There were three to sit by the kitchen stove now and talk of an evening
from half-past nine till ten, and they were the widow and Pat and Mike.
"It's Andy that makes me astonished quite," observed Mrs. O'Callaghan.
"Here it is the first of December and him three months at Gineral
Brady's and gettin' fat on it. He niver got fat to home, and that's what
bates me."
"Well, mother, he's got a nice big room by himself to sleep in. The
Physiology's down on crowding, and five boys in one bedroom ain't good
for a nervous boy like Andy."
"Nor it ain't good for the rest of you, nayther," responded Mrs.
O'Callaghan, with conviction.
"What do you say, b'ys? Shall we ask the landlord to put us on another
room in the spring? He'll raise the rint on us if he does."
The widow regarded her sons attentively, and they, feeling the proud
responsibility of being consulted by their mother, answered as she would
have them.
"Then that's settled," said she. "The more room, the more rint. Any
landlord can see that--a lawyer, anyway. Do you think, b'ys, Andy'll be
a lawyer when he comes from college?"
"Why, mother?" asked Pat.
"'Cause I don't want him to be. He ain't got it in him to be comin' down
hard and sharp on folks, and so he won't be a good wan. He'll be at the
law loike little Jim at puddin's. You niver was to coort, was you,
b'ys?"
Pat and Mike confessed that they had never been at court.
"I knowed you hadn't. I jist asked you. Well, you see, b'ys, them
lawyers gets the witnesses up and asks 'em all sorts of impudent
questions, and jist as good as tells 'em they lies quite often. Andy
couldn't niver do the loikes of that. 'Tain't in him. Do you know, b'ys,
folks can't do what ain't in 'em, no matter if they do go to college.
Now little Jim's the wan for a lawyer. He'd be the wan to make a man
forget his own name, and all on account of impudent questions."
Pat and Mike looked surprised. They were both fond of little Jim, Mike
particularly so.
"I see you wonders at me, but little Jim's a-worryin' me. I don't know
what to be doin' with him. B'ys, would you belave it? I can't teach him
a thing. Burn the steak he will if I lave him with it, and Moike knows
the sort of a bed he makes. He's clane out of the notion of that West
P'int and bein' a foightin' man, and the teacher's down on him at the
school for niver larnin' his lessons. And the fear's with me night and
day that he'll get to be wan of them agitators yet."
Pat and Mike looked at each other. Never before had their mother said a
word to them about any of their brothers. And while they looked at each
other the brave little woman kept her eyes fixed on the stove.
"The first step to bein' an agitator," she resumed as if half to
herself, "is niver to be doin' what you're set to do good. Then, of
course, them you work for don't loike it, and small blame to 'em. And
the nixt thing is to get turned off and somebody as _will_ do it
good put in your place. And then the nixt step is to go around tellin'
iverybody you meets, whether you knows 'em or not, how you're down on
your luck. And how it's a bad world with no chance in it for poor folks,
when iverybody knows most of the rich folks begun poor, and if there's
no chance for poor folks, how comes them that's rich now to be rich when
they started poor? And then the nixt step is to make them that's content
out of humor, rilin' 'em up with wishin' for what they've got no
business with, seein' they hain't earned it. And that's all there is to
it, for sure when you've got that far you're wan of them agitators."
The boys listened respectfully, and their mother went on: "Little Jim's
got started that way. He's that far along that he don't do nothin' good
he's set at only when it's a happen so. You can't depind on him. I've
got to head him off from bein' an agitator, for he's your father's b'y,
and I can't meet Tim in the nixt world if I let Jim get ahead of me.
B'ys, will you help me? I've always been thinkin' I couldn't have your
help; I must do it alone. But, b'ys, I can't do it alone." The little
woman's countenance was anxious as she gazed into the sober faces of Pat
and Mike.
Nothing but boys themselves, though with the reliability of men, they
promised to help.
"I knowed you would," said the widow gratefully. "And now good night to
you. It's gettin' late. But you've eased my moind wonderful. Just the
spakin' out has done me good. Maybe he'll come through all roight yet."
The next morning Mrs. O'Callaghan rose with a face bright as ever, but
Pat and Mike were still sober.
"Cheer up!" was her greeting as they came into the kitchen where she was
already bustling about the stove. "Cheer up, and stand ready till I give
you the word. I'm goin' to have wan more big try at Jim. You took such a
load off me with your listenin' to me and promisin' to help that it's
heartened me wonderful."
The two elder sons smiled. To be permitted to hearten their mother was
to them a great privilege, and suddenly little Jim did not appear the
hopeless case he had seemed when they went to bed the night before. They
cheered up, and the three were pleasantly chatting when sleepy-eyed
little Jim came out of the bedroom.
"Hurry, now, and get washed, and then set your table," said his mother
kindly.
But little Jim was sulky.
"I'm tired of gettin' up early mornin's just to be doin' girl's work,"
he said.
Mrs. O'Callaghan nodded significantly at Pat and Mike. "What was that
story, Moike, you was tellin' me about the smartest fellow in the
Gineral's mess, before he got to be a gineral, you know, bein' so handy
at all sorts of woman's work? Didn't you tell me the Gineral said there
couldn't no woman come up to him?"
"I did, mother."
"I call that pretty foine. Beatin' the women at their own work. There
was only wan man in the mess that could do it, you said?"
"Yes, mother," smiled Mike.
"I thought so. 'Tain't often you foind a rale handy man loike that. And
he was the best foighter they had, too?"
"Yes, mother."
"I thought I remimbered all about it. Jim, here, can foight, but do
woman's work he can't. That is, and do it good. He mostly gets the
tablecloth crooked. No, he's no hand at the girl's work."
"I'll show you," thought little Jim. On a sudden the tablecloth was
straight, and everything began to take its proper place on the table.
"Mother," ventured Pat, though he had not yet received the word, "the
table's set pretty good this morning."
"So it is, Pat, so it is," responded the widow glancing it over.
"Maybe Jim can do girl's work after all."
"Maybe he can, Pat, but he'll have to prove it before he'll foind them
that'll belave it. That's the way in this world. 'Tis not enough to be
sayin' you can do this and that. You've got to prove it. And how will
you prove it? By doin' it, of course."
Little Jim heard, though he did not seem to be listening, being intent
on making things uncomfortable for Barney and Tommie as far as he could
in a quiet way.
It was a passion with little Jim to prove things--not by his mother's
method, but by his own. So far his disputes had been with boys of his
own size and larger, and if they doubted what he said he was in the
habit of proving his assertions with his fists. The result was that
other boys either dodged him or agreed with him with suspicious
readiness. His mother had given him a fair trial at the housework. He
would prove to her that it was not because he could not, but because he
would not, that he succeeded no better. He washed the dishes with care
and put them shining on their shelves, and, a little later, poked his
head out of the bedroom door into the kitchen.
"Mother," he said, "you think I can't make a bed good, don't you?"
The widow smiled. "I think you _don't_ make it good," was her
answer.
Jim's face darkened with resolution. "She thinks I can't," he said to
himself. "I will, I guess."
With vim he set to work, and the bed was made in a trice. Little Jim
stood off as far as he could and sharply eyed his work. "'Tain't done
good," he snapped. And he tore it to pieces again. It took longer to
make it the next time, for he was more careful, but still it didn't look
right. He tore the clothes off it again, this time with a sigh. "Beds is
awful," he said. "It's lots easier to lick a boy than to make a bed."
And then he went at it again. The third time it was a trifle more
presentable, and the school bell was ringing.
"I've got to go, and I hain't proved it to her," he said. "But I'll work
till I do, see if I don't. And then when I have proved it to her I won't
make no more beds."
Jim was no favorite at school, where he had fallen a whole room behind
the class he had started with. His teacher usually wore a long-suffering
air when she dealt with him.
"She looks like she thought I didn't know nothin' and never would," he
said to himself that morning when he had taken his seat after a decided
failure of a recitation. "I'll show her." And he set to work. His mind
was all unused to study, and--that day he didn't show her.
"Who'd 'a' thought it was so hard to prove things?" he said at night.
"There's another day a-comin', though."
Now some people are thankful for showing. To little Jim, showing was
degrading. Suddenly his mother perceived this, and felt a relief she had
not known before.
"Whativer else Jim's got or not got," she said, "he's got a backbone of
his own, so he has. Let him work things out for himsilf. Will I be
showin' him how to make a bed? I won't that. I've been praisin' him too
much, intoirely. I see it now. Praise kapes Pat and Moike and Andy doin'
their best to get more of it. But it makes little Jim aisy in his moind
and scornful loike, so his nose is in the air all the toime and nothin'
done. A very little praise will do Jim. And still less of
fault-findin'," she added.
"B'ys," she announced that evening "Jim's took a turn. We'll stand off
and watch him a bit. If he'll do roight for his own makin', sure and
that'll be better than for us to be havin' a hand in it. Give him his
head and plinty of chances to prove things, and when he has proved 'em,
own up to it."
The two brightened. "I couldn't believe little Jim was so bad, mother,"
said Mike.
"Bad, is it? Sure and he ain't bad yet. And now's the toime to kape him
from it. 'Tis little you can be doin' with a spoiled anything. Would you
belave it? He made his bed three toimes this mornin' and done his best
at it, and me a-seein' him through the crack of the door where it was
open a bit. But I can't say nothin' to him nor show him how, for
showin's not for the loike of him. And them that takes iverything hard
that way comes out sometimes at the top of the hape. Provin' things is a
lawyer's business. If Jim iver gets to be a lawyer, he'll be a good
wan."
Mike, when he went to bed that night, looked down at the small red head
of the future lawyer, snuggled down into the pillow, with the bedclothes
close to his ears. "I'll not believe that Jim will ever come to harm,"
he said.