I WAS waiting at — Landing, on the Mississippi, for friends from the
East. The spring floods were subsiding. The low, level land on the
other side, with its rich vegetation exposed to the hot sun, sent up
sickly vapors, and each day brought some new cases of ague and fever.
Lofty bluffs, between which the town extended, shut away every breath
of air. At times the heat seemed like a furnace. Nevertheless, the
chills often drove me out to the sunny side of the hotel, where I would
stand shivering in my overcoat.
One morning I stood warming myself as usual. The street had few signs
of life, save that scores of hogs ran about grunting their love of
liberty, intent on plunder, which consisted mainly in running their
sharp noses into bags of flour that stood in tempting array at the
doors of the stores. The traders kept a long whip ready for the
porkers, but "practice makes perfect," and the hogs would often outwit
them.
An instance amused me. A shopkeeper, seeing the hogs coming, waited
tills they were within reach, then, springing out, he applied the
lash, and they ran squealing away. He saw them approach his neighbor's
flour. Assured that his own in the mean while was safe, he returned to
his counter. Scarcely was he there, however, when a long-legged boar
rushed back with the fleetness of a hound, and, by a dextrous blow of
his tusk, tore a bag from bottom to top, emptying the contents on the
ground. At once his companions rushed to the spot. The flour quickly
disappeared, and, as I was laughing at the scene, a deep voice at my
side said, "Wouldn't you like to take a walk, stranger?"
The speaker was a tall, powerfully built man, of about thirty. His
sallow, sunken cheeks and wasted limbs, marked him a recent victim of
fever. Nature had given him a manly, open countenance; but over it
there rested a reckless, fierce expression. His abrupt address was not
unpleasant to me; it was in keeping with Western frankness; but there
was a something, illy defined in his looks, that made me suspect an
evil design.
"I came down from St. Paul in the boat this morning," he continued,
"and it's dull enough here. Up the river a mile or so there is a
scythe-snath factory; I want to see it myself. You seem to be alone.
What say you to going, too?"
It was a wild, lonely path, but I was in the mood for a change from the
present monotony, and felt also a desire, after a moment's thought,
to study my new acquaintance, and assented. My companion proved to
be a person of varied information. He had evidently seen much of the
world, and I became interested in him; yet could not help watching
him suspiciously. Why did he leave the bar-room and select me as the
companion of his walk? Why did he wish to walk at all,—he so feeble
and weary-looking? And then there was an occasional glare of the
eye, and it seemed to me a look of desperation. This mingling of the
winning and the repulsive in the man kept my faculties observingly
alert. Instinctively, however, I assumed a careless demeanor. He was
not artful enough to be a villain by profession, and that was clear,
yet, before the walk was half completed, I could not divest myself of a
sense of personal danger.
"Come," said he, after inspecting the manufactory, "the bluffs shade
the way, let's keep on up the river a piece?"
He was disappointed at my declining. On our return, he spoke often
of the pleasures of foot journeys, and at length stated that he was
to leave next morning for D—, a town some twenty miles distant; said
he intended walking there, and pressed me to join him, as my course
homeward lay in that direction. This, also, I declined.
That evening, as I was going out to a religious meeting, a second
stranger accosted me,—"Are you a clergyman, sir?"
On receiving an affirmative answer, he said, "I hope you will pardon
the liberty I take. I am Mr. N., of New York. I am here looking
up land; have made some good investments, and wish to look around
a little more. I have some money with me, and am really afraid of
being robbed. You are the only guest at this house that has a room
to himself. Would you not, as a great favor, permit me to share your
room with you to-night? Last night I lodged with eight of the roughest
customers I ever saw. I slept but little; but once I was startled from
a doze, and looking up, saw a big whiskered fellow fumbling about my
clothes. He protested it was by mistake, but I don't believe it; and,"
said he, his voice sinking to a whisper, "there's the very chap, as I
live!" pointing to my morning acquaintance, who was just entering the
bar-room. "A desperado, no doubt," he continued, much agitated.
On inquiring, I found Mr. N. was a wealthy merchant from New York—a
speculator in land. The host at length reluctantly consented that Mr.
N. should room with me.
The speculator, on entering my apartment, examined the lock to the door
and added another fastening. He then seemed to breathe freely. His joy
at the change was almost childish. Depositing his valuables at the foot
of 'my' bed, as if he thought somehow they would be safer there, he
soon fell into a peaceful sleep, from which he awoke in the morning, to
renew his protestations of gratitude at what he deemed his escape from
threatening peril.
"But," said I, "I am a stranger to you; how is it that you felt so safe
with me?"
He replied, "I heard you asking for a meeting. I inferred that you were
a religious man. From your appearance, I judged you to be a minister."
"But I meet many who sneer at Christians and Christian ministers."
"Sir!" he answered, with emphasis, "it's my business to FIND OUT WHO TO
TRUST. Let infidels say what they will, the stoutest of them, if they
had been in my place, would gladly have found refuge with a religious
man."
Late in the forenoon, hearing loud voices in the bar-room, I glanced
in. The altercation was between the landlord and the man with whom I
had walked the morning previous.
"I will not pay so much. Give me back that dollar. It's every cent I've
got. I was sick at St. Paul, and have spent every cent I had. I can't
get work. I'm so weak nobody will hire me. Give me back the money, I
say."
"I'll show you what I'll give you!" said the landlord, with a dreadful
oath, "if you are not off mighty quick."
"But," said the other, in pleading tones, "I'm sick, I'm poor, I'm
hungry—'hungry as a dog!' Have I eaten a crumb at your table? I've
slept in your bed only one night,—last night I lay on the floor here,
that you know. And what am I to do if you take the last penny from me?"
The scene moved me deeply. It confirmed me in the opinion I had formed,
that the stranger was in some extremity Of trouble, and was not yet a
villain. So stepped into the bar-room. On seeing me, the landlord threw
a quarter on the counter, and said,—
"There, take that, then, and be off!" The man took the silver, went
out, and sat down on the tavern steps. An hour later, and he came to
me, and said,—
"I am going to D— now. Won't you go with me? I was going yesterday, but
have waited for you."
Avoiding a direct reply, I started with him, and when the confines
of the settlement were reached, while yet in sight of inhabitants, I
turned, saying,—
"I must leave you now."
"What!" he exclaimed, fiercely; "you going back?"
"Certainly. Why should I go all the way to D— afoot? Besides, I fear
the fatigue of such a walk would be a poor preparation for preaching
next Sabbath."
His whole demeanor changed.
"Are you a preacher, then?" he ejaculated. "I thought you were a
speculator!" and sinking down by the roadside, he looked the picture of
wretchedness.
"Friend," said I, "you seem to be in trouble; can I help you?"
"Trouble!" he replied, bitterly, "it's all trouble."