The first-class carriage was empty. I threw my coat into a corner
and settled myself in the seat opposite. Just as the train started to
move, the door was flung open and a tall lean body hurled itself
into the compartment and dropped on my coat. He was followed
instantaneously by a leather bag which crashed on to the floor.
"Say, these cars pull out pretty slick."
My intelligence at once conjectured that this was an American, one of
the thousands who have lately taken advantage of the exchange to spy
out the nakedness of our land.
I must admit that I understand American only with great difficulty. I
try to guess the meaning of each sentence from the unimportant words
which I can interpret. I surmised somehow that his speech referred to
the bag on the floor.
So I answered, civilly enough, "I hope your bag is undamaged. Excuse
me, I will relieve you of my coat." So saying, I pulled it from
beneath him and with a single movement flung it on the rack over my
own head.
The stranger spoke again after some moments. He appeared to have spent
the interval in repeating my words to himself, as though to grasp
their meaning. Yet, heaven knows, I speak plainly enough.
This time he said, "Guess my grip's O.K. But I ain't plunkin' my bucks
on the guy that says the old country's in the sweet and peaceful."
After this most extraordinary and unintelligible communication he
began to feel his pockets and his person all over, as though searching
for something. I felt myself at liberty to resume my study of _The
Spectator_.
However, I was not to be left alone. Again he addressed me. "Guess I
gotta hand it to you."
"I beg your pardon," I observed, lowering my paper.
"You've got 'em all whipped blocks," he went on, his absurd smile
still persisting. "You're a cracker jack, you're a smart aleck. You've
done to me what the fire did to the furnishing shack. You've dealt me
one in the spaghetti joint. Oh, I gotta hand it to you."
I could understand little of the words, but I gathered from his manner
that he was congratulating me on something in the extravagant but
interesting fashion of the North-American tribes.
"You sure put the monkey-wrench on me," he continued. "You make me
feel like I couldn't operate a pea-nut stand. I'm the rube from the
back-blocks, sure thing. I ain't going to holler any--not me. I'm real
pleased to get acquainted. Shake."
I took his hand with as little self-consciousness as possible, not
yet having been able to understand what praiseworthy act I had
accomplished. I must admit none the less that I felt vaguely pleased
at his encomiums.
"There was a guy way back in Nevada used to have a style like yours.
They called him Happy Cloud Sim, and he had a hand like a ham.
See that grip? Well, Sir, Sim 'ud come right in here, lay his hand
somewheres about, and that grip 'ud vanish into the sweet eternal. You
could search the hull of the cars from caboose to fire-box and nary
a grip. He was an artist. Poor Sim, he overreached himself in Albany,
trying to attach a cash-register. The blame thing started ringing a
bell and shedding tickets all along the sidewalk. The sleuths just
paper-chased him through the burg. He was easy meat for the calaboose
that Fall."
I was at a loss to understand the relevance of this extremely
improbable narrative. It did not appear, on the face of it,
complimentary to connect me with a declared thief and gaol-bird. Still
it was my duty to be courteous to one who was for the time a national
guest.
"A most interesting story," I remarked, "and one which has the further
advantage of conveying a moral lesson."
"But you got Sim beat ten blocks," he resumed. "The way you threw your
top-coat up made Sim look like a last year's made-over. I never set
eyes on a dry-goods clerk as could fix a package slicker. I'll have a
lil something to tell the home town."
He looked out of the window. "Guess this is Harrow," he remarked, "and
we're pulling into the deepo. I may as well have my wad back."
So saying he put his hand into the folds of the coat over my head and
withdrew a roll of notes fastened with a rubber band. This roll he
then stuffed into his hip-pocket. I began to see the meaning of his
insinuations.
"If you think," said I indignantly, "that I saw you drop your notes
and deliberately rolled them up in the coat----"
"Nix on that stuff," he retorted jovially. "I know them dollar-bills;
they kinder skin theirselves off the wad and when you come to pay the
bartender they've hit the trail and you stand lonesome with a bitter
taste in your mouth, like LOT's wife."
The train stopped; the man stepped out with the unnecessary haste of
his kind.
"Well, I'm pleased to have met you," he concluded, still smiling
amiably through the window; "if ever you strike Rapid City, Wis.,
you'll find me rustling wood somewheres near the saloon. I'd like to
have got better acquainted, but I promised the folks I'd stop off here
and get wise as to how boys is raised in your country. They sure grow
up fine men. I reckon we 're way behind the times in Rapid City----"
The train passed out leaving me speechless with indignation.
It took me some moments to recover my normal balance. Then I confess
I was delighted to notice that the fellow, in his enthusiasm over the
alleged lightness of my fingers, had left his precious "grip" behind
him.
It travelled with me to my destination. I hope it is still travelling.
* * * * *
[Illustration: MORE HASTE, LESS MEAT.
_The Calf_ (_to the Butcher of the Exchequer_). "OH, SIR, IT SEEMS
SUCH A PITY TO KILL ME. YOU'D GET SO MUCH MORE OFF ME LATER ON."]
* * * * *
[Illustration: WHEN EXPERTS DIFFER.
_Junior Partner_ (_in syndicate whose operations on the 2.30 race--six
furlongs--have gone wrong_). "THERE--DIDN'T I TELL YER DIAMOND'S PRIDE
WAS A FIVE-FURLONG 'ORSE?"]
* * * * *