Seth’s first impressions of the World, gathered when he found himself
and his valise alone on the sidewalk of one of Tecumseh’s chief streets,
were distinctly gloomy.
Other passengers who had left the train here, and in whose throng he
had been borne along thus far, started off briskly in various directions
once they reached the busy thoroughfare, elbowing their way through the
horde of clamorous hotel porters much as one might push through a clump
of obstructing bushes. He had firmly fixed in his mind the cardinal
rule of traveling countrymen, that these shouting runners were brigands
intent upon robbing him, and he was clear in his resolution to give
them no hold upon him, not even by so much as a civil expression of
countenance. He said “No, thank you!” sternly to at least a dozen
solicitations, so it seemed to him, and walked away steadily, fearful
that their practised eyes had detected in him an utter stranger, and
intent only upon proving to them that he knew where he was going. When
at last it seemed likely that they were no longer watching him, he
stopped, put his bag down in a door way, and looked about.
It was half-past six of a summer afternoon (for a failure to make
connections had prolonged the sixty-mile journey over eight hours), and
the sun, still high, beat down the whole length of the street with an
oppressive glare and heat. The buildings on both sides, as far as
eye could reach, were of brick, flat-topped, irregular in height, and
covered with flaring signs. There was no tree, nor any green thing, in
sight.
Past him in a ceaseless stream, and all in one direction, moved a swarm
of humanity--laborers and artisans with dinner-pails, sprucely dressed
narrow-chested clerks and book-keepers, and bold faced factory-girls in
dowdy clothes and boots run down at the heels--a bewildering, chattering
procession. No one of all this throng glanced at him, or paid the
slightest attention to him, until one merry girl, spying his forlorn
visage, grinned and called out with a humorous drawl “Hop-pick--ers!”
and then danced off with her laughing companions, one of whom said, “Aw,
come off! You’re rushin’ the season. Hop’s ain’t ripe yet.”
Seth felt deeply humiliated at this. He had been vaguely musing upon the
general impudence of his coming to this strange city to teach its people
daily on all subjects, from government down, while he did not even know
how to gracefully get his bag off the street. This incident added
the element of wounded self-pride to his discomfort--for even casual
passers-by were evidently able to tell by his appearance that he was
a farmer. Strange! neither Albert nor John had told him anything
calculated to serve him in this dilemma. They had warned him plentifully
as to what not to do. Indeed his head was full of negative information,
of pit-falls to avoid, temptations to guard against. But on the
affirmative side it was all a blank. John had, it was true, advised
him to get board with some quiet family, but if there were any
representatives of such quiet families in the crowd surging past, how
was he to know them?
While he tormented himself with this perplexing problem, two clerks
came out of the store next to which he stood, to pull up the awning
and prepare for night. A tall young man, with his hands deep in his
trouser’s pockets, and a flat straw hat much on one side of his head,
sauntered across the street to them, and was greeted familiarly.
“Well, Tom,” shouted one of these clerks, “you just everlastingly gave
it to that snide show to-night. _Wasn’t_ it a scorcher, though?”
The young man with the straw hat put on a satisfied smile: “That’s the
only way to do it,” he said lightly. “The sooner these fakirs understand
that they can’t play Tecumseh people for chumps, the better. If the
_Chronicle_ keeps on pounding ’em, they’ll begin to give us a wide
berth. Their advance agent thought he could fix me by opening a pint
bottle of champagne. That may work in Hornellsville, but when he gets
to-night’s _Chronicle_ I fancy he’ll twig that it doesn’t go down here.”
“Oh, by the way, Tom,” said the other clerk, in a low tone of voice, “my
sister’s engaged to Billy Peters. I don’t know that she wants to have it
given away, that is, names, and everything, but you might kind o’ hint
at it. It would please the old folks, I think--you know father’s taken
the _Chronicle_ for the last twenty years.”
“I know” said Tom, producing an old envelope from a side pocket and
making some dashes on it with a pencil--“the regulation gag: ‘It is
rumored that a rising young hat-dealer will shortly lead to the altar
one of the bright, particular social stars of Brewery street ’ eh?
Something like that?”
“Yes, that’s it. You know how to fix it so that everybody’ll know who is
meant. Be around at Menzel’s to-night?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I’ll look in. The beer’s been fearfully flat there,
though, this last carload. So long, boys!”--and Tom moved down the
street while the clerks re-entered the store.
Seth followed him eagerly, and touched him on the shoulder, saying:
“I beg your pardon, sir, but I heard you mention the _Chronicle_ just
now. I would be much obliged if you could tell me where the office is.”
The young man turned, looked Seth over and said, affably enough:
“Certainly. But you’ll find it shut up. The book-keeper’s gone home.”
Then he added, as by a happy afterthought: “If you want to pay a weekly
subscription, though, I can take it, just as well as not.”
“No,” answered Seth, “I’ve come to work on the _Chronicle_.”
“Oh--printer? I guess some of the fellows are there still, throwing in
their cases. If you like, I’ll show you.”
Seth replied, with some embarrassment, “No, I’m not a printer. I’ve come
to be--to be--an editor.”
Tom’s manner changed in a twinkling from civility to extreme cordiality.
“Oh--ho! you’re the new man from Thessaly, eh? Jack Fairchild’s brother!
By Jove! How _are_ you, anyway? When did you get in? Where are you
stopping?”
“I’m not stopping anywhere--unless it be this stairway here,” Seth
replied, pointing to his carpetbag with a smile, for his companion’s
cheerfulness was infectious. “I came in half an hour ago, and I scarcely
knew where to go, or what to do first. I gather that you are connected
with the _Chronicle_.”
“Well, I should remark!” said Tom, taking the bag up as he spoke. “Come
along. We’ll have some supper down at Bismarck’s, and leave your grip
there for the evening. We can call for it on our way home. You’ll stop
with me to-night, you know. It ain’t a particularly fly place, but we’ll
manage all right, I guess. And how’s Jack?”
In the delight of finding so genial a colleague, one, too, who had known
and worked with his brother, Seth’s heart rose, as they walked down the
street again. He had been more than a little dismayed at the prospect
of meeting these unknown writers whose genius radiated in the columns
of the _Chronicle_, and in whose company he was henceforth to labor.
Especially had he been nervous lest he should not speak with sufficient
correctness, and should shock their fastidious ears with idioms
insensibly acquired in the back-country. It was a great relief to
find that this gentleman was so easy in his conversation, not to say
colloquial.
They stopped presently at a broad open door, flanked by wide windows, in
which were displayed a variety of bright-tinted play bills, and two huge
pictures of a goat confidently butting a small barrel. There was a steep
pile of these little, dark-colored barrels on the sidewalk at the
curb, from which came a curious smell of resin. As they entered, Seth
discovered that this odor belonged to the whole place.
The interior was dark and, to the country youth’s eyes, unexpectedly
vast. The floor was sprinkled with gray sand. An infinitude of small,
circular oak tables, each surrounded with chairs, stretched out in every
direction into the distant gloom. Away at the farther end of the place,
somebody was banging furiously on a piano. In the middle distance, three
elderly men sat smoking long pipes and playing dominoes, silently, save
for the sharp clatter of the pieces. Nearer, three other men, seated
about a table, were all roaring in German at the top of their lungs,
pounding with their glasses on the resounding wood, and making the most
excited and menacing gestures. While Seth stared at them, expecting
momentarily to see the altercation develop into blows, he felt himself
clutched by the arm, and heard Tom say:
“Bismarck, this is Mr. Fairchild, a new _Chronicle_ man. You must use
him as well as you do me.”
Seth turned and found himself shaking hands with an old German monstrous
in girth, and at once fierce and comical in aspect, with short, upright
gray hair, a huge yellowish-white moustache, and little piggish blue
eyes nearly hidden from view by the wave of fat which rendered his great
purple face as featureless as the bottom of a platter.
“Who effer vas Misder Vott’s frent, den you bed he owens dis whole
houwus,” this stout gentleman wheezed out, smiling warmly, and releasing
Seth’s hand to indicate, with a sweeping gesture of his pudgy paw, the
extent of Seth’s new and figurative possessions.
On the invitation of the host they all took seats, and a lean,
wolfish-faced young man named “Ow-goost,” who shuffled along pushing
his big slippers on the floor, brought three tall foaming glasses
of dark-brown beer. Seth did not care for beer, and had always, in
a general way, avoided saloons and drink, but of course, under these
circumstances, it would be ridiculous not to do as the others did. The
beverage was bitter, but not unpleasant, and with an effort he drank it
half down at a time, as he saw his companions do. Then he looked about,
while they discussed the merits of this new “bock,” Tom speaking with an
air of great authority, and pronouncing it better than the last, but a
bit too cold.
The piano was still jangling, and the dominoes were being rattled around
for a new game. The three noisy old men had grown, if possible, more
violent and boisterous than ever. One of them now sprang to his feet,
lifted his right hand dramatically toward the dusky ceiling, and
bellowed forth sonorously something which Seth thought must be at least
a challenge to immediate combat, while the others hammered their glasses
vehemently, and fairly shrieked dissent.
“I’m afraid those men are going to fight,” he said.
“Fight? Nonsense! They’re rather quieter than usual,” remarked Tom.
“What are they chewing on to-night, Bismarck--the Sigel racket?”
“Yes,” said their host, listening indifferently. “Dot’s Sigel.” Then,
addressing Seth, he explained: “Somedimes it’s Sigel, unt somedimes the
reffolution uff forty-eighd, unt den somedimes der k-vestion of we haf
a vood bafement by Main streed. It all makes no differunce to dem,
vicheffer ding dey shdarts mit, dey git yust so much oxcited. Dot
rooster you see standing up mit der spegtacles, dot Henery Beckstein,
he’s a tailor; he sits mid his legs tvisted all day, den when night
comes he neets some exercises. Efery night for tweluf years he comes
here, unt has his liddle dalk, und de udders, dey alvays pitches into
him. He likes dot better as his dinner. De vurst is, dey all don’t know
vat dey talk aboud. I bleef, so help me Gott, no one of ’em ever laid
eyes by Sigel, unt dey all svear he vas deir dearest frent. Now--hear
dot! Dot Beckstein say uff he didn’t shleep mid him four years in his
dent, in de same bet! How was dot for lies, huh?” The host, pained
and mortified at this mendacity, left his seat and waddled over to
the disputants, shouting as he went, and joined the conversation so
earnestly that his little eyes seemed bursting from his beet-red face.
“Great old man, that,” said Tom, pounding with his glass for the waiter;
“there’s no flies on _him!_ I named him Bismarck three or four years
ago--everybody calls him that now--and it tickled him so, there’s
nothing here too good for me. You like cheese, don’t you?”
“Well, yes, I eat cheese sometimes.”
Seth never _had_ eaten this kind of cheese which Owgoost presently
slapped down before them, along with a mustard cup, a long bulging roll
of black bread, and more beer. It was pale and hard and strong of
scent, was cut in thick slabs, and was to be eaten, he judged from Tom’s
procedure, under a heavy top-dressing of the brown mustard. He liked
it though, and was interested to find how well beer went with it, or it
went with beer. Then they had each a little pickled lambs-tongue,
pink and toothsome, to be eaten with plenty of salt, and it was quite
remarkable how ideally beer seemed to go with this, too. In all, three
large glasses went.
Tom was a delightful companion. It was simply charming to hear him talk,
as he did almost continuously, describing the round of life in Tecumseh,
relating gay little anecdotes of personal experience, and commenting
trenchantly on various men as they came in. To some of these he
introduced Seth. They seemed extremely affable young people, and some
of them who took seats near by invited Tom and him with much fervor and
still greater frequency, to have their glasses filled up. The former
accepted these proffers very freely, but the beer did not taste as
good to Seth as it had during supper, and he kept to his one glass--the
fourth--sipping at it from time to time. Tom was so urgent about it,
though, that he did take a cigar, a dark, able-bodied cigar which
annoyed him by burning up on one side.
The beer-hall presented a brilliant appearance now, with all the lights
flaming, with most of the chairs filled by merry young men, with three
or four white-jacketed waiters flitting about, bearing high in air
both hands full of foaming glasses--a fine contrast to the dingy, bare
interior of the twilight, with only the solitary Owgoost. Above the
ceaseless hum of conversation and laughter, rose, at intervals, the
strains of lively music from the far-off piano, reinforced now by a harp
and a flute.
After a time cards were proposed, and Tom made one of a quartette who
ranged themselves at the table. Seth could not play, and so moved his
chair back, to watch the game. His cigar burned badly and he relighted
it. Then it tasted bitter, and, after some hesitation, he threw it
away. The game, called seven-up, was one he had never seen before; the
ten-spots were invested with a fictitious value which puzzled him. Tom,
over whose shoulder he watched had three of these tens, and silently
indicated to Seth that they were of especial interest. Seth fixed his
eyes upon them, to see how they were to be managed. They were very
curious ten-spots, being made of beer-glasses running over with
lambs-tongues, with lambs chasing them to rescue their lamented members,
and burly “Bismarck” striving in vain to secure order. General Sigel
came to help him, and Tom dealt him a terrific blow. Here _was_ a fight
at last, and John Fairchild stood by, rapidly taking notes. Then it came
bed-time, and--Seth was being shaken into sensibility by Tom, who said
between fits of chuckling:
“Wake up, old boy! Wake up!”
Another great change had taken place in the beer-hall--the lights
were out, the music had ceased, the crowd was gone. A solitary gas-jet
flickered from the chandelier over the table; the game was ended, and
the players were standing ready to depart, and laughing. Fat Bismarck
stood behind him, in the half-shadow, looking very sleepy, and he seemed
to be grinning too.
Seth saw all this first. Then he discovered that he held his collar and
necktie in his hand, and that his coat and waistcoat were on the table.
He dimly began to understand that he had been asleep, and that, in
the operation of his dream, he had commenced undressing. Everybody was
laughing at him, his friend Tom, who now was helping him on with his
coat, most heartily of all.
“I declare,” Seth said, “I must have fallen asleep. I had no idea--I
suppose I was dreaming of getting ready for bed.”
“Oh, dots all right, dots all right,” said Bismarck heartily. “Ve don’d
mind it a bit. You vas only dired owut.”
“Yes, that’s it,” said Tom, “he’d had a hard day of it, traveling all
the way from Thessaly. Are you ready? We’ll get the bag, and trot along
home. Good night, boys!”
Seth responded to the chorus of answering “good nights,” and the twain
started out. Tom not only carried the bag, but took his companion’s
arm--much to Seth’s satisfaction, for he felt very tired, and it seemed
unusually difficult for him to shake off his sleepiness. Tom was more
talkative than ever, and he seemed to be saying extremely clever things,
but Seth somehow did not follow their meaning, and he could think of
nothing to say in reply. They were in a dark side street now.
“Ah, I thought he’d be open!” said Tom, abruptly, stopping before a
place, through the closed shutters of which long horizontal threads of
light gleamed. “Let’s go in and have a night-cap. It’ll set you straight
in a minute.”
The curious reluctance to speak, of which Seth had felt vaguely
conscious all along, now prompted acquiescence as the easiest course,
and he followed Tom into a small, low room, thick with cigar-smoke and
the odor of kerosene, where four or five men, with their hats tilted
over their eyes, were playing cards: there was a pile of money in the
centre of the table, to which each in turn seemed to be adding from a
smaller heap before him. They were so much engrossed in the game that
they only nodded at Tom, and Seth felt relieved at escaping the ordeal
of being introduced to them. At Tom’s suggestion he took a little glass
of brandy--“to do their duty by the National debt,”--what ever that
meant. It was burning, nauseous stuff, which brought the tears to his
eyes, but it made him feel better.
It especially enabled him to talk, which he proceeded to do now with
a fluency that surprised him. Tom was evidently much impressed by his
remarks, saying little, it is true, but gripping his arm more closely.
Thus they walked to Tom’s lodgings--a tall, dark brick house opposite
a long line of coal sheds. The hall was so dark that Seth, in trying to
follow his guide, stumbled over an umbrella-rack, and fell to the floor.
Tom assisted him to rise, with a paternal “steady now, steady; that’s
it, lean on me,” and so helped him up the two flights of steep, narrow
stairs. In all the world, it seemed to Seth, he could not have met a
more amiable or congenial friend than Tom, and he told him so, as they
climbed the stairs, affectionately leaning upon his arm, and making his
phrases as ornate in diction and warm in tone as he could.
“Here we are,” said Tom, opening a door, and lighting a lamp which
revealed a small, scantily furnished room, in extreme disorder. “Make
yourself at home, my boy. Smoke a pipe before you go to bed?”
“Oh, mercy, no. I thinks--do you know, I feel a little dizzy.”
“Oh, you’ll be all right in the morning. Just undress and pile into bed.
I’ll smoke a pipe first.” Half an hour after Seth’s first day in the
World had closed in heavy slumber, Tom looked at him before blowing out
the light, and smiled to himself: “He _is_ about as fresh as they make
’em.”