasn't even weather-boarded, but,
instead, was covered smoothly with cement,
as though the plasterers had come while the folks
were visiting, and so, unable to get at the interior,
had just plastered the outside.
I am more than glad that I was hungry enough,
and weary enough, and wise enough to take the
house at its first suggestion; for, putting away my
fishing-tackle for the morning, at least, I went up
the sloping bank, crossed the dusty road, and
confidently clambered over the fence.
Not even a growling dog to intimate that I was
trespassing. All was open--gracious-looking--pastoral.
The sward beneath my feet was velvet-like
in elasticity, and the scarce visible path I followed
through it led promptly to the open kitchen door.
From within I heard a woman singing some old
ballad in an undertone, while at the threshold a
trim, white-spurred rooster stood poised on one foot,
curving his glossy neck and cocking his wattled
head as though to catch the meaning of the words.
I paused. It was a scene I felt restrained from
breaking in upon, nor would I have, but for the
sound of a strong male voice coming around the
corner of the house:
"Sir. Howdy!"
Turning, I saw a rough-looking but kindly
featured man of sixty-five, evidently the owner of the
place.
I returned his salutation with some confusion
and much deference. "I must really beg your pardon
for this intrusion," I began, "but I have been
tiring myself out fishing, and your home here looked
so pleasant--and I felt so thirsty--and--"
"Want a drink, I reckon," said the old man,
turning abruptly toward the kitchen door, then pausing
as suddenly, with a backward motion of his thumb
--"jest follow the path here down to the little
brick--that's the spring--and you'll find 'at you've
come to the right place fer drinkin'-worter! Hold
on a minute tel I get you a tumbler--there's nothin'
down there but a tin."
"Then don't trouble yourself any further," I
said, heartily, "for I'd rather drink from a tin cup
than a goblet of pure gold."
"And so'd I," said the old man, reflectively,
turning mechanically, and following me down the path.
" 'Druther drink out of a tin--er jest a fruit-can
with the top knocked off--er--er--er a gourd," he
added in a zestful, reminiscent tone of voice, that
so heightened my impatient thirst that I reached
the spring-house fairly in a run.
"Well-sir!" exclaimed my host, in evident
delight, as I stood dipping my nose in the second
cupful of the cool, revivifying liquid, and peering in a
congratulatory kind of way at the blurred and rubicund
reflection of my features in the bottom of the
cup, "well-sir, blame-don! ef it don't do a feller
good to see you enjoyin' of it thataway! But don't
you drink too much o' the worter!--'cause there's
some sweet milk over there in one o' them crocks,
maybe; and ef you'll jest, kind o' keerful-like, lift
off the led of that third one, say, over there to
yer left, and dip you out a tinful er two o' that,
w'y, it'll do you good to drink it, and it'll do me
good to see you at it-- But hold up!--hold up!"
he called, abruptly, as, nowise loath, I bent above
the vessel designated. "Hold yer hosses fer a second!
Here's Marthy; let her git it fer ye."
If I was at first surprised and confused, meeting
the master of the house, I was wholly startled and
chagrined in my present position before its mistress.
But as I arose, and stammered, in my confusion,
some incoherent apology, I was again reassured and
put at greater ease by the comprehensive and
forgiving smile the woman gave me, as I yielded her
my place, and, with lifted hat, awaited her further
kindness.
"I came just in time, sir," she said, half
laughingly, as with strong, bare arms she reached across
the gurgling trough and replaced the lid that I had
partially removed.--"I came just in time, I see, to
prevent father from having you dip into the morning's-
milk, which, of course, has scarcely a veil of
cream over the face of it as yet. But men, as you
are doubtless willing to admit," she went on jocularly,
"don't know about these things. You must
pardon father, as much for his well-meaning ignorance
of such matters, as for this cup of cream,
which I am sure you will better relish."
She arose, still smiling, with her eyes turned
frankly on my own. And I must be excused when
I confess that as I bowed my thanks, taking the
proffered cup and lifting it to my lips, I stared
with an uncommon interest and pleasure at the
donor's face.
She was a woman of certainly not less than forty
years of age. But the figure, and the rounded grace
and fulness of it, together with the features and the
eyes, completed as fine a specimen of physical and
mental health as ever it has been my fortune to
meet; there was something so full of purpose and
resolve--something so wholesome, too, about the
character--something so womanly--I might almost
say manly, and would, but for the petty prejudice
maybe occasioned by the trivial fact of a locket
having dropped from her bosom as she knelt; and
that trinket still dangles in my memory even as it
then dangled and dropped back to its concealment
in her breast as she arose. But her face, by no
means handsome in the common sense of the word,
was marked with a breadth and strength of outline
and expression that approached the heroic--a face
that once seen is forever fixed in memory--a personage
once met one must know more of. And so it
was, that an hour later, as I strolled with the old
man about his farm, looking, to all intents, with the
profoundest interest at his Devonshires, Shorthorns,
Jerseys, and the like, I lured from him something
of an outline of his daughter's history.
"There're no better girl 'n Marthy!" he said,
mechanically answering some ingenious allusion to
her worth. "And yit," he went on reflectively,
stooping from his seat in the barn door and with
his open jack-knife picking up a little chip with the
point of the blade--"and yit--you wouldn't believe
it--but Marthy was the oldest o' three daughters,
and hed--I may say--hed more advantages o' marryin'--
and yit, as I was jest goin' to say, she's the
very one 'at didn't marry. Hed every advantage--
Marthy did. W'y, we even hed her educated--her
mother was a-livin' then--and we was well enough
fixed to afford the educatin' of her, mother allus
contended--and we was--besides, it was Marthy's
notion, too, and you know how women is thataway
when they git their head set. So we sent Marthy
down to Indianop'lus, and got her books and put
her in school there, and paid fer her keepin' and
ever'thing; and she jest--well, you may say, lived
there stiddy fer better'n four year. O' course
she'd git back ever' once-an-a-while, but her visits
was allus, some-way-another, onsatisfactory-like,
'cause, you see, Marthy was allus my favorite, and
I'd allus laughed and told her 'at the other girls
could git marrid ef they wanted, but SHE was goin'
to be the 'nest-egg' of our family, and 'slong as I
lived I wanted her at home with me. And she'd
laugh and contend 'at she'd as li'f be an old maid as
not, and never expected to marry, ner didn't want
to.
"But she had me sceart onc't, though! Come
out from the city one time, durin' the army, with
a peart-lookin' young feller in blue clothes and gilt
straps on his shoulders. Young lieutenant he was
--name o' Morris. Was layin' in camp there in the
city som'er's. I disremember which camp it was
now adzackly--but anyway, it 'peared like he had
plenty o' time to go and come, fer from that time
on he kep' on a-comin'--ever' time Marthy 'ud
come home, he'd come, too; and I got to noticin' 'at
Marthy come home a good 'eal more'n she used to
afore Morris first brought her. And blame' ef the
thing didn't git to worryin' me! And onc't I spoke
to mother about it, and told her ef I thought the
feller wanted to marry Marthy I'd jest stop his
comin' right then and there. But mother she sort o'
smiled and said somepin' 'bout men a-never seein'
through nothin'; and when I ast her what she meant,
w'y, she ups and tells me 'at Morris didn't keer
nothin' fer Marthy, ner Marthy fer Morris, and
then went on to tell me that Morris was kind o'
aidgin' up to'rds Annie--she was next to Marthy,
you know, in p'int of years and experience, but
ever'body allus said 'at Annie was the purtiest one
o' the whole three of 'em. And so when mother
told me 'at the signs p'inted to'rds Annie, w'y, of course, I
hedn't no particular objections to that,
'cause Morris was of good fambly enough it turned
out, and, in fact, was as stirrin' a young feller as
ever I' want fer a son-in-law, and so I hed nothin'
more to say--ner they wasn't no occasion to say
nothin', 'cause right along about then I begin to
notice 'at Marthy quit comin' home so much, and
Morris kep' a-comin' more.
"Tel finally, one time he was out here all by
hisself, 'long about dusk, come out here where
I was feedin', and ast me, all at onct, and in
a straightfor'ard way, ef he couldn't marry
Annie; and, some-way-another, blame' ef it didn't
make me happy as him when I told him yes!
You see that thing proved, pine-blank, 'at he wasn't
a-fishin' round fer Marthy. Well-sir, as luck would
hev it, Marthy got home about a half-hour later,
and I'll give you my word I was never so glad to
see the girl in my life! It was foolish in me, I
reckon, but when I see her drivin' up the lane--
it was purt' nigh dark then, but I could see her
through the open winder from where I was sittin'
at the supper-table, and so I jest quietly excused
myself, p'lite-like, as a feller will, you know, when
they's comp'ny round, and slipped off and met her
jest as she was about to git out to open the barn
gate. 'Hold up, Marthy,' says I; 'set right where
you air; I'll open the gate fer you, and I'll do
anything else fer you in the world 'at you want me to!'
" 'W'y, what's pleased YOU so?' she says,
laughin', as she druv through slow-like and a-ticklin' my nose
with the cracker of the buggy-whip.--'What's
pleased YOU?'
" 'Guess,' says I, jerkin' the gate to, and turnin' to
lift her out.
" 'The new peanner's come?' says she, eager-like.
" 'Yer new peanner's come,' says I, 'but that's
not it.'
" 'Strawberries for supper?' says she.
" 'Strawberries fer supper,' says I; 'but that
ain't it.'
"Jest then Morris's hoss whinnied in the barn,
and she glanced up quick and smilin' and says,
'Somebody come to see somebody?'
" 'You're a-gittin' warm,' says I.
" 'Somebody come to see ME?' she says, anxious-like.
" 'No,' says I, 'and I'm glad of it--fer this one
'at's come wants to git married, and o' course I
wouldn't harber in my house no young feller 'at
was a-layin' round fer a chance to steal away the
"Nest-egg," ' says I, laughin'.
"Marthy had riz up in the buggy by this time,
but as I helt up my hands to her, she sort o' drawed
back a minute, and says, all serious-like and kind o'
whisperin':
" 'Is it ANNIE?'
"I nodded. 'Yes,' says I, 'and what's more, I've
give my consent, and mother's give hern--the thing's
all settled. Come, jump out and run in and be
happy with the rest of us!' and I helt out my hands
ag'in, but she didn't 'pear to take no heed. She was kind o'
pale, too, I thought, and swallered a
time er two like as ef she couldn't speak plain.
" 'Who is the man?' she ast.
" 'Who--who's the man,' I says, a-gittin' kind o'
out o' patience with the girl.--'W'y, you know who
it is, o' course.--It's Morris,' says I. 'Come, jump
down! Don't you see I'm waitin' fer ye?'
" 'Then take me,' she says; and blame-don! ef
the girl didn't keel right over in my arms as limber
as a rag! Clean fainted away! Honest! Jest the
excitement, I reckon, o' breakin' it to her so suddent-
like--'cause she liked Annie, I've sometimes
thought, better'n even she did her own mother.
Didn't go half so hard with her when her other
sister married. Yes-sir!" said the old man, by way
of sweeping conclusion, as he rose to his feet--
"Marthy's the on'y one of 'em 'at never married--
both the others is gone--Morris went all through
the army and got back safe and sound--'s livin' in
Idyho, and doin' fust-rate. Sends me a letter ever'
now and then. Got three little chunks o' grandchildren
out there, and I never laid eyes on one
of 'em. You see, I'm a-gittin' to be quite a middle-
aged man--in fact, a very middle-aged man, you
might say. Sence mother died, which has be'n--
lem-me-see--mother's be'n dead som'er's in the
neighberhood o' ten years.--Sence mother died I've
be'n a-gittin' more and more o' MARTHY'S notion--
that is,--you couldn't ever hire ME to marry nobody!
and them has allus be'n and still is the 'Nest-egg's'
views! Listen! That's her a-callin' fer us now. You must sort
o' overlook the freedom, but I told
Marthy you'd promised to take dinner with us to-
day, and it 'ud never do to disappoint her now.
Come on." And ah! it would have made the soul
of you either rapturously glad or madly envious to
see how meekly I consented.
I am always thinking that I never tasted coffee
till that day; I am always thinking of the crisp and
steaming rolls, ored over with the molten gold
that hinted of the clover-fields, and the bees that
had not yet permitted the honey of the bloom and
the white blood of the stalk to be divorced; I am
thinking that the young and tender pullet we happy
three discussed was a near and dear relative of the
gay patrician rooster that I first caught peering so
inquisitively in at the kitchen door; and I am
always--always thinking of "The Nest-egg."
"THE BOY FROM ZEENY"
His advent in our little country town was at
once abrupt and novel. Why he came, when
he came, or how he came, we boys never knew. My
first remembrance of him is of his sudden appearance
in the midst of a game of "Ant'ny-over," in
which a dozen boys besides myself were most
enthusiastically engaged. The scene of the exciting
contest was the center of the main street of the
town, the elevation over which we tossed the ball
being the skeleton remains of a grand triumphal
arch, left as a sort of cadaverous reminder of some
recent political demonstration. Although I recall
the boy's external appearance upon that occasion
with some vagueness, I vividly remember that his
trousers were much too large and long, and that
his heavy, flapping coat was buttonless, and very
badly worn and damaged at the sleeves and elbows.
I remember, too, with even more distinctness, the
hat he wore; it was a high, silk, bell-crowned hat--
a man's hat and a veritable "plug"--not a new and
shiny "plug," by any means, but still of dignity and
gloss enough to furnish a noticeable contrast to the
other appurtenances of its wearer's wardrobe. In
fact, it was through this latter article of dress that the
general attention of the crowd came at last to
be drawn particularly to its unfortunate possessor,
who, evidently directed by an old-time instinct, had
mechanically thrust the inverted "castor" under a
falling ball, and the ball, being made of yarn
wrapped tightly over a green walnut, and dropping
from an uncommon height, had gone through the
hat like a round shot.
Naturally enough much merriment was occasioned
by the singular mishap, and the victim of
the odd occurrence seemed himself inclined to join
in the boisterous laughter and make the most of
his ridiculous misfortune. He pulled the hat back
over his tousled head, and with the flapping crown
of it still clinging by one frayed hinge, he capered
through a grotesquely executed jig that made the
clamorous crowd about him howl again.
"Wo! what a hat!" cried Billy Kinzey, derisively,
and with a palpably rancorous twinge of envy in
his heart; for Billy was the bad boy of our town,
and would doubtless have enjoyed the strange boy's
sudden notoriety in thus being able to convert
disaster into positive fun. "Wo! what a hat!"
reiterated Billy, making a feint to knock it from the
boy's head as the still capering figure pirouetted
past him.
The boy's eye caught the motion, and he whirled
suddenly in a backward course and danced past his
reviler again, this time much nearer than before.
"Better try it," he said, in a low, half-laughing
tone that no one heard but Billy and myself. He
was out of range in an instant, still laughing as he
went.
"Durn him!" said Billy, with stifling anger,
clutching his fist and leaving one knuckle protruding
in a very wicked-looking manner.--"Durn him! He
better not sass me! He's afeard to come past here
ag'in and say that! I'll knock his durn ole stove-
pipe in the middle o' nex' week!"
"You will, hey?" queried a revolving voice, as
the boy twirled past again--this time so near that
Billy felt his taunting breath blown in his face.
"Yes, I 'will, hey'!" said Billy, viciously; and
with a side-sweeping, flat-handed lick that sounded
like striking a rusty sheet of tin, the crownless
"plug" went spinning into the gutter, while, as
suddenly, the assaulted little stranger, with a peculiarly
pallid smile about his lips and an electric glitter
in his eye, adroitly flung his left hand forward,
smiting his insulter such a blow in the region of the
brow that the unguarded Billy went tumbling
backward, his plucky assailant prancing wildly
around his prostrate form.
"Oh! come and see me!" snarled the strange boy,
in a contemptuous tone, cocking his fists up in a
scientific manner, and dropping into a stoop-
shouldered swagger that would have driven envy into
the heart of a bullying hack-driver. "Git the bloke
on his pins!" he sneered, turning to the crowd.--
"S'pose I'm goin' to hit a man w'en he's down?"
But his antagonist needed no such assistance.
Stung with his unlooked-for downfall, bleeding
from the first blow ever given him by mortal boy,
and goaded to absolute frenzy by the taunts of his
swaggering enemy, Billy sprang to his feet, and a
moment later had succeeded in closing with the
boy in a rough-and-tumble fight, in which his
adversary was at a disadvantage, being considerably
smaller, hampered, too, with his loose, unbuttoned
coat and baggy trousers. But, for all that, he did
some very efficient work in the way of a deft and
telling blow or two upon the nose of his overpowering
foe, who sat astride his wriggling body, but
wholly unable to get in a lick.
"Durn you!" said Billy, with his hand gripping
the boy's throat, "holler 'nough!"
"Holler nothin'!" gurgled the boy, with his eyes
fairly starting from his head.
"Oh, let him up, Billy," called a compassionate
voice from the excited crowd.
"Holler 'nough and I will," said Billy, in a tragic
whisper in the boy's ear. "Durn ye! holler 'Calf-rope!' "
The boy only shook his head, trembled convulsively,
let fall his eyelids, and lay limp and, to all
appearances, unconscious.
The startled Billy loosed his hold, rose half-way
to his feet, then fiercely pounced again at his rival.
But it was too late.--The ruse had succeeded,
and the boy was once more on his feet.
"You fight like a dog!" said the strange boy, in
a tone of infinite contempt--"and you AIR a dog!
Put up yer props like a man and come at me, and
I'll meller yer head till yer mother won't know
you! Come on! I dare you!"
This time, as Billy started forward at the
challenge, I regret to say that in his passion he snatched
up from the street a broken buggy-spoke, before
which warlike weapon the strange boy was forced
warily to retreat. Step by step he gave way, and
step by step his threatening foe advanced. I think,
perhaps, part of the strange boy's purpose in thus
retreating was to arm himself with one of the "ax-
handles" that protruded from a churn standing in
front of a grocery, toward which he slowly backed
across the sidewalk. However that may be, it is
evident he took no note of an open cellar-way that
lay behind him, over the brink of which he deliberately
backed, throwing up his hands as he disappeared.
We heard a heavy fall, but heard no cry. Some
loungers in the grocery, attracted by the clamor of
the throng without, came to the door inquiringly;
one man, learning what had happened, peered down
the stairway of the cellar, and called to ask the boy
if he was hurt, which query was answered an instant
later by the appearance of the boy himself, his face
far whiter than his shirt, and his lips trembling,
but his teeth clenched.
"Guess I broke my arm ag'in," he said, briefly, as
the man leaned over and helped him up the steps,
the boy sweeping his keen eyes searchingly over the
faces of the crowd. "It's the RIGHT arm, though,"
he continued, glancing at the injured member dangling
helplessly at his side--"THIS-'UN'S all right yet!"
and as he spoke he jerked from the man's assistance,
wheeled round, and an instant later, as a
buggy-spoke went hurtling through the air, he
slapped the bewildered face of Billy with his open
hand. "Dam' coward!" he said.
Then the man caught him, and drew him back,
and the crowd closed in between the combatants,
following, as the boy with the broken arm was
hurried down street to the doctor's office, where the
door was immediately closed on the rabble and all
the mystery within--not an utter mystery, either,
for three or four enterprising and sagacious boys
slipped off from the crowd that thronged in front,
and climbing by a roundabout way and over a high
board fence into the back yard, secretly posted
themselves at the blinded window in the rear of the little
one-roomed office and breathlessly awaited news
from within.
"They got him laid out on the settee," whispered
a venturous boy who had leaned a board against
the window-sill and climbed into a position
commanding the enviable advantage of a broken window-
pane. "I kin see him through a hole in the
curtain. Keep still!
"They got his coat off, and his sleeve rolled up,"
whispered the boy, in continuation--"and the doctor's
a-givin' him some medicine in a tumbler. Now
he's a-pullin' his arm. Gee-mun-nee! I kin hear the
bones crunch!"
"Hain't he a-cryin'?" queried a milk-faced boy,
with very large blue eyes and fine white hair, and
a grieved expression as he spoke.--"Hain't he
a-cryin'?"
"Well, he hain't!" said the boy in the window,
with unconscious admiration. "Listen!
"I heerd him thist tell 'em 'at it wasn't the first
time his arm was broke. Now keep still!" and
the boy in the window again bent his ear to the
broken pane.
"He says both his arm's be'n broke," continued
the boy in the window--"says this-'un 'at's broke
now's be'n broke two times 'fore this time."
"Dog-gone! hain't he a funny feller!" said the
milk-faced boy, with his big eyes lifted wistfully
to the boy in the window.
"He says onc't his pap broke his arm w'en he was
whippin' him," whispered the boy in the window.
"Bet his pa's a wicked man!" said the milk-faced
boy, in a dreamy, speculative way--"s'pect he's a
drunkard, er somepin'!"
"Keep still," said the boy at the window; "they're
tryin' to git him to tell his pap's name and his, and
he won't do it, 'cause he says his pap comes and
steals him ever' time he finds out where he is."
The milk-faced boy drew a long, quavering
breath and gazed suspiciously round the high board
fence of the enclosure.
"He says his pap used to keep a liberty-stable
in Zeeny--in Ohio som'er's,--but he daresn't stay
round THERE no more, 'cause he broke up there, and
had to skedaddle er they'd clean him out! He says
he hain't got no mother, ner no brothers, ner no
sisters, ner no nothin'--on'y," the boy in the window
added, with a very dry and painful swallow, "he
says he hain't got nothin' on'y thist the clothes on
his back!"
"Yes, and I bet," broke in the milk-faced boy,
abruptly, with his thin lips compressed, and his
big eyes fixed on space--"yes, and I bet he kin lick
Billy Kinzey, ef his arm IS broke!"
At this juncture, some one inside coming to raise
the window, the boy at the broken pane leaped to
the ground, and, flocking at his heels, his frightened
comrades bobbed one by one over the horizon of the
high fence and were gone in an instant.
So it was the hero of this sketch came to be
known as "The Boy from Zeeny."
The Boy from Zeeny, though evidently predisposed
to novel and disastrous happenings, for once,
at least, had come upon a streak of better fortune;
for the doctor, it appeared, had someway taken a
fancy to him, and had offered him an asylum at
his own home and hearth--the compensation stipulated,
and suggested by the boy himself, being a
conscientious and efficient service in the doctor's
stable. Even with his broken arm splinted and
bandaged and supported in a sling, The Boy from
Zeeny could daily be seen loping the doctor's spirited
horse up the back alley from the stable to the office,
with the utter confidence and careless grace
of a Bedouin. When, at last, the injured arm was
wholly well again, the daring feats of horsemanship
of which the boy was capable were listened to with
incredulity by the "good" boys of the village school,
who never played "hooky" on long summer afternoons,
and, in consequence, never had a chance of
witnessing The Boy from Zeeny loping up to the
"swimmin'-hole," a mile from town, barebacked,
with nothing but a halter, and his face turned
toward the horse's tail. In fact The Boy from
Zeeny displayed such a versatility of accomplishments,
and those, too, of a character but faintly
represented in the average boy of the country town,
that, for all the admiration their possessor evoked,
an equal envy was aroused in many a youthful
breast.
"The boys in this town's down on you!" said
a cross-eyed, freckled-faced boy, one day, to The
Boy from Zeeny.
The Boy from Zeeny was sitting in the alley
window of the hayloft of the doctor's stable, and
the cross-eyed boy had paused below, and, with his
noward-looking eyes upturned, stood waiting the
effect of this intelligence.
"What do I care for the boys in this town?" said
The Boy from Zeeny.
"The boys in this town," repeated the cross-eyed
boy, with a slow, prophetic flourish of his head--
"the boys in this town says 'cause you come from
Zeeny and blacked Billy Kinzey's eye, 'at you think
you're goin' to run things round here! And you'll
find out you ain't the bosst o' this town!" and the
cross-eyed boy shook his head again with dire foreboding.
"Looky here, Cocky!" said The Boy from Zeeny,
trying to focus a direct gaze on the boy's delusive
eyes, "w'y don't you talk straight out from the
shoulder? I reckon 'the boys in this town,' as you
call 'em, didn't send YOU round here to tell me what
THEY was goin' to do! But ef you want to take it
up fer 'em, and got any sand to back you, jest say it,
and I'll come down there and knock them durn
twisted eyes o' yourn straight ag'in!"
"Yes, you will!" muttered the cross-eyed boy,
with dubious articulation, glancing uneasily up the
alley.
"What?" growled The Boy from Zeeny, thrusting
one dangling leg farther out the window, supporting
his weight by the palms of his hands, and poised as
though about to spring--"what 'id you say?"
"Didn't say nothin'," said the cross-eyed boy,
feebly; and then, as a sudden and most bewildering
smile lighted up his defective eyes, he exclaimed:
"Oh, I tell you what le's do! Le's me and you
git up a show in your stable, and don't let none o'
the other boys be in it! I kin turn a handspring
like you, and purt' nigh walk on my hands; and
you kin p'form on the slack-rope--and spraddle
out like the 'inja-rubber man'--and hold a pitch-
fork on yer chin-and stand up on a horse 'ithout
a-holdin'--and--and--Oh! ever'thing!" And as the
cross-eyed boy breathlessly concluded this list of
strong attractions, he had The Boy from Zeeny so
thoroughly inoculated with the enterprise that he
warmly closed with the proposition, and the preparations
and the practise for the show were at once
inaugurated.
Three hours later, an extremely cross-eyed boy,
with the freckles of his face thrown into vivid relief
by an intense pallor, rushed pantingly into the
doctor's office with the fateful intelligence that The
Boy from Zeeny had "fell and broke his arm ag'in."
And this time, as it seemed, the hapless boy had
surpassed the seriousness of all former fractures,
this last being of a compound nature, and very
painful in the setting, and tedious in recovery; the
recovery, too, being anything but perfect, since it
left the movement of the elbow somewhat restricted,
and threw the little fellow's arm into an unnatural
position, with the palm of the hand turned forward
as he walked. But for all that, the use of it was,
to all appearances, little impaired.
Doubtless it was through such interludes from
rough service as these accidents afforded that The
Boy from Zeeny had acquired the meager education
he possessed. The doctor's wife, who had from the
first been kind to him, grew to like him very much.
Through her gentle and considerate interest he was
stimulated to study by the occasional present of a
simple volume. Oftentimes the good woman would
devote an hour to his instruction in the mysteries of
the book's orthography and rhetoric.
Nor was The Boy from Zeeny a dull pupil, nor
was he an ungrateful one. He was quick to learn,
and never prouder than when a mastered lesson
gained for him the approbation of his patient instructor.
The history of The Boy from Zeeny, such as had
been gathered by the doctor and his wife, was
corroborative in outline with the brief hint of it
communicated to the curious listeners at the rear
window of the doctor's office on the memorable day
of the boy's first appearance in the town. He was
without family, save a harsh, unfeeling father, who,
from every evidence, must have neglected and
abused the child most shamefully, the circumstantial
proof of this fact being evidenced in the boy's
frank acknowledgment that he had repeatedly "run
away" from him, and his still firm resolve to keep
his name a secret, lest he might thereby be traced
to his present security and fall once more into the
hands of his unnatural parent.
Certain it was that the feelings of all who knew
the lad's story showed hearty sympathy with him,
and when one morning it was rumored that The Boy
from Zeeny had mysteriously disappeared, and the
rumor rapidly developed into an unquestionable
fact, there was a universal sense of regret in the
little town, which in turn resolved itself into positive
indignation when it was learned from the doctor
that an explanation, printed in red keel on the
back of a fragment of circus-poster, had been
found folded and tucked away an the buckle-strap
of his horse's bridle. The somewhat remarkable
communication, in sprawling capitals, ran thus:
"PAPS GOT ME AGIN. I HAF TO GO. DAM HIM. DOC TEL
HER TO KEEP MY BOOCKS. GOOD BY. I FED OLE CHARLY. I
FED HIM OTES AND HA AN CORN. HE WONT NEED NO MORE FER
A WEAK. AN BRAND TO. DOC TEL HER GOOD BY."
It was a curious bit of composition--uncouth,
assuredly, and marred, maybe, with an unpardonable
profanity--but it served. In the silence and gloom
of the old stable, the doctor's fingers trembled as
he read, and the good wife's eyes, peering anxiously
above his heaving shoulder, filled and overflowed
with tears.
I wish that it were in the veracious sequence of
this simple history to give this wayward boy back
to the hearts that loved him, and that still in memory
enshrine him with affectionate regard; but the
hapless lad--the little ragged twelve-year-old that
wandered out of nowhere into town, and wandered
into nowhere out again--never returned. Yet we
who knew him in those old days--we who were
children with him, and, in spite of boyish jealousy
and petty bickerings, admired the gallant spirit of
the lad--are continually meeting with reminders of
him; the last instance of which, in my own experience,
I can not refrain from offering here:
For years I have been a wanderer from the dear
old town of my nativity, but through all my
wanderings a gracious fate has always kept me somewhere
in its pleasant neighborhood, and, in consequence,
I often pay brief visits to the scenes of my
long-vanished boyhood. It was during such a visit,
but a few short years ago, that remembrances of
my lost youth were most forcibly recalled by the
progress of the county fair, which institution I
was permitted to attend through the kindness of an
old chum who drove me over in his buggy.
Although it was not the day for racing, we found
the track surrounded by a dense crowd of clamorous
and applauding people.
"What does it mean?" I asked my friend, as he
guided his horse in and out among the trees toward
the edge of the enclosure.
"It's Professor Andrus, I suspect," he answered,
rising in the buggy as he spoke, and peering eagerly
above the heads of the surging multitude.
"And who's Professor Andrus?" I asked, striking
a match against the tire of the now stationary buggy-
wheel, and lighting the stump of my cigar.
"Why, haven't you heard of the famous Professor?"
he answered, laughingly--immediately adding
in a serious tone: "Professor Andrus is the famous
'horse-tamer' who has been driving the country
absolutely wild here for two or three days. Stand up
here where you can see!" he went on, excitedly.
"Yonder he comes! Isn't that splendid?"
And it was.
Across the sea of heads, and facing toward us
down the track, I caught sight of a glossy span of
horses that in their perfect beauty of symmetry,
high heads and tossing manes looked as though
they were just prancing out of some Arabian dream.
The animals seemed nude of rein or harness, save
only a jeweled strap that crossed the breast of each,
together with a slender trace at either side connecting
with a jaunty little phaeton whose glittering
wheels slivered the sunshine into splinters as they
spun. Upon the narrow seat of the airy vehicle sat
the driver. No lines were wound about his hands
--no shout or lash to goad the horses to their telling
speed. They were simply directed and controlled
by the graceful motions of a long and slender whip
which waved slowly to and fro above their heads.
The great crowd cheered the master as he came. He
arose deliberately, took off his hat, and bowed. The
applause was deafening. Still standing, he whizzed
past us and was gone. But something in the manner
of the handsome fellow struck me with a strange
sense of familiarity. Was it the utter disregard of
fear that I saw on his face? Was it the keenness
of the eye and the perfect self-possession of the
man? Or was it--was it the peculiar way in which
the right arm had dropped to his side after his
salute to us while curving past us, and did I fancy,
for that reason, that the palm of his hand turned
forward as he stood?
"Clear the track, there!" came a far voice across
the ring.--"Don't cross there, in God's name! Drive
back!"
The warning evidently came too late. There was
an instant's breathless silence, then a far-away, pent-
sounding clash, then utter havoc in the crowd: The
ropes about the ring were broken over, and a tumultuous
tide of people poured across the ring, myself
borne on the very foremost wave.
"Jest the buggy smashed, that's all!" cried a voice.
"The hosses hain't hurt--ner the man."
The man referred to was the Professor. I caught
a glimpse of him as he rose from the grassy bank
where he had been flung. He was very pale, but
calm. An uncouth man brought him his silk hat
from where it had rolled in the dust.
"Wish you'd just take this handkerchief and
brush it off," said the Professor; "I guess I've broke
my arm."
It was The Boy from Zeeny.