When Judge Priest, on this particular morning, came puffing into his
chambers at the courthouse, looking, with his broad beam and in his
costume of flappy, loose white ducks, a good deal like an old-fashioned
full-rigger with all sails set, his black shadow, Jeff Poindexter, had
already finished the job of putting the quarters to rights for the day.
The cedar water bucket had been properly replenished; the jagged flange
of a fifteen-cent chunk of ice protruded above the rim of the bucket;
and alongside, on the appointed nail, hung the gourd dipper that the
master always used. The floor had been swept, except, of course, in the
corners and underneath things; there were evidences, in streaky scrolls
of fine grit particles upon various flat surfaces, that a dusting brush
had been more or less sparingly employed. A spray of trumpet flowers,
plucked from the vine that grew outside the window, had been draped over
the framed steel engraving of President Davis and his Cabinet upon the
wall; and on the top of the big square desk in the middle of the room,
where a small section of cleared green-blotter space formed an oasis in
a dry and arid desert of cluttered law journals and dusty documents, the
morning's mail rested in a little heap.
Having placed his old cotton umbrella in a corner, having removed his
coat and hung it upon a peg behind the hall door, and having seen to it
that a palm-leaf fan was in arm's reach should he require it, the
Judge, in his billowy white shirt, sat down at his desk and gave his
attention to his letters. There was an invitation from the Hylan B.
Gracey Camp of Confederate Veterans of Eddyburg, asking him to deliver
the chief oration at the annual reunion, to be held at Mineral Springs
on the twelfth day of the following month; an official notice from the
clerk of the Court of Appeals concerning the affirmation of a judgment
that had been handed down by Judge Priest at the preceding term of his
own court; a bill for five pounds of a special brand of smoking tobacco;
a notice of a lodge meeting--altogether quite a sizable batch of mail.
At the bottom of the pile he came upon a long envelope addressed to him
by his title, instead of by his name, and bearing on its upper
right-hand corner several foreign-looking stamps; they were British
stamps, he saw, on closer examination.
To the best of his recollection it had been a good long time since Judge
Priest had had a communication by post from overseas. He adjusted his
steel-bowed spectacles, ripped the wrapper with care and shook out the
contents. There appeared to be several inclosures; in fact, there were
several--a sheaf of printed forms, a document with seals attached, and a
letter that covered two sheets of paper with typewritten lines. To the
letter the recipient gave consideration first. Before he reached the end
of the opening paragraph he uttered a profound grunt of surprise; his
reading of the rest was frequently punctuated by small exclamations, his
face meantime puckering up in interested lines. At the conclusion, when
he came to the signature, he indulged himself in a soft low whistle. He
read the letter all through again, and after that he examined the forms
and the document which had accompanied it.
Chuckling under his breath, he wriggled himself free from the snug
embrace of his chair arms and waddled out of his own office and down the
long bare empty hall to the office of Sheriff Giles Birdsong. Within,
that competent functionary, Deputy Sheriff Breck Quarles, sat at ease in
his shirt sleeves, engaged, with the smaller blade of his pocketknife,
in performing upon his finger nails an operation that combined the fine
deftness of the manicure with the less delicate art of the farrier. At
the sight of the Judge in the open doorway he hastily withdrew from a
tabletop, where they rested, a pair of long thin legs, and rose.
"Mornin', Breck," said Judge Priest to the other's salutation. "No,
thank you, son. I won't come in; but I've got a little job for you. I
wisht, ef you ain't too busy, that you'd step down the street and see ef
you can't find Peep O'Day fur me and fetch him back here with you. It
won't take you long, will it?"
"No, suh--not very." Mr. Quarles reached for his hat and snuggled his
shoulder holster back inside his unbuttoned waistcoat. "He'll most
likely be down round Gafford's stable. Whut's Old Peep been doin',
Judge--gettin' himself in contempt of court or somethin'?" He grinned,
asking the question with the air of one making a little joke.
"No," vouchsafed the Judge; "he ain't done nothin'. But he's about to
have somethin' of a highly onusual nature done to him. You jest tell him
I'm wishful to see him right away--that'll be sufficient, I reckin."
Without making further explanation, Judge Priest returned to his
chambers and for the third time read the letter from foreign parts.
Court was not in session, and the hour was early and the weather was
hot; nobody interrupted him. Perhaps fifteen minutes passed. Mr. Quarles
poked his head in at the door.
"I found him, suh," the deputy stated. "He's outside here in the hall."
"Much obliged to you, son," said Judge Priest. "Send him on in, will
you, please?"
The head was withdrawn; its owner lingered out of sight of His Honor,
but within earshot. It was hard to figure the presiding judge of the
First Judicial District of the State of Kentucky as having business with
Peep O'Day; and, though Mr. Quarles was no eavesdropper, still he felt a
pardonable curiosity in whatsoever might transpire. As he feigned an
absorbed interest in a tax notice, which was pasted on a blackboard just
outside the office door, there entered the presence of the Judge a man
who seemingly was but a few years younger than the Judge himself--a man
who looked to be somewhere between sixty-five and seventy. There is a
look that you may have seen in the eyes of ownerless but
well-intentioned dogs--dogs that, expecting kicks as their daily
portion, are humbly grateful for kind words and stray bones; dogs that
are fairly yearning to be adopted by somebody--by anybody--being
prepared to give to such a benefactor a most faithful doglike devotion
in return.
This look, which is fairly common among masterless and homeless dogs, is
rare among humans; still, once in a while you do find it there too. The
man who now timidly shuffled himself across the threshold of Judge
Priest's office had such a look out of his eyes. He had a long simple
face, partly inclosed in gray whiskers. Four dollars would have been a
sufficient price to pay for the garments he stood in, including the
wrecked hat he held in his hands and the broken, misshaped shoes on his
feet. A purchaser who gave more than four dollars for the whole in its
present state of decrepitude would have been but a poor hand at
bargaining.
The man who wore this outfit coughed in an embarrassed fashion and
halted, fumbling his ruinous hat in his hands.
"Howdy do?" said Judge Priest heartily. "Come in!"
The other diffidently advanced himself a yard or two.
"Excuse me, suh," he said apologetically; "but this here Breck Quarles
he come after me and he said ez how you wanted to see me. 'Twas him ez
brung me here, suh."
Faintly underlying the drawl of the speaker was just a suspicion--a mere
trace, as you might say--of a labial softness that belongs solely and
exclusively to the children, and in a diminishing degree to the
grandchildren, of native-born sons and daughters of a certain small
green isle in the sea. It was not so much a suggestion of a brogue as it
was the suggestion of the ghost of a brogue; a brogue almost
extinguished, almost obliterated, and yet persisting through the
generations--South of Ireland struggling beneath south of Mason and
Dixon's Line.
"Yes," said the Judge; "that's right. I do want to see you." The tone
was one that he might employ in addressing a bashful child. "Set down
there and make yourself at home."
The newcomer obeyed to the extent of perching himself on the extreme
forward edge of a chair. His feet shuffled uneasily where they were
drawn up against the cross rung of the chair.
The Judge reared well back, studying his visitor over the tops of his
glasses with rather a quizzical look. In one hand he balanced the large
envelope which had come to him that morning.
"Seems to me I heared somewheres, years back, that your regular
Christian name was Paul--is that right?" he asked.
"Shorely is, suh," assented the ragged man, surprised and plainly
grateful that one holding a supremely high position in the community
should vouchsafe to remember a fact relating to so inconsequent an atom
as himself. "But I ain't heared it fur so long I come mighty nigh
furgittin' it sometimes, myself. You see, Judge Priest, when I wasn't
nothin' but jest a shaver folks started in to callin' me Peep--on
account of my last name bein O'Day, I reckin. They been callin' me so
ever since. Fust off, 'twas Little Peep, and then jest plain Peep; and
now it's got to be Old Peep. But my real entitled name is Paul, jest
like you said, Judge--Paul Felix O'Day."
"Uh-huh! And wasn't your father's name Philip and your mother's name
Katherine Dwyer O'Day?"
"To the best of my recollection that's partly so, too, suh. They both of
'em up and died when I was a baby, long before I could remember anything
a-tall. But they always told me my paw's name was Phil, or Philip. Only
my maw's name wasn't Kath--Kath--wasn't whut you jest now called it,
Judge. It was plain Kate."
"Kate or Katherine--it makes no great difference," explained Judge
Priest. "I reckin the record is straight this fur. And now think hard
and see ef you kin ever remember hearin' of an uncle named Daniel
O'Day--your father's brother."
The answer was a shake of the tousled head.
"I don't know nothin' about my people. I only jest know they come over
frum some place with a funny name in the Old Country before I was born.
The onliest kin I ever had over here was that there no-'count triflin'
nephew of mine--Perce Dwyer--him that uster hang round this town. I
reckin you call him to mind, Judge?"
The old Judge nodded before continuing:
"All the same, I reckin there ain't no manner of doubt but whut you had
an uncle of the name of Daniel. All the evidences would seem to p'int
that way. Accordin' to the proofs, this here Uncle Daniel of yours lived
in a little town called Kilmare, in Ireland." He glanced at one of the
papers that lay on his desktop; then added in a casual tone: "Tell me,
Peep, whut are you doin' now fur a livin'?"
The object of this examination grinned a faint grin of extenuation.
"Well, suh, I'm knockin' about, doin' the best I kin--which ain't much.
I help out round Gafford's liver' stable, and Pete Gafford he lets me
sleep in a little room behind the feed room, and his wife she gives me
my vittles. Oncet in a while I git a chancet to do odd jobs fur folks
round town--cuttin' weeds and splittin' stove wood and packin' in coal,
and sech ez that."
"Not much money in it, is there?"
"No, suh; not much. Folks is more prone to offer me old clothes than
they are to pay me in cash. Still, I manage to git along. I don't live
very fancy; but, then, I don't starve, and that's more'n some kin say."
"Peep, whut was the most money you ever had in your life--at one time?"
Peep scratched with a freckled hand at his thatch of faded whitish hair
to stimulate recollection.
"I reckin not more'n six bits at any one time, suh. Seems like I've
sorter got the knack of livin' without money."
"Well, Peep, sech bein' the case, whut would you say ef I was to tell
you that you're a rich man?"
The answer came slowly:
"I reckin, suh, ef it didn't sound disrespectful, I'd say you was
prankin' with me--makin' fun of me, suh."
Judge Priest bent forward in his chair.
"I'm not prankin' with you. It's my pleasant duty to inform you that at
this moment you are the rightful owner of eight thousand pounds."
"Pounds of whut, Judge?" The tone expressed a heavy incredulity.
"Why, pounds in money."
Outside, in the hall, with one ear held conveniently near the crack in
the door, Deputy Sheriff Quarles gave a violent start; and then, at
once, was torn between a desire to stay and hear more and an urge to
hurry forth and spread the unbelievable tidings. After the briefest of
struggles the latter inclination won; this news was too marvelously good
to keep; surely a harbinger and a herald were needed to spread it
broadcast.
Mr. Quarles tiptoed rapidly down the hall. When he reached the sidewalk
the volunteer bearer of a miraculous tale fairly ran. As for the man who
sat facing the Judge, he merely stared in a dull bewilderment.
"Judge," he said at length, "eight thousand pounds of money oughter make
a powerful big pile, oughten it?"
"It wouldn't weigh quite that much ef you put it on the scales,"
explained His Honor painstakingly. "I mean pounds sterlin'--English
money. Near ez I kin figger offhand, it comes in our money to somewheres
between thirty-five and forty thousand dollars--nearer forty than
thirty-five. And it's yours, Peep--every red cent of it."
"Excuse me, suh, and not meanin' to contradict you, or nothin' like
that; but I reckin there must be some mistake. Why, Judge, I don't
scursely know anybody that's ez wealthy ez all that, let alone anybody
that'd give me sech a lot of money."
"Listen, Peep: This here letter I'm holdin' in my hand came to me by
to-day's mail--jest a little spell ago. It's frum Ireland--frum the town
of Kilmare, where your people came frum. It was sent to me by a firm of
barristers in that town--lawyers we'd call 'em. In this letter they ask
me to find you and to tell you what's happened. It seems, from whut they
write, that your uncle, by name Daniel O'Day, died not very long ago
without issue--that is to say, without leavin' any children of his own,
and without makin' any will.
"It appears he had eight thousand pounds saved up. Ever since he died
those lawyers and some other folks over there in Ireland have been
tryin' to find out who that money should go to. They learnt in some way
that your father and your mother settled in this town a mighty long time
ago, and that they died here and left one son, which is you. All the
rest of the family over there in Ireland have already died out, it
seems; that natchelly makes you the next of kin and the heir at law,
which means that all your uncle's money comes direct to you.
"So, Peep, you're a wealthy man in your own name. That's the news I had
to tell you. Allow me to congratulate you on your good fortune."
The beneficiary rose to his feet, seeming not to see the hand the old
Judge had extended across the desktop toward him. On his face, of a
sudden, was a queer, eager look. It was as though he foresaw the coming
true of long-cherished and heretofore unattainable visions.
"Have you got it here, suh?"
He glanced about him as though expecting to see a bulky bundle. Judge
Priest smiled.
"Oh, no; they didn't send it along with the letter--that wouldn't be
regular. There's quite a lot of things to be done fust. There'll be some
proofs to be got up and sworn to before a man called a British consul;
and likely there'll be a lot of papers that you'll have to sign; and
then all the papers and the proofs and things will be sent across the
ocean. And, after some fees are paid out over there--why, then you'll
git your inheritance."
The rapt look faded from the strained face, leaving it downcast. "I'm
afeared, then, I won't be able to claim that there money," he said
forlornly.
"Why not?"
"Because I don't know how to sign my own name. Raised the way I was, I
never got no book learnin'. I can't neither read nor write."
Compassion shadowed the Judge's chubby face; and compassion was in his
voice as he made answer:
"You don't need to worry about that part of it. You can make your
mark--- just a cross mark on the paper, with witnesses present--like
this."
He took up a pen, dipped it in the inkwell and illustrated his meaning.
"Yes, suh; I'm glad it kin be done thataway. I always wisht I knowed how
to read big print and spell my own name out. I ast a feller oncet to
write my name out fur me in plain letters on a piece of paper. I was
aimin' to learn to copy it off; but I showed it to one of the hands at
the liver' stable and he busted out laughin'. And then I come to find
out this here feller had tricked me fur to make game of me. He hadn't
wrote my name out a-tall--- he'd wrote some dirty words instid. So after
that I give up tryin' to educate myself. That was several years back and
I ain't tried sence. Now I reckin I'm too old learn.... I wonder,
suh--I wonder ef it'll be very long before that there money gits here
and I begin to have the spendin' of it?"
"Makin' plans already?"
"Yes, suh," O'Day answered truthfully; "I am." He was silent for a
moment, his eyes on the floor; then timidly he advanced the thought that
had come to him. "I reckin, suh, it wouldn't be no more'n fair and
proper ef I divided my money with you to pay you back fur all this
trouble, you're fixin' to take on my account. Would--would half of it be
enough? The other half oughter last me fur what uses I'll make of it."
"I know you mean well and I'm much obliged to you fur your offer,"
stated Judge Priest, smiling a little; "but it wouldn't be fittin' or
proper fur me to tech a cent of your money. There'll be some court dues
and some lawyers' fees, and sech, to pay over there in Ireland; but
after that's settled up everything comes direct to you. It's goin' to be
a pleasure to me to help you arrange these here details that you don't
understand--a pleasure and not a burden."
He considered the figure before him.
"Now here's another thing, Peep; I judge it's hardly fittin' fur a man
of substance to go on livin' the way you've had to live durin' your
life. Ef you don't mind my offerin' you a little advice I would suggest
that you go right down to Felsburg Brothers when you leave here and git
yourself fitted out with some suitable clothin'. And you'd better go to
Max Biederman's, too, and order a better pair of shoes fur yourself than
them you've got on. Tell 'em I sent you and that I guarantee the payment
of your bills. Though I reckin that'll hardly be necessary--when the
news of your good luck gits noised round I misdoubt whether there's any
firm in our entire city that wouldn't be glad to have you on their books
fur a stiddy customer.
"And, also, ef I was you I'd arrange to git me regular board and
lodgin's somewheres round town. You see, Peep, comin' into a property
entails consider'ble many responsibilities right frum the start."
"Yes, suh," assented the legatee obediently. "I'll do jest ez you say,
Judge Priest, about the clothes and the shoes, and all that; but--but,
ef you don't mind, I'd like to go on livin' at Gafford's. Pete Gafford's
been mighty good to me--him and his wife both; and I wouldn't like fur
'em to think I was gittin' stuck up jest because I've had this here
streak of luck come to me. Mebbe, seein' ez how things has changed with
me, they'd be willin' to take me in fur a table boarder at their house;
but I shorely would hate to give up livin' in that there little room
behind the feed room at the liver' stable. I don't know ez I could ever
find any place that would seem ez homelike to me ez whut it is."
"Suit yourself about that," said Judge Priest heartily. "I don't know
but whut you've got the proper notion about it after all."
"Yes, suh. Them Gaffords have been purty nigh the only real true friends
I ever had that I could count on." He hesitated a moment. "I reckin--I
reckin, suh, it'll be a right smart while, won't it, before that money
gits here frum all the way acrost the ocean?"
"Why, yes; I imagine it will. Was you figurin' on investin' a little of
it now?"
"Yes, suh; I was."
"About how much did you think of spendin' fur a beginnin'?"
O'Day squinted his eyes, his lips moving in silent calculation.
"Well, suh," he said at length, "I could use ez much ez a silver dollar.
But, of course, sence--"
"That sounds kind of moderate to me," broke in Judge Priest. He shoved a
pudgy hand into a pocket of his white trousers. "I reckin this detail
kin be arranged. Here, Peep"--he extended his hand--"here's your
dollar." Then, as the other drew back, stammering a refusal, he hastily
added: "No, no, no; go ahead and take it--it's yours. I'm jest
advancin' it to you out of whut'll be comin' to you shortly.
"I'll tell you whut: Until sech time ez you are in position to draw on
your own funds you jest drap in here to see me when you're in need of
cash, and I'll try to let you have whut you require--in reason. I'll
keep a proper reckinin' of whut you git and you kin pay me back ez soon
ez your inheritance is put into your hands.
"One thing more," he added as the heir, having thanked him, was making
his grateful adieu at the threshold: "Now that you're wealthy, or about
to be so, I kind of imagine quite a passel of fellers will suddenly
discover themselves strangely and affectionately drawed toward you.
You're liable to find out you've always had more true and devoted
friends in this community than whut you ever imagined to be the case
before.
"Now friendship is a mighty fine thing, takin' it by and large; but it
kin be overdone. It's barely possible that some of this here new crop of
your well-wishers and admirers will be makin' little business
propositions to you--desirin' to have you go partners with 'em in
business, or to sell you desirable pieces of real estate; or even to let
you loan 'em various sums of money. I wouldn't be surprised but whut a
number of sech chances will be comin' your way durin' the next few days,
and frum then on. Ef sech should be the case I would suggest to you
that, before committin' yourself to anybody or anything, you tell 'em
that I'm sort of actin' as your unofficial adviser in money matters, and
that they should come to me and outline their little schemes in person.
Do you git my general drift?"
"Yes, suh," said Peep. "I won't furgit; and thank you ag'in, Judge,
specially fur lettin' me have this dollar ahead of time."
He shambled out with the coin in his hand; and on his face was again the
look of one who sees before him the immediate fulfillment of a
delectable dream.
With lines of sympathy and amusement crosshatched at the outer corners
of his eyelids, Judge Priest, rising and stepping to his door, watched
the retreating figure of the town's newest and strangest capitalist
disappear down the wide front steps of the courthouse.
Presently he went back to his chair and sat down, tugging at his short
chin beard.
"I wonder now," said he, meditatively addressing the emptiness of the
room, "I wonder whut a man sixty-odd-year old is goin' to do with the
fust whole dollar he ever had in his life!"
It was characteristic of our circuit judge that he should have voiced
his curiosity aloud. Talking to himself when he was alone was one of his
habits. Also, it was characteristic of him that he had refrained from
betraying his inquisitiveness to his late caller. Similar motives of
delicacy had kept him from following the other man to watch the
sequence.
However, at secondhand, the details very shortly reached him. They were
brought by no less a person than Deputy Sheriff Quarles, who, some
twenty minutes or possibly half an hour later, obtruded himself upon
Judge Priest's presence.
"Judge," began Mr. Quarles, "you'd never in the world guess whut Old
Peep O'Day done with the first piece of money he got his hands on out of
that there forty thousand pounds of silver dollars he's come into from
his uncle's estate."
The old man slanted a keen glance in Mr. Quarles' direction.
"Tell me, son," he asked softly, "how did you come to hear the glad
tidin's so promptly?"
"Me?" said Mr. Quarles innocently. "Why, Judge Priest, the word is all
over this part of town by this time. Why, I reckin twenty-five or fifty
people must 'a' been watchin' Old Peep to see how he was goin' to act
when he come out of this courthouse."
"Well, well, well!" murmured the Judge blandly. "Good news travels
almost ez fast sometimes ez whut bad news does--don't it, now? Well,
son, I give up the riddle. Tell me jest whut our elderly friend did do
with the first installment of his inheritance."
"Well, suh, he turned south here at the gate and went down the street,
a-lookin' neither to the right nor the left. He looked to me like a man
in a trance, almost. He keeps right on through Legal Row till he comes
to Franklin Street, and then he goes up Franklin to B. Weil & Son's
confectionery store; and there he turns in. I happened to be followin'
'long behind him, with a few others--with several others, in fact--and
we-all sort of slowed up in passin' and looked in at the door; and
that's how I come to be in a position to see what happened.
"Old Peep, he marches in jest like I'm tellin' it to you, suh; and Mr.
B. Weil comes to wait on him, and he starts in buyin'. He buys hisself a
five-cent bag of gumdrops; and a five-cent bag of jelly beans; and a
ten-cent bag of mixed candies--kisses and candy mottoes, and sech ez
them, you know; and a sack of fresh-roasted peanuts--a big sack, it was,
fifteen-cent size; and two prize boxes; and some gingersnaps--ten cents'
worth; and a cocoanut; and half a dozen red bananas; and half a dozen
more of the plain yaller ones. Altogether I figger he spent a even
dollar; in fact, I seen him hand Mr. Weil a dollar, and I didn't see him
gittin' no change back out of it.
"Then he comes on out of the store, with all these things stuck in his
pockets and stacked up in his arms till he looks sort of like some new
kind of a summertime Santy Klaws; and he sets down on a goods box at the
edge of the pavement, with his feet in the gutter, and starts in eatin'
all them things.
"First, he takes a bite off a yaller banana and then off a red banana,
and then a mouthful of peanuts; and then maybe some mixed candies--not
sayin' a word to nobody, but jest natchelly eatin' his fool head off. A
young chap that's clerkin' in Bagby's grocery, next door, steps up to
him and speaks to him, meanin', I suppose, to ast him is it true he's
wealthy. And Old Peep, he says to him, 'Please don't come botherin' me
now, sonny--I'm busy ketchin' up,' he says; and keeps right on
a-munchin' and a-chewin' like all possessed.
"That ain't all of it, neither, Judge--not by a long shot it ain't!
Purty soon Old Peep looks round him at the little crowd that's gathered.
He didn't seem to pay no heed to the grown-up people standin' there; but
he sees a couple of boys about ten years old in the crowd, and he
beckons to them to come to him, and he makes room fur them alongside him
on the box and divides up his knick-knacks with them.
"When I left there to come on back here he had no less'n six kids
squatted round him, includin' one little nigger boy; and between 'em all
they'd jest finished up the last of the bananas and peanuts and the
candy and the gingersnaps, and was fixin' to take turns drinkin' the
milk out of the cocoanut. I s'pose they've got it all cracked out of the
shell and et up by now--the cocoanut, I mean. Judge, you oughter stepped
down into Franklin Street and taken a look at the picture whilst there
was still time. You never seen sech a funny sight in all your days, I'll
bet!"
"I reckin 'twould be too late to be startin' now," said Judge Priest.
"I'm right sorry I missed it.... Busy ketchin' up, huh? Yes; I reckin he
is.... Tell me, son, whut did you make out of the way Peep O'Day acted?"
"Why, suh," stated Mr. Quarles, "to my mind, Judge, there ain't no
manner of doubt but whut prosperity has went to his head and turned it.
He acted to me like a plum' distracted idiot. A grown man with forty
thousand pounds of solid money settin' on the side of a gutter eatin'
jimcracks with a passel of dirty little boys! Kin you figure it out any
other way, Judge--except that his mind is gone?"
"I don't set myself up to be a specialist in mental disorders, son,"
said Judge Priest softly; "but, sence you ask me the question, I should
say, speakin' offhand, that it looks to me more ez ef the heart was the
organ that was mainly affected. And possibly"--he added this last with a
dry little smile--"and possibly, by now, the stomach also."
* * *
Whether or not Mr. Quarles was correct in his psychopathic diagnosis, he
certainly had been right when he told Judge Priest that the word was
already all over the business district. It had spread fast and was still
spreading; it spread to beat the wireless, traveling as it did by that
mouth-to-ear method of communication which is so amazingly swift and
generally so tremendously incorrect. Persons who could not credit the
tale at all, nevertheless lost no time in giving to it a yet wider
circulation; so that, as though borne on the wind, it moved in every
direction, like ripples on a pond; and with each time of retelling the
size of the legacy grew.
The _Daily Evening News_, appearing on the streets at five P. M.,
confirmed the tale; though by its account the fortune was reduced to a
sum far below the gorgeously exaggerated estimates of most of the
earlier narrators. Between breakfast and supper-time Peep O'Day's
position in the common estimation of his fellow citizens underwent a
radical and revolutionary change. He ceased--automatically, as it
were--to be a town character; he became, by universal consent, a town
notable, whose every act and every word would thereafter be subjected to
close scrutiny and closer analysis.
The next morning the nation at large had opportunity to know of the
great good fortune that had befallen Paul Felix O'Day, for the story had
been wired to the city papers by the local correspondents of the same;
and the press associations had picked up a stickful of the story and
sped it broadcast over leased wires. Many who until that day had never
heard of the fortunate man, or, indeed, of the place where he lived, at
once manifested a concern in his well-being.
Certain firms of investment brokers in New York and Chicago promptly
added a new name to what vulgarly they called their "sucker" lists.
Dealers in mining stocks, in oil stocks, in all kinds of attractive
stocks showed interest; in circular form samples of the most optimistic
and alluring literature the world has ever known were consigned to the
post, addressed to Mr. P. F. O'Day, such-and-such a town, such-and-such
a state, care of general delivery.
Various lonesome ladies in various lonesome places lost no time in
sitting themselves down and inditing congratulatory letters; object
matrimony. Some of these were single ladies; others had been widowed,
either by death or request. Various other persons of both sexes,
residing here, there, and elsewhere in our country, suddenly remembered
that they, too, were descended from the O'Days of Ireland, and wrote on
forthwith to claim proud and fond relationship with the particular O'Day
who had come into money.
It was a remarkable circumstance, which speedily developed, that one man
should have so many distant cousins scattered over the Union, and a
thing equally noteworthy that practically all these kinspeople, through
no fault of their own, should at the present moment be in such
straitened circumstances and in such dire need of temporary assistance
of a financial nature. Ticker and printer's ink, operating in
conjunction, certainly did their work mighty well; even so, several days
were to elapse before the news reached one who, of all those who read
it, had most cause to feel a profound personal sensation in the
intelligence.
This delay, however, was nowise to be blamed upon the tardiness of the
newspapers; it was occasioned by the fact that the person referred to
was for the moment well out of contact with the active currents of world
affairs, he being confined in a workhouse at Evansville, Indiana.
As soon as he had rallied from the shock this individual set about
making plans to put himself in direct touch with the inheritor. He had
ample time in which to frame and shape his campaign, inasmuch as there
remained for him yet to serve nearly eight long and painfully tedious
weeks of a three-months' vagrancy sentence. Unlike most of those now
manifesting their interest, he did not write a letter; but he dreamed
dreams that made him forget the annoyances of a ball and chain fast on
his ankle and piles of stubborn stones to be cracked up into fine bits
with a heavy hammer.
We are getting ahead of our narrative, though--days ahead of it. The
chronological sequence of events properly dates from the morning
following the morning when Peep O'Day, having been abruptly translated
from the masses of the penniless to the classes of the wealthy, had
forthwith embarked upon the gastronomic orgy so graphically detailed by
Deputy Sheriff Quarles.
On that next day more eyes probably than had been trained in Peep
O'Day's direction in all the unremarked and unremarkable days of his
life put together were focused upon him. Persons who theretofore had
regarded his existence--if indeed they gave it a thought--as one of the
utterly trivial and inconsequential incidents of the cosmic scheme, were
moved to speak to him, to clasp his hand, and, in numerous instances, to
express a hearty satisfaction over his altered circumstances. To all
these, whether they were moved by mere neighborly good will, or
perchance were inspired by impulses of selfishness, the old man
exhibited a mien of aloofness and embarrassment.
This diffidence or this suspicion--or this whatever it was--protected
him from those who might entertain covetous and ulterior designs upon
his inheritance even better than though he had been brusque and rude;
while those who sought to question him regarding his plans for the
future drew from him only mumbled and evasive replies, which left them
as deeply in the dark as they had been before. Altogether, in his
intercourse with adults he appeared shy and very ill at ease.
It was noted, though, that early in the forenoon he attached to him
perhaps half a dozen urchins, of whom the oldest could scarcely have
been more than twelve or thirteen years of age; and that these
youngsters remained his companions throughout the day. Likewise the
events of that day were such as to confirm a majority of the observers
in practically the same belief that had been voiced of Mr.
Quarles--namely, that whatever scanty brains Peep O'Day might have ever
had were now completely addled by the stroke of luck that had befallen
him.
In fairness to all--to O'Day and to the town critics who sat in judgment
upon his behavior--it should be stated that his conduct at the very
outset was not entirely devoid of evidences of sanity. With his troupe
of ragged juveniles trailing behind him, he first visited Felsburg
Brothers' Emporium to exchange his old and disreputable costume for a
wardrobe that, in accordance with Judge Priest's recommendation, he had
ordered on the afternoon previous, and which had since been undergoing
certain necessary alterations.
With his meager frame incased in new black woolens, and wearing, as an
incongruous added touch, the most brilliant of neckties, a necktie of
the shade of a pomegranate blossom, he presently issued from Felsburg
Brothers' and entered M. Biederman's shoe store, two doors below. Here
Mr. Biederman fitted him with shoes, and in addition noted down a
further order, which the purchaser did not give until after he had
conferred earnestly with the members of his youthful entourage.
Those watching this scene from a distance saw--and perhaps marveled at
the sight--that already, between these small boys, on the one part, and
this old man, on the other, a perfect understanding appeared to have
been established.
After leaving Biederman's, and tagged by his small escorts, O'Day went
straight to the courthouse and, upon knocking at the door, was admitted
to Judge Priest's private chambers, the boys meantime waiting outside
in the hall. When he came forth he showed them something he held in his
hand and told them something; whereupon all of them burst into excited
and joyous whoops.
It was at that point that O'Day, by the common verdict of most grown-up
onlookers, began to betray the vagaries of a disordered intellect. Not
that his reason had not been under suspicion already, as a result of his
freakish excess in the matter of B. Weil & Son's wares on the preceding
day; but the relapse that now followed, as nearly everybody agreed, was
even more pronounced, even more symptomatic than the earlier attack of
aberration.
In brief, this was what happened: To begin with, Mr. Virgil Overall, who
dealt in lands and houses and sold insurance of all the commoner
varieties on the side, had stalked O'Day to this point and was lying in
wait for him as he came out of the courthouse into the Public Square,
being anxious to describe to him some especially desirable bargains, in
both improved and unimproved realty; also, Mr. Overall was prepared to
book him for life, accident and health policies on the spot.
So pleased was Mr. Overall at having distanced his professional rivals
in the hunt that he dribbled at the mouth. But the warmth of his
disappointment and indignation dried up the salivary founts instantly
when the prospective patron declined to listen to him at all and,
breaking free from Mr. Overall's detaining clasp, hurried on into Legal
Row, with his small convoys trotting along ahead and alongside him.
At the door of the Blue Goose Saloon and Short Order Restaurant its
proprietor, by name Link Iserman, was lurking, as it were, in ambush. He
hailed the approaching O'Day most cordially; he inquired in a warm voice
regarding O'Day's health; and then, with a rare burst of generosity, he
invited, nay urged, O'Day to step inside and have something on the
house--wines, ales, liquors or cigars; it was all one to Mr. Iserman.
The other merely shook his head and, without a word of thanks for the
offer, passed on as though bent upon a important mission.
Mark how the proofs were accumulating: The man had disdained the company
of men of approximately his own age or thereabout; he had refused an
opportunity to partake of refreshment suitable to his years; and now he
stepped into the Bon Ton toy store and bought for cash--most
inconceivable of acquisitions!--a little wagon that was painted bright
red and bore on its sides in curlicued letters, the name Comet.
His next stop was made at Bishop & Bryan's grocery, where, with the aid
of his youthful compatriots, he first discriminatingly selected, and
then purchased on credit, and finally loaded into the wagon, such
purchases as a dozen bottles of soda pop, assorted flavors; cheese,
crackers--soda and animal; sponge cakes with weather-proof pink icing on
them; fruits of the season; cove oysters; a bottle of pepper sauce; and
a quantity of the extra large sized bright green cucumber pickles known
to the trade as the Fancy Jumbo Brand, Prime Selected.
Presently the astounding spectacle was presented of two small boys, with
string bridles on their arms, drawing the wagon through our town and out
of it into the country, with Peep O'Day in the rôle of teamster walking
alongside the laden wagon. He was holding the lines in his hands and
shouting orders at his team, who showed a colty inclination to shy at
objects, to kick up their heels without provocation, and at intervals to
try to run away. Eight or ten small boys--for by now the troupe had
grown in number and in volume of noise--trailed along, keeping step with
their elderly patron and advising him shrilly regarding the management
of his refractory span.
As it turned out, the destination of this preposterous procession was
Bradshaw's Grove, where the entire party spent the day picnicking in the
woods and, as reported by several reliable witnesses, playing games. It
was not so strange that holidaying boys should play games; the amazing
feature of the performance was that Peep O'Day, a man old enough to be
grandfather to any of them, played with them, being by turns an Indian
chief, a robber baron, and the driver of a stagecoach attacked by Wild
Western desperadoes.
When he returned to town at dusk, drawing his little red wagon behind
him, his new suit was rumpled into many wrinkles and marked by dust and
grass stains; his flame-colored tie was twisted under one ear; his new
straw hat was mashed quite out of shape; and in his eyes was a light
that sundry citizens, on meeting him, could only interpret for a spark
struck from inner fires of madness.
Days that came after this, on through the midsummer, were, with
variations, but repetitions of the day I have just described. Each
morning Peep O'Day would go to either the courthouse or Judge Priest's
home to turn over to the Judge the unopened mail which had been
delivered to him at Gafford's stables; then he would secure from the
Judge a loan of money against his inheritance. Generally the amount of
his daily borrowing was a dollar; rarely was it so much as two dollars;
and only once was it more than two dollars.
By nightfall the sum would have been expended upon perfectly useless and
absolutely childish devices. It might be that he would buy toy pistols
and paper caps for himself and his following of urchins; or that his
whim would lead him to expend all the money in tin flutes. In one case
the group he so incongruously headed would be for that one day a gang of
make-believe banditti; in another, they would constitute themselves a
fife-and-drum corps--with barreltops for the drums--and would march
through the streets, where scandalized adults stood in their tracks to
watch them go by, they all the while making weird sounds, which with
them passed for music.
Or again, the available cash resources would be invested in provender;
and then there would be an outing in the woods. Under Peep O'Day's
captaincy his chosen band of youngsters picked dewberries; they went
swimming together in Guthrie's Gravel Pit, out by the old Fair Grounds,
where his spare naked shanks contrasted strongly with their plump
freckled legs as all of them splashed through the shallows, making for
deep water. Under his leadership they stole watermelons from Mr. Dick
Bell's patch, afterward eating their spoils in thickets of grapevines
along the banks of Perkins' Creek.
It was felt that mental befuddlement and mortal folly could reach no
greater heights--or no lower depths--than on a certain hour of a certain
day, along toward the end of August, when O'Day came forth from his
quarters in Gafford's stables, wearing a pair of boots that M.
Biederman's establishment had turned out to his order and his
measure--not such boots as a sensible man might be expected to wear, but
boots that were exaggerated and monstrous counterfeits of the
red-topped, scroll-fronted, brass-toed, stub-heeled, squeaky-soled
bootees that small boys of an earlier generation possessed.
Very proudly and seemingly unconscious of, or, at least, oblivious to,
the derisive remarks that the appearance of these new belongings drew
from many persons, the owner went clumping about in them, with the
rumply legs of his trousers tucked down in them, and ballooning up and
out over the tops in folds which overlapped from his knee joints halfway
down his attenuated calves.
As Deputy Sheriff Quarles said, the combination was a sight fit to make
a horse laugh. It may be that small boys have a lesser sense of humor
than horses have, for certainly the boys who were the old man's
invariable shadows did not laugh at him, or at his boots either. Between
the whiskered senior and his small comrades there existed a freemasonry
that made them all sense a thing beyond the ken of most of their elders.
Perhaps this was because the elders, being blind in their superior
wisdom, saw neither this thing nor the communion that flourished. They
saw only the farcical joke. But His Honor, Judge Priest, to cite a
conspicuous exception, seemed not to see the lamentable comedy of it.
Indeed, it seemed to some almost as if Judge Priest were aiding and
abetting the befogged O'Day in his demented enterprises, his peculiar
excursions and his weird purchases. If he did not actually encourage him
in these constant exhibitions of witlessness, certainly there were no
evidences available to show that he sought to dissuade O'Day from his
strange course.
At the end of a fortnight one citizen, in whom patience had ceased to be
a virtue and to whose nature long-continued silence on any public topic
was intolerable, felt it his duty to speak to the Judge upon the
subject. This gentleman--his name was S. P. Escott--held, with many,
that, for the good name of the community, steps should be taken to abate
the infantile, futile activities of the besotted legatee.
Afterward Mr. Escott, giving a partial account of the conversation with
Judge Priest to certain of his friends, showed unfeigned annoyance at
the outcome.
"I claim that old man's not fittin' to be runnin' a court any longer,"
he stated bitterly. "He's too old and peevish--that's what ails him! For
one, I'm certainly not never goin' to vote fur him again. Why, it's
gettin' to be ez much ez a man's life is worth to stop that there
spiteful old crank in the street and put a civil question to him--that's
whut's the matter!"
"What happened S. P.?" inquired some one.
"Why, here's what happened!" exclaimed the aggrieved Mr. Escott. "I
hadn't any more than started in to tell him the whole town was talkin'
about the way that daffy Old Peep O'Day was carryin' on, and that
somethin' had oughter be done about it, and didn't he think it was
beholdin' on him ez circuit judge to do somethin' right away, sech ez
havin' O'Day tuck up and tried fur a lunatic, and that I fur one was
ready and willin' to testify to the crazy things I'd seen done with my
own eyes--when he cut in on me and jest ez good ez told me to my own
face that ef I'd quit tendin' to other people's business I'd mebbe have
more business of my own to tend to.
"Think of that, gentlemen! A circuit judge bemeanin' a citizen and a
taxpayer"--he checked himself slightly--"anyhow, a citizen, thataway! It
shows he can't be rational his ownself. Personally I claim Old Priest is
failin' mentally--he must be! And ef anybody kin be found to run against
him at the next election you gentlemen jest watch and see who gits my
vote!"
Having uttered this threat with deep and significant emphasis Mr.
Escott, still muttering, turned and entered the front gate of his
boarding house. It was not exactly his boarding house; his wife ran it.
But Mr. Escott lived there and voted from there.
But the apogee of Peep O'Day's carnival of weird vagaries of deportment
came at the end of two months--two months in which each day the man
furnished cumulative and piled-up material for derisive and jocular
comment on the part of a very considerable proportion of his fellow
townsmen.
Three occurrences of a widely dissimilar nature, yet all closely
interrelated to the main issue, marked the climax of the man's new rôle
in his new career. The first of these was the arrival of his legacy; the
second was a one-ring circus; and the third and last was a nephew.
In the form of sundry bills of exchange the estate left by the late
Daniel O'Day, of the town of Kilmare, in the island of Ireland, was on a
certain afternoon delivered over into Judge Priest's hands, and by him,
in turn, handed to the rightful owner, after which sundry
indebtednesses, representing the total of the old Judge's day-to-day
cash advances to O'Day, were liquidated.
The ceremony of deducting this sum took place at the Planters' Bank,
whither the two had journeyed in company from the courthouse. Having,
with the aid of the paying teller, instructed O'Day in the technical
details requisite to the drawing of personal checks, Judge Priest went
home and had his bag packed, and left for Reelfoot Lake to spend a week
fishing. As a consequence he missed the remaining two events, following
immediately thereafter.
The circus was no great shakes of a circus; no grand, glittering,
gorgeous, glorious pageant of education and entertainment, traveling on
its own special trains; no vast tented city of world's wonders and
world's champions, heralded for weeks and weeks in advance of its coming
by dead walls emblazoned with the finest examples of the lithographer's
art, and by half-page advertisements in the _Daily Evening News_. On the
contrary, it was a shabby little wagon show, which, coming overland on
short notice, rolled into town under horse power, and set up its ragged
and dusty canvases on the vacant lot across from Yeiser's drug store.
Compared with the street parade of any of its great and famous rivals,
the street parade of this circus was a meager and disappointing thing.
Why, there was only one elephant, a dwarfish and debilitated-looking
creature, worn mangy and slick on its various angles, like the cover of
an old-fashioned haircloth trunk; and obviously most of the closed cages
were weather-beaten stake wagons in disguise. Nevertheless, there was a
sizable turnout of people for the afternoon performance. After all, a
circus was a circus.
Moreover, this particular circus was marked at the afternoon performance
by happenings of a nature most decidedly unusual. At one o'clock the
doors were opened; at one-ten the eyes of the proprietor were made glad
and his heart was uplifted within him by the sight of a strange
procession, drawing nearer and nearer across the scuffed turf of the
Common, and heading in the direction of the red ticket wagon.
At the head of the procession marched Peep O'Day--only, of course, the
proprietor didn't know it was Peep O'Day--a queer figure in his rumpled
black clothes and his red-topped brass-toed boots, and with one hand
holding fast to the string of a captive toy balloon. Behind him, in an
uneven jostling formation, followed many small boys and some small
girls. A census of the ranks would have developed that here were
included practically all the juvenile white population who otherwise,
through a lack of funds, would have been denied the opportunity to
patronize this circus or, in fact, any circus.
Each member of the joyous company was likewise the bearer of a toy
balloon--red, yellow, blue, green, or purple, as the case might be. Over
the line of heads the taut rubbery globes rode on their tethers, nodding
and twisting like so many big iridescent bubbles; and half a block away,
at the edge of the lot, a balloon vender, whose entire stock had been
disposed of in one splendid transaction, now stood, empty-handed but
full-pocketed, marveling at the stroke of luck that enabled him to take
an afternoon off and rest his voice.
Out of a seemingly bottomless exchequer Peep O'Day bought tickets of
admission for all. But this was only the beginning. Once inside the tent
he procured accommodations in the reserved-seat section for himself and
those who accompanied him. From such superior points of vantage the
whole crew of them witnessed the performance, from the thrilling grand
entry, with spangled ladies and gentlemen riding two by two on
broad-backed steeds, to the tumbling bout introducing the full strength
of the company, which came at the end.
They munched fresh-roasted peanuts and balls of sugar-coated popcorn,
slightly rancid, until they munched no longer with zest but merely
mechanically. They drank pink lemonade to an extent that threatened
absolute depletion of the fluid contents of both barrels in the
refreshment stand out in the menagerie tent. They whooped their
unbridled approval when the wild Indian chief, after shooting down a
stuffed coon with a bow and arrow from somewhere up near the top of the
center pole while balancing himself jauntily erect upon the haunches of
a coursing white charger, suddenly flung off his feathered headdress,
his wig and his fringed leather garments, and revealed himself in pink
fleshings as the principal bareback rider.
They screamed in a chorus of delight when the funny old clown, who had
been forcibly deprived of three tin flutes in rapid succession, now
produced yet a fourth from the seemingly inexhaustible depths of his
baggy white pants--a flute with a string and a bent pin attached to
it--and, secretly affixing the pin in the tail of the cross ringmaster's
coat, was thereafter enabled to toot sharp shrill blasts at frequent
intervals, much to the chagrin of the ringmaster, who seemed utterly
unable to discover the whereabouts of the instrument dangling behind
him.
But no one among them whooped louder or laughed longer than their
elderly and bewhiskered friend, who sat among them, paying the bills. As
his guests they stayed for the concert; and, following this, they
patronized the side show in a body. They had been almost the first upon
the scene; assuredly they were the last of the audience to quit it.
Indeed, before they trailed their confrère away from the spot the sun
was nearly down; and at scores of supper tables all over town the tale
of poor old Peep O'Day's latest exhibition of freakishness was being
retailed, with elaborations, to interested auditors. Estimates of the
sum probably expended by him in this crowning extravagance ranged well
up into the hundreds of dollars.
As for the object of these speculations, he was destined not to eat any
supper at all that night. Something happened that so upset him as to
make him forget the meal altogether. It began to happen when he reached
the modest home of P. Gafford, adjoining the Gafford stables, on Locust
Street, and found sitting on the lower-most step of the porch a young
man of untidy and unshaved aspect, who hailed him affectionately as
Uncle Paul, and who showed deep annoyance and acute distress upon being
rebuffed with chill words.
It is possible that the strain of serving a three-months' sentence, on
the technical charge of vagrancy, in a workhouse somewhere in Indiana,
had affected the young man's nerves. His ankle bones still ached where
the ball and chain had been hitched; on his palms the blisters induced
by the uncongenial use of a sledge hammer on a rock pile had hardly as
yet turned to calluses. So it is only fair to presume that his nervous
system felt the stress of his recent confining experiences also.
Almost tearfully he pleaded with Peep O'Day to remember the ties of
blood that bound them; repeatedly he pointed out that he was the only
known kinsman of the other in all the world, and, therefore, had more
reason than any other living being to expect kindness and generosity at
his uncle's hands. He spoke socialistically of the advisability of an
equal division; failing to make any impression here he mentioned the
subject of a loan--at first hopefully, but finally despairingly.
When he was done Peep O'Day, in a perfectly colorless and unsympathetic
voice, bade him good-by--not good-night but good-by! And, going inside
the house, he closed the door behind him, leaving his newly returned
relative outside and quite alone.
At this the young man uttered violent language; but, since there was
nobody present to hear him, it is likely he found small satisfaction in
his profanity, rich though it may have been in metaphor and variety. So
presently he betook himself off, going straight to the office in Legal
Row of H. B. Sublette, Attorney-at-law.
From the circumstance that he found Mr. Sublette in, though it was long
past that gentleman's office hours, and, moreover, found Mr. Sublette
waiting in an expectant and attentive attitude, it might have been
adduced by one skilled in the trick of putting two and two together that
the pair of them had reached a prior understanding sometime during the
day; and that the visit of the young man to the Gafford home and his
speeches there had all been parts of a scheme planned out at a prior
conference.
Be this as it may, so soon as Mr. Sublette had heard his caller's
version of the meeting upon the porch he lost no time in taking certain
legal steps. That very night, on behalf of his client, denominated in
the documents as Percival Dwyer, Esquire, he prepared a petition
addressed to the circuit judge of the district, setting forth that,
inasmuch as Paul Felix O'Day had by divers acts shown himself to be of
unsound mind, now, therefore, came his nephew and next of kin praying
that a committee or curator be appointed to take over the estate of the
said Paul Felix O'Day, and administer the same in accordance with the
orders of the court until such time as the said Paul Felix O'Day should
recover his reason, or should pass from this life, and so forth and so
on; not to mention whereases in great number and aforesaids abounding
throughout the text in the utmost profusion.
On the following morning the papers were filed with Circuit Clerk Milam.
That vigilant barrister, Mr. Sublette, brought them in person to the
courthouse before nine o'clock, he having the interests of his client at
heart and perhaps also visions of a large contingent fee in his mind. No
retainer had been paid. The state of Mr. Dwyer's finances--or, rather,
the absence of any finances--had precluded the performance of that
customary detail; but to Mr. Sublette's experienced mind the prospects
of future increment seemed large.
Accordingly he was all for prompt action. Formally he said he wished to
go on record as demanding for his principal a speedy hearing of the
issue, with a view to preventing the defendant named in the pleadings
from dissipating any more of the estate lately bequeathed to him and now
fully in his possession--or words to that effect.
Mr. Milam felt justified in getting into communication with Judge Priest
over the long-distance 'phone; and the Judge, cutting short his vacation
and leaving uncaught vast numbers of bass and perch in Reelfoot Lake,
came home, arriving late that night.
Next morning, having issued divers orders in connection with the
impending litigation, he sent a messenger to find Peep O'Day and to
direct O'Day to come to the courthouse for a personal interview.
Shortly thereafter a scene that had occurred some two months earlier,
with his Honor's private chamber for a setting, was substantially
duplicated: there was the same cast of two, the same stage properties,
the same atmosphere of untidy tidiness. And, as before, the dialogue was
in Judge Priest's hands. He led and his fellow character followed his
leads.
"Peep," he was saying, "you understand, don't you, that this here
fragrant nephew of yours that's turned up from nowheres in particular is
fixin' to git ready to try to prove that you are feeble-minded? And, on
top of that, that he's goin' to ask that a committee be app'inted fur
you--in other words, that somebody or other shall be named by the court,
meanin' me, to take charge of your property and control the spendin' of
it frum now on?"
"Yes, suh," stated O'Day. "Pete Gafford he set down with me and made hit
all clear to me, yestiddy evenin', after they'd done served the papers
on me."
"All right, then. Now I'm goin' to fix the hearin' fur to-morrow mornin'
at ten. The other side is askin' fur a quick decision; and I rather
figger they're entitled to it. Is that agreeable to you?"
"Whutever you say, Judge."
"Well, have you retained a lawyer to represent your interests in court?
That's the main question that I sent fur you to ast you."
"Do I need a lawyer, Judge?"
"Well, there have been times when I regarded lawyers ez bein'
superfluous," stated Judge Priest dryly. "Still, in most cases litigants
do have 'em round when the case is bein' heard."
"I don't know ez I need any lawyer to he'p me say whut I've got to say,"
said O'Day. "Judge, you ain't never ast me no questions about the way
I've been carryin' on sence I come into this here money; but I reckin
mebbe this is ez good a time ez any to tell you jest why I've been
actin' the way I've done. You see, suh--"
"Hold on!" broke in Judge Priest. "Up to now, ez my friend, it would 'a'
been perfectly proper fur you to give me your confidences ef you were
minded so to do; but now I reckin you'd better not. You see, I'm the
judge that's got to decide whether you are a responsible person--whether
you're mentally capable of handlin' your own financial affairs, or
whether you ain't. So you'd better wait and make your statement in your
own behalf to me whilst I'm settin' on the bench. I'll see that you git
an opportunity to do so and I'll listen to it; and I'll give it all the
consideration it's deservin' of.
"And, on second thought, p'raps it would only be a waste of time and
money fur you to go hirin' a lawyer specially to represent you. Under
the law it's my duty, in sech a case ez this here one is, to app'int a
member of the bar to serve durin' the proceedin's ez your guardian _ad
litem_.
"You don't need to be startled," he added, as O'Day flinched at the
sound in his ears of these strange and fearsome words. "A guardian _ad
litem_ is simply a lawyer that tends to your affairs till the case is
settled one way or the other. Ef you had a dozen lawyers I'd have to
app'int him jest the same. So you don't need to worry about that part of
it.
"That's all. You kin go now ef you want to. Only, ef I was you, I
wouldn't draw out any more money from the bank 'twixt now and the time
when I make my decision."
* * *
All things considered, it was an unusual assemblage that Judge Priest
regarded over the top rims of his glasses as he sat facing it in his
broad armchair, with the flat top of the bench intervening between him
and the gathering. Not often, even in the case of exciting murder
trials, had the old courtroom held a larger crowd; certainly never had
it held so many boys. Boys, and boys exclusively, filled the back rows
of benches downstairs. More boys packed the narrow shelf-like balcony
that spanned the chamber across its far end--mainly small boys,
barefooted, sunburned, freckle-faced, shock-headed boys. And, for boys,
they were strangely silent and strangely attentive.
The petitioner sat with his counsel, Mr. Sublette. The petitioner had
been newly shaved, and from some mysterious source had been equipped
with a neat wardrobe. Plainly he was endeavoring to wear a look of
virtue, which was a difficult undertaking, as you would understand had
you known the petitioner.
The defending party to the action was seated across the room, touching
elbows with old Colonel Farrell, dean of the local bar and its most
florid orator.
"The court will designate Col. Horatio Farrell as guardian _ad litem_
for the defendant during these proceedings," Judge Priest had stated a
few minutes earlier, using the formal and grammatical language he
reserved exclusively for his courtroom.
At once old Colonel Farrell had hitched his chair up alongside O'Day;
had asked him several questions in a tone inaudible to those about them;
had listened to the whispered answers of O'Day; and then had nodded his
huge curly white dome of a head, as though amply satisfied with the
responses.
Let us skip the preliminaries. True, they seemed to interest the
audience; here, though, they would be tedious reading. Likewise, in
touching upon the opening and outlining address of Attorney-at-Law
Sublette let us, for the sake of time and space, be very much briefer
than Mr. Sublette was. For our present purposes, I deem it sufficient to
say that in all his professional career Mr. Sublette was never more
eloquent, never more forceful never more vehement in his allegations,
and never more convinced--as he himself stated, not once but
repeatedly--of his ability to prove the facts he alleged by competent
and unbiased testimony. These facts, he pointed out, were common
knowledge in the community; nevertheless, he stood prepared to buttress
them with the evidence of reputable witnesses, given under oath.
Mr. Sublette, having unwound at length, now wound up. He sat down,
perspiring freely and through the perspiration radiating confidence in
his contentions, confidence in the result, and, most of all, unbounded
confidence in Mr. Sublette.
Now Colonel Farrell was standing up to address the court. Under the
cloak of a theatrical presence and a large orotund manner, and behind a
Ciceronian command of sonorous language, the colonel carried concealed a
shrewd old brain. It was as though a skilled marksman lurked in ambush
amid a tangle of luxuriant foliage. In this particular instance,
moreover, it is barely possible that the colonel was acting on a cue,
privily conveyed to him before the court opened.
"May it please Your Honor," he began, "I have just conferred with the
defendant here; and, acting in the capacity of his guardian _ad litem_,
I have advised him to waive an opening address by counsel. Indeed, the
defendant has no counsel. Furthermore, the defendant, also acting upon
my advice, will present no witnesses in his own behalf. But, with Your
Honor's permission, the defendant will now make a personal statement;
and thereafter he will rest content, leaving the final arbitrament of
the issue to Your Honor's discretion."
"I object!" exclaimed Mr. Sublette briskly.
"On what ground does the learned counsel object?" inquired Judge Priest.
"On the grounds that, since the mental competence of this man is
concerned--since it is our contention that he is patently and plainly a
victim of senility, an individual prematurely in his dotage--any
utterances by him will be of no value whatsoever in aiding the
conscience and intelligence of the court to arrive at a fair and just
conclusion regarding the defendant's mental condition."
Mr. Sublette excelled in the use of big words; there was no doubt about
that.
"The objection is overruled," said Judge Priest. He nodded in the
direction of O'Day and Colonel Farrell. "The court will hear the
defendant. He is not to be interrupted while making his statement. The
defendant may proceed."
Without further urging, O'Day stood up, a tall, slab-sided rack of a
man, with his long arms dangling at his sides, half facing Judge Priest
and half facing his nephew and his nephew's lawyer. Without hesitation
he began to speak. And this was what he said:
"There's mebbe some here ez knows about how I was raised and fetched up.
My paw and my maw died when I was jest only a baby; so I was brung up
out here at the old county porehouse ez a pauper. I can't remember the
time when I didn't have to work for my board and keep, and work hard.
While other boys was goin' to school and playin' hooky, and goin' in
washin' in the creek, and playin' games, and all sech ez that, I had to
work. I never done no playin' round in my whole life--not till here jest
recently, anyway.
"But I always craved to play round some. I didn't never say nothin'
about it to nobody after I growed up, 'cause I figgered it out they
wouldn't understand and mebbe'd laugh at me; but all these years, ever
sence I left that there porehouse, I've had a hankerin' here inside of
me"--he lifted one hand and touched his breast--"I've had a hankerin' to
be a boy and to do all the things a boy does; to do the things I was
chiseled out of doin' whilst I was of a suitable age to be doin' 'em. I
call to mind that I uster dream in my sleep about doin' 'em; but the
dream never come true--not till jest here lately. It didn't have no
chancet to come true--not till then.
"So, when this money come to me so sudden and unbeknownstlike I said to
myself that I was goin' to make that there dream come true; and I
started out fur to do it. And I done it! And I reckin that's the cause
of my bein' here to-day, accused of bein' feeble-minded. But, even so,
I don't regret it none. Ef it was all to do over ag'in, I'd do it jest
the very same way.
"Why, I never knowed whut it was, till here two months or so ago, to
have my fill of bananas and candy and gingersnaps, and all sech
knickknacks ez them. All my life I've been cravin' secretly to own a
pair of red-topped boots with brass toes on 'em, like I used to see
other boys wearin' in the wintertime when I was out yonder at that
porehouse wearin' an old pair of somebody else's cast-off shoes--mebbe a
man's shoes, with rags wropped round my feet to keep the snow frum
comin' through the cracks in 'em, and to keep 'em from slippin' right
spang off my feet. I got three toes frostbit oncet durin' a cold spell,
wearin' them kind of shoes. But here the other week I found myself able
to buy me some red-top boots with brass toes on 'em. So I had 'em made
to order and I'm wearin' 'em now. I wear 'em reg'lar even ef it is
summertime. I take a heap of pleasure out of 'em. And, also, all my life
long I've been wantin' to go to a circus. But not till three days ago I
didn't never git no chancet to go to one.
"That gentleman yonder--Mister Sublette--he 'lowed jest now that I was
leadin' a lot of little boys in this here town into bad habits. He said
that I was learnin' 'em nobody knowed whut devilment. And he spoke of my
havin' egged 'em on to steal watermelons frum Mister Bell's watermelon
patch out here three miles frum town, on the Marshallville gravel road.
You-all heared whut he jest now said about that.
"I don't mean no offense and I beg his pardon fur contradictin' him
right out before everybody here in the big courthouse; but, mister,
you're wrong. I don't lead these here boys astray that I've been runnin'
round with. They're mighty nice clean boys, all of 'em. Some of 'em are
mighty near ez pore ez whut I uster be; but there ain't no real harm in
any of 'em. We git along together fine--me and them. And, without no
preachin', nor nothin' like that, I've done my best these weeks we've
been frolickin' and projectin' round together to keep 'em frum growin'
up to do mean things. I use chawin' tobacco myself; but I've told 'em, I
don't know how many times, that ef they chaw it'll stunt 'em in their
growth. And I've got several of 'em that was smokin' cigarettes on the
sly to promise me they'd quit. So I don't figger ez I've done them boys
any real harm by goin' round with 'em. And I believe ef you was to ast
'em they'd all tell you the same, suh.
"Now about them watermelons: Sence this gentleman has brung them
watermelons up, I'm goin' to tell you-all the truth about that too."
He cast a quick, furtive look, almost a guilty look, over his shoulder
toward the rear of the courtroom before he went on:
"Them watermelons wasn't really stole at all. I seen Mister Dick Bell
beforehand and arranged with him to pay him in full fur whutever damage
mout be done. But, you see, I knowed watermelons tasted sweeter to a boy
ef he thought he'd hooked 'em out of a patch; so I never let on to my
little pardners yonder that I'd the same ez paid Mister Bell in advance
fur the melons we snuck out of his patch and et in the woods. They've
all been thinkin' up till now that we really hooked them watermelons.
But ef that was wrong I'm sorry fur it.
"Mister Sublette, you jest now said that I was fritterin' away my
property on vain foolishment. Them was the words you used--'fritterin''
and 'vain foolishment.' Mebbe you're right, suh, about the fritterin'
part; but ef spendin' money in a certain way gives a man ez much
pleasure ez it's give me these last two months, and ef the money is
his'n by rights, I figger it can't be so very foolish; though it may
'pear so to some.
"Excusin' these here clothes I've got on and these here boots, which
ain't paid fur yet, but is charged up to me on Felsburg Brothers' books
and Mister M. Biederman's books, I didn't spend only a dollar a day, or
mebbe two dollars, and once three dollars in a single day out of whut
was comin' to me. The Judge here, he let me have that out of his own
pocket; and I paid him back. And that was all I did spend till here
three days ago when that there circus come to town. I reckin I did spend
a right smart then.
"My money had come frum the old country only the day before; so I went
to the bank and they writ out one of them pieces of paper which is
called a check, and I signed it--with my mark; and they give me the
money I wanted--an even two hundred dollars. And part of that there
money I used to pay fur circus tickets fur all the little boys and
little girls I could find in this town that couldn't 'a' got to the
circus no other way. Some of 'em are settin' back there behind you-all
now--some of the boys, I mean; I don't see none of the little girls.
"There was several of 'em told me at the time they hadn't never seen a
circus--not in their whole lives. Fur that matter, I hadn't, neither;
but I didn't want no pore child in this town to grow up to be ez old ez
I am without havin' been to at least one circus. So I taken 'em all in
and paid all the bills; and when night come there wasn't but 'bout nine
dollars left out of the whole two hundred that I'd started out with in
the mornin'. But I don't begredge spendin' it. It looked to me like it
was money well invested. They all seemed to enjoy it; and I know I done
so.
"There may be bigger circuses'n whut that one was; but I don't see how a
circus could 'a' been any better than this here one I'm tellin' about,
ef it was ten times ez big. I don't regret the investment and I don't
aim to lie about it now. Mister Sublette, I'd do the same thing over
ag'in ef the chance should come, lawsuit or no lawsuit. Ef you should
win this here case mebbe I wouldn't have no second chance.
"Ef some gentleman is app'inted ez a committee to handle my money it's
likely he wouldn't look at the thing the same way I do; and it's likely
he wouldn't let me have so much money all in one lump to spend takin' a
passel of little shavers that ain't no kin to me to the circus and to
the side show, besides lettin' 'em stay fur the grand concert or after
show, and all. But I done it once; and I've got it to remember about and
think about in my own mind ez long ez I live.
"I'm 'bout finished now. There's jest one thing more I'd like to say,
and that is this: Mister Sublette he said a minute ago that I was in my
second childhood. Meanin' no offense, suh, but you was wrong there too.
The way I look at it, a man can't be in his second childhood without
he's had his first childhood; and I was cheated plum' out of mine. I'm
more'n sixty years old, ez near ez I kin figger; but I'm tryin' to be a
boy before it's too late."
He paused a moment and looked round him.
"The way I look at it, Judge Priest, suh, and you-all, every man that
grows up, no matter how old he may git to be, is entitled to 'a' been a
boy oncet in his lifetime. I--I reckin that's all."
He sat down and dropped his eyes upon the floor, as though ashamed that
his temerity should have carried him so far. There was a strange little
hush filling the courtroom. It was Judge Priest who broke it.
"The court," he said, "has by the words just spoken by this man been
sufficiently advised as to the sanity of the man himself. The court
cares to hear nothing more from either side on this subject. The
petition is dismissed."
Very probably these last words may have been as so much Greek to the
juvenile members of the audience; possibly, though, they were made aware
of the meaning of them by the look upon the face of Nephew Percival
Dwyer and the look upon the face of Nephew Percival Dwyer's attorney. At
any rate, His Honor hardly had uttered the last syllable of his decision
before, from the rear of the courtroom and from the gallery above, there
arose a shrill, vehement, sincere sound of yelling--exultant,
triumphant, and deafening. It continued for upward of a minute before
the small disturbers remembered where they were and reduced themselves
to a state of comparative quiet.
For reasons best known to himself, Judge Priest, who ordinarily stickled
for order and decorum in his courtroom, made no effort to quell the
outburst or to have it quelled--not even when a considerable number of
the adults present joined in it, having first cleared their throats of a
slight huskiness that had come upon them, severally and generally.
Presently the Judge rapped for quiet--and got it. It was apparent that
he had more to say; and all there hearkened to hear what it might be.
"I have just this to add," quoth His Honor: "It is the official judgment
of this court that the late defendant, being entirely sane, is competent
to manage his own affairs after his preferences.
"And it is the private opinion of this court that not only is the late
defendant sane but that he is the sanest man in this entire
jurisdiction. Mister Clerk, this court stands adjourned."
Coming down the three short steps from the raised platform of the bench,
Judge Priest beckoned to Sheriff Giles Birdsong, who, at the tail of the
departing crowd, was shepherding its last exuberant members through the
doorway.
"Giles," said Judge Priest in an undertone, when the worthy sheriff had
drawn near, "the circuit clerk tells me there's an indictment for
malicious mischief ag'in this here Perce Dwyer knockin' round amongst
the records somewheres--an indictment the grand jury returned several
sessions back, but which was never pressed, owin' to the sudden
departure frum our midst of the person in question.
"I wonder ef it would be too much trouble fur you to sort of drap a hint
in the ear of the young man or his lawyer that the said indictment is
apt to be revived, and that the said Dwyer is liable to be tuck into
custody by you and lodged in the county jail sometime during the ensuin'
forty-eight hours--without he should see his way clear durin' the
meantime to get clean out of this city, county and state! Would it?"
"Trouble? No, suh! It won't be no trouble to me," said Mr. Birdsong
promptly. "Why, it'll be more of a pleasure, Judge."
And so it was.
Except for one small added and purely incidental circumstance, our
narrative is ended. That same afternoon Judge Priest sat on the front
porch of his old white house out on Clay Street, waiting for Jeff
Poindexter to summon him to supper. Peep O'Day opened the front gate and
came up the graveled walk between the twin rows of silver-leaf poplars.
The Judge, rising to greet his visitor, met him at the top step.
"Come in," bade the Judge heartily, "and set down a spell and rest your
face and hands."
"No, suh; much obliged, but I ain't got only a minute to stay," said
O'Day. "I jest come out here, suh, to thank you fur whut you done to-day
on my account in the big courthouse, and--and to make you a little kind
of a present."
"It's all right to thank me," said Judge Priest; "but I couldn't accept
any reward fur renderin' a decision in accordance with the plain facts."
"'Tain't no gift of money, or nothin' like that," O'Day hastened to
explain. "Really, suh, it don't amount to nothin' at all, scursely. But
a little while ago I happened to be in Mr. B. Weil & Son's store, doin'
a little tradin', and I run acrost a new kind of knickknack, which it
seemed like to me it was about the best thing I ever tasted in my whole
life. So, on the chancet, suh, that you might have a sweet tooth, too, I
taken the liberty of bringin' you a sack of 'em and--and--and here they
are, suh; three flavors--strawberry, lemon and vanilly."
Suddenly overcome with confusion, he dislodged a large-sized paper bag
from his side coat pocket and thrust it into Judge Priest's hands; then,
backing away, he turned and clumped down the graveled path in great and
embarrassed haste.
Judge Priest opened the bag and peered down into it.
It contained a sticky sugary dozen of flattened confections, each molded
round a short length of wooden splinter. These sirupy articles, which
have since come into quite general use, are known, I believe, as all-day
suckers.
When Judge Priest looked up again, Peep O'Day was outside the gate,
clumping down the uneven sidewalk of Clay Street with long strides of
his booted legs. Half a dozen small boys, who, it was evident, had
remained hidden during the ceremony of presentation, now mysteriously
appeared and were accompanying the departing donor, half trotting to
keep up with him.