Hitch Diamond stepped up to the platform and spoke:
“Brudders an’ sisteren, we is come to dis place so dat de lodge
brudders of de Nights of Darkness kin bestow a D on Revun Vinegar
Atts. Eve’ybody chipped in a few change an’ we bought it fer him wid
twenty-five dollars. De high chief money-keeper will now advance an’
hand over de money.”
Figger Bush pushed through the crowd, and emptied all his pockets, as
he laid a pile of silver on a little table beside the pulpit.
“I ain’t spent none of it, brudders,” he announced. “It’s all right dar
jes’ like you gib it to me.”
“Perfessor Green Trapps will now advance wid de obscribe!” Hitch
commanded.
Thereupon, Green rose from a chair near the pulpit and walked to the
little table. He took from his pocket a square of sheepskin, spread
it out before him, and flattened it out by piling a handful of silver
around the edges. Then he fitted his gold spectacles to his pop eyes,
unscrewed the top of a fountain pen and sat down.
There was a slight commotion at the door, but Green did not notice it.
There was a scrouging of people who stood in the aisle in order that
two distinguished white men might pass, but Green Trapps did not notice
that. Green looked up just as the two white men stood at the pulpit
railing almost within reach of his hand. Then his startled eyes gazed
down into the faces of Dr. Gilbo, president of the Silliway Female
Institute, and Dr. Sentelle.
“Gawdlemighty!” Green gasped. He sprang from his chair and sent that
piece of furniture whirling across the platform. With four gigantic
leaps he covered the space between himself and the nearest window, and
he went through that window, splashing the crowd out of his way in his
exit like a brickbat dropped in a puddle of black mud.
The people were dazed by this sudden departure of Trapps, and they
waited breathlessly for what might happen next. Dr. Gilbo strode upon
the pulpit platform and stopped at the table where Green had been
sitting. With a snort of indignation, he realized that his servant,
Green Trapps, had stolen one of his college graduate diplomas, and was
just about to fill it out with the name of Vinegar Atts.
Dr. Gilbo turned and addressed the audience:
“My colored friends, I regret to inform you that Green Trapps is a
fraud and impostor, also a liar and a thief. He persuaded you to
raise a sum of money to purchase from him an honorary degree from the
Silliway Female Institute which he had no right or power to bestow.
This college, of which I am president, does not grant honorary degrees,
and if it did, we would not sell such an honor under any circumstances
or at any price. I think you should congratulate yourselves upon my
arrival just in time to thwart the nefarious designs of Green Trapps.
He was endeavoring to secure money under false pretenses, and if I
remain in my present state of righteous indignation, I shall have him
prosecuted under the law.”
Then Dr. Gilbo stalked off the platform and sat down.
“Beg parding, boss,” Hitch Diamond mumbled. “Does I gather from dem
remarks of yourn dat Brudder Vinegar Atts don’t git no D?”
“He does not from the Silliway Female Institute,” Dr. Gilbo answered.
“Dat’s too bad,” Hitch Diamond rumbled, scratching his head and
wondering what to do next.
At this point, Skeeter Butts, who was sitting in the choir, rose and
said:
“Brudder Hitchie, I moves dat de twenty-five dollars dat Green Trapps
didn’t git be give to Elder Vinegar Atts to buy a pulpit chair an’ a
’lectric readin’ lamp.”
“I seconts dat motion,” Pap Curtain snarled. “Dat’ll let Vinegar down
kinder easy an’ won’t hurt his feelin’s so much.”
When Hitch Diamond put the question, the motion was carried with a
whoop and everybody was in a good humor again.
“Less sing our lodge song fer de closin’ exercises, brudders,” Hitch
bellowed. “Eve’ybody sing!”
“Ef a smile we kin renew
As our journey we pursue,
Oh, de good we all may do
While de days is gwine by.”
In this mighty chorus, Dr. Sentelle missed a voice that he loved--the
superb baritone of Vinegar Atts. That voice, like the tones of a great
pipe-organ, was the joy and pride of Tickfall. Now it was silent.
Dr. Sentelle turned and looked at Vinegar. The pastor of the Shoofly
church sat huddled in a heap in his broken-bottomed pulpit chair,
looking like a big, fat dumpling soaked in gravy. His simple, childish,
baby face was puckered and drawn with sad lines until he looked like a
big fat baby just tuning up to cry.
In fact, Vinegar was completely crushed. He had set his heart upon
that meaningless piece of parchment and that sham degree, and the loss
to him was overwhelming. The pathos of ignorance lies here, that the
untaught covet above everything the tinsel and feathers and adornments
of knowledge.
“Oh, de worl’ is full of sighs,
Full of sad an’ weepin’ eyes;
He’p yo’ fallen brudder rise
While de days is gwine by.”
Still Vinegar’s superb voice was silent, and Dr. Sentelle felt a sense
of loss and dissatisfaction. The music was not complete.
Then something happened which explains why all Tickfall, white and
black, loved Dr. Sentelle almost to adoration.
Suddenly an idea burst like an opening blossom in the scholar’s brain,
and brought forth its fruit of kindly and gracious service. He rose to
his feet, leaning his frail body heavily upon his ponderous cane for
support, and held up a thin, blue-veined, delicate hand for silence.
The singing stopped.
“My friends,” he began in a voice so thrillingly sweet and musical
that every word was like a caress, “for over thirty years your pastor,
Vinegar Atts, and I have been the only preachers in Tickfall. He and I
have spent many an hour in that time discussing together the problems
which concern both the white and the black people of Tickfall. While
the days have been going by, Vinegar has added much to my joy of
living, and I am sure that he has never robbed you of any happiness.”
“Dat’s right!” a dozen voices murmured.
“I have always tried to stand between you colored people and any kind
of harm, and it pleases me tonight that I have been instrumental in
preventing you from paying something for nothing--absolutely nothing!”
“Thank ’e, suh!” several voices spoke.
“Nevertheless, I believe that Vinegar Atts very richly deserves the one
D which you in your kindness were trying to purchase for him.”
“Hear dat, now!”
“The word ‘doctor’ is an academic title, originally meaning a man so
well versed in his department as to be qualified to teach it. I knew
Vinegar Atts years ago as a prize-fighter, and I have seen him fight;
and I assure you that in the department of pugilistic activity, Vinegar
is well enough versed in the manly art of self-defense to know how to
teach it!”
“Now you done said a plum’ mouthful!” Hitch Diamond, the Tickfall
Tiger, howled. “Elder Atts teached me all _I_ know ’bout fightin’!”
“Thirty years have passed since Vinegar became the pastor of the
Shoofly church. In that time, negro preachers have come and gone
through the other negro churches in this parish like a Mardi Gras
procession, but Vinegar holds on to his job. It is my conviction that a
man so endowed with the gift of continuance possesses the supreme art
of pleasing all the people all the time, and should be qualified to
teach that art to others.”
“Listen to dat white man!” a chorus of voices mumbled in admiration.
“I therefore believe that Vinegar Atts richly deserves the title
of doctor, and I therefore greet him as a fellow clergyman with his
honorary entitlements: ‘Dr. Vinegar Atts.’”
Vinegar was not slumped down in his chair now. He was sitting up in his
broken-bottomed chair, his backbone as stiff as if he had swallowed
a ramrod. Dr. Sentelle walked over and held out his hand. Vinegar
sprang up with a half sob and seized that fragile white hand in his
gorilla-like black paw.
There was a shout from that congregation which nearly lifted the roof
off the church.
Then Dr. Gilbo was suddenly galvanized into action. He sprang up from
his seat and knocked his hat on the floor. He jerked his hands in and
out of his pockets, seeking for something, and in his eagerness he
spilled something out of each pocket.
Suddenly he found what he wanted and held it up--a little square box,
such as jewelers use. Taking the top from the box, he brought out a
small gold medal about the size of a postage stamp, and almost as thin.
“My colored friends,” Dr. Gilbo announced in a shrill, high voice.
“This gold medal which you behold is bestowed upon the deserving
pupils of the Silliway Female Institute as a reward of merit. At our
graduating exercises last June twenty-five of these medals were given
away, but it happened that no pupil earned the one which I hold in my
hand. It is now my pleasure to confer this medal on Dr. Vinegar Atts!”
When Dr. Gilbo walked across the platform and pinned his medal upon the
lapel of Vinegar’s long-tailed preaching-coat, there is no language to
describe the whoop of adulation which sprang from the throats of that
delighted audience.
Vinegar Atts sat down and wiped the tears from his eyes upon his coat
sleeve.
“Us would like to hear a speech from de Revun Dr. Vinegar Atts!” Hitch
Diamond bellowed.
The prince of platform spellbinders stood up and made a speech of two
words, but in the intonation of those two words he comprised all that a
negro can express of eloquent gratitude:
“Bless Gawd!”
He sat down for the last time in his broken pulpit chair, and his
powerful shoulders quivered with emotion. The next day he put a new
chair in its place, adorned his pulpit with an electric reading lamp,
and recovered his gift of gab.
“Lodge brudders, attention!” Hitch Diamond bellowed. “Give de
good-night salute an’ sing de last verse!”
The men folded their hands over their breasts and their superb voices
chanted:
“But de deeds of good we sow
Bofe in shade an’ shine will grow,
An’ will keep our hearts aglow,
While de days is gwine by.”
Dr. Sentelle listened and smiled. The music was complete.
He reflected that he had never heard Dr. Vinegar Atts sing so well.
The Untamed
By
Max Brand
A tale of the West, a story of the Wild; of three strange
comrades,--Whistling Dan of the untamed soul, within whose mild eyes
there lurks the baleful yellow glare of beast anger; of the mighty
black stallion Satan, King of the Ranges, and the wolf devil dog, to
whom their master’s word is the only law,--and of the Girl.
How Jim Silent, the “long-rider” and outlaw, declared feud with Dan,
how of his right-hand men one strove for the Girl, one for the horse,
and one to “‘get’ that black devil of a dog,” and their desperate
efforts to achieve their ends, form but part of the stirring action.
A tale of the West, yes--but a most unusual one, touched with an almost
weird poetic fancy from the very first page, when over the sandy wastes
sounds the clear sweet whistling of Pan of the desert, to the very last
paragraph when the reader, too, hears the cry and the call of the wild
geese flying south.
* * * * *
G. P. Putnam’s Sons
New York London
The Beloved Sinner
By
Rachel Swete Macnamara
Author of “Fringe of the Desert,” “The Torch of Life,” and “Drifting
Waters”
But for the sin, they would have lived happily from their meeting--and
there would have been no story. But the sin brought misunderstanding,
making the old road of true love rough--for awhile. But it strengthened
the courage and the devotion of the two, and all the varied and
fascinating characters in this charmingly told story. And the Man and
the Girl found their hard-won happiness awaiting them--in the proper
place--at the end of the road.
A tale for all who like a story of true love untouched by war or the
rumours of war.
* * * * *
G. P. Putnam’s Sons
New York London
[Transcriber’s Note:
Obvious printer errors corrected silently.
Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation are as in the original.]