gentleman in his club. He reassured it with some more cheerful words.
He had a thought right then, he says; kind of a sudden fear. He had been
told the first day by his cousin, and also by his great friend Doctor
Hong Foy, that the skunk gave out a strong scent disagreeable to many
people. But this one he'd caught didn't have any scent of any kind. So
mebbe that meant it wasn't in good condition and Doctor Hong Foy wouldn't
wish it for twenty-five dollars. However, it was sure a skunk, and looked
strong and healthy and worth taking in to the doctor, who could then tell
about its condition.
Lew Wee opened the neck of the bag, laid it on the ground close by him,
got down on his knees, and carefully raised one side of the coop. The
wild animal looked more beautiful than ever; and it didn't seem alarmed,
but just the tiniest mite suspicious. It must of looked like it was
saying it was entirely willing to be friendly, but you couldn't ever tell
about these Chinamen. Lew Wee reached a hand slowly over toward it and it
moved against the back of the coop, very watchful. Then Lew Wee made a
quick grab and caught the back of its neck neatly.
Of course this showed at once that a Chinaman wasn't to be trusted, and
Lew Wee says it put up a fierce fight, being so quick and muscular as to
surprise him. He was fully engaged for at least thirty seconds; the
animal clawed and squirmed and twisted, and it bit in the clinches and
almost got away. He was breathing hard when he finally got his wild
animal into the sack and the neck tied.
He says he didn't actually realize until then, what with all the
excitement, that something had gone kind of wrong. He was not only
breathing hard but it was hard breathing. He says he felt awful good
at that moment. He had been afraid his animal might not be in good
condition, but it undoubtedly was. He thought right off that if one in
just ordinary good condition was worth twenty-five dollars to Doctor Hong
Foy, then this one might be worth as much as thirty-five, or even forty.
He thought it must be the best wild animal of that kind in the world.
So he picked up the sack, with his prize squirming and swearing inside,
and threw it over his shoulder and started back to the country club. He
stopped a minute to thank his cousin once more; but his cousin seen him
coming and run swiftly off in a strange manner, as if not wishing to be
thanked again. Then Lew Wee went on across a field and over the golf
links. His idea was to take the little animal to his room in the
clubhouse and keep it there until night, when he could take it into
town and get all that money for it. He was quite happy and wished he
hadn't scared the poor thing so.
He thought when he got to his room he might let it out of the sack to
play round there in freedom during the day. He spent the twenty-five
dollars for different things on the way over the golf links. He told me
he knew perfectly well that his pet would be likely to attract notice;
but he didn't realize how much. A Chinese is a wonder. He can very soon
get used to anything.
But Lew Wee never did get to his room again. When he got up near the
clubhouse some fine people were getting out of a shiny purple motor car
as big as a palace, and they had golf sticks in bags. One of 'em was a
big red-faced man with a fierce gray moustache, and this man begun to
yell at Lew Wee in a remarkable manner. The words being in a foreign
language, he couldn't make 'em out well, but the sense of it was that
the big man wanted him to go away from there. Lew Wee knew he wasn't
working for this man, who was only a club member; so he paid no attention
to him beyond waving his hand friendly, and went on round toward the back
entrance.
Then out of the side entrance come the chief steward, also yelling, and
this was the man he was working for; so he stopped to listen. It wasn't
for long. He lost a good job as cook in no time at all. Of course that
never bothers a Chinee any; but when he started in to get his things
from his room the steward picked up a golf club with an iron end and
threatened to hurt him, and some of the kitchen help run round from the
back with knives flashing, and the big red-faced man was yelling to the
steward to send for a policeman, and some ladies that had got out of
another big car had run halfway across the golf links, as if pursued by
something, and more people from the inside come to the door and yelled at
him and made motions he should go away; so he thought he better not try
to get his things just then. He couldn't see why all the turmoil, even if
he had got something in prime condition for his friend Doctor Hong Foy.
It was noticeable, he thought; but nothing to make all this fuss about,
especially if the fools would just let him get it to his own room, where
it could become quiet again, like when he had first seen it in the trap.
But he saw they wasn't going to let him, and the big man had gone in the
front way and was now shaking both fists at him through a side window
that was closed; so he thought, all right, he'd leave 'em flat, without
a cook--and a golf tournament was on that day, too! He was twenty-five
dollars to the good and he could easy get another job.
So he waved good-bye to all of 'em and went down the road half a mile
to the car line. He was building air castles by that time. He says it
occurred to him that Doctor Hong Foy might like many of these wild
animals, at twenty-five dollars each; and he might take up the work
steady. It was exciting and sporty, and would make him suddenly rich.
Mebbe it wasn't as pleasant work as his cousin did, spending his time
round gardens and greenhouses; but it was more adventurous. He really
liked it, and he would get even more used to it in time so he wouldn't
hardly notice it at all. As he stood there waiting for a trolley car he
must of thought up a whole headful of things he'd buy with all these
sudden emoluments. Several motor cars passed while he waited and he
noticed that folks in 'em all turned to look at him in an excited way.
But he knew all Americans was crazy and liable to be mad about something.
Pretty soon a car stopped and some people got off the front end. They
stopped short and begun to look all round 'em in a frightened manner--two
ladies and a child and an old man. The conductor also stepped off and
looked round in a frightened manner; but he jumped back on the car quick.
Lew Wee then hopped on to the back platform, with his baggage, just as it
started on. It started quick and was going forty miles an hour by the
time he'd got the door open. The two women in the car screamed at him
like maniacs, and before he'd got comfortably set down the conductor had
opened the front door and started for him. He got halfway down the car;
then he started back and made a long speech at him from the front end,
while the car stopped like it had hit a mountain, throwing everyone off
their seats.
Lew Wee gathered that he was being directed to get off the car quickly.
The other passengers had crowded back by the conductor and was telling
him the same thing. One old gentleman with a cane, who mebbe couldn't
walk good, had took up his cane and busted a window quick and had his
head outside. Lew Wee thought he was an anarchist, busting up property
that way. Also the motorman, who had stopped the car so soon, was now
shaking a brass weapon at him over the heads of the others. So he thought
he might as well get off the car and save all this talk. He'd got his
fare out, but he put it back in his pocket and picked up his sack and
went out in a very dignified way, even if they was threatening him. He
knew he had something worth twenty-five dollars in his sack, and they
probably didn't know it or they wouldn't act that way.
He set down and waited for another car, still spending his money.
The next one slowed down for him; but all at once it started up again
more swift than the wind, he says; and he could see that the motorman
was a coward about something, because he looked greatly frightened when
he flew by the spot. He never saw one go so fast as this one did after it
had slowed up for him. It looked like the motorman would soon be arrested
for driving his car too fast. He then had the same trouble with another
car; it slowed up, but was off again before it stopped, and the people in
it looked out at him kind of horrified.
It begun to look like he wasn't going to ride to the city in a trolley
car. Pretty soon along the road come a Japanese man he knew. His name
was Suzuki Katsuzo; and Lew Wee says that, though nothing but a Japanese,
he is in many respects a decent man. Suzuki passed him, going round in a
wide circle, and stopped to give him some good advice. He refused to come
a step nearer, even after Lew Wee told him that what he had in the sack
was worth a lot of money.
Suzuki was very polite, but he didn't want to come any nearer, even
after that. He told Lew Wee he was almost certain they didn't want him
on street cars with it, no matter if it was worth thousands of dollars.
It might be worth that much, and very likely was if the price depended on
its condition. But the best and most peaceful way for Lew Wee was to find
a motor car going that way and ask the gentleman driving it to let him
ride; he said it would be better, too, to pick out a motor car without a
top to it, because the other kind are often shut up too tightly for such
affairs as this, like street cars. He said the persons in street cars are
common persons, and do not care if a thing is worth thousands of dollars
or not if they don't like to have it in the car with them. He didn't
believe it would make any difference to them if something like this was
worth a million dollars in American gold.
So Lew Wee thanked Suzuki Katsuzo, who went quickly on his way; and then
he tried to stop a few motor cars. It seemed like they was as timid as
street cars. People would slow up when they seen him in the road and then
step on the gas like it was a matter of life and death. Lew Wee must of
said "Can happen!" a number of times that morning.
Finally, along come a German. He was driving a big motor truck full of
empty beer kegs, and Lew Wee says the German himself was a drinking man
and had been drinking so much beer that he could nearly go to sleep while
driving the car.
He slowed up and stopped when he saw Lew Wee in the middle of the road.
Lew Wee said he wanted to go to San Francisco and would give the driver a
dollar to let him ride back on the beer kegs. The driver said: "Let's see
the dollar." And took it and said: "All right, John; get up." Then he
sniffed the air several times and said it seemed like there had been a
skunk round. Lew Wee didn't tell him he had it in his bag because the
driver might know how much it was worth and try foul play on him to get
possession of it. So they started on, and the German, who had been
drinking, settled into a kind of doze at the wheel.
Lew Wee was up on the beer kegs and enjoying himself like a rich
gentleman riding to the city in his motor car. It was kind of nice, in
spite of being used to his pet, to be going through the air so fast.
The German seemed to be getting sobered up by something, and after
about five or six miles he stopped the car and yelled to Lew Wee that
a skunk had been round this place, too; and mebbe he had run over one.
Lew Wee looked noncommittal; but the German was getting more wakeful
every minute, and after a couple more miles he pulled up again and come
round to where Lew Wee was. He says it seems like a skunk has been round
everywhere; and, in fact, it seems to be right here now. He sees the sack
and wants to know what's in it. But he don't give Lew Wee a chance to
lie about it. He was thoroughly awake now and talked quite sober but
bitterly. He ordered Lew Wee to get off of there quickly. Lew Wee says
he swore at him a lot. He thinks it was in German. He ain't sure of the
language, but he knows it was swearing.
He wasn't going to get off, at first; but the German got a big stick from
the roadside and started for him, so he climbed down the other side and
started to run. But the cowardly German didn't chase him a single step.
He got back in his seat and started down the road quicker than it looked
like his truck had been able to travel.
Anyway, Lew Wee was a lot nearer to town, owing to the German not having
been sensitive at first; and if worst come to worst he could walk. It
looked like he'd have to. Then he saw he'd have to walk, anyway, because
this brutal German that put him off the truck hadn't give him back his
dollar, and that was all he had. He now put the First High Curse of the
One Hundred and Nine Malignant Devils on all Germans. It is a grand
curse, he says, and has done a lot of good in China. He was uncertain
whether it would work away from home; but he says it did. Every time he
gets hold of a paper now he looks for the place where Germans in close
formation is getting mowed down by machine-gun fire.
But his money was gone miles away from him by this time; so he started
his ten-mile walk. I don't know. It's always been a mystery to me how he
could do it. He could get kind of used to it himself, and mebbe he
thought the public could do as much. It was an interesting walk he had.
At first, he thought he was only attracting the notice of the vulgar,
like when some American ruffians doing a job of repair work on the road
threw rocks at him when he stopped to rest a bit. But he soon noticed
that rich ladies and gentlemen also seemed to shun him as he passed
through little towns. He carried his impetuous burden on a stick over
his shoulder and at a distance seemed to be an honest workman; but people
coming closer didn't look respectfully at him, by any means. It seemed
as if some odium was attached to him.
Once he stopped to pick a big red rose from a bush that hung over the
wall in front of a pretty place, and a beautiful child dressed like a
little princess stood there; and, being fond of children, like all Chinee
men, he spoke to her; but a nurse screamed and run out at him and yelled
something in another foreign language. He thinks it was swearing, same as
the German, though she looked like a lady. So he went sadly on, smelling
of his lovely rose from time to time.
The only way I can figure out how he got through them suburbs is that
parties wanted to have him arrested or shot, or something, but wouldn't
let him stick round long enough to get it done; they was in two minds
about him, I guess: they wished to detain him, but also wished harder
to have him away.
So he went on uninjured, meeting murderous looks and leaving excitement
in his trail; hearing men threaten him even while they run away from him.
It hurt him to be shunned this way--him that had always felt so friendly
toward one and all. He couldn't deny it by this time: people was shunning
him on account of what Doctor Hong Foy wanted alive and in good
condition.
As he worked his way into the city the excitement mounted higher. He took
to the middle of the street where he could. Mobs collected behind him and
waved things at him and looked like they would lynch him; but they didn't
come close enough for that. It seemed like he bore a charmed life in
spite of this hostility. When he'd got well into the city a policeman did
come up and start to arrest him, but thought better of it and went round
a corner. It made him feel like a social cull or an outcast, or
something.
He wasn't a bit foolish about his cunning little pet by this time. And
it looked as if these crowds of people that gathered behind him would
finally get their nerve up to do something with him. They was getting
bigger and acting more desperate. When he was on the sidewalk he swept
people off into the road like magic, and when he was in the street they
would edge close in to the buildings.
It really hurt him. He'd always liked Americans, in spite of their
foreign ways, and they had seemed to like him; but now all at once they
was looking on him as a yellow peril. He still kept his rose to smell of.
He said it was a sweet comfort to him at a time when the whole world had
turned against him for nothing at all.
He made for Chinatown by the quietest streets he could pick out, though
even on them hardly escaping the lawless mob. But at last he got to the
street where Doctor Hong Foy's office was. It was largely a Chinese
street and lots of his friends lived there; but even now, when you'd
think he'd get kind words and congratulations, he didn't.
His best friends regarded him as one better let alone and made swift
gestures of repulsion when he passed 'em. Quite a crowd followed at a
safe distance and gathered outside when he went into Doctor Hong Foy's
office. It was a kind of store on the ground floor, so Lew Wee says, with
shelves full of rich old Chinee medicines that had a certain powerful
presence of their own. But even in here Doctor Hong Foy should of known
beyond a doubt what his friend had brought him.
It seemed the doctor had to make sure. He wasn't of the same believing
nature as the street-car people, and the German and others. He wanted to
be shown. So they undone the sack and opened it down to where Doctor Hong
Foy could make sure. But their work was faulty and the wild animal didn't
like handling after its day of mistreatment. It had been made morbid, I
guess. Anyway, it displayed an extremely nervous tendency, and many
impetuous movements, and bit Doctor Hong Foy in the thumb. Then the first
owner tried to grab him and the pet wriggled away on to a tray of dried
eel gizzards, or something, and off that to the open door.
The little thing run into the front of the large crowd that had waited
outside and had a wonderful effect on it. Them in the centre tried to
melt away, but couldn't on account of them on the outside; so there was
fights and accidents, and different ones tromped on, and screams of fear.
And this brought a lot bigger crowd that pressed in and made the centre
ones more anguished. I don't know. That poor animal had been imposed on
all day and must of been overwrought. It was sore vexed by now and didn't
care who knew it. Lots of 'em did.
Of course Lew Wee dashed out after his property, hugging the sack to his
chest; and, of course, he created just as much disturbance as his little
pet had. Policemen was mingling with the violence by this time and adding
much to its spirit. One public-spirited citizen grabbed Lew Wee in spite
of its being distasteful; but he kicked the poor man on the kneecap and
made a way through the crowd without too much trouble.
He wasn't having any vogue whatever in that neighbourhood. He run down
a little side street, up an alley, and into a cellar he knew about, this
cellar being the way out of the Young China Progressive Association when
they was raided up the front stairs on account of gambling at poker.
He could hear the roar of the mob clear from there. It took about an hour
for this to die down. People would come to see what all the excitement
was about, and find out almost at once; then they'd try to get away,
and run against others coming to find out, thus producing a very earnest
riot. There was mounted policemen and patrol wagons and many arrests,
and an armed posse hunting for the escaped pet and shooting up alleys at
every little thing that moved. They never did find the pet--so one of Lew
Wee's cousins wrote him; which made him sorry on account of Doctor Hong
Foy and the twenty-five or mebbe thirty dollars.
He lay hid in this cellar till dark; then started out to find his friends
and get something to eat. He darned near started everything all over
again; but he dodged down another alley and managed to get some noodles
and chowmain at the back door of the Hong-Kong Grill, where a tong
brother worked. He begun to realize that he was a marked man. The mark
didn't show; but he was. He didn't know what the law might do to him.
It looked like at least twenty years in some penal institution, if not
hanging; and he didn't want either one.
So he borrowed three dollars from the tong brother and started for
some place where he could lead a quiet life. He managed to get to
Oakland, though the deck hands on the ferryboat talked about throwing
him overboard. But they let him live if he would stay at the back end
till everyone, including the deck hands, was safe off or behind something
when the boat landed. Then he wandered off into the night and found a
freight train. He didn't care where he went--just somewhere they wouldn't
know about his crime.
He rode a while between two freight cars; then left that train and found
a blind baggage on a passenger train that went faster and near froze him
to death. He got off, chilled in the early morning, at some little town
and bought some food in a Chinee restaurant and also got warm. But he
hadn't no more than got warm when he was put out of the place, right by
his own people.
It was warm outside by this time, so he didn't mind it so much. The town
did, though. It must of been a small town, but he says thousands of men
chased him out of it about as soon as he was warmed up enough to run. He
couldn't understand this, because how could they know he was the one that
caused all that trouble in San Francisco?
He got a freight train outside the town and rode on and on. He says
he rode on for weeks and weeks; but that's his imagination. It must of
been about three days, with spells of getting off for food and to get
warmed when he was freezing, and be chased by these wild hill tribes when
he had done the latter. It put a crimp into his sunny nature--all this
armed pursuit of him. He says if he had been a Christian, and believed
in only one God, he would never of come through alive, it taking about
seventy-four or five of his own gods to protect him from these maddened
savages. He had a continuous nightmare of harsh words and blows. He
wondered they didn't put him in jail; but it seemed like they only
wanted to keep him going.
Of course it had to end. He got to Spokane finally and sneaked round to
a friend that had a laundry; and this friend must of been a noble soul.
He took in the outcast and nursed him with food and drink, and repeatedly
washed his clothes. Wanting a ranch cook about that time, I got in touch
with him through another cousin, who said this man wanted very much to
go out into a safe country, and would never leave it because of
unpleasantness in getting here.
It was ten days after he got there that I saw him first, and I'll be
darned if he was any human sachet, even then. But after hearing his story
I knew that time would once more make him fit for human association.
He told me his story with much feeling this time and he told it to me
about once a week for three months after he got here--pieces of it at a
time. It used to cheer me a lot. He was always remembering something new.
He said he liked the great silence and peace of this spot.
You couldn't tell him to this day that his belief about the savage hill
tribes ain't sound. He believes anything "can happen" in that country
down there. Doctor Hong Foy never paid him the twenty-five, of course,
though admitting that he would of done so if the animal had not escaped,
because he was in such good condition, for a skunk, that he was worth
twenty-five dollars of any doctor's money. I don't know. As I say,
they're friendly little critters; but it's more money that I would
actually pay for one.
Through two closed doors the whine of the fiddle still penetrated.
Perhaps Lew Wee's recent loss had moved him to play later than was his
custom, pondering upon the curious whims that stir the gods when they
start to make things happen. But he was still no cynic. Over and over he
played the little air which means: "Life comes like a bird-song through
the open windows of the heart."
IX
THE TAKER-UP
On a tired evening, in front of the Arrowhead's open fire, I lived over
for the hundredth time a great moment. From the big pool under the falls
four miles up the creek I had landed the Big Trout. Others had failed in
years past; I, too, had failed more than once. But to-day!
At the hour of 9:46 A.M., to be exact, as one should in these matters, I
had cast three times above the known lair of this fish. Then I cast a
fourth time, more from habit than hope; and the fight was on. I put it
here with the grim brevity of a communique. Despite stout resistance, the
objective was gained at 9:55 A.M. And the Big Trout would weigh a good
two and one half--say three or three and one quarter--pounds. These are
the bare facts.
Verily it was a moment to live over; and to myself now I was more
discursive. I vanquished the giant trout again and again, altering
details of the contest at will--as when I waded into icy water to the
waist in a last moment of panic. My calm review disclosed that this had
been fanciful overcaution; but at the great crisis and for three minutes
afterward I had gloried in the wetting.