“I am not waiting on you.”
When I asked him to call my waiter, I was passed by as though he had not
heard me. I called the assistant head waiter, only to be told that the
waiters were very busy, and were doing the best they could.
When I realized I was up against it good and plenty I rested on my oars,
awhile, wondering how I would play even. While I was thinking it over
and wondering if I would be obliged to acknowledge myself beaten, my
waiter, thinking I was through, came to me and asked if I was done. At
the same time another waiter came on the scene holding a huge tray high
over his head. The tray was filled to the guards with everything from
soup to pie. An idea struck me, but I had to be quick.
I dropped my fork, my waiter stooped to pick it up, and, as he was
stooping, I kicked my chair from under me and, throwing myself on all
fours in front of the fast approaching waiter with the tray, causing him
to trip and bring the tray and its contents fair on top of my waiter’s
back and head.
I escaped without a spatter, the incoming waiter got but little, but the
poor devil of a nig that was supposed to wait on me got a good bit more
than I expected, for he was not only drenched with the soup, gravy,
chicken potpie, custard pie, and a few other edibles, but a broken piece
of crockery or glass took him in the back of the head and cut a
good-sized gash. Either this or his striking the floor with his head put
him out of business, for he never moved a muscle. The head waiter and
the assistant head waiter came rushing up, and there was a general
stampede of guests to see what was the matter. I was the first to demand
to know how it all happened.
The proprietor came in and gave orders for the removal of the debris,
and, incidentally, of the waiter also. He was picked up and carried out,
and so were the dishes.
After the nigger had been carried out, there was a good deal of talk
about how it happened. They found the nig who had the tray and demanded
of him what part he had in it. He was just about to open his mouth when
I stepped in front of him, clenched my fist and looked him square in the
eye.
“Fo’ de Lawd, I don’ know how it all did come about. I jes’ tripped on
sumthin’ and dar I was.”
With this explanation Mr. Nig slid out of the way. The next time I came
in the dining-room I was fitted out with an umbrella handle. It was one
of the largest ones I ever saw and shaped not unlike a revolver handle.
This I had in my hip pocket. I threw my coat tails to one side and
exposed for a moment the top of the handle to the gaze of the head
waiter. After I was sure he had seen it I walked up to him and said:
“Look here, Sam, you saw my gun, but you only saw one of the pair. They
are forty-fours and will carry a bullet through a six-inch plank. Now, I
don’t propose to be held up by you damned rascals any more. What I want
of you is to put me to the same table each time, give me as good a
waiter as you have in the house, and see that I am waited on in
first-class shape. If you do this, all right; if not, there will be a
pile of dead niggers here that will bring on international
complications.”
“I don’ know what yo’ mean, sar.”
My hand went to my hip pocket, but before I had time to draw, the moke
threw up his hands and cried out:
“Fo’ de Lawd, mister man, you can hab any waiter yo’ want.”
The head waiter seated me himself, and I was never waited on better in
my life, and it was kept up as long as I stayed in the house. I expected
to be interviewed about those concealed weapons, but was not, and the
umbrella handle did service equally as well as a cannon.
The negro is strong on long words, and about three days after my calling
down the head waiter, he stopped me as I was leaving the dining-room and
said:
“Mister Henderson, what’s dis yer international complexions you told me
about dat day?”
“Is it possible you don’t know, Sam? Don’t you attend church every
Sunday?”
“I suah does, sar, but we hain’t got none of dose things about our
church.”
“Oh, yes you have, only you don’t see all there is going on about the
church. International complications, Sam, act the same on the heart as
vermiform appendix does on the liver, and it is a serious thing when
they both begin working at once.”
“Yes, sar,” said Sam, as he bowed me out, and there was a puzzled look
on his face that proved to me that I had raised about twenty feet in his
estimation. I was only there two days more, but I think he stood more in
awe of me on account of the big words I tossed him as I passed him each
day than of the two big guns he thought I had.
I was stopping in Detroit at one time and had been introduced by some
would-be society sports to the smart set, and Detroit has a smart set,
even if the people generally are bigotted. I suppose these society boys
thought they would have some fun with me when they got me up against
some of those society bathing costumes, but I did not balk at them. I
had seen them before on people who did not lay claim to so much
respectability.
Perhaps I should say why I claim that the people of Detroit are
bigotted. I want to tell you, Billy, you can gamble that the people of
any town are bigotted when they will not accept Standard time, but have
Sun time for their business and claim that the railroad people are a
half an hour out of the way. The so-called Christian people should rise
above anything of this kind, for these two-time towns are the cause of
more profanity than any other one thing that I know of. All the prayers
of all the good people in Christendom will not keep the traveling men
out of h— if they don’t get this fool idea out of their heads of having
a time of their own in these jay towns, and it can only be a jay town
that will keep that much behind the trains.
Standard time was inaugurated for the benefit of all the people in the
United States, and these guys who are not willing to go with the push
have no particular excuse for living.
I started to tell you about my adventure with the smart set in Detroit,
or rather my adventure at one of their functions. That word functions,
Billy, is answerable for a lot of bum doings that I know about, and that
only covers a small territory. I had on my turkey tail suit, just like a
waiter, and felt as though the waist bands of my trousers were coming up
through that big hole in the front of my vest. I had on a little dinkey
tie, made out of some white stuff that I did not dare to put my hands on
for fear I would make a mark on it, and I had one of those choker
standing collars like a priest, that keeps a fellow guessing whether he
is coming back or going ahead. On the whole I was not feeling any too
good with that suit and perhaps was not altogether answerable for what I
said and did.
When a lady looked at me more than a second I thought something was the
matter with my clothes, and I could feel my face getting as red as a
pickled beet.
I was standing around looking as though I would sell myself for a song
or less, when one of those waistless dresses started toward me. It had a
woman in it and I got scared. I thought she was about to tell me my
collar was unbuttoned or that my shirt front had wilted.
“Mr. Henderson,” said she, “will you please send for an ice for me?”
“Sure,” said I, quite relieved that it was no worse. I turned about and
seeing a fellow that I thought waited on me that morning at the hotel, I
said:
“Here, Jim, run along and get this lady an ice.”
Jim did not move, and thinking he was waiting for a tip in advance, I
handed him a quarter, saying:
“Get a move on you now, don’t waste any more time.”
“I am a guest,” said he, but he spoke so low the lady did not hear, but
she heard me tell him to get the ice, and I could see but one way out.
“You get that ice,” said I, “or I will break your d——d head. I did not
know you were a guest and you have no business to look so much like a
waiter,” and I not only made him get the ice, but I made him take the
quarter.