Jan Pier, the little Frenchman, who came here several months ago from
Norfolk, is going back to the Atlantic coast, where he can hear the roar
of the mighty waters as they break upon the American shores, and see the
ships as they come and go.
One morning, about ninety days ago, as I approached the square, on East
Trade, I beheld a shock-headed boy, bowing low shining a shoe. Beneath
the auburn locks shone the skin of an Anglo-Saxon.
“A white shoe-shine?” said I to Chris Karnazes, the fruit dealer, at the
Central Hotel corner.
“Yes,” answered Chris, joyfully and proudly.
“Me brought him to work here.”
“What is his name?”
“Jan.”
It was a beautiful Sunday--fair, cool and bracing, and everybody save
Jan Pier and two colored associates had on their holiday clothes. Chris
wore a clean shirt, white collar and red tie. It was his day off, but
Jan, the newcomer, the boy of seventeen, with thick brown hair, and big
brownish eyes, bent to his labors, side by side with negro lads, in
tattered togs. Not a word did the Frenchman utter, nor a time lift his
face, but slaved on and on, hour after hour, polishing shoes, and taking
in nickels.
“Have a shine,” said Chris to me.
I mounted the stand. Jan Pier, without looking up, ran his rag across my
shoe.
“Where are you from, young fellow?” I asked.
No answer; not even a grunt.
“Where, boy, is your home?”
Chris spoke to him in Greek.
“France,” said Jan, looking up into my eyes.
“Where did he come from, Chris?”
“Norfolk.”
That was the first time I saw Jan Pier.
A Frenchman--an auburn-haired Frenchman--with bright eyes, working for a
Greek and with an Afro-American shoeblack!
How could it be?
A week later, Jan Pier, with downcast look, soiled clothes, and
tear-stained cheeks, came to me, silently begging.
“What is the matter?” I asked.
“Me no work; no mon; no friends.”
I pitied Jan, but what could I do. The next day the Greek at the corner
gave him work. I asked a negro boy why Jan left Chris, and he answered:
“Jan knock down, Chris say.”
I had Jan shine my shoes every time they needed it. I wrote a story about
him, and advertised his business, hoping that it might prosper. But
Jan flourished not. Once more he loafed the streets penniless, hungry,
friendless, and far, far from home and loved ones.
“Jan, where did you come from?”
“Norfolk.”
“Before that?”
“Greece.”
“Before that, even?”
“France.”
“When did you leave France?”
“I was twelve years old.”
“Did you run away?”
“Yes.”
“Where did you go?”
“To Turkey.”
“How did you get to this country?”
“On a big ship.”
“Were you a stowaway?”
“I helped the seamen.”
That is the story of Jan Pier. He ran away from home, when a small boy,
went to Turkey, learned Greek, and four years later shipped for America,
and landed at Norfolk. In the course of a short time he drifted to
Charlotte, where he has been very unhappy, nobody to talk with, no kind
friend to help him, and no wise hand to guide him. His energy, courage,
and stout heart and body have kept him going. But, now, alas, he is tired
of the struggle among strangers, who do not understand his language, and
will go back to Norfolk, and, perhaps, home. A generous-hearted Greek,
of one of the Greek restaurants, is getting up a purse to defray his
railroad fare to the Virginia city.
Soon the little outcast will say “adieu.”
When Jan came to me the second time, with the woe-begone look, I took
him to Buster Brown, the mailing clerk, and recommended him for a
newsboy. Buster ran his cruel eye over him and asked, in Pilot Mountain
vernacular: “Have you ever harpooned the public in any way?”
“A coup sur,” said Jan.
“What’s that you’ve handed me?” asked Buster.
“‘Surely,’ he means,” said I.
“What is he?”
“French.”
“Will you accept me as a friend?” asked Buster, proud to have a real
Frenchman for an employé.
“A bras ouverts,” was the reply.
“Come again,” said the Pilot Mountain man.
“He says ‘with open arms’ he will be your friend.”
“Good, I gad.”
“Coute qu’il coute,” declared Jan, smiling.
“The devil abit,” said Dick Allen, who had just come up, “and what is it
he says?”
“He has sworn to be Buster’s friend ‘Let it cost what it may.’”
“A beau jeu, beau retour (one good turn deserves another).”
Buster and Jan, the one six-feet-five, erect, weighing 260, and the
other, four-feet-one, stocky, and stooped, ambled off toward the press
room.
“That pile of old papers, under the table, will be your bed, Monsieur
Jan Pier,” said Buster. “Your drawing room and all. The spigot will be
your wash basin, and any old issue of _The Observer_ or _Chronicle_, your
towel. May you prosper.”
Jan Pier stirred the enmity of the native newsboys, some of whom hammered
him the next morning when out of sight of the shop force. Although
dejected and sad, the Frenchman sold every paper he took out. Offering
one to a traveling man, who was climbing in a hack at the Selwyn, he
imagined that his offer had been accepted, and ran to the station, four
blocks away, keeping close in the wake of the hustling horse. Seeing what
the boy had done the salesman said: “I will take two.” Jan was delighted.
Unable to talk and tell his troubles, surrounded by hostile youngsters,
and contending with prospective customers made life one long, desperate
fight for the Frenchman. The climax came one night, when he slumbered
in his corner beneath the table in the press room, and a loafer, a town
lad, slept above him. Somebody, on mischief bent, turned the hose on the
shaver on the top berth, and the water poured down on Jan.
That was the straw that broke the camel’s back--the fighting word had
passed, and the pent-up dander of the bushy red head was at last aroused.
As the intruding chap fell off of his perch Jan nailed him, believing
that he had wet him, and such a fight as was never witnessed in _The
Observer_ building before followed.
Round and round the diminutive pugilists went until Jan showed signs of
the savage, and onlookers interfered to prevent murder. The devil in Jan
was in tumult and he fought like a Spartan.
After that the boys--the paper sellers--left Jan alone.
Now, Jan is going to leave us. His friends will chip in and help him on
the way.
He will be missed in circles where his auburn hair has become familiar.
Jan, industrious, capable, and good-natured, but unfamiliar with the ways
of this country, deserves credit for being as good as he is.
Some day Jan Pier may wander back again.