THE TAVERN FIRESIDE.
I call to mind a certain wild, dark night in November. St. Pierre lay
under his palmetto thatch in the forest behind Grande Pointe, and
could not sleep for listening to the wind, and wondering where his son
was, in that wild Texas norther. On the Mississippi a steamer, upward
bound, that had whistled to land at Belmont or Belle Alliance
plantation, seemed to be staying there afraid to venture away. Miles
southward beyond the river and the lands on that side, Lake des
Allemands was combing with the tempest and hissing with the rain.
Still farther away, on the little bayou and at the railway-station in
the edge of the swamp that we already know, and westward over the
prairie where Claude had vanished into the world, all life was hidden
and mute. And farther still, leagues and leagues away, the mad tempest
was riding the white-caps in Berwick's Bay and Grande Lake; and yet
beyond, beyond New Iberia, and up by Carancro, and around again by
St. Martinville, Breaux Bridge, Grand Coteau, and Opelousas, and down
once more across the prairies of Vermilion, the marshes about Côte
Blanche Bay, and the islands in the Gulf, it came bounding, screaming,
and buffeting. And all the way across that open sweep from Mermentau
to Côte Gelée it was tearing the rain to mist and freezing it wherever
it fell, only lulling and warming a little about Joseph Jefferson's
Island, as if that prank were too mean a trick to play upon his
orange-groves.
In Vermilionville the wind came around every corner piercing and
pinching to the bone. The walking was slippery; and though it was
still early bedtime and the ruddy lamp-light filled the wet panes of
some window every here and there, scarce a soul was stirring without,
on horse or afoot, to be guided by its kindly glow.
At the corner of two streets quite away from the court-house square, a
white frame tavern, with a wooden Greek porch filling its whole
two-story front and a balcony built within the porch at the
second-story windows in oddest fashion, was glowing with hospitable
firelight. It was not nearly the largest inn of the place, nor the
oldest, nor the newest, nor the most accessible. There was no clink of
glass there. Yet in this, only third year of its present management,
it was the place where those who knew best always put up.
Around the waiting-room fire this evening sat a goodly semicircle of
men,--commercial travellers. Some of them were quite dry and
comfortable, and wore an air of superior fortune over others whose
shoes and lower garments sent out more or less steam and odor toward
the open fireplace. Several were smoking. One who neither smoked nor
steamed stood with his back to the fire and the skirts of his coat
lifted forward on his wrists. He was a rather short, slight, nervy
man, about thirty years of age, with a wide pink baldness running so
far back from his prominent temples and forehead that when he tipped
his face toward the blue joists overhead, enjoying the fatigue of a
well-filled day, his polished skull sent back the firelight
brilliantly. There was a light skirmish of conversation going on, in
which he took no part. No one seemed really acquainted with another.
Presently a man sitting next on the left of him put away a quill
toothpick in his watch-pocket, looked up into the face of the standing
man, and said, with a faint smile:
"That job's done!"
With friendly gravity the other looked down and replied, "I never use
a quill toothpick."
"Yes," said the one who sat, "it's bad. Still I do it."
"Nothing," continued the other,--"nothing harder than a sharpened
white-pine match should ever go between the teeth. Brush thoroughly
but not violently once or twice daily with a moderately stiff brush
dipped in soft water into which has been dropped a few drops of the
tincture of myrrh. A brush of badger's hair is best. If tartar
accumulates, have it removed by a dentist. Do not bite thread or crack
nuts with the teeth, or use the teeth for other purposes than those
for which nature designed them." He bent toward his hearer with a
smile of irresistible sweetness, drew his lips away from his gums,
snapped his teeth together loudly twice or thrice, and smiled again,
modestly. The other man sought defence in buoyancy of manner.
"Right you are!" he chirruped. He reached up to his adviser's blue and
crimson neck-scarf, and laid his finger and thumb upon a large,
solitary pear-shaped pearl. "You're like me; you believe in the real
thing."
"I do," said the pearl's owner; "and I like people that like the real
thing. A pearl of the first water _is_ real. There's no sham there; no
deception--except the iridescence, which is, as you doubtless know, an
optical illusion attributable to the intervention of rays of light
reflected from microscopic corrugations of the nacreous surface. But
for that our eye is to blame, not the pearl. See?"
The seated man did not reply; but another man on the speaker's right,
a large man, widest at the waist, leaned across the arm of his chair
to scrutinize the jewel. Its owner turned his throat for the
inspection, despite a certain grumness and crocodilian aggressiveness
in the man's interest.
"I like a diamond, myself," said the new on-looker, dropped back in
his chair, and met the eyes of the pearl's owner with a heavy glance.
"Tastes differ," kindly responded the wearer of the pearl. "Are you
acquainted with the language of gems?"
The big-waisted man gave a negative grunt, and spat bravely into the
fire. "Didn't know gems could talk," he said.
"They do not talk, they speak," responded their serene interpreter.
The company in general noticed that, with all his amiability of tone
and manner, his mild eyes held the big-waisted man with an
uncomfortable steadiness. "They speak not to the ear, but to the eye
and to the thought:
'Thought is deeper than all speech;
Feeling deeper than all thought;
Souls to souls can never teach
What unto themselves was taught.'"
The speaker's victim writhed, but the riveted gaze and an uplifted
finger pinioned him. "You should know--every one should know--the
language of gems. There is a language of flowers:
'To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.'
But the language of gems is as much more important than that of
flowers as the imperishable gem is itself more enduring than the
withering, the evanescent blossom. A gentleman may not with safety
present to a lady a gem of whose accompanying sentiment he is
ignorant. But with the language of gems understood between them, how
could a sentiment be more exquisitely or more acceptably expressed
than by the gift of a costly gem uttering that sentiment with an
unspoken eloquence! Did you but know the language of gems, your choice
would not be the diamond. 'Diamond me no diamonds,' emblems of pride--
'Pride in their port, defiance in their eye,
I see the lords of humankind pass by.'
"Your choice would have been the pearl, symbol of modest loveliness.
'Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear;'
'Orient pearls at random strung;'
'Fold, little trembler, thy fluttering wing,
Freely partake of love's fathomless spring;
So hallowed thy presence, the spirit within
Hath whispered, "The angels protect thee from sin."'"
The speaker ceased, with his glance hovering caressingly over the
little trembler with fluttering wing, that is, the big-waisted man.
The company sat in listening expectancy; and the big-waisted man,
whose eyes had long ago sought refuge in the fire, lifted them and
said, satirically, "Go on," at the same time trying to buy his way out
with a smile.
"It's your turn," quickly responded the jewel's owner, with something
droll in his manner that made the company laugh at the other's
expense. The big-waisted man kindled, then smiled again, and said:
"Was that emblem of modest loveliness give' to you symbolically, or
did you present it to yourself?"
"I took it for a debt," replied the wearer, bowing joyously.
"Ah!" said the other. "Well, I s'pose it was either that or her
furniture?"
"Thanks, yes." There was a pause, and then the pearl's owner spoke on.
"Strange fact. That was years ago. And yet"--he fondled his gem with
thumb and finger and tender glance--"you're the first man I've met to
whom I could sincerely and symbolically present it, and you don't want
it. I'm sorry."
"I see," said the big-waisted man, glaring at him.
"So do I," responded the pearl's owner. A smile went round, and the
company sat looking into the fire. Outside the wind growled and
scolded, shook and slapped the house, and thrashed it with the rain. A
man sitting against the chimney said:
"If this storm keeps on six hours longer I reduce my estimate of the
cotton-crop sixty-five thousand bales." But no one responded; and as
the importance died out of his face he dropped his gaze into the fire
with a pretence of deep meditation. Presently another, a good-looking
young fellow, said:
"Well, gents, I never cared much for jewelry. But I like a nice
scarf-pin; it's nobby. And I like a handsome seal-ring." He drew one
from a rather chubby finger, and passed it to his next neighbor,
following it with his eyes, and adding: "That's said to be a real
intaglio. But--now, one thing I don't like, that's to see a lady wear
a quantity of diamond rings outside of her glove, and heavy gold
chains, and"--He was interrupted. A long man, with legs stiffened out
to the fire, lifted a cigar between two fingers, sent a soft jet of
smoke into the air, and began monotonously:
"'Chains on a Southern woman? Chains?'
I know the lady that wrote that piece." He suddenly gathered himself
up for some large effort. "I can't recite it as she used to, but"--And
to the joy of all he was interrupted.
"Gentlemen," said one, throwing a cigarette stump into the fire,
"that brings up the subject of the war. By the by, do you know what
that war cost the Government of the United States?" He glanced from
one to another until his eye reached the wearer of the pearl, who had
faced about, and stood now, with the jewel glistening in the
firelight, and who promptly said:
"Yes; how much?"
"Well," said the first questioner with sudden caution, "I may be
mistaken, but I've heard that it cost six--I think they say
six--billion dollars. Didn't it?"
"It did," replied the other, with a smile of friendly commendation;
"it cost six billion, one hundred and eighty-nine million, nine
hundred and twenty-nine thousand, nine hundred and eight dollars. The
largest item is interest; one billion, seven hundred and one million,
two hundred and fifty-six thousand, one hundred and ninety-eight
dollars, forty-two cents. The next largest, the pay of troops; the
next, clothing the army. If there's any item of the war's expenses you
would like to know, ask me. Capturing president Confederate
States--ninety-seven thousand and thirty-one dollars, three cents."
The speaker's manner grew almost gay. The other smiled defensively,
and responded:
"You've got a good memory for sta-stistics. I haven't; and yet I
always did like sta-stistics. I'm no sta-stitian, and yet if I had the
time sta-stistics would be my favorite study; I s'pose it's yours."
The wearer of the pearl shook his head. "No. But I like it. I like
the style of mind that likes it." The two bowed with playful
graciousness to each other. "Yes, I do. And I've studied it, some
little. I can tell you the best time of every celebrated trotter in
this country; the quickest trip a steamer ever made between Queenstown
and New York, New York and Queenstown, New Orleans and New York; the
greatest speed ever made on a railroad or by a yacht, pedestrian,
carrier-pigeon, or defaulting cashier; the rate of postage to every
foreign country; the excess of women over men in every State of the
Union so afflicted--or blessed, according to how you look at it; the
number of volumes in each of the world's ten largest libraries; the
salary of every officer of the United-States Government; the average
duration of life in a man, elephant, lion, horse, anaconda, tortoise,
camel, rabbit, ass, etcetera-etcetera; the age of every crowned head
in Europe; each State's legal and commercial rate of interest; and how
long it takes a healthy boy to digest apples, baked beans, cabbage,
dates, eggs, fish, green corn, h, i, j, k, l-m-n-o-p, quinces, rice,
shrimps, tripe, veal, yams, and any thing you can cook commencing with
z. It's a fascinating study. But it's not my favorite.
'The proper study of mankind is man.
* * * * *
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled,
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!'
"I love to study human nature. That's my favorite study! The art of
reading the inner human nature by the outer aspect is of immeasurable
interest and boundless practical value, and the man who can practise
it skilfully and apply it sagaciously is on the high road to fortune,
and why? Because to know it thoroughly is to know whom to trust and
how far; to select wisely a friend, a confidant, a partner in any
enterprise; to shun the untrustworthy, to anticipate and turn to our
personal advantage the merits, faults, and deficiencies of all, and to
evolve from their character such practical results as we may choose
for our own ends; but a thorough knowledge is attained only by
incessant observation and long practice; like music, it demands a
special talent possessed by different individuals in variable quantity
or not at all. You, gentlemen, all are, what I am not, commercial
tourists. Before you I must be modest. You, each of you, have been
chosen from surrounding hundreds or thousands for your superior
ability, natural or acquired, to scan the human face and form and know
whereof you see. I look you in the eye--you look me in the eye--for
the eye, though it does not tell all, tells much--it is the key of
character--it has been called the mirror of the soul--
'And looks commercing with the skies,
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes.'
And so looking you read me. You say to yourself, 'There's a man with
no concealments, yet who speaks not till he's spoken to; knows when to
stop, and stops.' You note my pale eyebrows, my slightly prominent and
pointed chin, somewhat over-sized mouth; small, well-spread ears,
faintly aquiline nose; fine, thin, blonde hair, a depression in the
skull where the bump of self-conceit ought to be, and you say, 'A man
that knows his talents without being vain of them; who not only minds
his own business, but loves it, and who in that business, be it
buggy-whips or be it washine, or be it something far nobler,'--which,
let me say modestly, it is,--'simply goes to the head of the class and
stays there.' Yes, sirs, if I say that reading the human countenance
is one of my accomplishments, I am diffidently mindful that in this
company, I, myself, am read, perused; no other probably so well
read--I mean so exhaustively perused. For there is one thing about me,
gentlemen, if you'll allow me to say it, I'm short metre, large print,
and open to the public seven days in the week. And yet you probably
all make one mistake about me: you take me for the alumni of some
university. Not so. I'm a self-made man. I made myself; and
considering that I'm the first man I ever made, I think--pardon the
seeming egotism--I think I've done well. A few years ago there dwelt
in humble obscurity among the granite hills of New England, earning
his bread by the sweat of his brow upon his father's farm, a youth to
fortune and to fame unknown. But one day a voice within him said,
'Tarbox'--George W.,--namesake of the man who never told a lie,--'do
you want to succeed in life? Then leave the production of tobacco and
cider to unambitious age, and find that business wherein you can
always give a man ten times as much for his dollar as his dollar is
worth.' The meaning was plain, and from that time forth young Tarbox
aspired to become a book-agent. 'Twas not long ere he, like
'Young Harry Bluff, left his friends and his home,
And his dear native land, o'er the wide world to roam.'
Books became his line, and full soon he was the head of the line.
And why? Was it because in the first short twelve months of his
career he sold, delivered, and got the money for, 5107 copies of
'Mend-me-at-Home'? No. Was it, then, because three years later he
sold in one year, with no other assistance than a man to drive the
horse and wagon, hold the blackboard, and hand out the books, 10,003
copies of 'Rapid 'Rithmetic'? It was not. Was it, then, because in
1878, reading aright the public mind, he said to his publishers,
whose confidence in him was unbounded, 'It ain't "Mend-me-at-Home"
the people want most, nor "Rapid 'Rithmetic," nor "Heal Thyself,"
nor "I meet the Emergency," nor the "Bouquet of Poetry and Song."
What they want is all these in one.'--'Abridged?' said the
publishers. 'Enlarged!' said young Tarbox,--'enlarged and copiously
illustrated, complete in one volume, price, cloth, three dollars,
sheep four, half morocco, gilt edges, five; real value to the
subscriber, two hundred and fifty; title, "The Album of Universal
Information; author, G. W. Tarbox; editor, G. W. T.; agent for the
United States, the Canadas, and Mexico, G. W. Tarbox," that is to
say, myself.' That, gentlemen, is the reason I stand at the head of
my line; not merely because on every copy sold I make an author's as
well as a solicitor's margin; but because, being the author, I know
whereof I sell. A man that's got my book has got a college
education; and when a man taps me,--for, gentlemen, I never spout
until I'm tapped,--and information bursts from me like water from a
street hydrant, and he comes to find out that every thing I tell is
in that wonderful book, and that every thing that is in that
wonderful book I can tell, he wants to own a copy; and when I tell
him I can't spare my sample copy, but I'll take his subscription, he
smiles gratefully"--
A cold, wet blast, rushing into the room from the hall, betrayed the
opening of the front door. The door was shut again, and a well-formed,
muscular young man who had entered stood in the parlor doorway lifting
his hat from his head, shaking the rain from it, and looking at it
with amused diffidence. Mr. Tarbox turned about once more with his
back to the fire, gave the figure a quick glance of scrutiny, then a
second and longer one, and then dropped his eyes to the floor. The
big-waisted man shifted his chair, tipped it back, and said:
"He smiles gratefully, you say?"
"Yes."
"And subscribes?"
"If he's got any sense," Mr. Tarbox replied in a pre-occupied tone.
His eyes were on the young man who still stood in the door. This
person must have reached the house in some covered conveyance. Even
his boot-tops were dry or nearly so. He was rather pleasing to see; of
good stature, his clothing cheap. A dark-blue flannel sack of the
ready-made sort hung on him not too well. Light as the garment was, he
showed no sign that he felt the penetrating cold out of which he had
just come. His throat and beardless face had the good brown of outdoor
life, his broad chest strained the two buttons of his sack, his head
was well-poised, his feet were shapely, and but for somewhat too much
roundness about the shoulder-blades, noticeable in the side view as he
carefully stood a long, queer package that was not buggy-whips against
the hat-rack, it would have been fair to pronounce him an athlete.
The eyes of the fireside group were turned toward him; but not upon
him. They rested on a girl of sixteen who had come down the hall, and
was standing before the new-comer just beyond the door. The
registry-book was just there on a desk in the hall. She stood with a
freshly dipped pen in her hand, ignoring the gaze from the fireside
with a faintly overdone calmness of face. The new guest came forward,
and, in a manner that showed slender acquaintance with the operation,
slowly registered his name and address.
He did it with such pains-taking, that, upside down as the writing
was, she read it as he wrote. As the Christian name appeared, her
perfunctory glance became attention. As the surname followed, the
attention became interest and recognition. And as the address was
added, Mr. Tarbox detected pleasure dancing behind the long fringe of
her discreet eyes, and marked their stolen glance of quick inspection
upon the short, dark locks and strong young form still bent over the
last strokes of the writing. But when he straightened up, carefully
shut the book, and fixed his brown eyes upon hers in guileless
expectation of instructions, he saw nothing to indicate that he was
not the entire stranger that she was to him.
"You done had sopper?" she asked. The uncommon kindness of such a
question at such an hour of a tavern's evening was lost on the young
man's obvious inexperience, and as one schooled to the hap-hazard of
forest and field he merely replied:
"Naw, I didn' had any."
The girl turned--what a wealth of black hair she had!--and disappeared
as she moved away along the hall. Her voice was heard: "Mamma?" Then
there was the silence of an unheard consultation. The young man moved
a step or two into the parlor and returned toward the door as a light
double foot-fall approached again down the hall and the girl appeared
once more, somewhat preceded by a small, tired-looking, pretty woman
some thirty-five years of age, of slow, self-contained movement and
clear, meditative eyes.
But the guest, too, had been re-enforced. A man had come silently from
the fireside, taken his hand, and now, near the doorway, was softly
shaking it and smiling. Surprise, pleasure, and reverential regard
were mingled in the young man's face, and his open mouth was gasping--
"Mister Tarbox!"
"Claude St. Pierre, after six years, I'm glad to see you.--Madame,
take good care of Claude.--No fear but she will, my boy; if anybody
in Louisiana knows how to take care of a traveller, it's Madame
Beausoleil." He smiled for all. The daughter's large black eyes
danced, but the mother asked Claude, with unmoved countenance and soft
tone:
"You are Claude St. Pierre?--from Gran' Point'?"
"Yass."
"Dass lately since you left yondah?"
"About two month'."
"Bonaventure Deschamps--he was well?"
"Yass." Claude's eyes were full of a glad surprise, and asked a
question that his lips did not dare to venture upon. Madame Beausoleil
read it, and she said:
"We was raise' together, Bonaventure and me." She waved her hand
toward her daughter. "He teach her to read. Seet down to the fire; we
make you some sopper."