IN WHICH THE SATYR AND THE NARRATOR BECOME VERY DRUNK AND THE LATTER IS
LIFTED TO EARTH AGAIN
"Come in here, Jeff Angel!" I cried, joy at sight of him mounting, and
brightening my face with a smile of welcome. I dropped my pen and
beckoned eagerly.
His grin broadened as he accepted my invitation forthwith, through the
window. I meant that he should enter by the door, naturally, but instead
he gave a leap, and came squirming and wriggling in like a great
caterpillar. I was up and had him by the hand as soon as his feet
touched the floor.
"Where's Lessie? How is she? How does she feel toward me? Why didn't you
stop when I called you the other night? Talk, man! Hurry!"
The Satyr's grin seemed fixed.
"Whur 'n hell yo' ben?" he drawled, disengaging my clasp and sliding
around the table to a seat on a box.
I rattled my chair on the floor impatiently and begged him to take that,
but he demurred.
"Ain't used to 'em," he explained. Then, once more, in genuine and open
curiosity--"Whur 'n hell yo' ben?"
"You've said it--in hell!" I answered, savagely, slipping my papers to
one side and sitting upon the table's edge. "And Granny, your blessed
aunt, is the one who shoved me in--good and deep!"
"Haw! Haw! Haw! Haw!" roared Jeff Angel, with an intonation
indescribably ludicrous had I been in the humor to enjoy it. His head
went back and his curving whisker shook at me like a bent forefinger.
"Damn it, man!" I gritted, worn irascible by that week's awful
experiences; "don't laugh and joke the night away! Tell me about
Lessie--then we'll make merry till morning if you wish!"
"We'll drink, till we sink, in th' middle o' th' road,
But we won't go home till mawn--'n'!"
Thus caroled this irrepressible Antic, and drew from some recess in his
rags the bottle which I had seen before.
I glared at him helplessly. Perhaps he was a trifle drunker than he was
that other time, when I gave him his supper. There he sat swaying his
head from side to side, peering mischievously at me with his watery blue
eyes, irresponsible as an infant. Then I recognized the futility of
anger, or importunity. This queer being would speak when he got ready,
and not before. I made a great effort, and threw off the impetuousness
which desired to know everything at once. I would humor this half
civilized, half crazy person.
"Let us drink, then!" I agreed, bending forward with outstretched arm.
"I need a bracer, anyway."
At this the Satyr sat up with distended lids and mouth ajar, holding
himself to a rigid perpendicular by planting his hands on either side of
him and putting his weight upon them.
"Shore 'nough?" he burst out.
"Shore 'nough!" I answered, with a positive nod. "Give me some of your
white lightning; I've grown used to fire."
He picked up the bottle haltingly, as though constrained to unbelief in
spite of my words and my waiting hand, and placing his thumb over the
cob stopper, began to shake the contents furiously.
"What's that for?" I asked.
"Shakin' th' fusic off!" he enlightened me, and it was a moment or two
before I figured out what he meant. Fusil oil in whisky rises; Jeff's
vigorous action was to diffuse it. His corruption of the word told me
that he was totally ignorant of what he really was doing.
He drew the stopper with his teeth, and handed me the bottle. I think I
have said elsewhere in this narrative that drinking whisky is not one of
my weaknesses. That is to say, it is not a habit. I can scarcely
conceive of a man living thirty years in Kentucky without drinking a
little whisky. I knew the stuff I held was vile, but I put it to my lips
for two reasons. I was dead tired, and I wanted to set this contrary
creature's tongue to going on topics which would interest me. I took a
big mouthful, swallowed, and thought my time had come. Hot? My throat
closed up, tight, and for a time I could not breathe. My mouth burned as
though it had been cauterized. I slid from the table, choked, coughing,
my eyes running water. Back to the kitchen I tore for a draught from the
bucket on the shelf--for something that would unstop my windpipe.
Pelting my ears as I ran were the high-pitched, cackling notes of the
Satyr, volley after volley, as he hugged his knees and rocked and weaved
in unrestrained delight.
"Whut's the matter?" he queried, in mock surprise, as I reappeared with
my handkerchief busy about my eyes and mouth.
"No more o' that junk, Jeffy!" I replied, thrusting my hand into the
medicine chest on the wall and producing a quart of ten-year-old rye
whisky. "If I make merry with you I'll choose my beverage."
"That's spring wadder!" he returned, contemptuously. "We feed that to
babies out here."
"Spring water it may be, but it's stout enough for your uncle."
I drew the cork as I spoke, placed my private brand upon the table,
found my pipe and sat down facing my strange guest.
He proceeded to shame me by indulging in a very liberal potation,
smacking his lips with greatest zest at its conclusion, and winking
across at me in a manner intended to indicate his superiority.
"Where's your fiddle?" I asked; not that I cared especially, but it was
incumbent upon me to be agreeable.
The Satyr jerked a grimy thumb toward the window which had just admitted
him.
"Out thur on th' binch. 'S wropped up 'n' th' jew won't hurt it."
In the short silence which followed, we got our pipes to going.
"Was that you whistling a while ago?" I continued, after waiting vainly
for my visitor to say something voluntarily.
"That's me a-play'n'."
"Playing?"
"Yes, play'n' a reed. Fus' thing ever I got music out o'."
Again his hand was hidden in his tatters for a moment, and came out with
what appeared to be a long, slender stick. This he placed to his mouth
after the manner of a clarinet player, and blew a pure, flute-like note.
Then I saw the instrument was hollow, with little round holes along its
length.
"Pipes o' Pan, by Jove!" I breathed. "Make me some music, Satyr."
Already I was aware of the effect of that mouthful of white lightning. A
slow but sure elation was beginning to buoy me up unnaturally, and I
felt the ebullience of spirit such as follows the knowledge of some
great joy.
"Pipe for me, you heathen minstrel!" I added, smiling at him with
narrowed eyes. "Draw from that piece of wood the things the birds, and
the trees, and the brooks, and the flowers have told you. Trill me a
moonlight roundelay, such as inspires the feet of fairies; make me see
the wood violets nodding in the warm dusk, and let me hear the drone of
bees in the tiger-lily's cup. Sound for me the dream-song of the runlet,
as it whispers and babbles over its pebbly bed and between its
moss-draped banks in the silver starlight. Bring me the low love-message
of the dove when the breeze is but a sigh, and the witch-light from a
sun just sunk fills all the forest with a chastened radiance, and makes
it one vast sanctuary upheld by a million pillars. It is there your
patron lives--the great god Pan! Tell me not you've never heard him by
the river bank o' quiet days, when the squirrels sleep, and the
chipmunks drowse, and the birds forget their tunes. Belike you've never
seen him, for to mortals he remains ever invisible; but you, O Satyr,
are most surely a cousin, if not nearer kin, and it may be you and he
have danced many a bacchanalian revel together. Dost know him--the great
god Pan? Goat-legged, horn-headed, pleasure-loving, with his pipes to
while the time?"
I did not stop to consider that this outburst was jargon pure and simple
to the ears which received it. My mind had suddenly become gorged with
poetic thoughts, and I poured them out upon the helpless head of Jeff
Angel.
"Fur Gawd's sake!--air yo' plum' gone?" he exclaimed, in unfeigned
alarm, casting a rapid glance around as though meditating flight.
"That's what your juice did for me," I explained, laughing to reassure
him of my sanity. "One more swallow, then we'll have a tune!"
We pledged each other from our respective bottles, and the Satyr played.
Again I find myself hampered, for I cannot translate that performance
through the medium of words. It was the most astounding exhibition I
have ever listened to. His work on the violin had been entirely beyond
the range of my comprehension, but then the dormant possibilities were
in the violin. What was there in this slender reed? Unguessed miracles
of sound! I sat and stared at the grotesque form on the box, wondering
at first if I really was so intoxicated that my imagination was acting
the ally for this vagabond artist. No, the ability of this uncouth
musician was real, and my appreciation was only heightened by the subtle
power of the draught of mountain dew. As I sat and puffed in lazy
contentment, many a woodland pageant passed before my eyes. I saw all
the things for which I had asked, and more. Beneath his hands the dumb
reed became a sentient power; became a living, speaking force. Nature's
infinite secrets dropped from it in purest pearls of sound. I heard the
twitter of birds; the love-call, the anger-cry, the alarm-shriek, the
mother-croon. I heard the wailing sweep of the wind when the storm
gathers and hurls its invisible battalions upon the countless army of
trees. I heard the wordless lisp of the matin zephyr when a new, fresh
breath moves across the world at dawn. I heard the vesper sigh like a
prayer from tired lips. I heard the whistle of the dove's wing in its
startled flight, and the quail's liquid call. I heard the holy hymn of
midnight when the moon hangs big and yellow, and the numberless strings
of the Ancient Harp vibrate softly to her summons. I heard the sweet
purling of running water, and the barely audible echo of an insect's
hum.
I had no word of praise or compliment when Jeff took the pipe from his
lips and carelessly laid it aside. What I had just given ear to was
beyond platitude or fervent adjective; beyond comment. Silence was the
only true meed which might be accorded it, and this I gave.
Jeff sighed, twisted his shoulders as though to rid himself of a cramp,
ran his tongue over his lips, and picked up his bottle.
"Wuz that whut yo' wanted w'en yo' 's talk'n' out o' yo' head?" he
ventured, with a coy, sideways movement of his chin.
I nodded. Here was a combination worthy of profound study. Totally
unlearned, depraved but not debased, with a soul so full of music that
even his besotted state had no power against it. I failed to understand.
For an hour thereafter I strove with all the skill at my command, used
every artifice, to draw the Satyr out, and make him tell what he knew.
In vain. He saw through each device; he avoided each veiled trap. He
drank often, and good-naturedly insisted that I should imbibe every time
he did. There was no help for it, but presently I was taking no more
than a thimbleful at a time, for I realized that my condition was
becoming most uncertain. Jeff seemed proof against the stuff, for he
poured it down recklessly, without any noticeable effect. But when he
arose to his feet after a while to feel in his trousers pocket for a
match, I saw results. He giggled, swayed, and quite suddenly sat down
again. I hospitably got up to supply his needs from a box on the mantel,
when to my dismay and great surprise I discovered that the room was
beginning to turn around and the furniture to do a silent jig. I drew my
face down sternly to rebuke myself for this hallucination, and started
determinedly toward the mantel. Where was the mantel? As I sat it was to
my left. When I stood it was in front. Now it was to my _back_! I
whirled angrily, and bumped into Jeff Angel, who had risen to renew the
investigation of his trousers--I mean pants. Jeff didn't wear trousers;
he wore pants--and that's too dignified a name for them. We bumped,
instinctively grappled, and naturally came to the floor. Jeff fell on
top; I felt that abominable chin-tuft tickling my neck. I pushed him
off, and in a few moments we had gained what I shall term an oblique
perpendicular. That is, both his feet and mine were on the floor, but
his were some distance away from mine, and we were mutually supported by
our intertwined arms. He regarded me with a watery leer, and one eyebrow
tilted, while I endeavored to look very dignified; with what success I
of course cannot say.
"Y's damn good feller!" averred my cup companion, blinking laboredly.
I managed to move my feet forward a little, and to straighten my leaning
body correspondingly. Then I bethought me that I was host, and my guest
wanted a match. I looked for the mantel; it was not in sight. I turned
gravely to my _vis-a-vis_.
"Whersh man'l?" I asked, when a weakening of my waist muscles caused me
to bend forward and then back in a most awkward manner.
Instead of replying to my question, the Satyr, with eyes glassily set on
vacancy, began some more of his infernal doggerel.
"Possum live in a holler tree,
Raccoon any ol' place;
Rabbit takes a drink o' booze
'N' spits in a bulldog's face!"
This classic quatrain was delivered after repeated efforts, and I bowed
my approval as the silly sing-song came to an end.
Just how it was managed I cannot say to-night, as I sit with aching head
and write the story of my shame, but in some way we found our original
seats.
"Hongry, ain't yo'?" asked Jeff, with what I thought a sardonic look.
"No 'm not 'ung'y."
"Yes yo' air--hongry fur news! Huh? He! He! He!"