Moved by mutual impulse, Hiram and the Cap'n plodded through the
deserted tavern, up-stairs and down-stairs. When they went into the
kitchen the two hired girls were dragging their trunks to the door,
and scornfully resisted all appeals to remain. They said it was a
nasty rum-hole, and that they had reputations to preserve just as
well as some folks who thought they were better because they had money.
Fine hand of the W.T.W.'s shown thus early in the game of
tavern-keeping! There were even dirty dishes in the sink, so
precipitate was the departure.
In the stable, the hostler, a one-eyed servitor, with the piping
voice, wobbly gait, and shrunken features of the "white drunkard,"
was in his usual sociable state of intoxication, and declared that
he would stick by them. He testified slobberingly as to his devotion
to Mr. Parrott, declared that when the women descended Mr. Parrott
confided to him the delicate task of "hiding the stuff," and that
he had managed to conceal quite a lot of it.
"Well, dig it up and throw it away," directed Hiram.
"Oh, only a fool in the business buries rum," confided the hostler.
"I've been in the rum business, and I know. They allus hunts haymows
and sullers. But I know how to hide it. I'm shrewd about them things."
"We don't want no rum around here," declared the showman with
positiveness.
The hostler winked his one eye at him, and, having had a rogue's long
experience in roguery, plainly showed that he believed a command of
this sort to be merely for the purpose of publication and not an
evidence of good faith.
"And there won't be much rum left round here if we only let him alone,"
muttered Hiram as he and the Cap'n walked back to the house. "I only
wisht them hired girls had as good an attraction for stayin' as he's
got."
"Look here, Hiram," said the Cap'n, stopping him on the porch, "it's
all right to make loud talk to them Double-yer T. Double-yers, but
there ain't any sense in makin' it to each other. You and me can't
run this tavern no more'n hen-hawks can run a revival. Them wimmen--"
"You goin' to let them wimmen cackle for the next two years, and pass
it down to their grandchildren how they done us out of all the money
we put in here--two able-bodied business men like we be? A watch ain't
no good only so long's it's runnin', and a tavern ain't, either. We've
got to run this till we can sell it, wimmen or no wimmen--and you
hadn't ought to be a quitter with thutty-five hunderd in it."
But there was very little enthusiasm or determination in the Cap'n's
face. The sullenness deepened there when he saw a vehicle turn in
at the tavern yard. It was a red van on runners, and on its side was
inscribed:
T. BRACKETT,
TINWARE AND YANKEE NOTIONS.
He was that round-faced, jovial little man who was known far and wide
among the housewives of the section as "Balm o' Joy Brackett," on
account of a certain liniment that he compounded and dispensed as
a side-line. With the possible exception of one Marengo Todd,
horse-jockey and also far-removed cousin of Mrs. Sproul, there was
no one in her circle of cousins that the Cap'n hated any more
cordially than Todd Ward Brackett. Mr. Brackett, by cheerfully
hailing the Cap'n as "Cousin Aaron" at every opportunity, had
regularly added to the latter's vehemence of dislike.
The little man nodded cheery greeting to the showman, cried his usual
"Hullo, Cousin Aaron!" to the surly skipper, bobbed off his van, and
proceeded to unharness.
"Well," sighed Hiram, resignedly, "guest Number One for supper,
lodgin', and breakfast--nine shillin's and hossbait extry. 'Ev'ry
little helps,' as old Bragg said when he swallowed the hoss-fly."
"There ain't any Todd Ward Brackett goin' to stop in _my_ tavern,"
announced the Cap'n with decision. Mr. Brackett overheard and
whirled to stare at them with mild amazement. "That's what I said,"
insisted Cap'n Sproul, returning the stare. "Ferd Parrott ain't
runnin' this tavern any longer. We're runnin' it, and you nor none
of your stripe can stop here." He reflected with sudden comfort that
there was at least one advantage in owning a hotel. It gave a man
a chance at his foes.
"You're _runnin'_ it, be you?" inquired Mr. Brackett, raising his
voice and glancing toward Broadway's store platform where loafers
were listening.
"That's what we be," shouted the Cap'n.
"Well, I'm glad to hear that you're really _runnin'_ it--and that
it ain't closed," said Mr. Brackett, "'cause I'm applyin' here to
a public house to be put up, and if you turn me away, havin' plenty
of room and your sign up, by ginger, I'll sue you under the statute
and law made and pervided. I ain't drunk nor disorderly, and I've
got money to pay--and I'll have the law on ye if ye don't let me in."
Mention of the law always had terrifying effect on Cap'n Sproul. He
feared its menace and its intricacies. It was his nightmare that law
had long been lying in wait on shore for him, and that once the
land-sharks got him in their grip they would never let go until he
was sucked dry.
"I've got witnesses who heard," declared Mr. Brackett, waggling
mittened hand at the group on the platform. "Now you look out for
yourself!"
He finished unharnessing his horse and led the animal toward the barn,
carolling his everlasting lay about "Old Hip Huff, who went by
freight to Newry Corner, in this State."
"There's just this much about it, Cap," Hiram hastened to say; "me
'n' you have got to run the shebang till we can unlo'd it. We can't
turn away custom and kill the thing dead. I'll 'tend the office, make
the beds, and keep the fires goin'. You--you--" He gazed at the Cap'n,
faltering in his speech and fingering his nose apprehensively.
"Well, me what?" snapped the ex-master of the _Jefferson P. Benn_.
But his sparkling eyes showed that he realized what was coming.
"You've allus been braggin'," gulped Hiram, "what a dabster you was
at cookin', havin' been to sea and--"
"Me--_me?_" demanded the Cap'n, slugging his own breast ferociously.
"Me put on an ap'un, and go out there, and kitchen-wallop for that
jimbedoggified junacker of a tin-peddler? I'll burn this old shack
down first, I will, by the--"
But Hiram entered fervent and expostulatory appeal.
"If you don't, we're sendin' that talkin'-machine on legs off to sue
and get damages, and report this tavern from Clew to Hackenny, and
spoil our chances for a customer, and knock us out generally."
He put his arm about the indignant Cap'n and drew him in where the
loafers couldn't listen, and continued his anxious coaxings until
at last Cap'n Sproul kicked and stamped his way into the kitchen,
cursing so horribly that the cat fled. He got a little initial
satisfaction by throwing after her the dirty dishes in the sink,
listening to their crashing with supreme satisfaction. Then he
proceeded to get supper.
It had been a long time since he had indulged his natural taste for
cookery. In a half-hour he had forgotten his anger and was revelling
in the domain of pots and pans. He felt a sudden appetite of his own
for the good, old-fashioned plum-duff of shipboard days, and started
one going. Then gingercake--his own kind--came to his memory. He
stirred up some of that. He sent Hiram on a dozen errands to the
grocery, and Hiram ran delightedly.
"I'll show you whether I can cook or not," was the Cap'n's proud boast
to the showman when the latter bustled eagerly in from one of his
trips. He held out a smoking doughnut on a fork. "There ain't one
woman in ten can fry 'em without 'em soakin' fat till they're as heavy
as a sinker."
Hiram gobbled to the last mouthful, expressing his admiration as he
ate, and the Cap'n glowed under the praise.
His especial moment of triumph came when his wife and Mrs. Look,
adventuring to seek their truant husbands, sat for a little while
in the tavern kitchen and ate a doughnut, and added their astonished
indorsement. In the flush of his masterfulness he would not permit
them to lay finger on dish, pot, or pan.
Hiram served as waiter to the lonely guest in the dining-room, and
was the bearer of several messages of commendation that seemed to
anger the Cap'n as much as other praise gratified him.
"Me standin' here cookin' for that sculpin!" he kept growling.
However, he ladled out an especially generous portion of
plum-duff--the climax of his culinary art--and to his wrathful
astonishment Hiram brought it back untasted.
"Mebbe it's all right," he said, apologetically, "but he was filled
full, and he said it was a new dish to him and didn't look very good,
and--"
The Cap'n grabbed the disparaged plum-duff with an oath and started
for the dining-room.
"Hold on!" Hiram expostulated; "you've got to remember that he's a
guest, Cap. He's--"
"He's goin' to eat what I give him, after I've been to all the
trouble," roared the old skipper.
Mr. Brackett was before the fire in the office, hiccuping with
repletion and stuffing tobacco into the bowl of his clay pipe.
"Anything the matter with that duff?" demanded the irate cook,
pushing the dish under Mr. Brackett's retreating nose. "Think I don't
know how to make plum-duff--me that's sailed the sea for thutty-five
years?"
"Never made no such remarks on your cookin'," declared the guest,
clearing his husky throat in which the food seemed to be sticking.
"Hain't got no fault to find with that plum-duff?"
"Not a mite," agreed Mr. Brackett, heartily.
"Then you come back out here to the table and eat it. You ain't goin'
to slander none of my vittles that I've took as much trouble with
as I have with this."
"But I'm full up--chock!" pleaded Mr. Brackett. "I wisht I'd have
saved room. I reckon it's good. But I ain't carin' for it."
"You'll come out and eat that duff if I have to stuff it down your
thro't with the butt of your hoss-whip," said the Cap'n with an
iciness that was terrifying. He grabbed the little man by the collar
and dragged him toward the dining-room, balancing the dish in the
other hand.
"I'll bust," wailed Mr. Brackett.
"Well, that bump will make a little room," remarked Cap'n Sproul,
jouncing him down into a chair.
He planted one broad hand on the table and the other on his hip, and
stood over the guest until the last crumb of the duff was gone,
although Mr. Brackett clucked hiccups like an overfed hen. The Cap'n
felt some of his choler evaporate, indulging in this sweet act of
tyranny.
Resentment came slowly into the jovial nature of meek Todd Ward
Brackett. But as he pushed away from the table he found courage to
bend baleful gaze on his over-hospitable host.
"I've put up at a good many taverns in my life," he said, "and I'm
allus willin' to eat my fair share of vittles, but I reckon I've got
the right to say how much!"
"If you're done eatin'," snapped the Cap'n, "get along out, and don't
stay round in the way of the help." And Mr. Brackett retired, growling
over this astonishing new insult.
He surveyed the suspended alligator gloomily, as he stuffed tobacco
into his pipe.
"Better shet them jaws," he advised, "or now that he's crazy on the
plum-duff question he'll be jamming the rest of that stuff into you."
"You can't say outside that the table ain't all right or that folks
go away hungry under the new management," remarked Hiram,
endeavoring to palliate.
"New management goin' to inorg'rate the plum-duffin' idee as a
reg'lar system?" inquired Mr. Brackett, sullenly. "If it is, I'll
stay over to-morrow and see you operate on the new elder that's goin'
to supply the pulpit Sunday--pervidin' he stays here."
Hiram blinked his eyes inquiringly. "New elder?" he repeated.
"Get a few elders to put up here," suggested Mr. Brackett, venomously,
"and new management might take a little cuss off'm the reppytation
of this tavern." And the guest fell to smoking and muttering.
Even as wisdom sometimes falls from the mouths of babes, so do good
ideas occasionally spring from careless sarcasm.
After Mr. Brackett had retired Hiram discussed the matter of the
impending elder with Cap'n Sproul, the Cap'n not warming to the
proposition.
"But I tell you if we can get that elder here," insisted Hiram, "and
explain it to him and get him to stay, he's goin' to look at it in
the right light, if he's got any Christian charity in him. We'll
entertain him free, do the right thing by him, tell him the case from
A to Z, and get him to handle them infernal wimmen. Only an elder
can do it. If we don't he may preach a sermon against us. That'll
kill our business proposition deader'n it is now. If he stays it will
give a tone to the new management, and he can straighten the thing
out for us."
Not only did Cap'n Sproul fail to become enthusiastic, but he was
so distinctly discouraging that Hiram forbore to argue, feeling his
own optimistic resolution weaken under this depressing flow of cold
water.
He did not broach the matter the next morning. He left the Cap'n
absorbed and busy in his domain of pots, set his jaws, took his own
horse and pung, and started betimes for the railroad-station two
miles away. On the way he overtook and passed, with fine contempt
for their podgy horse, a delegation from the W.T.W.'s.
On the station platform they frowned upon him, and he scowled at them.
He realized that his only chance in this desperate venture lay in
getting at the elder first, and frisking him away before the women
had opportunity to open their mouths. A word from them might check
operations. And then, with the capture once made, if he could speed
his horse fast enough to allow him an uninterrupted quarter of an
hour at the tavern with the minister, he decided that only complete
paralysis of the tongue could spoil his plan.
Hiram, with his superior bulk and his desperate eagerness, had the
advantage of the women at the car-steps. He crowded close. It was
the white-lawn tie on the first passenger who descended that did the
business for Hiram. In his mind white-lawn ties and clergymen were
too intimately associated to admit of error. He yanked away the
little man's valise, grabbed his arm, and rushed him across the
platform and into the pung's rear seat. And the instant he had scooped
the reins from the dasher he flung himself into the front seat and
was away up the road, larruping his horse and ducking the snow-cakes
that hurtled from the animal's hoofs.
"Look here! I--I--" gasped the little man, prodding him behind.
"It's all right, elder!" bellowed Hiram. "You wait till we get there
and it will be made all right. Set clus' and hold on, that's all now!"
"But, look here, I want to go to Smyrna tavern!"
"Good for you!" Hiram cried. "Set clus' and you'll get there!" It
seemed, after all, that ill repute had not spread far. His spirits
rose, and he whipped on at even better speed.
"If this isn't life or death," pleaded the little man, "you needn't
hurry so." Several "thank-you-marms" had nearly bounced him out.
"Set clus'," advised the driver, and the little man endeavored to
obey the admonition, clinging in the middle of the broad seat.
Hiram did not check speed even on the slope of the hill leading into
the village, though the little man again lifted voice of fear and
protest. So tempestuous was the rush of the pung that the loafers
in Broadway's store hustled out to watch. And they saw the runners
strike the slush-submerged plank-walk leading across the square,
beheld the end of the pung flip, saw the little man rise high above
the seat with a fur robe in his arms and alight with a yell of mortal
fright in the mushy highway, rolling over and over behind the
vehicle.
Helping hands of those running from the store platform picked him
up, and brought his hat, and stroked the slush out of his eyes so
that he could see Hiram Look sweeping back to recover his passenger.
"You devilish, infernal jayhawk of a lunatic!" squealed the little
man. "Didn't I warn you not to drive so fast?"
Hiram's jaw dropped at the first blast of that irreligious outbreak.
But the white-lawn tie reassured him. There was no time for argument.
Before those loafers was no fit place. He grabbed up the little man,
poked him into the pung, held him in with one hand and with the other
drove furiously to the tavern porch. With equal celerity he hustled
him into the office.
"You ain't in any condition to talk business jest now till you're
slicked off a little, elder," he began in tones of abject apology.
"You bet your jeeroosly life I'm not!" cried the little man in a
perfect frenzy of fury.
Again Hiram opened his mouth agitatedly, and his eyebrows wrinkled
in pained surprise. Yet once more his eyes sought the white tie and
his hand reached for the little man's arm, and, feeling at a loss
just then for language of explanation, he hurried him up-stairs and
into a room whose drawn curtains masked some of its untidiness.
"You wash up, elder," he counselled. "I won't let anybody disturb
you, and then whatever needs to be explained will be all explained.
Don't you blame me till you know it all." And he backed out and shut
the door.
He faced the Cap'n at the foot of the stairs. The Cap'n had been
watching intently the ascent of the two, and had gathered from the
little man's scuffles and his language that he was not a particularly
enthusiastic guest.
"They come hard, but we must have 'em, hey?" he demanded, grimly.
"This is worse than shanghaiing for a Liverpool boardin'-house, and
I won't--"
"S-s-s-sh!" hissed Hiram, flapping his hand. "That's the elder."
"An elder? A man that uses that kind of language?"
"He's had good reason for it," returned Hiram, fervently. "It's stout
talk, but I ain't blamin' him." He locked the outside door. "Them
Double-yer T. Double-yers will be flockin' this way in a few
minutes," he said, in explanation, "but they'll have to walk acrost
me in addition to the doormat to get him before I've had my say."
But even while he was holding the unconvinced Cap'n by the arm and
eagerly going over his arguments, once more they heard the treading
of many feet in the office. There were the W.T.W.'s in force, and
they had with them a tall, gaunt man; and the presence of Mrs. Look
and Mrs. Sproul, flushed but determined, indicated that the citadel
had been betrayed from the rear.
"I present to you Reverend T. Thayer, gents," said the president,
icily, "and seein' that he is field-secretary of the enforcement
league, and knows his duty when he sees it clear, he will talk to
you for your own good, and if it don't do you good, I warn you that
there will be something said from the pulpit to-morrow that will
bring down the guilty in high places."
"The elder!" gasped Hiram, whirling to gaze aghast at the Cap'n. Then
he turned desperate eyes up at the ceiling, where creaking footsteps
sounded. "Who in the name o' Jezebel--" he muttered.
Above there was a sort of spluttering bark of a human voice, and the
next moment there was a sound as of some one running about wildly.
Then down the stairs came the guest, clattering, slipping, and
falling the last few steps as he clung to the rail. His eyes were
shut tight, his face was dripping, and he was plaintively bleating
over and over: "I'm poisoned! I'm blind!"
Hiram ran to him and picked him up from where he had fallen. His coat
and vest were off, and his suspenders trailed behind him. One sniff
at his frowsled hair told Hiram the story. The little man's topknot
was soppy with whiskey; his face was running with it; his eyes were
full of it. And the next moment the doubtful aroma had spread to the
nostrils of all. And the one-eyed hostler and liquor depository,
standing on the outskirts of the throng that he had solicitously
followed in, slapped palm against thigh and cried: "By Peter, that's
the gallon I poured in the water-pitcher and forgot where I left it!"
"Didn't I tell you and command you and order you to throw away all
the liquor round this place, you one-eyed sandpipe?" demanded Hiram,
furiously.
"There was a lot of hidin' done in a hurry when they come down on
Ferd," pleaded the hostler, "and I forgot where I hid that gallon!"
The little man had his smarting eyes open. "Whiskey?" he mumbled,
dragging his hand over his hair and sniffing at his fingers.
"You heard what that renegade owned up to," shouted Hiram, facing
the women. "I gave him his orders. I give him his orders now. You
jest appoint your delegation, wimmen! Don't you hold me to blame for
rum bein' here. You foller that man! And if he don't show you where
every drop is hid and give it into your hands to spill, I'll--I'll--"
He paused for a threat, cast his eyes about him, and tore down the
alligator from the ceiling, seized it by the stiff tail and poised
it like a cudgel. "I'll meller him within an inch of his life."
"That sounds fair and reasonable, ladies," said the clergyman,
"though, of course, we don't want any violence."
"I'm always fair and reasonable," protested Hiram, "when folks come
at me in a fair and reasonable way. You talk to them wimmen, elder,
about bein' fair and reasonable themselves, and then lead 'em back
here, and you'll find me ready to pull with 'em for the good of this
place, without tryin' to run cross-legged or turn a yoke or twist
the hames."
When the reformers had departed on the heels of the cowed hostler,
Hiram surveyed with interest the little man who was left alone with
them.
"I--I--reckon I've got a little business to talk over with you,"
faltered the old showman, surveying him ruefully. The little man took
a parting sniff at his finger-tips.
"You think, do you, that you've got over being driven up and that
now you can stop flying and perch a few minutes?" inquired the little
man with biting irony.
"I'll 'tend to your case now jest as close as I can," returned Hiram,
meekly.
"Well," proceeded the little man, after boring Hiram and then the
Cap'n for a time with steely eyes, "I happened to run across one
Ferdinand Parrott on the train, and he seemed to have what I've been
looking for, a property that I can convert into a sanitarium. My name
is Professor Diamond, and I am the inventor of the Telauto--"
But Hiram's curiosity did not extend to the professor's science.
"The idee is," he broke in, eagerly, "did Ferd Parrott say anything
about a morgidge and bill of sale bein' on this property, and be you
prepared to clear off encumbrances?"
"I am," declared the professor promptly.
"Then you take it," snapped Hiram, with comprehensive sweep of his
big hand. He kicked the alligator into the fireplace, took down his
overcoat and shrugged his shoulders into it. "Get your money counted
and come 'round to town office for your papers."
While he was buttoning it the Reverend Thayer returned, leading the
ladies of the Women's Temperance Workers, Miss Philamese Nile at his
side. But Hiram checked her first words.
"You talk to him after this," he said, with a chuck of his thumb over
his shoulder toward the professor. "Speakin' for Cap'n Aaron Sproul
and myself, I take the liberty to here state that we are now biddin'
farewell to the tavern business in one grand tableau to slow music,
lights turned low and the audience risin' and singin' 'Home, Sweet
Home'." He strode out by the front way, followed by Mrs. Look.
"Had you just as soon come through the kitchen with me?" asked the
Cap'n in a whisper as he approached his wife. "I'm goin' to do up
what's left of that plum-duff and take it home. It kind o' hits my
tooth!"