THE COUNTRY TOWN.
It was barely daylight the following Monday morning, when I started with
my father for Twin Mounds, where we were to take possession of the
“Union of States” newspaper. As we were getting into the wagon, Agnes
came out to hand me a letter, which she said she had written the night
before because opportunity did not present itself to tell me what it
contained. As my father was impatiently waiting to start, with the lines
in his hands, I only had time to say that I would see her in a few
weeks, and, kissing my hand to her, we drove away. She waved her
handkerchief until we were out of sight, when I soon forgot her and the
letter in the excitement of the visit to a strange place and the
engaging in a work of which I had no knowledge.
My father’s usual humor had returned, and he drove along without
speaking, except occasionally to the horses. Once or twice he began to
sing the songs for which he was famous, but he was evidently not in tune
that day, for he soon gave it up.
I had never been to Twin Mounds, as there was a post-office and a small
trading-place several miles nearer, and had no idea how it looked, and
knew nothing of it, except that it had a brick court-house, a stone
jail, several wooden stores, a school-house, and about six hundred very
wicked people. This I had incidentally learned from listening to people
talk who had been there, and I was so occupied in thinking it all over
that I had no inclination to talk, and it occurred to me that after I
grew up, perhaps I shall be a thinking man, like my father, for we did
not exchange a word during the long drive. Several times as we drove
along I caught him looking at me, and I thought he was wondering how I
would get on in the new business, but as he looked away quickly when I
caught him at it, I concluded he was at his old habit of mentally
accusing me of being dull, which made me very wretched. I never knew
what his objection to me was, but I always believed that when he looked
at me, and then resumed his thinking, he was accusing me of something.
At last we came in sight of the place--we came upon it suddenly, after
reaching a high place which overlooked it--and I occupied myself in
wondering where the house in which we were to live, and the office in
which I was to work, were located, until we stopped at a place where
horses were cared for, adjoining, and evidently belonging to a hotel, in
front of which a swinging sign was displayed under a bell, announcing
that the Twin Mounds House was kept there. I noticed that all the
business places were in a square, in the centre of which was the brick
court-house, and in one corner of the yard the stone jail. In a valley
north of the town ran a river, and on its banks were mills, and the site
of Twin Mounds had evidently been timbered originally, for in the
people’s yards I saw great oak and hickory trees, and the woods adjoined
the town on every side. Great numbers of impudent boys, dressed in a
rakish fashion with which I was not at all familiar, abounded, and while
I was thinking I should certainly have trouble with these, my father
started down the street with long strides, telling me to follow.
Stopping in front of a low wooden building which had evidently been
used at some time in its history as a dwelling, and on the front porch
of which was a board sign reading “Printing Office,” we went in, where
we found three men--two with paper caps on, who were throwing their arms
violently around over a high stand, and the other, a pale man seated at
a desk, who was evidently the retiring proprietor. This man and one of
those with a paper cap on his head spoke pleasantly to my father, and
looked inquiringly at me.
“This is the son I have told you about,” he explained, pointing at me as
if I were a bag of corn. “He is ready to commence learning the printer’s
trade.”
This was addressed to one of the men who wore the paper caps, and he
began at once to initiate me in the mysteries of his craft. I soon
learned that the high table at which he worked was covered with shallow
boxes, and that each one contained a different letter; every character
in the language was hid away in the nooks and corners, and my first work
was to hunt them out, and remember them for future reference. This I
began immediately, and became so interested in it that I did not notice
for some time that a number of the rakish-looking boys I had seen when
first driving into the town had collected outside the window to look at
me. These were evidently the town boys of whom I had heard, and no doubt
they were waiting for me to come out and fight, to see of what kind of
stuff I was made. It was the understanding in the country that all town
boys were knockers, and that every country boy who went there to live
must fight his way to respectability. They were less ferocious than I
had expected, and as I was much stronger than any of them, I should have
gone out and thrown them all over the house, but for the fact that my
father did not countenance fighting. They were generally
delicate-looking--from high living and idleness, I thought--and while I
was engaged with pleasant thoughts to myself that when Jo came over we
would capture Twin Mounds, my attention was called to the circumstance,
by my friend in the paper cap, that it was noon, and that my father
evidently intended that I should go out with him to dinner, for he had
gone himself without making any other arrangement.
I had heard them call him Martin, and he appeared to be very much of a
gentleman, for before we went out he showed me through the
establishment, and explained as much of it as he thought I could
understand. The press was in a little room by itself--there was but one,
although I remembered that in the advertisement it was said that the
office was supplied with new and fast presses--and from the paper on the
wall I judged that the former owner of the house had occupied that
particular part of it with a bed. Back of that was a place for plunder,
formerly a kitchen, and back of that still a yard and a deserted garden.
There was also in the yard a large oak-tree, and to the branches of this
was suspended a hammock, in which Martin said I might sometimes sleep,
if I became a friend of his, as he had no doubt I should.
While we walked to the hotel he explained that he was the foreman, and
that, as I was to learn the trade under him, we should be a great deal
together.
“It is not much of a trade,” he said, “and if you are a bright boy you
will speedily acquire it. You can learn it in six months, or three
years, just as you please, for I have known boys to become excellent
printers in six months, while others, with thicker heads, were about it
three or four years. But as your father said you were to stay with me
to-night, I will tell you more about it then.”
Going into the hotel, we found a large number of men seated at a long
table in a long room, every one eating hurriedly, as though oppressed
with the fear that the supply in the kitchen was likely to give out
before they were filled. Near the head of the table sat my father and
the pale proprietor, and between them and Martin the other man who wore
the paper cap, whose name seemed to be Adams, from which circumstance I
thought there was no other hotel in the place. Opposite him sat Clinton
Bragg, I noticed with some astonishment, forgetting for a moment that
Twin Mounds was his home, and he looked as sullen and mean as ever, but
he was not so well dressed as when I had seen him at Fairview. He could
not help being aware of my father’s presence, but they had evidently
mutually agreed not to renew their acquaintance, though I noticed that
Bragg stopped working his jaws when my father was speaking to his
companion, and listened to what was being said, as though he wondered
how it came we were both there.
Some of the other men were flashily dressed, and some of them plainly,
and they talked a great deal to each other about their business, and by
listening to this I learned which of them occupied shops, and stores,
and offices, and which one was the driver of the stage that made two
trips a week to a railroad station a long way off.
The dinner was served in large plates, distributed at convenient
distances apart, and two smart girls in stiff aprons and dresses were in
attendance should any one think anything additional could be had by
asking for it, and both of them seemed to be on very confidential terms
with the boarders, for they talked to them familiarly, and called them
tiresome, and impudent, and I don’t know what all. A small man with a
hump on his back, who occasionally came into the room, I took to be the
proprietor, and Martin told me afterwards that I was right, and that
while he was rather an agreeable man, his health was wretched. After
most of the boarders had gone out, his wife came in with her family, and
from her conversation I learned that she conducted a shop for making
bonnets and dresses in the parlor of the house, and that business was
dreadfully dull.
I spent the afternoon in studying the mystery of the boxes, and was
encouraged to find all the letters of my name. My father was very busy
at the desk with the pale proprietor, posting himself with reference to
his future work, and was very careful and thorough in his inquiries into
the details, from which I believed he would speedily become accustomed
to his new position. The pale proprietor was evidently not accustomed to
so much work in one afternoon, for he yawned frequently, and seemed
bored, but my father kept him at it steadily.
Half the boys belonging in the town appeared at the window before night
to look at me, and I noticed with alarm that they were not all pale and
sickly, as the first lot had been, which evidently meant trouble ahead.
Several of them wore their father’s boots and coats, with leather belts
around their bodies, which they buckled up from tune to time as the
afternoon wore away, and most of them chewed plug tobacco, which was
passed around by a boy I judged belonged to a storekeeper. Occasionally
they got up a game, and tried to play at it, but the interest soon
flagged, and they returned to the window to look at me. Once when they
became more noisy than usual, the printer named Adams dashed out, and
drove them away as he would chase so many hens, but they soon came back
again, and stared at me. I pretended not to notice them, as though they
were of no consequence, but they made me very miserable, for they were
evidently the town boys I had been warned against.
There was one who appeared late in the afternoon who looked particularly
like a fighter, and the others immediately gathered around him to tell
him of my arrival. He was so bow-legged that I thought it would be
impossible to get him off his feet when the inevitable clash came, for I
was certain he was the boy picked out to do me bodily injury, and as
soon as he had been told of my appearance among them, he walked straight
over to the window, and, flattening his nose against the glass, looked
at me with great impudence. I thought I would turn upon him suddenly,
and frighten him, but he seemed rather glad that I had turned my head,
that he might see my eyes and face. Indeed, instead of being abashed, he
made the ugliest face at me I have ever seen, and, drawing back from the
window, spit at me through a vacancy in his lower row of teeth. He
remained around there for an hour or more, walking on his hands, and
turning somersaults, for my benefit, and once he lay down flat in the
road, and invited four of the others to hold him there. The ease with
which he got up made me more uncomfortable than ever. Although they
called him “Shorty,” he was really a very long boy of his age, and wore
a coat which hung about him in shreds, and instead of a shirt he had on
a brown duster, tucked into a pair of pants as much too small as the
coat was too large. To add to my discomfort, I heard Adams say to Martin
that the town authorities really ought to do something with Shorty
Wilkinson for he was always fighting and hurting somebody.
When we went to supper at the hotel the same men were there, and, as I
expected, Bragg was in better humor, promising by dark to be agreeable.
His principal characteristic was sullen indifference, and I wondered if
a bomb exploded under his chair would disturb him. They all disliked
him, evidently, from which circumstance I imagined he regarded them as a
herd, as he had regarded the people of Fairview. Nobody spoke to him or
he to any one, and his only tribute to the approaching darkness was a
noticeable softening in his indifference, for occasionally he stopped
his jaws--he munched his food like an animal, and impatiently, as though
he disliked the disagreeable necessity of having a habit in common with
such people--to listen to what was being said; but at dinner he was
oblivious to everything. He went out before me, and when I passed
through the office I saw him looking at a copy of the “Union of States,”
and I was glad we had not yet taken charge, for I was sure he was making
fun of it.
After Martin came out we walked down to the house where we were to live,
which was a considerable distance down the street from where the hotel
was kept, and which was in a lonely location on the brow of a hill
overlooking the valley and the mills. Directly opposite, and across the
river, were the mounds which gave the town its name, a pair of little
mountains where it was said the Indians built signal fires when they
occupied the country, and where they buried their dead, for human bones
were often found there by curious persons who dug among the rocks. The
house was built of stone, in the centre of a great many lots, surrounded
by heavy hardwood trees, and as we went through the rooms Martin
explained that it had been occupied long before he came there by an
Indian agent, and that Twin Mounds was originally an agency, where the
Indians came to draw their supplies. But the agency and the Indians had
been removed further west years ago, and the house sold to an eccentric
bachelor, who occupied it alone until a few months before, when he died,
and the place being offered for sale, it came into possession of my
father. It was two stories high, built in such a manner as to contain
six large rooms of about the same size, and there were iron shutters at
all the windows and doors, and the roof was of slate, which Martin said
was a precaution the agent had taken against the treachery of his wards.
It was in good repair, but I feared we should be very lonely in it, and
felt better when we were out in the street again.
Returning to the office, I sat with him until dark on the little porch
in front, on top of which was the long “Printing Office” sign, and I
became convinced that I should learn rapidly under him, for he took
great pains to prepare me for the work, and delivered a sort of lecture
with reference to printing in general which was very instructive. He
said after a while that he would go out and swing in the hammock,
leaving me alone, and while wondering what I should do to amuse myself,
I remembered the letter Agnes had given me. I opened it eagerly, and
after finding a light with some difficulty, read:--
MY DEAR NED: I tried to get an opportunity to say good-bye to you
on Sunday night, but it did not present itself, therefore I write
you this letter.
You said to me once that I loved every one in Fairview alike, which
is very near the truth now that you are away, for I thought more of
you than any of them, and express the sentiment since we are no
longer to be together. I hope it will be a comfort to you to know
that I esteem you as my best friend, and in your new home I desire
you to think of me in the same way, for I shall never change. If I
have been a blessing to you, as you have said, so you have been to
me, and we have mutually enjoyed the friendship of the years we
were together.
It is natural to suppose that you will rapidly improve in your new
position. I sincerely hope you will, and I have so much confidence
in you that I have no favor to ask except that you always remain
my worthy friend. My greatest ambition for your future is that your
boyhood will not fill your manhood with regrets. I have always told
you that it is best to do right in everything, and while you may
not succeed in this entirely, come as near it as you can. The next
seven years will be the most precious of your life, and if I have a
favor to ask it is that you will improve them.
I believe in you, and shall always be proud of your friendship. It
has been manly, pure, and honest, and all the more acceptable
because I have neither brothers nor sisters, like yourself. In one
sense you have been my protégé; I undertook your education, and
taught you more at home than at school, and if you succeed well in
life (as I am confident you will), it will at least be evidence
that I did the best I could. Probably I shall be your last teacher,
for your father is a busy man, and will no doubt train you in his
way; therefore I hope you will realize how necessary it is that you
apply yourself, and learn whenever there is opportunity. There is
nothing in the future for me but to teach other deserving boys, but
everything for you. Do the best you can, and I shall be proud of
you all my life.
Always your friend,
AGNES.
I had it in my mind to sit down and write a long reply at once, but much
to my surprise Clinton Bragg came in at this moment and interrupted me.
From what he said on entering I judged he was looking for the printer
named Adams, who was a dissolute fellow, but seeing I was alone he sat
down.
I had disliked Bragg from the first, but he seemed friendly enough, and,
taking a bottle of liquor from his pocket, asked me to drink with him.
This I refused to do; whereupon he held the bottle in his hand a long
while, as if dreading to drink it. At length he went into another room
and returned with a dipper of water, after which he took a drink of the
liquor, but it gagged him so that he couldn’t get the water to his lips
to put out the fire, and he coughed and spit in such a manner as to
alarm me. The tears were standing in his eyes when he finished.
“Do you like it?” I asked.
“I like GOOD liquor,” he replied, wiping the tears out of his eyes.
“This is horrible. I believe I will throw it away.”
He made a motion as if to toss the bottle out into the street, but he
didn’t do it, probably reflecting that it would do very well to carry in
his pocket.
I am certain that he came in to let me know that he was addicted to
drink, as he was very proud of that reputation, and although liquor was
revolting to him he was always trying to create the impression that he
could not possibly let it alone. I inferred, also, that he was well
acquainted around the establishment, by reason of his association with
Adams, for he seemed quite at home.
“Martin don’t drink,” he said, after trying to revive the stub of his
cigar, and several ineffectual attempts to light it with a match.
“Martin does nothing that is not sensible. He is out there in the
hammock asleep now, while I carouse around half the night. Where do you
intend to sleep?”
I replied that I believed I was to sleep there, somewhere, although I
had it in my mind to say it was none of his business. I showed my
contempt for him so plainly that he was ill at ease, as though he felt
that his attempt to convince me that he was a drinking man had failed.
“There is a cot in the plunder room; I suppose that is for you,” he
said. “I have a room above here. I believe I will wander up that way,
and go to bed.”
He skulked off like a guilty dog, going through the court-house yard,
and stopped occasionally as if to wonder if something that would amuse
him were not going on at some of the places lit up around the square.
Being satisfied at last, apparently, that the same old loungers were
probably there, with their rude jokes and uninteresting experiences, he
turned the corner, and passed out of sight.