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[Stones] Semanticate italics and play, fixup endnotes
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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xmlns:epub="http://www.idpf.org/2007/ops" epub:prefix="z3998: http://www.daisy.org/z3998/2012/vocab/structure/, se: https://standardebooks.org/vocab/1.0" xml:lang="en-US">
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<head>
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<title>A Dinner At ⸻[3]</title>
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<title>A Dinner At ⸻</title>
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<link href="../css/core.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"/>
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<link href="../css/local.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"/>
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</head>
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<body epub:type="bodymatter z3998:fiction">
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<section id="a-dinner-at-3" epub:type="volume se:short-story">
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<header>
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<h2 epub:type="title">A DINNER AT ⸻<a href="#footnote3">[3]</a></h2>
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<h2 epub:type="title">A Dinner At ⸻<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-3" id="noteref-3" epub:type="noteref">3</a></h2>
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<blockquote epub:type="epigraph">
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<p>The story referred to in this skit appears in “The Trimmed Lamp” under the same title—“The Badge of Policeman O’Roon.”</p>
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</blockquote>
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@ -32,7 +32,7 @@
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<p>Still I must admit that Van Sweller’s conduct in the park that morning was almost without flaw. The courage, the dash, the modesty, the skill, and fidelity that he displayed atoned for everything.</p>
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<p>This is the way the story runs. Van Sweller has been a gentleman member of the “Rugged Riders,” the company that made a war with a foreign country famous. Among his comrades was Lawrence O’Roon, a man whom Van Sweller liked. A strange thing—and a hazardous one in fiction—was that Van Sweller and O’Roon resembled each other mightily in face, form, and general appearance. After the war Van Sweller pulled wires, and O’Roon was made a mounted policeman.</p>
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<p>Now, one night in New York there are commemorations and libations by old comrades, and in the morning, Mounted Policeman O’Roon, unused to potent liquids—another premise hazardous in fiction—finds the earth bucking and bounding like a bronco, with no stirrup into which he may insert foot and save his honor and his badge.</p>
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<p><i>Noblesse oblige?</i> Surely. So out along the driveways and bridle paths trots Hudson Van Sweller in the uniform of his incapacitated comrade, as like unto him as one French pea is unto a <i>petit pois</i>.</p>
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<p>Noblesse oblige?> Surely. So out along the driveways and bridle paths trots Hudson Van Sweller in the uniform of his incapacitated comrade, as like unto him as one French pea is unto a <i xml:lang="fr">petit pois</i>.</p>
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<p>It is, of course, jolly larks for Van Sweller, who has wealth and social position enough for him to masquerade safely even as a police commissioner doing his duty, if he wished to do so. But society, not given to scanning the countenances of mounted policemen, sees nothing unusual in the officer on the beat.</p>
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<p>And then comes the runaway.</p>
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<p>That is a fine scene—the swaying victoria, the impetuous, daft horses plunging through the line of scattering vehicles, the driver stupidly holding his broken reins, and the ivory-white face of Amy Ffolliott, as she clings desperately with each slender hand. Fear has come and gone: it has left her expression pensive and just a little pleading, for life is not so bitter.</p>
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@ -52,12 +52,12 @@
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<p>“You will wear,” I replied, “evening dress, such as a gentleman wears. If it is full, your tailor should be responsible for its bagginess. And I will leave it to whatever erudition you are supposed to possess whether a white tie is rendered any whiter by being immaculate. And I will leave it to the consciences of you and your man whether a tie that is not white, and therefore not immaculate, could possibly form any part of a gentleman’s evening dress. If not, then the perfect tie is included and understood in the term ‘dress,’ and its expressed addition predicates either a redundancy of speech or the spectacle of a man wearing two ties at once.”</p>
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<p>With this mild but deserved rebuke I left Van Sweller in his dressing-room, and waited for him in his library.</p>
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<p>About an hour later his valet came out, and I heard him telephone for an electric cab. Then out came Van Sweller, smiling, but with that sly, secretive design in his eye that was puzzling me.</p>
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<p>“I believe,” he said easily, as he smoothed a glove, “that I will drop in at–––– <a name="footnotetag4"/><a href="#footnote4">[4]</a> for dinner.”</p>
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<p>“I believe,” he said easily, as he smoothed a glove, “that I will drop in at ⸻<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-4" id="noteref-4" epub:type="noteref">4</a> for dinner.”</p>
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<p>I sprang up, angrily, at his words. This, then, was the paltry trick he had been scheming to play upon me. I faced him with a look so grim that even his patrician poise was flustered.</p>
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<p>“You will never do so,” I exclaimed, “with my permission. What kind of a return is this,” I continued, hotly, “for the favors I have granted you? I gave you a ‘Van’ to your name when I might have called you ‘Perkins’ or ‘Simpson.’ I have humbled myself so far as to brag of your polo ponies, your automobiles, and the iron muscles that you acquired when you were stroke-oar of your ‘varsity eight,’ or ‘eleven,’ whichever it is. I created you for the hero of this story; and I will not submit to having you queer it. I have tried to make you a typical young New York gentleman of the highest social station and breeding. You have no reason to complain of my treatment to you. Amy Ffolliott, the girl you are to win, is a prize for any man to be thankful for, and cannot be equalled for beauty—provided the story is illustrated by the right artist. I do not understand why you should try to spoil everything. I had thought you were a gentleman.”</p>
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<p>“What it is you are objecting to, old man?” asked Van Sweller, in a surprised tone.</p>
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<p>“To your dining at–––– <a name="footnotetag5"/><a href="#footnote5">[5]</a>,” I answered. “The pleasure would be yours, no doubt, but the responsibility would fall upon me. You intend deliberately to make me out a tout for a restaurant. Where you dine to-night has not the slightest connection with the thread of our story. You know very well that the plot requires that you be in front of the Alhambra Opera House at 11:30 where you are to rescue Miss Ffolliott a second time as the fire engine crashes into her cab. Until that time your movements are immaterial to the reader. Why can’t you dine out of sight somewhere, as many a hero does, instead of insisting upon an inapposite and vulgar exhibition of yourself?”</p>
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<p>“My dear fellow,” said Van Sweller, politely, but with a stubborn tightening of his lips, “I’m sorry it doesn’t please you, but there’s no help for it. Even a character in a story has rights that an author cannot ignore. The hero of a story of New York social life must dine at–––– <a name="footnotetag6"/><a href="#footnote6">[6]</a> at least once during its action.”</p>
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<p>“To your dining at ⸻,”<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-5" id="noteref-5" epub:type="noteref">5</a> I answered. “The pleasure would be yours, no doubt, but the responsibility would fall upon me. You intend deliberately to make me out a tout for a restaurant. Where you dine to-night has not the slightest connection with the thread of our story. You know very well that the plot requires that you be in front of the Alhambra Opera House at 11:30 where you are to rescue Miss Ffolliott a second time as the fire engine crashes into her cab. Until that time your movements are immaterial to the reader. Why can’t you dine out of sight somewhere, as many a hero does, instead of insisting upon an inapposite and vulgar exhibition of yourself?”</p>
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<p>“My dear fellow,” said Van Sweller, politely, but with a stubborn tightening of his lips, “I’m sorry it doesn’t please you, but there’s no help for it. Even a character in a story has rights that an author cannot ignore. The hero of a story of New York social life must dine at ⸻<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-6" id="noteref-6" epub:type="noteref">6</a> at least once during its action.”</p>
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<p>“ ‘Must,’ ” I echoed, disdainfully; “why ‘must’? Who demands it?”</p>
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<p>“The magazine editors,” answered Van Sweller, giving me a glance of significant warning.</p>
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<p>“But why?” I persisted.</p>
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@ -66,18 +66,18 @@
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<p>“Pardon me for referring to it,” said Van Sweller, with a sympathetic smile, “but I have been the hero of hundreds of stories of this kind.”</p>
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<p>I felt a slow flush creeping into my face.</p>
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<p>“I thought …” I stammered; “I was hoping … that is … Oh, well, of course an absolutely original conception in fiction is impossible in these days.”</p>
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<p>“Metropolitan types,” continued Van Sweller, kindly, “do not offer a hold for much originality. I’ve sauntered through every story in pretty much the same way. Now and then the women writers have made me cut some rather strange capers, for a gentleman; but the men generally pass me along from one to another without much change. But never yet, in any story, have I failed to dine at–––– <a name="footnotetag7"/><a href="#footnote7">[7]</a>.”</p>
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<p>“Metropolitan types,” continued Van Sweller, kindly, “do not offer a hold for much originality. I’ve sauntered through every story in pretty much the same way. Now and then the women writers have made me cut some rather strange capers, for a gentleman; but the men generally pass me along from one to another without much change. But never yet, in any story, have I failed to dine at ⸻.”<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-7" id="noteref-7" epub:type="noteref">7</a></p>
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<p>“You will fail this time,” I said, emphatically.</p>
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<p>“Perhaps so,” admitted Van Sweller, looking out of the window into the street below, “but if so it will be for the first time. The authors all send me there. I fancy that many of them would have liked to accompany me, but for the little matter of the expense.”</p>
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<p>“I say I will be touting for no restaurant,” I repeated, loudly. “You are subject to my will, and I declare that you shall not appear of record this evening until the time arrives for you to rescue Miss Ffolliott again. If the reading public cannot conceive that you have dined during that interval at some one of the thousands of establishments provided for that purpose that do not receive literary advertisement it may suppose, for aught I care, that you have gone fasting.”</p>
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<p>“Thank you,” said Van Sweller, rather coolly, “you are hardly courteous. But take care! it is at your own risk that you attempt to disregard a fundamental principle in metropolitan fiction—one that is dear alike to author and reader. I shall, of course attend to my duty when it comes time to rescue your heroine; but I warn you that it will be your loss if you fail to send me to-night to dine at–––– <a name="footnotetag8"/><a href="#footnote8">[8]</a>.”</p>
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<p>“Thank you,” said Van Sweller, rather coolly, “you are hardly courteous. But take care! it is at your own risk that you attempt to disregard a fundamental principle in metropolitan fiction—one that is dear alike to author and reader. I shall, of course attend to my duty when it comes time to rescue your heroine; but I warn you that it will be your loss if you fail to send me to-night to dine at ⸻.”<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-8" id="noteref-8" epub:type="noteref">8</a></p>
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<p>“I will take the consequences if there are to be any,” I replied. “I am not yet come to be sandwich man for an eating-house.”</p>
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<p>I walked over to a table where I had left my cane and gloves. I heard the whirr of the alarm in the cab below and I turned quickly. Van Sweller was gone.</p>
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<p>I rushed down the stairs and out to the curb. An empty hansom was just passing. I hailed the driver excitedly.</p>
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<p>“See that auto cab halfway down the block?” I shouted. “Follow it. Don’t lose sight of it for an instant, and I will give you two dollars!”</p>
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<p>If I only had been one of the characters in my story instead of myself I could easily have offered $10 or $25 or even $100. But $2 was all I felt justified in expending, with fiction at its present rates.</p>
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<p>The cab driver, instead of lashing his animal into a foam, proceeded at a deliberate trot that suggested a by-the-hour arrangement.</p>
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<p>But I suspected Van Sweller’s design; and when we lost sight of his cab I ordered my driver to proceed at once to–––– <a name="footnotetag9"/><a href="#footnote9">[9]</a>.</p>
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<p>But I suspected Van Sweller’s design; and when we lost sight of his cab I ordered my driver to proceed at once to ⸻.<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-9" id="noteref-9" epub:type="noteref">9</a></p>
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<p>I found Van Sweller at a table under a palm, just glancing over the menu, with a hopeful waiter hovering at his elbow.</p>
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<p>“Come with me,” I said, inexorably. “You will not give me the slip again. Under my eye you shall remain until 11:30.”</p>
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<p>Van Sweller countermanded the order for his dinner, and arose to accompany me. He could scarcely do less. A fictitious character is but poorly equipped for resisting a hungry but live author who comes to drag him forth from a restaurant. All he said was: “You were just in time; but I think you are making a mistake. You cannot afford to ignore the wishes of the great reading public.”</p>
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@ -87,17 +87,15 @@
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<p>“Think of anything you could eat?” I asked; “try a chop, or what?”</p>
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<p>“Anything,” said Van Sweller, enthusiastically, “except a grilled bone.”</p>
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<p>Two weeks afterward the postman brought me a large, fat envelope. I opened it, and took out something that I had seen before, and this typewritten letter from a magazine that encourages society fiction:</p>
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<blockquote>
|
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<blockquote class="small">
|
||||
<p>Your short story, “The Badge of Policeman O’Roon,” is herewith returned.</p>
|
||||
<p>We are sorry that it has been unfavorably passed upon; but it seems to lack in some of the essential requirements of our publication.</p>
|
||||
<p>The story is splendidly constructed; its style is strong and inimitable, and its action and character-drawing deserve the highest praise. As a story <i>per se</i> it has merit beyond anything that we have read for some time. But, as we have said, it fails to come up to some of the standards we have set.</p>
|
||||
<p>Could you not re-write the story, and inject into it the social atmosphere, and return it to us for further consideration? It is suggested to you that you have the hero, Van Sweller, drop in for luncheon or dinner once or twice at–––– <a name="footnotetag10"/><a href="#footnote10">[10]</a> or at the–––– <a name="footnotetag11"/><a href="#footnote11">[11]</a> which will be in line with the changes desired.</p>
|
||||
<p class="noindent">
|
||||
<span class="ind15">Very truly yours,</span>
|
||||
<span class="ind15"><span class="smallcaps">The Editors</span>.</span>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:letter">
|
||||
<p>Your short story, “The Badge of Policeman O’Roon,” is herewith returned.</p>
|
||||
<p>We are sorry that it has been unfavorably passed upon; but it seems to lack in some of the essential requirements of our publication.</p>
|
||||
<p>The story is splendidly constructed; its style is strong and inimitable, and its action and character-drawing deserve the highest praise. As a story per se it has merit beyond anything that we have read for some time. But, as we have said, it fails to come up to some of the standards we have set.</p>
|
||||
<p>Could you not re-write the story, and inject into it the social atmosphere, and return it to us for further consideration? It is suggested to you that you have the hero, Van Sweller, drop in for luncheon or dinner once or twice at ⸻<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-10" id="noteref-10" epub:type="noteref">10</a> or at the ⸻<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-11" id="noteref-11" epub:type="noteref">11</a> which will be in line with the changes desired.</p>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p epub:type="valediction">Very truly yours,</p>
|
||||
<p epub:type="z3998:sender">The Editors</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -38,10 +38,16 @@
|
||||
<p>The bottle oscillates from one to the other, continues to do so, and is not removed from the counter. The bartender sees two emaciated invalids dispose of enough Kentucky Belle to floor a dozen cowboys, without displaying any emotion save a sad and contemplative interest in the peregrinations of the bottle. So he is moved to manifest a solicitude as to the consequences.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Not on your Uncle Mark Hanna,” responds Toledo, “will we get drunk. We’ve been—vaccinated with whiskey—and—cod liver oil. What would send you to the police station—only gives us a thirst. S-s-set out another bottle.”</p>
|
||||
<p>It is slow work trying to meet death by that route. Some quicker way must be found. They leave the saloon and plunge again into the mist. The sidewalks are mere flanges at the base of the houses; the street a cold ravine, the fog filling it like a freshet. Not far away is the Mexican quarter. Conducted as if by wires along the heavy air comes a guitar’s tinkle, and the demoralizing voice of some señorita singing:</p>
|
||||
<blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="small">
|
||||
<p class="noindent">“En las tardes sombrillos del invierroEn el prado a Marar me reclinoY maldigo mi fausto destino—Una vida la mas infeliz.”</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="z3998:song">
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<span>“En las tardes sombrillos del invierro</span>
|
||||
<br/>
|
||||
<span>En el prado a Marar me reclino</span>
|
||||
<br/>
|
||||
<span>Y maldigo mi fausto destino—</span>
|
||||
<br/>
|
||||
<span>Una vida la mas infeliz.”</span>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>The words of it they do not understand—neither Toledo nor Memphis, but words are the least important things in life. The music tears the breasts of the seekers after Nepenthe, inciting Toledo to remark:</p>
|
||||
<p>“Those kids of mine—I wonder—by God, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Goodall of Memphis, we had too little of that whiskey! No slow music in mine, if you please. It makes you disremember to forget.”</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -13,14 +13,14 @@
|
||||
<p>This is the kind of waggish editorial O. Henry was writing in 1894 for the readers of <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i>. The reader will do well to remember that the paper was for local consumption and that the allusions are to a very special place and time.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<blockquote class="small">
|
||||
<blockquote>
|
||||
<p>(It will be remembered that about a month ago there were special rates offered to the public for a round trip to the City of Washington. The price of the ticket being exceedingly low, we secured a loan of twenty dollars from a public-spirited citizen of Austin, by mortgaging our press and cow, with the additional security of our brother’s name and a slight draught on Major Hutchinson for $4,000.</p>
|
||||
<p>We purchased a round trip ticket, two loaves of Vienna bread, and quite a large piece of cheese, which we handed to a member of our reportorial staff, with instructions to go to Washington, interview President Cleveland, and get a scoop, if possible, on all other Texas papers.</p>
|
||||
<p>Our reporter came in yesterday morning, via the Manor dirt road, with a large piece of folded cotton bagging tied under each foot.</p>
|
||||
<p>It seems that he lost his ticket in Washington, and having divided the Vienna bread and cheese with some disappointed office seekers who were coming home by the same route, he arrived home hungry, desiring food, and with quite an appetite.</p>
|
||||
<p>Although somewhat late, we give his description of his interview with President Cleveland.)</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>I am chief reporter on the staff of <i>The Rolling Stone</i>.</p>
|
||||
<p>I am chief reporter on the staff of <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i>.</p>
|
||||
<p>About a month ago the managing editor came into the room where we were both sitting engaged in conversation and said:</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, by the way, go to Washington and interview President Cleveland.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“All right,” said I. “Take care of yourself.”</p>
|
||||
@ -51,7 +51,7 @@
|
||||
<p>I saw him jerk a string, and a camera snapped on another table, taking our picture as we stood.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Don’t die in the House, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> President,” I said. “Go over into the Senate Chamber.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Peace, murderer!” he said. “Let your bomb do its deadly work.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’m no bum,” I said, with spirit. “I represent <i>The Rolling Stone</i>, of Austin, Texas, and this I hold in my hand does the same thing, but, it seems, unsuccessfully.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’m no bum,” I said, with spirit. “I represent <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i>, of Austin, Texas, and this I hold in my hand does the same thing, but, it seems, unsuccessfully.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The President sank back in his chair greatly relieved.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I thought you were a dynamiter,” he said. “Let me see; Texas! Texas!” He walked to a large wall map of the United States, and placing his finger thereon at about the location of Idaho, ran it down in a zigzag, doubtful way until he reached Texas.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, yes, here it is. I have so many things on my mind, I sometimes forget what I should know well.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -14,7 +14,7 @@
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p>The person who sweeps the office, translates letters from foreign countries, deciphers communications from graduates of business colleges, and does most of the writing for this paper, has been confined for the past two weeks to the under side of a large red quilt, with a joint caucus of la grippe and measles.</p>
|
||||
<p>We have missed two issues of <i>The Rolling Stone</i>, and are now slightly convalescent, for which we desire to apologize and express our regrets.</p>
|
||||
<p>We have missed two issues of <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i>, and are now slightly convalescent, for which we desire to apologize and express our regrets.</p>
|
||||
<p>Everybody’s term of subscription will be extended enough to cover all missed issues, and we hope soon to report that the goose remains suspended at a favorable altitude. People who have tried to run a funny paper and entertain a congregation of large piebald measles at the same time will understand something of the tact, finesse, and hot sassafras tea required to do so. We expect to get out the paper regularly from this time on, but are forced to be very careful, as improper treatment and deleterious after-effects of measles, combined with the high price of paper and presswork, have been known to cause a relapse. Any one not getting their paper regularly will please come down and see about it, bringing with them a ham or any little delicacy relished by invalids.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -10,10 +10,10 @@
|
||||
<header>
|
||||
<h2 epub:type="title">An Unfinished Christmas Story</h2>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="epigraph">
|
||||
<p>Probably begun several years before his death. Published, as it here appears, in <i>Short Stories</i>, January, 1911.</p>
|
||||
<p>Probably begun several years before his death. Published, as it here appears, in <i epub:type="se:name.publication.book">Short Stories</i>, January, 1911.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p>Now, a Christmas story should be one. For a good many years the ingenious writers have been putting forth tales for the holiday numbers that employed every subtle, evasive, indirect and strategic scheme they could invent to disguise the Christmas flavor. So far has this new practice been carried that nowadays when you read a story in a holiday magazine the only way you can tell it is a Christmas story is to look at the footnote which reads: [“The incidents in the above story happened on December 25th.—<span class="smallcaps">Ed</span>.”]</p>
|
||||
<p>Now, a Christmas story should be one. For a good many years the ingenious writers have been putting forth tales for the holiday numbers that employed every subtle, evasive, indirect and strategic scheme they could invent to disguise the Christmas flavor. So far has this new practice been carried that nowadays when you read a story in a holiday magazine the only way you can tell it is a Christmas story is to look at the footnote which reads: [“The incidents in the above story happened on December 25th.—<b>Ed</b>.”]</p>
|
||||
<p>There is progress in this; but it is all very sad. There are just as many real Christmas stories as ever, if we would only dig ’em up. Me, I am for the Scrooge and Marley Christmas story, and the Annie and Willie’s prayer poem, and the long lost son coming home on the stroke of twelve to the poorly thatched cottage with his arms full of talking dolls and popcorn balls and—Zip! you hear the second mortgage on the cottage go flying off it into the deep snow.</p>
|
||||
<p>So, this is to warn you that there is no subterfuge about this story—and you might come upon stockings hung to the mantel and plum puddings and hark! the chimes! and wealthy misers loosening up and handing over penny whistles to lame newsboys if you read further.</p>
|
||||
<p>Once I knocked at a door (I have so many things to tell you I keep on losing sight of the story). It was the front door of a furnished room house in West ‘Teenth Street. I was looking for a young illustrator named Paley originally and irrevocably from Terre Haute. Paley doesn’t enter even into the first serial rights of this Christmas story; I mention him simply in explaining why I came to knock at the door—some people have so much curiosity.</p>
|
||||
@ -34,7 +34,7 @@
|
||||
<p>Christmas came that year on Thursday, and snow came with it.</p>
|
||||
<p>Stickney (Harry Clarence Fowler Stickney to whomsoever his full baptismal cognominal burdens may be of interest) reached his address at six-thirty Wednesday afternoon. “Address” is New Yorkese for “home.” Stickney roomed at 45 West ‘Teenth Street, third floor rear hall room. He was twenty years and four months old, and he worked in a cameras-of-all-kinds, photographic supplies and films-developed store. I don’t know what kind of work he did in the store; but you must have seen him. He is the young man who always comes behind the counter to wait on you and lets you talk for five minutes, telling him what you want. When you are done, he calls the proprietor at the top of his voice to wait on you, and walks away whistling between his teeth.</p>
|
||||
<p>I don’t want to bother about describing to you his appearance; but, if you are a man reader, I will say that Stickncy looked precisely like the young chap that you always find sitting in your chair smoking a cigarette after you have missed a shot while playing pool—not billiards but pool—when you want to sit down yourself.</p>
|
||||
<p>There are some to whom Christmas gives no Christmassy essence. Of course, prosperous people and comfortable people who have homes or flats or rooms with meals, and even people who live in apartment houses with hotel service get something of the Christmas flavor. They give one another presents with the cost mark scratched off with a penknife; and they hang holly wreaths in the front windows and when they are asked whether they prefer light or dark meat from the turkey they say: “Both, please,” and giggle and have lots of fun. And the very poorest people have the best time of it. The Army gives ’em a dinner, and the 10 <span class="smallcaps"><abbr class="time">a.m.</abbr></span> issue of the Night Final edition of the newspaper with the largest circulation in the city leaves a basket at their door full of an apple, a Lake Ronkonkoma squab, a scrambled eggplant and a bunch of Kalamazoo bleached parsley. The poorer you are the more Christmas does for you.</p>
|
||||
<p>There are some to whom Christmas gives no Christmassy essence. Of course, prosperous people and comfortable people who have homes or flats or rooms with meals, and even people who live in apartment houses with hotel service get something of the Christmas flavor. They give one another presents with the cost mark scratched off with a penknife; and they hang holly wreaths in the front windows and when they are asked whether they prefer light or dark meat from the turkey they say: “Both, please,” and giggle and have lots of fun. And the very poorest people have the best time of it. The Army gives ’em a dinner, and the 10 <abbr class="time">a.m.</abbr> issue of the Night Final edition of the newspaper with the largest circulation in the city leaves a basket at their door full of an apple, a Lake Ronkonkoma squab, a scrambled eggplant and a bunch of Kalamazoo bleached parsley. The poorer you are the more Christmas does for you.</p>
|
||||
<p>But, I’ll tell you to what kind of a mortal Christmas seems to be only the day before the twenty-sixth day of December. It’s the chap in the big city earning sixteen dollars a week, with no friends and few acquaintances, who finds himself with only fifty cents in his pocket on Christmas eve. He can’t accept charity; he can’t borrow; he knows no one who would invite him to dinner. I have a fancy that when the shepherds left their flocks to follow the star of Bethlehem there was a bandy-legged young fellow among them who was just learning the sheep business. So they said to him, “Bobby, we’re going to investigate this star route and see what’s in it. If it should turn out to be the first Christmas day we don’t want to miss it. And, as you are not a wise man, and as you couldn’t possibly purchase a present to take along, suppose you stay behind and mind the sheep.”</p>
|
||||
<p>So as we may say, Harry Stickney was a direct descendant of the shepherd who was left behind to take care of the flocks.</p>
|
||||
<p>Getting back to facts, Stickney rang the doorbell of 45. He had a habit of forgetting his latchkey.</p>
|
||||
@ -43,9 +43,7 @@
|
||||
<p>“Evening,” said Stickney cheerlessly, as he distributed little piles of muddy slush along the hall matting. “Think we’ll have snow?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You left your key,” said—</p>
|
||||
<blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="small">
|
||||
<p class="noindent">[Here the manuscript ends.]</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>[Here the manuscript ends.]</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -13,7 +13,7 @@
|
||||
<p>From <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i>.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p>The snake reporter of <i>The Rolling Stone</i> was wandering up the avenue last night on his way home from the Y.M.C.A. rooms when he was approached by a gaunt, hungry-looking man with wild eyes and dishevelled hair. He accosted the reporter in a hollow, weak voice.</p>
|
||||
<p>The snake reporter of <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i> was wandering up the avenue last night on his way home from the Y.M.C.A. rooms when he was approached by a gaunt, hungry-looking man with wild eyes and dishevelled hair. He accosted the reporter in a hollow, weak voice.</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Can you tell me, Sir, where I can find in this town a family of scrubs?’</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘I don’t understand exactly.’</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Let me tell you how it is,’ said the stranger, inserting his forefinger in the reporter’s buttonhole and badly damaging his chrysanthemum. ‘I am a representative from Soapstone County, and I and my family are houseless, homeless, and shelterless. We have not tasted food for over a week. I brought my family with me, as I have indigestion and could not get around much with the boys. Some days ago I started out to find a boarding house, as I cannot afford to put up at a hotel. I found a nice aristocratic-looking place, that suited me, and went in and asked for the proprietress. A very stately lady with a Roman nose came in the room. She had one hand laid across her stom—across her waist, and the other held a lace handkerchief. I told her I wanted board for myself and family, and she condescended to take us. I asked for her terms, and she said $300 per week.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -122,17 +122,17 @@
|
||||
<p>This stairway ends above at the tent-shaped space between the roof and the joists.</p>
|
||||
<p>That space is dark and forbidding, and being useless is rarely visited.</p>
|
||||
<p>Sharp opened this door and gazed for a moment up this narrow cobwebbed stairway.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>After dark that night a man opened cautiously one of the lower windows of the Land Office, crept out with great circumspection and disappeared in the shadows.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>One afternoon, a week after this time, Sharp lingered behind again after the clerks had left and the office closed. The next morning the first comers noticed a broad mark in the dust on the upstairs floor, and the same mark was observed below stairs near a window.</p>
|
||||
<p>It appeared as if some heavy and rather bulky object had been dragged along through the limestone dust. A memorandum book with “E. Harris” written on the flyleaf was picked up on the stairs, but nothing particular was thought of any of these signs.</p>
|
||||
<p>Circulars and advertisements appeared for a long time in the papers asking for information concerning Edward Harris, who left his mother’s home on a certain date and had never been heard of since.</p>
|
||||
<p>After a while these things were succeeded by affairs of more recent interest, and faded from the public mind.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Sharp died two years ago, respected and regretted. The last two years of his life were clouded with a settled melancholy for which his friends could assign no reason. The bulk of his comfortable fortune was made from the land he obtained by fraud and crime.</p>
|
||||
<p>The disappearance of the file was a mystery that created some commotion in the Land Office, but he got his patent.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>It is a well-known tradition in Austin and vicinity that there is a buried treasure of great value somewhere on the banks of Shoal Creek, about a mile west of the city.</p>
|
||||
<p>Three young men living in Austin recently became possessed of what they thought was a clue of the whereabouts of the treasure, and Thursday night they repaired to the place after dark and plied the pickaxe and shovel with great diligence for about three hours.</p>
|
||||
<p>At the end of that time their efforts were rewarded by the finding of a box buried about four feet below the surface, which they hastened to open.</p>
|
||||
@ -140,7 +140,7 @@
|
||||
<p>They immediately left the scene and notified the proper authorities of their ghastly find.</p>
|
||||
<p>On closer examination, in the left breast pocket of the skeleton’s coat, there was found a flat, oblong packet of papers, cut through and through in three places by a knife blade, and so completely soaked and clotted with blood that it had become an almost indistinguishable mass.</p>
|
||||
<p>With the aid of a microscope and the exercise of a little imagination this much can be made out of the letter; at the top of the papers:</p>
|
||||
<p class="noindent">B–xa–––rip N–2–92.</p>
|
||||
<p>B⸺x a⸺ ⸺rip N⸺2⸺92.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
</html>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -5,94 +5,41 @@
|
||||
<link href="../css/core.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"/>
|
||||
<link href="../css/local.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"/>
|
||||
</head>
|
||||
<body epub:type="bodymatter z3998:fiction">
|
||||
<body epub:type="backmatter z3998:fiction">
|
||||
<section id="endnotes" epub:type="endnotes">
|
||||
<h2 epub:type="title">Endnotes</h2>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote1"/><b>Footnote 1</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>O. Henry</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag1">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote2"/><b>Footnote 2</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>Mother of O. Henry</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag2">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote3"/><b>Footnote 3</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag3">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote4"/><b>Footnote 4</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag4">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote5"/><b>Footnote 5</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag5">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote6"/><b>Footnote 6</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag6">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote7"/><b>Footnote 7</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag7">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote8"/><b>Footnote 8</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag8">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote9"/><b>Footnote 9</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag9">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote10"/><b>Footnote 10</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag10">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote11"/><b>Footnote 11</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag11">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="footnote">
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><a name="footnote12"/><b>Footnote 12</b>:</p>
|
||||
<p>An estate famous in Texas legal history. It took many, many years for adjustment and a large part of the property was, of course, consumed as expenses of litigation.</p>
|
||||
<p>
|
||||
<a href="#footnotetag12">(return)</a>
|
||||
</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<hr class="full"/>
|
||||
<ol>
|
||||
<li id="note-3" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-3" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-4" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-4" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-5" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-5" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-6" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-6" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-7" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-7" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-8" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-8" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-9" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-9" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-10" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-10" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-11" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>See advertising column, “Where to Dine Well,” in the daily newspapers. <a href="a-dinner-at-3.xhtml#noteref-11" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li id="note-12" epub:type="endnote">
|
||||
<p>An estate famous in Texas legal history. It took many, many years for adjustment and a large part of the property was, of course, consumed as expenses of litigation. <a href="fickle-fortune-or-how-gladys-hustled.xhtml#noteref-12" epub:type="backlink">↩</a></p>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
</ol>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
</html>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -29,9 +29,9 @@
|
||||
<p>When he had gone, Gladys felt an uncontrollable yearning take possession of her. She said slowly, rather to herself than for publication, “I wonder if there was any of that cold cabbage left from dinner.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She then left the room.</p>
|
||||
<p>When she did so, a dark-complexioned man with black hair and gloomy, desperate looking clothes, came out of the fireplace where he had been concealed and stated:</p>
|
||||
<p>“Aha! I have you in my power at last, Bertram D. Snooper. Gladys Vavasour-Smith shall be mine. I am in the possession of secrets that not a soul in the world suspects. I have papers to prove that Bertram Snooper is the heir to the Tom Bean estate, <a name="footnotetag12"/><a href="#footnote12">[12]</a> and I have discovered that Gladys’ grandfather who sawed wood for the Hornsby’s was also a cook in Major Rhoads Fisher’s command during the war. Therefore, the family repudiate her, and she will marry me in order to drag their proud name down in the dust. Ha, ha, ha!”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Aha! I have you in my power at last, Bertram D. Snooper. Gladys Vavasour-Smith shall be mine. I am in the possession of secrets that not a soul in the world suspects. I have papers to prove that Bertram Snooper is the heir to the Tom Bean estate,<a href="endnotes.xhtml#note-12" id="noteref-12" epub:type="noteref">12</a> and I have discovered that Gladys’ grandfather who sawed wood for the Hornsby’s was also a cook in Major Rhoads Fisher’s command during the war. Therefore, the family repudiate her, and she will marry me in order to drag their proud name down in the dust. Ha, ha, ha!”</p>
|
||||
<p>As the reader has doubtless long ago discovered, this man was no other than Henry R. Grasty. <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Grasty then proceeded to gloat some more, and then with a sardonic laugh left for New York.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Fifteen years have elapsed.</p>
|
||||
<p>Of course, our readers will understand that this is only supposed to the the case.</p>
|
||||
<p>It really took less than a minute to make the little stars that represent an interval of time.</p>
|
||||
@ -41,7 +41,7 @@
|
||||
<p><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Grasty had evidently worked his rabbit’s foot successfully, although he was quite a while in doing so.</p>
|
||||
<p>Just as the preacher was about to pronounce the fatal words on which he would have realized ten dollars and had the laugh on <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Grasty, the steeple of the church fell off and Bertram D. Snooper entered.</p>
|
||||
<p>The preacher fell to the ground with a dull thud. He could ill afford to lose ten dollars. He was hastily removed and a cheaper one secured.</p>
|
||||
<p>Bertram D. Snooper held a <i>Statesman</i> in his hand.</p>
|
||||
<p>Bertram D. Snooper held a <i epub:type="se:name.publication.newspaper">Statesman</i> in his hand.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Aha!” he said, “I thought I would surprise you. I just got in this morning. Here is a paper noticing my arrival.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He handed it to Henry R. Grasty.</p>
|
||||
<p><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Grasty looked at the paper and turned deadly pale. It was dated three weeks after <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Snooper’s arrival.</p>
|
||||
@ -58,7 +58,7 @@
|
||||
<p>“What is it? Speak, I implore you,” said Gladys.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Those papers,” said Henry R. Grasty, “are the proofs of my appointment as administrator of the Tom Bean estate.”</p>
|
||||
<p>With a loving cry Gladys threw herself in Henry R. Grasty’s arms.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Twenty minutes later Bertram D. Snooper was seen deliberately to enter a beer saloon on Seventeenth Street.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -17,9 +17,12 @@
|
||||
<cite>—Mulvaney.</cite>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p>This is the story that William Trotter told me on the beach at Aguas Frescas while I waited for the gig of the captain of the fruit steamer <i>Andador</i> which was to take me abroad. Reluctantly I was leaving the Land of Always Afternoon. William was remaining, and he favored me with a condensed oral autobiography as we sat on the sands in the shade cast by the Bodega Nacional.</p>
|
||||
<p>As usual, I became aware that the Man from Bombay had already written the story; but as he had compressed it to an eight-word sentence, I have become an expansionist, and have quoted his phrase above, with apologies to him and best regards to <i>Terence</i>.</p>
|
||||
<h3>II</h3>
|
||||
<section id="helping-the-other-fellow-1" epub:type="chapter">
|
||||
<p>This is the story that William Trotter told me on the beach at Aguas Frescas while I waited for the gig of the captain of the fruit steamer <i epub:type="se:vessel.ship">Andador</i> which was to take me abroad. Reluctantly I was leaving the Land of Always Afternoon. William was remaining, and he favored me with a condensed oral autobiography as we sat on the sands in the shade cast by the Bodega Nacional.</p>
|
||||
<p>As usual, I became aware that the Man from Bombay had already written the story; but as he had compressed it to an eight-word sentence, I have become an expansionist, and have quoted his phrase above, with apologies to him and best regards to <em>Terence</em>.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
<section id="helping-the-other-fellow-2" epub:type="chapter">
|
||||
<h3 epub:type="title z3998:roman">II</h3>
|
||||
<p>“Don’t you ever have a desire to go back to the land of derby hats and starched collars?” I asked him. “You seem to be a handy man and a man of action,” I continued, “and I am sure I could find you a comfortable job somewhere in the States.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Ragged, shiftless, barefooted, a confirmed eater of the lotos, William Trotter had pleased me much, and I hated to see him gobbled up by the tropics.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’ve no doubt you could,” he said, idly splitting the bark from a section of sugar-cane. “I’ve no doubt you could do much for me. If every man could do as much for himself as he can for others, every country in the world would be holding millenniums instead of centennials.”</p>
|
||||
@ -50,7 +53,9 @@
|
||||
<p>“ ‘It’s my failing,’ says he. ‘What’s your particular soft point?’</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Industry,’ says I, promptly. ‘I’m hard-working, diligent, industrious, and energetic.’</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘My dear <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Trotter,’ says he, ‘surely I’ve known you long enough to tell you you are a liar. Every man must have his own particular weakness, and his own particular strength in other things. Now, you will buy me a drink of rum, and we will call on President Gomez.’ ”</p>
|
||||
<h3>III</h3>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
<section id="helping-the-other-fellow-3" epub:type="chapter">
|
||||
<h3 epub:type="title z3998:roman">III</h3>
|
||||
<p>“Well, sir,” Trotter went on, “we walks the four miles out, through a virgin conservatory of palms and ferns and other roof-garden products, to the president’s summer White House. It was blue, and reminded you of what you see on the stage in the third act, which they describe as ‘same as the first’ on the programs.</p>
|
||||
<p>“There was more than fifty people waiting outside the iron fence that surrounded the house and grounds. There was generals and agitators and épergnes in gold-laced uniforms, and citizens in diamonds and Panama hats—all waiting to get an audience with the Royal Five-Card Draw. And in a kind of a summer-house in front of the mansion we could see a burnt-sienna man eating breakfast out of gold dishes and taking his time. I judged that the crowd outside had come out for their morning orders and requests, and was afraid to intrude.</p>
|
||||
<p>“But C. Wainwright wasn’t. The gate was open, and he walked inside and up to the president’s table as confident as a man who knows the head waiter in a fifteen-cent restaurant. And I went with him, because I had only seventy-five cents, and there was nothing else to do.</p>
|
||||
@ -79,15 +84,18 @@
|
||||
<p>“I think she went back with her mother,” said Trotter, “to the village in the mountains that they come from. Tell me, what would this job you speak of pay?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Why,” said I, hesitating over commerce, “I should say fifty or a hundred dollars a month—maybe two hundred.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Ain’t it funny,” said Trotter, digging his toes in the sand, “what a chump a man is when it comes to paddling his own canoe? I don’t know. Of course, I’m not making a living here. I’m on the bum. But—well, I wish you could have seen that Timotea. Every man has his own weak spot.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The gig from the <i>Andador</i> was coming ashore to take out the captain, purser, and myself, the lone passenger.</p>
|
||||
<p>The gig from the <i epub:type="se:vessel.ship">Andador</i> was coming ashore to take out the captain, purser, and myself, the lone passenger.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I’ll guarantee,” said I confidently, “that my brother will pay you seventy-five dollars a month.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“All right, then,” said William Trotter. “I’ll—”</p>
|
||||
<p>But a soft voice called across the blazing sands. A girl, faintly lemon-tinted, stood in the Calle Real and called. She was bare-armed—but what of that?</p>
|
||||
<p>“It’s her!” said William Trotter, looking. “She’s come back! I’m obliged; but I can’t take the job. Thanks, just the same. Ain’t it funny how we can’t do nothing for ourselves, but we can do wonders for the other fellow? You was about to get me with your financial proposition; but we’ve all got our weak points. Timotea’s mine. And, say!” Trotter had turned to leave, but he retraced the step or two that he had taken. “I like to have left you without saying good-bye,” said he. “It kind of rattles you when they go away unexpected for a month and come back the same way. Shake hands. So long! Say, do you remember them gunshots we heard a while ago up at the cuartel? Well, I knew what they was, but I didn’t mention it. It was Clifford Wainwright being shot by a squad of soldiers against a stone wall for giving away secrets of state to that Nicamala republic. Oh, yes, it was rum that did it. He backslided and got his. I guess we all have our weak points, and can’t do much toward helping ourselves. Mine’s waiting for me. I’d have liked to have that job with your brother, but—we’ve all got our weak points. So long!”</p>
|
||||
<h3>IV</h3>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
<section id="helping-the-other-fellow-4" epub:type="chapter">
|
||||
<h3 epub:type="title z3998:roman">IV</h3>
|
||||
<p>A big black Carib carried me on his back through the surf to the ship’s boat. On the way the purser handed me a letter that he had brought for me at the last moment from the post-office in Aguas Frescas. It was from my brother. He requested me to meet him at the <abbr>St.</abbr> Charles Hotel in New Orleans and accept a position with his house—in either cotton, sugar, or sheetings, and with five thousand dollars a year as my salary.</p>
|
||||
<p>When I arrived at the Crescent City I hurried away—far away from the <abbr>St.</abbr> Charles to a dim <i>chambre garnie</i> in Bienville Street. And there, looking down from my attic window from time to time at the old, yellow, absinthe house across the street, I wrote this story to buy my bread and butter.</p>
|
||||
<p>When I arrived at the Crescent City I hurried away—far away from the <abbr>St.</abbr> Charles to a dim <i xml:lang="fr">chambre garnie</i> in Bienville Street. And there, looking down from my attic window from time to time at the old, yellow, absinthe house across the street, I wrote this story to buy my bread and butter.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Can thim that helps others help thimselves?”</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
</html>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -13,67 +13,55 @@
|
||||
<p>From <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i>, June 23, 1894.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Can you inform me where I can buy an interest in a newspaper of some kind? I have some money and would be glad to invest it in something of the sort, if some one would allow me to put in my capital against his experience.</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">College Graduate</span>.</p>
|
||||
<p>Can you inform me where I can buy an interest in a newspaper of some kind? I have some money and would be glad to invest it in something of the sort, if some one would allow me to put in my capital against his experience.</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">College Graduate.</p>
|
||||
<p>Telegraph us your address at once, day message. Keep telegraphing every ten minutes at our expense until we see you. Will start on first train after receiving your wire.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Who was the author of the line, “Breathes there a man with soul so dead?”</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright">G. F.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Who was the author of the line, “Breathes there a man with soul so dead?”</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">G. F.</p>
|
||||
<p>This was written by a visitor to the State Saengerfest of 1892 while conversing with a member who had just eaten a large slice of limburger cheese.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Where can I get the “Testimony of the Rocks”?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Geologist</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Where can I get the “Testimony of the Rocks”?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Geologist.</p>
|
||||
<p>See the reports of the campaign committees after the election in November.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Please state what the seven wonders of the world are. I know five of them, I think, but can’t find out the other two.</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Scholar</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Please state what the seven wonders of the world are. I know five of them, I think, but can’t find out the other two.</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Scholar.</p>
|
||||
<p>The Temple of Diana, at Lexington, Ky.; the Great Wall of China; Judge Von Rosenberg (the Colossus of Roads); the Hanging Gardens at Albany; a San Antonio Sunday school; <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Frank Leslie, and the Populist party.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">What day did Christmas come on in the year 1847?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Constant Reader</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>What day did Christmas come on in the year 1847?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Constant Reader.</p>
|
||||
<p>The 25th of December.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">What does an F. F. <span epub:type="z3998:roman">V</span>. mean?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Ignorant</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>What does an <abbr>F. F. V.</abbr> mean?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Ignorant.</p>
|
||||
<p>What does he mean by what? If he takes you by the arm and tells you how much you are like a brother of his in Richmond, he means Feel For Your Vest, for he wants to borrow a five. If he holds his head high and don’t speak to you on the street he means that he already owes you ten and is Following a Fresh Victim.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Please decide a bet for us. My friend says that the sentence, “The negro bought the watermelon <i>of</i> the farmer” is correct, and I say it should be “The negro bought the watermelon from the farmer.” Which is correct?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright">R.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Please decide a bet for us. My friend says that the sentence, “The negro bought the watermelon <em>of</em> the farmer” is correct, and I say it should be “The negro bought the watermelon from the farmer.” Which is correct?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">R.</p>
|
||||
<p>Neither. It should read, “The negro stole the watermelon from the farmer.”</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">When do the Texas game laws go into effect?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Hunter</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>When do the Texas game laws go into effect?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Hunter.</p>
|
||||
<p>When you sit down at the table.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Do you know where I can trade a section of fine Panhandle land for a pair of pants with a good title?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Land Agent</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Do you know where I can trade a section of fine Panhandle land for a pair of pants with a good title?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Land Agent.</p>
|
||||
<p>We do not. You can’t raise anything on land in that section. A man can always raise a dollar on a good pair of pants.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Name in order the three best newspapers in Texas.</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Advertiser</span>.</p>
|
||||
<p>Well, the Galveston <i>News</i> runs about second, and the San Antonio <i>Express</i> third. Let us hear from you again.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Has a married woman any rights in Texas?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Prospector</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Name in order the three best newspapers in Texas.</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Advertiser.</p>
|
||||
<p>Well, the Galveston <i epub:type="se:name.publication.newspaper">News</i> runs about second, and the San Antonio <i epub:type="se:name.publication.newspaper">Express</i> third. Let us hear from you again.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Has a married woman any rights in Texas?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Prospector.</p>
|
||||
<p>Hush, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Prospector. Not quite so loud, if you please. Come up to the office some afternoon, and if everything seems quiet, come inside, and look at our eye, and our suspenders hanging on to one button, and feel the lump on the top of our head. Yes, she has some rights of her own, and everybody else’s she can scoop in.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Who was the author of the sayings, “A public office is a public trust,” and “I would rather be right than President”?</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Who was the author of the sayings, “A public office is a public trust,” and “I would rather be right than President”?</p>
|
||||
<p>Eli Perkins.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus"/>
|
||||
<p class="jus">Is the Lakeside Improvement Company making anything out of their own town tract on the lake?</p>
|
||||
<p class="jright"><span class="smallcaps">Inquisitive</span>.</p>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Is the Lakeside Improvement Company making anything out of their own town tract on the lake?</p>
|
||||
<p class="signature">Inquisitive.</p>
|
||||
<p>Yes, lots.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -13,79 +13,223 @@
|
||||
<p>O. Henry wrote this for <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">Ainslee’s Magazine</i>, where it appeared in March, 1903.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p class="noindent">PERSONS OF THE DRAMA</p>
|
||||
<table class="med">
|
||||
<p><b>Persons of the Drama</b></p>
|
||||
<ul>
|
||||
<li><p><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne, an author</p></li>
|
||||
<li><p>Miss Lore, an amanuensis</p></li>
|
||||
</ul>
|
||||
<h3>Scene—<i>Workroom of</i> <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne’s<i> popular novel factory</i>.</h3>
|
||||
<table>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td>
|
||||
<span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span>
|
||||
</td>
|
||||
<td align="right">
|
||||
<i>An Author</i>
|
||||
</td>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Good morning, Miss Lore. Glad to see you so prompt. We should finish that June installment for the <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">Epoch</i> to-day. Leverett is crowding me for it. Are you quite ready? We will resume where we left off yesterday. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Kate, with a sigh, rose from his knees, and—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td>
|
||||
<span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore </span>
|
||||
</td>
|
||||
<td align="right">
|
||||
<i>An Amanuensis</i>
|
||||
</td>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Excuse me; you mean “rose from <em>her</em> knees,” instead of “his,” don’t you?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Er—no—“his,” if you please. It is the love scene in the garden. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Rose from his knees where, blushing with youth’s bewitching coyness, she had rested for a moment after Cortland had declared his love. The hour was one of supreme and tender joy. When Kate—scene that Cortland never—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Excuse me; but wouldn’t it be more grammatical to say “when Kate <em>saw</em>,” instead of “seen”?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>The context will explain. (<em>Dictates</em>.) “When Kate—scene that Cortland never forgot—came tripping across the lawn it seemed to him the fairest sight that earth had ever offered to his gaze.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—“Kate had abandoned herself to the joy of her new-found love so completely, that no shadow of her former grief was cast upon it. Cortland, with his arm firmly entwined about her waist, knew nothing of her sighs—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Goodness! If he couldn’t tell her size with his arm around—</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<em>frowning</em>)—“Of her sighs and tears of the previous night.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<em>dictates</em>)—“To Cortland the chief charm of this girl was her look of innocence and unworldiness. Never had nun—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>How about changing that to “never had any?”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>emphatically</i>)—“Never had nun in cloistered cell a face more sweet and pure.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persoa"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—“But now Kate must hasten back to the house lest her absence be discovered. After a fond farewell she turned and sped lightly away. Cortland’s gaze followed her. He watched her rise—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Excuse me, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne; but how could he watch her eyes while her back was turned toward him?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>with extreme politeness</i>)—Possibly you would gather my meaning more intelligently if you would wait for the conclusion of the sentence. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Watched her rise as gracefully as a fawn as she mounted the eastern terrace.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—“And yet Cortland’s position was so far above that of this rustic maiden that he dreaded to consider the social upheaval that would ensue should he marry her. In no uncertain tones the traditional voices of his caste and world cried out loudly to him to let her go. What should follow—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>looking up with a start</i>)—I’m sure I can’t say, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne. Unless (<i>with a giggle</i>) you would want to add “Gallegher.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>coldly</i>)—Pardon me. I was not seeking to impose upon you the task of a collaborator. Kindly consider the question a part of the text.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—“On one side was love and Kate; on the other side his heritage of social position and family pride. Would love win? Love, that the poets tell us will last forever! (<i>Perceives that Miss Lore looks fatigued, and looks at his watch.</i>) That’s a good long stretch. Perhaps we’d better knock off a bit.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td/>
|
||||
<td><p>(Miss Lore <i>does not reply</i>.)</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>I said, Miss Lore, we’ve been at it quite a long time—wouldn’t you like to knock off for a while?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh! Were you addressing me before? I put what you said down. I thought it belonged in the story. It seemed to fit in all right. Oh, no; I’m not tired.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Very well, then, we will continue. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “In spite of these qualms and doubts, Cortland was a happy man. That night at the club he silently toasted Kate’s bright eyes in a bumper of the rarest vintage. Afterward he set out for a stroll with, as Kate on—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Excuse me, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne, for venturing a suggestion; but don’t you think you might state that in a less coarse manner?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>astounded</i>)—Wh—wh—I’m afraid I fail to understand you.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>His condition. Why not say he was “full” or “intoxicated”? It would sound much more elegant than the way you express it.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>still darkly wandering</i>)—Will you kindly point out, Miss Lore, where I have intimated that Cortland was “full,” if you prefer that word?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>calmly consulting her stenographic notes</i>)—It is right here, word for word. (Reads.) “Afterward he set out for a stroll with a skate on.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>with peculiar emphasis</i>)—Ah! And now will you kindly take down the expurgated phrase? (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Afterward he set out for a stroll with, as Kate on one occasion had fancifully told him, her spirit leaning upon his arm.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—Chapter thirty-four. Heading—“What Kate Found in the Garden.” “That fragrant summer morning brought gracious tasks to all. The bees were at the honeysuckle blossoms on the porch. Kate, singing a little song, was training the riotous branches of her favorite woodbine. The sun, himself, had rows—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Shall I say “had risen”?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>very slowly and with desperate deliberation</i>)—“The—sun—himself—had—rows—of—blushing—pinks—and—hollyhocks—and—hyacinths—waiting—that—he—might—dry—their—dew-drenched—cups.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—“The earliest trolley, scattering the birds from its pathway like some marauding cat, brought Cortland over from Oldport. He had forgotten his fair—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Hm! Wonder how he got the conductor to—</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>very loudly</i>)—“Forgotten his fair and roseate visions of the night in the practical light of the sober morn.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—“He greeted her with his usual smile and manner. ‘See the waves,’ he cried, pointing to the heaving waters of the sea, ‘ever wooing and returning to the rockbound shore.’ ” “ ‘Ready to break,’ Kate said, with—”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>My! One evening he has his arm around her, and the next morning he’s ready to break her head! Just like a man!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>with suspicious calmness</i>)—There are times, Miss Lore, when a man becomes so far exasperated that even a woman—But suppose we finish the sentence. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “ ‘Ready to break,’ Kate said, with the thrilling look of a soul-awakened woman, ‘into foam and spray, destroying themselves upon the shore they love so well.”</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Oh!</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>dictates</i>)—“Cortland, in Kate’s presence heard faintly the voice of caution. Thirty years had not cooled his ardor. It was in his power to bestow great gifts upon this girl. He still retained the beliefs that he had at twenty.” (<i>To Miss Lore, wearily</i>) I think that will be enough for the present.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>wisely</i>)—Well, if he had the twenty that he believed he had, it might buy her a rather nice one.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>faintly</i>)—The last sentence was my own. We will discontinue for the day, Miss Lore.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona">Miss Lore</td>
|
||||
<td><p>Shall I come again to-morrow?</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td epub:type="z3998:persona"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</td>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>helpless under the spell</i>)—If you will be so good.</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
<tr>
|
||||
<td/>
|
||||
<td><p>(<i>Exit</i> Miss Lore.)</p></td>
|
||||
</tr>
|
||||
</table>
|
||||
<p class="noindent"><span class="smallcaps"><span class="xlarge">Scene</span></span>—<i>Workroom of</i> <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne’s <i>popular novel factory</i>.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span>—Good morning, Miss Lore. Glad to see you so prompt. We should finish that June installment for the <i>Epoch</i> to-day. Leverett is crowding me for it. Are you quite ready? We will resume where we left off yesterday. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Kate, with a sigh, rose from his knees, and—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Excuse me; you mean “rose from <i>her</i> knees,” instead of “his,” don’t you?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span>—Er—no—“his,” if you please. It is the love scene in the garden. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Rose from his knees where, blushing with youth’s bewitching coyness, she had rested for a moment after Cortland had declared his love. The hour was one of supreme and tender joy. When Kate—scene that Cortland never—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Excuse me; but wouldn’t it be more grammatical to say “when Kate <i>saw</i>,” instead of “seen”?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span>—The context will explain. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “When Kate—scene that Cortland never forgot—came tripping across the lawn it seemed to him the fairest sight that earth had ever offered to his gaze.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“Kate had abandoned herself to the joy of her new-found love so completely, that no shadow of her former grief was cast upon it. Cortland, with his arm firmly entwined about her waist, knew nothing of her sighs—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Goodness! If he couldn’t tell her size with his arm around—</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>frowning</i>)—“Of her sighs and tears of the previous night.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“To Cortland the chief charm of this girl was her look of innocence and unworldiness. Never had nun—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—How about changing that to “never had any?”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>emphatically</i>)—“Never had nun in cloistered cell a face more sweet and pure.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“But now Kate must hasten back to the house lest her absence be discovered. After a fond farewell she turned and sped lightly away. Cortland’s gaze followed her. He watched her rise—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Excuse me, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne; but how could he watch her eyes while her back was turned toward him?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>with extreme politeness</i>)—Possibly you would gather my meaning more intelligently if you would wait for the conclusion of the sentence. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Watched her rise as gracefully as a fawn as she mounted the eastern terrace.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“And yet Cortland’s position was so far above that of this rustic maiden that he dreaded to consider the social upheaval that would ensue should he marry her. In no uncertain tones the traditional voices of his caste and world cried out loudly to him to let her go. What should follow—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span> (<i>looking up with a start</i>)—I’m sure I can’t say, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne. Unless (<i>with a giggle</i>) you would want to add “Gallegher.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>coldly</i>)—Pardon me. I was not seeking to impose upon you the task of a collaborator. Kindly consider the question a part of the text.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“On one side was love and Kate; on the other side his heritage of social position and family pride. Would love win? Love, that the poets tell us will last forever! (<i>Perceives that Miss Lore looks fatigued, and looks at his watch.</i>) That’s a good long stretch. Perhaps we’d better knock off a bit.”</p>
|
||||
<p>(Miss Lore <i>does not reply</i>.)</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span>—I said, Miss Lore, we’ve been at it quite a long time—wouldn’t you like to knock off for a while?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh! Were you addressing me before? I put what you said down. I thought it belonged in the story. It seemed to fit in all right. Oh, no; I’m not tired.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span>—Very well, then, we will continue. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “In spite of these qualms and doubts, Cortland was a happy man. That night at the club he silently toasted Kate’s bright eyes in a bumper of the rarest vintage. Afterward he set out for a stroll with, as Kate on—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Excuse me, <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne, for venturing a suggestion; but don’t you think you might state that in a less coarse manner?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>astounded</i>)—Wh-wh—I’m afraid I fail to understand you.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—His condition. Why not say he was “full” or “intoxicated”? It would sound much more elegant than the way you express it.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>still darkly wandering</i>)—Will you kindly point out, Miss Lore, where I have intimated that Cortland was “full,” if you prefer that word?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span> (<i>calmly consulting her stenographic notes</i>)—It is right here, word for word. (Reads.) “Afterward he set out for a stroll with a skate on.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>with peculiar emphasis</i>)—Ah! And now will you kindly take down the expurgated phrase? (<i>Dictates</i>.) “Afterward he set out for a stroll with, as Kate on one occasion had fancifully told him, her spirit leaning upon his arm.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—Chapter thirty-four. Heading—“What Kate Found in the Garden.” “That fragrant summer morning brought gracious tasks to all. The bees were at the honeysuckle blossoms on the porch. Kate, singing a little song, was training the riotous branches of her favorite woodbine. The sun, himself, had rows—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Shall I say “had risen”?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>very slowly and with desperate deliberation</i>)—“The—sun—himself—had—rows—of—blushing—pinks—and—hollyhocks—and—hyacinths—waiting—that—he—might—dry—their—dew-drenched—cups.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“The earliest trolley, scattering the birds from its pathway like some marauding cat, brought Cortland over from Oldport. He had forgotten his fair—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Hm! Wonder how he got the conductor to—</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>very loudly</i>)—“Forgotten his fair and roseate visions of the night in the practical light of the sober morn.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“He greeted her with his usual smile and manner. ‘See the waves,’ he cried, pointing to the heaving waters of the sea, ‘ever wooing and returning to the rockbound shore.’ ” “ ‘Ready to break,’ Kate said, with—”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—My! One evening he has his arm around her, and the next morning he’s ready to break her head! Just like a man!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>with suspicious calmness</i>)—There are times, Miss Lore, when a man becomes so far exasperated that even a woman—But suppose we finish the sentence. (<i>Dictates</i>.) “ ‘Ready to break,’ Kate said, with the thrilling look of a soul-awakened woman, ‘into foam and spray, destroying themselves upon the shore they love so well.”</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Oh!</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>dictates</i>)—“Cortland, in Kate’s presence heard faintly the voice of caution. Thirty years had not cooled his ardor. It was in his power to bestow great gifts upon this girl. He still retained the beliefs that he had at twenty.” (<i>To Miss Lore, wearily</i>) I think that will be enough for the present.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span> (<i>wisely</i>)—Well, if he had the twenty that he believed he had, it might buy her a rather nice one.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>faintly</i>)—The last sentence was my own. We will discontinue for the day, Miss Lore.</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps">Miss Lore</span>—Shall I come again to-morrow?</p>
|
||||
<p><span class="smallcaps"><abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne</span> (<i>helpless under the spell</i>)—If you will be so good.</p>
|
||||
<p>(<i>Exit</i> Miss Lore.)</p>
|
||||
<p class="noindent">ASBESTOS CURTAIN</p>
|
||||
<p><b>ASBESTOS CURTAIN</b></p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
</html>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -48,7 +48,7 @@
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Poplar Avenue,’ says I, sarcastic. ‘Poplar Avenue! That’s a street to live on! It only runs two blocks and then falls off a bluff. You can throw a keg of nails the whole length of it. Don’t talk to me about Poplar Avenue.’</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘It’s—it’s miles long,’ says the kid. ‘Our number’s 862 and there’s lots of houses after that. What’s the matter with—aw, you make me tired, Jeff.’</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Well, well, now,’ says I. ‘I guess that man made a mistake. Maybe it was some other boy he was talking about. If I catch him I’ll teach him to go around slandering people.’ And after supper I goes up town and telegraphs to <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Conyers, 862 Poplar Avenue, Quincy, Ill., that the kid is safe and sassy with us, and will be held for further orders. In two hours an answer comes to hold him tight, and she’ll start for him by next train.</p>
|
||||
<p>“The next train was due at 6 <span class="smallcaps"><abbr class="time">p.m.</abbr></span> the next day, and me and John Tom was at the depot with the kid. You might scour the plains in vain for the big Chief Wish-Heap-Dough. In his place is <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Little Bear in the human habiliments of the Anglo-Saxon sect; and the leather of his shoes is patented and the loop of his necktie is copyrighted. For these things John Tom had grafted on him at college along with metaphysics and the knockout guard for the low tackle. But for his complexion, which is some yellowish, and the black mop of his straight hair, you might have thought here was an ordinary man out of the city directory that subscribes for magazines and pushes the lawn-mower in his shirt-sleeves of evenings.</p>
|
||||
<p>“The next train was due at 6 <abbr class="time">p.m.</abbr> the next day, and me and John Tom was at the depot with the kid. You might scour the plains in vain for the big Chief Wish-Heap-Dough. In his place is <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Little Bear in the human habiliments of the Anglo-Saxon sect; and the leather of his shoes is patented and the loop of his necktie is copyrighted. For these things John Tom had grafted on him at college along with metaphysics and the knockout guard for the low tackle. But for his complexion, which is some yellowish, and the black mop of his straight hair, you might have thought here was an ordinary man out of the city directory that subscribes for magazines and pushes the lawn-mower in his shirt-sleeves of evenings.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Then the train rolled in, and a little woman in a gray dress, with sort of illuminating hair, slides off and looks around quick. And the Boy Avenger sees her, and yells ‘Mamma,’ and she cries ‘O!’ and they meet in a clinch, and now the pesky redskins can come forth from their caves on the plains without fear any more of the rifle of Roy, the Red Wolf. <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Conyers comes up and thanks me an’ John Tom without the usual extremities you always look for in a woman. She says just enough, in a way to convince, and there is no incidental music by the orchestra. I made a few illiterate requisitions upon the art of conversation, at which the lady smiles friendly, as if she had known me a week. And then <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Little Bear adorns the atmosphere with the various idioms into which education can fracture the wind of speech. I could see the kid’s mother didn’t quite place John Tom; but it seemed she was apprised in his dialects, and she played up to his lead in the science of making three words do the work of one.</p>
|
||||
<p>“That kid introduced us, with some footnotes and explanations that made things plainer than a week of rhetoric. He danced around, and punched us in the back, and tried to climb John Tom’s leg. ‘This is John Tom, mamma,’ says he. ‘He’s a Indian. He sells medicine in a red wagon. I shot him, but he wasn’t wild. The other one’s Jeff. He’s a fakir, too. Come on and see the camp where we live, won’t you, mamma?’</p>
|
||||
<p>“It is plain to see that the life of the woman is in that boy. She has got him again where her arms can gather him, and that’s enough. She’s ready to do anything to please him. She hesitates the eighth of a second and takes another look at these men. I imagine she says to herself about John Tom, ‘Seems to be a gentleman, if his hair don’t curl.’ And <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Peters she disposes of as follows: ‘No ladies’ man, but a man who knows a lady.’</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -33,7 +33,7 @@
|
||||
<p>They stepped into the corridor, and each one of the doomed seven knew. Limbo Lane is a world on the outside of the world; but it had learned, when deprived of one or more of the five senses, to make another sense supply the deficiency. Each one knew that it was nearly eight, and that Murray was to go to the chair at eight. There is also in the many Limbo Lanes an aristocracy of crime. The man who kills in the open, who beats his enemy or pursuer down, flushed by the primitive emotions and the ardor of combat, holds in contempt the human rat, the spider, and the snake.</p>
|
||||
<p>So, of the seven condemned only three called their farewells to Murray as he marched down the corridor between the two guards—Bonifacio, Marvin, who had killed a guard while trying to escape from the prison, and Bassett, the train-robber, who was driven to it because the express-messenger wouldn’t raise his hands when ordered to do so. The remaining four smoldered, silent, in their cells, no doubt feeling their social ostracism in Limbo Lane society more keenly than they did the memory of their less picturesque offences against the law.</p>
|
||||
<p>Murray wondered at his own calmness and nearly indifference. In the execution room were about twenty men, a congregation made up of prison officers, newspaper reporters, and lookers-on who had succeeded</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Here, in the very middle of a sentence, the hand of Death interrupted the telling of O. Henry’s last story. He had planned to make this story different from his others, the beginning of a new series in a style he had not previously attempted. “I want to show the public,” he said, “that I can write something new—new for me, I mean—a story without slang, a straightforward dramatic plot treated in a way that will come nearer my idea of real story-writing.” Before starting to write the present story, he outlined briefly how he intended to develop it: Murray, the criminal accused and convicted of the brutal murder of his sweetheart—a murder prompted by jealous rage—at first faces the death penalty, calm, and, to all outward appearances, indifferent to his fate. As he nears the electric chair he is overcome by a revulsion of feeling. He is left dazed, stupefied, stunned. The entire scene in the death-chamber—the witnesses, the spectators, the preparations for execution—become unreal to him. The thought flashes through his brain that a terrible mistake is being made. Why is he being strapped to the chair? What has he done? What crime has he committed? In the few moments while the straps are being adjusted a vision comes to him. He dreams a dream. He sees a little country cottage, bright, sun-lit, nestling in a bower of flowers. A woman is there, and a little child. He speaks with them and finds that they are his wife, his child—and the cottage their home. So, after all, it is a mistake. Some one has frightfully, irretrievably blundered. The accusation, the trial, the conviction, the sentence to death in the electric chair—all a dream. He takes his wife in his arms and kisses the child. Yes, here is happiness. It was a dream. Then—at a sign from the prison warden the fatal current is turned on.</p>
|
||||
<p>Murray had dreamed the wrong dream.</p>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -46,7 +46,7 @@
|
||||
<p>I was too surprised to make any further comment.</p>
|
||||
<p>Bell lived in a comfortable, plain, square, two-story white house on the edge of the little town. I waited in the parlor—a room depressingly genteel—furnished with red plush, straw matting, looped-up lace curtains, and a glass case large enough to contain a mummy, full of mineral specimens.</p>
|
||||
<p>While I waited, I heard, upstairs, that unmistakable sound instantly recognized the world over—a bickering woman’s voice, rising as her anger and fury grew. I could hear, between the gusts, the temperate rumble of Bell’s tones, striving to oil the troubled waters.</p>
|
||||
<p>The storm subsided soon; but not before I had heard the woman say, in a lower, concentrated tone, rather more carrying than her high-pitched railings: “This is the last time. I tell you—the last time. Oh, you <i>will</i> understand.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The storm subsided soon; but not before I had heard the woman say, in a lower, concentrated tone, rather more carrying than her high-pitched railings: “This is the last time. I tell you—the last time. Oh, you <em>will</em> understand.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The household seemed to consist of only Bell and his wife and a servant or two. I was introduced to <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Bell at supper.</p>
|
||||
<p>At first sight she seemed to be a handsome woman, but I soon perceived that her charm had been spoiled. An uncontrolled petulance, I thought, and emotional egotism, an absence of poise and a habitual dissatisfaction had marred her womanhood. During the meal, she showed that false gayety, spurious kindliness and reactionary softness that mark the woman addicted to tantrums. Withal, she was a woman who might be attractive to many men.</p>
|
||||
<p>After supper, Bell and I took our chairs outside, set them on the grass in the moonlight and smoked. The full moon is a witch. In her light, truthful men dig up for you nuggets of purer gold; while liars squeeze out brighter colors from the tubes of their invention. I saw Bell’s broad, slow smile come out upon his face and linger there.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -99,7 +99,7 @@
|
||||
<p>“I never yet—struck a woman.”</p>
|
||||
<p>It were vain to attempt to con such men. There is no curriculum that can reckon with them in its ken. They are offshoots from the types whereof men say, “He will do this,” or “He will do that.” We only know that they exist; and that we can observe them, and tell one another of their bare performances, as children watch and speak of the marionettes.</p>
|
||||
<p>Yet it were a droll study in egoism to consider these two—one an assassin and a robber, standing above his victim; the other baser in his offences, if a lesser law-breaker, lying, abhorred, in the house of the wife he had persecuted, spoiled, and smitten, one a tiger, the other a dog-wolf—to consider each of them sickening at the foulness of the other; and each flourishing out of the mire of his manifest guilt his own immaculate standard—of conduct, if not of honor.</p>
|
||||
<p>The one retort of Doctor James must have struck home to the other’s remaining shreds of shame and manhood, for it proved the <i>coup de grâce</i>. A deep blush suffused his face—an ignominious <i>rosa mortis</i>; the respiration ceased, and, with scarcely a tremor, Chandler expired.</p>
|
||||
<p>The one retort of Doctor James must have struck home to the other’s remaining shreds of shame and manhood, for it proved the coup de grâce. A deep blush suffused his face—an ignominious <i xml:lang="la">rosa mortis</i>; the respiration ceased, and, with scarcely a tremor, Chandler expired.</p>
|
||||
<p>Close following upon his last breath came the negress, bringing the medicine. With a hand gently pressing upon the closed eyelids, Doctor James told her of the end. Not grief, but a hereditary rapprochement with death in the abstract, moved her to a dismal, watery snuffling, accompanied by her usual jeremiad.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Dar now! It’s in de Lawd’s hands. He am de jedge ob de transgressor, and de suppo’t of dem in distress. He gwine hab suppo’t us now. Cindy done paid out de last quarter fer dis bottle of physic, and it nebber come to no use.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Do I understand,” asked Doctor James, “that <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Chandler has no money?”</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -16,7 +16,7 @@
|
||||
<p>I am the richer by the acquaintance of four newspaper men. Singly, they are my encyclopedias, friends, mentors, and sometimes bankers. But now and then it happens that all of them will pitch upon the same printworthy incident of the passing earthly panorama and will send in reportorial constructions thereof to their respective journals. It is then that, for me, it is to laugh. For it seems that to each of them, trained and skilled as he may be, the same occurrence presents a different facet of the cut diamond, life.</p>
|
||||
<p>One will have it (let us say) that <abbr>Mme.</abbr> André Macarté’s apartment was looted by six burglars, who descended via the fire-escape and bore away a ruby tiara valued at two thousand dollars and a five-hundred-dollar prize Spitz dog, which (in violation of the expectoration ordinance) was making free with the halls of the Wuttapesituckquesunoowetunquah Apartments.</p>
|
||||
<p>My second “chiel” will take notes to the effect that while a friendly game of pinochle was in progress in the tenement rooms of <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Andy McCarty, a lady guest named Ruby O’Hara threw a burglar down six flights of stairs, where he was pinioned and held by a two-thousand-dollar English bulldog amid a crowd of five hundred excited spectators.</p>
|
||||
<p>My third chronicler and friend will gather the news threads of the happening in his own happy way; setting forth on the page for you to read that the house of Antonio Macartini was blown up at 6 <span class="smallcaps"><abbr class="time">a.m.</abbr></span>, by the Black Hand Society, on his refusing to leave two thousand dollars at a certain street corner, killing a pet five-hundred-dollar Pomeranian belonging to Alderman Rubitara’s little daughter (see photo and diagram opposite).</p>
|
||||
<p>My third chronicler and friend will gather the news threads of the happening in his own happy way; setting forth on the page for you to read that the house of Antonio Macartini was blown up at 6 <abbr class="time">a.m.</abbr>, by the Black Hand Society, on his refusing to leave two thousand dollars at a certain street corner, killing a pet five-hundred-dollar Pomeranian belonging to Alderman Rubitara’s little daughter (see photo and diagram opposite).</p>
|
||||
<p>Number four of my history-makers will simply construe from the premises the story that while an audience of two thousand enthusiasts was listening to a Rubinstein concert on Sixth Street, a woman who said she was <abbr>Mrs.</abbr> Andrew M. Carter threw a brick through a plate-glass window valued at five hundred dollars. The Carter woman claimed that some one in the building had stolen her dog.</p>
|
||||
<p>Now, the discrepancies in these registrations of the day’s doings need do no one hurt. Surely, one newspaper is enough for any man to prop against his morning water-bottle to fend off the smiling hatred of his wife’s glance. If he be foolish enough to read four he is no wiser than a Higher Critic.</p>
|
||||
<p>I remember (probably as well as you do) having read the parable of the talents. A prominent citizen, about to journey into a far country, first hands over to his servants his goods. To one he gives five talents; to another two; to another one—to every man according to his several ability, as the text has it. There are two versions of this parable, as you well know. There may be more—I do not know.</p>
|
||||
@ -80,18 +80,14 @@
|
||||
<p>Thus they get their chance. Amateur night is a kindly boon. It is charity divested of almsgiving. It is a brotherly hand reached down by members of the best united band of coworkers in the world to raise up less fortunate ones without labelling them beggars. It gives you the chance, if you can grasp it, to step for a few minutes before some badly painted scenery and, during the playing by the orchestra of some ten or twelve bars of music, and while the soles of your shoes may be clearly holding to the uppers, to secure a salary equal to a Congressman’s or any orthodox minister’s. Could an ambitious student of literature or financial methods get a chance like that by spending twenty minutes in a Carnegie library? I do not not trow so.</p>
|
||||
<p>But shall we look in at Creary’s? Let us say that the specific Friday night had arrived on which the fortunate Mac McGowan was to justify the flattering predictions of his distinguished patron and, incidentally, drop his silver talent into the slit of the slot-machine of fame and fortune that gives up reputation and dough. I offer, sure of your acquiescence, that we now forswear hypocritical philosophy and bigoted comment, permitting the story to finish itself in the dress of material allegations—a medium more worthy, when held to the line, than the most laborious creations of the word-milliners …</p>
|
||||
<blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="small">
|
||||
<p class="noindent">[Page of (O. Henry’s) manuscript missing here.]</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>[Page of (O. Henry’s) manuscript missing here.]</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p class="noindent">… easily among the wings with his patron, the great Del Delano. For, whatever footlights shone in the City-That-Would-Be-Amused, the freedom of their unshaded side was Del’s. And if he should take up an amateur—see? and bring him around—see? and, winking one of his cold blue eyes, say to the manager: “Take it from me—he’s got the goods—see?” you wouldn’t expect that amateur to sit on an unpainted bench sudorifically awaiting his turn, would you? So Mac strolled around largely with the nonpareil; and the seven waited, clammily, on the bench.</p>
|
||||
<p>A giant in shirt-sleeves, with a grim, kind face in which many stitches had been taken by surgeons from time to time, <i><abbr>i.e.</abbr></i>, with a long stick, looped at the end. He was the man with the Hook. The manager, with his close-smoothed blond hair, his one-sided smile, and his abnormally easy manner, pored with patient condescension over the difficult program of the amateurs. The last of the professional turns—the Grand March of the Happy Huzzard—had been completed; the last wrinkle and darn of their blue silkolene cotton tights had vanished from the stage. The man in the orchestra who played the kettle-drum, cymbals, triangle, sandpaper, whang-doodle, hoof-beats, and catcalls, and fired the pistol shots, had wiped his brow. The illegal holiday of the Romans had arrived.</p>
|
||||
<p>… easily among the wings with his patron, the great Del Delano. For, whatever footlights shone in the City-That-Would-Be-Amused, the freedom of their unshaded side was Del’s. And if he should take up an amateur—see? and bring him around—see? and, winking one of his cold blue eyes, say to the manager: “Take it from me—he’s got the goods—see?” you wouldn’t expect that amateur to sit on an unpainted bench sudorifically awaiting his turn, would you? So Mac strolled around largely with the nonpareil; and the seven waited, clammily, on the bench.</p>
|
||||
<p>A giant in shirt-sleeves, with a grim, kind face in which many stitches had been taken by surgeons from time to time, <abbr>i.e.</abbr>, with a long stick, looped at the end. He was the man with the Hook. The manager, with his close-smoothed blond hair, his one-sided smile, and his abnormally easy manner, pored with patient condescension over the difficult program of the amateurs. The last of the professional turns—the Grand March of the Happy Huzzard—had been completed; the last wrinkle and darn of their blue silkolene cotton tights had vanished from the stage. The man in the orchestra who played the kettle-drum, cymbals, triangle, sandpaper, whang-doodle, hoof-beats, and catcalls, and fired the pistol shots, had wiped his brow. The illegal holiday of the Romans had arrived.</p>
|
||||
<p>While the orchestra plays the famous waltz from “The Dismal Wife,” let us bestow two hundred words upon the psychology of the audience.</p>
|
||||
<p>The orchestra floor was filled by People. The boxes contained Persons. In the galleries was the Foreordained Verdict. The claque was there as it had originated in the Stone Age and was afterward adapted by the French. Every Micky and Maggie who sat upon Creary’s amateur bench, wise beyond their talents, knew that their success or doom lay already meted out to them by that crowded, whistling, roaring mass of Romans in the three galleries. They knew that the winning or the losing of the game for each one lay in the strength of the “gang” aloft that could turn the applause to its favorite. On a Broadway first night a wooer of fame may win it from the ticket buyers over the heads of the cognoscenti. But not so at Creary’s. The amateur’s fate is arithmetical. The number of his supporting admirers present at his try-out decides it in advance. But how these outlying Friday nights put to a certain shame the Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, and matinées of the Broadway stage you should know …</p>
|
||||
<blockquote>
|
||||
<blockquote class="small">
|
||||
<p class="noindent">[Here the manuscript ends.]</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<p>[Here the manuscript ends.]</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</section>
|
||||
</body>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -13,9 +13,7 @@
|
||||
<p>These two farcical stories about Tictocq appeared in <i epub:type="se:name.publication.magazine">The Rolling Stone</i>. They are reprinted here with all of their local references because, written hurriedly and for neighborly reading, they nevertheless have an interest for the admirer of O. Henry. They were written in 1894.</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<div class="center">
|
||||
<p class="noindent">THE GREAT FRENCH DETECTIVE, IN AUSTIN</p>
|
||||
</div>
|
||||
<p><b>THE GREAT FRENCH DETECTIVE, IN AUSTIN</b></p>
|
||||
<i>A Successful Political Intrigue</i>
|
||||
<section id="tictocq-1" epub:type="chapter">
|
||||
<h3 epub:type="title z3998:roman">I</h3>
|
||||
@ -39,7 +37,7 @@
|
||||
<p>“Bien, Monsieur; schlafen sie wohl.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Au revoir.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The Chairman of the Democratic Executive Committee, Platform No.2, bowed courteously and withdrew.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Tictocq sent for the bell boy.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Did you go to room 76 last night?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yes, sir.”</p>
|
||||
@ -100,7 +98,7 @@
|
||||
<p>Tictocq stands in the centre of the room. The electric light burns brightly above him. He seems the incarnation of alertness, vigor, cleverness, and cunning.</p>
|
||||
<p>The company seat themselves in chairs along the wall.</p>
|
||||
<p>“When informed of the robbery,” begins Tictocq, “I first questioned the bell boy. He knew nothing. I went to the police headquarters. They knew nothing. I invited one of them to the bar to drink. He said there used to be a little colored boy in the Tenth Ward who stole things and kept them for recovery by the police, but failed to be at the place agreed upon for arrest one time, and had been sent to jail.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I then began to think. I reasoned. No man, said I, would carry a Populist’s socks in his pocket without wrapping them up. He would not want to do so in the hotel. He would want a paper. Where would he get one? At the <i>Statesman</i> office, of course. I went there. A young man with his hair combed down on his forehead sat behind the desk. I knew he was writing society items, for a young lady’s slipper, a piece of cake, a fan, a half emptied bottle of cocktail, a bunch of roses, and a police whistle lay on the desk before him.</p>
|
||||
<p>“I then began to think. I reasoned. No man, said I, would carry a Populist’s socks in his pocket without wrapping them up. He would not want to do so in the hotel. He would want a paper. Where would he get one? At the <i epub:type="se:name.publication.newspaper">Statesman</i> office, of course. I went there. A young man with his hair combed down on his forehead sat behind the desk. I knew he was writing society items, for a young lady’s slipper, a piece of cake, a fan, a half emptied bottle of cocktail, a bunch of roses, and a police whistle lay on the desk before him.</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Can you tell me if a man purchased a paper here in the last three months?’ I said.</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Yes,’ he replied; ‘we sold one last night.</p>
|
||||
<p>“ ‘Can you describe the man?’</p>
|
||||
@ -119,7 +117,7 @@
|
||||
<p>The two other Populists in the room gazed at him coldly and sternly.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Is this tale true?” they demanded of the Candidate.</p>
|
||||
<p>“No, by gosh, it ain’t!” he replied, pointing a trembling finger at the Democratic Chairman. “There stands the man who has concocted the whole scheme. It is an infernal, unfair political trick to lose votes for our party. How far has thing gone?” he added, turning savagely to the detective.</p>
|
||||
<p>“All the newspapers have my written report on the matter, and the <i>Statesman</i> will have it in plate matter next week,” said Tictocq, complacently.</p>
|
||||
<p>“All the newspapers have my written report on the matter, and the <i epub:type="se:name.publication.newspaper">Statesman</i> will have it in plate matter next week,” said Tictocq, complacently.</p>
|
||||
<p>“All is lost!” said the Populists, turning toward the door.</p>
|
||||
<p>“For God’s sake, my friends,” pleaded the Candidate, following them; “listen to me; I swear before high heaven that I never wore a pair of socks in my life. It is all a devilish campaign lie.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The Populists turn their backs.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -8,10 +8,10 @@
|
||||
<body epub:type="bodymatter z3998:fiction">
|
||||
<section id="tracked-to-doom" epub:type="volume se:short-story">
|
||||
<header>
|
||||
<h2 epub:type="title">Tracked to Doom</h2>
|
||||
<blockquote epub:type="epigraph">
|
||||
<p>ORTHE MYSTERY OF THE RUE DE PEYCHAUD</p>
|
||||
</blockquote>
|
||||
<h2 epub:type="title">
|
||||
<span>Tracked to Doom</span>
|
||||
<span epub:type="subtitle">Or<br/>The Mystery of the Rue de Peychaud</span>
|
||||
</h2>
|
||||
</header>
|
||||
<p>’Tis midnight in Paris.</p>
|
||||
<p>A myriad of lamps that line the Champs Elysées and the Rouge et Noir, cast their reflection in the dark waters of the Seine as it flows gloomily past the Place Vendôme and the black walls of the Convent Notadam.</p>
|
||||
@ -30,7 +30,7 @@
|
||||
<p>“Voilà, Gray Wolf,” cries Couteau, the bartender. “How many victims to-day? There is no blood upon your hands. Has the Gray Wolf forgotten how to bite?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sacrè Bleu, Mille Tonnerre, by George,” hisses the Gray Wolf. “Monsieur Couteau, you are bold indeed to speak to me thus.</p>
|
||||
<p>“By Ventre <abbr>St.</abbr> Gris! I have not even dined to-day. Spoils indeed. There is no living in Paris now. But one rich American have I garroted in a fortnight.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Bah! those Democrats. They have ruined the country. With their income tax and their free trade, they have destroyed the millionaire business. Carrambo! Diable! D––––n it!”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Bah! those Democrats. They have ruined the country. With their income tax and their free trade, they have destroyed the millionaire business. Carrambo! Diable! D–n it!”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Hist!” suddenly says Chamounix the rag-picker, who is worth 20,000,000 francs, “some one comes!”</p>
|
||||
<p>The cellar door opened and a man crept softly down the rickety steps. The crowd watches him with silent awe.</p>
|
||||
<p>He went to the bar, laid his card on the counter, bought a drink of absinthe, and then drawing from his pocket a little mirror, set it up on the counter and proceeded to don a false beard and hair and paint his face into wrinkles, until he closely resembled an old man seventy-one years of age.</p>
|
||||
@ -49,7 +49,7 @@
|
||||
<p>He then enters rapidly in a memorandum book the result of his investigations, and leaves the cellar.</p>
|
||||
<p>Tictocq bends his rapid steps in the direction of the headquarters of the Paris gendarmerie, but suddenly pausing, he strikes his hand upon his brow with a gesture of impatience.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Mille tonnerre,” he mutters. “I should have asked the name of that man with the knife in his hand.”</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>It is reception night at the palace of the Duchess Valerie du Bellairs.</p>
|
||||
<p>The apartments are flooded with a mellow light from paraffine candles in solid silver candelabra.</p>
|
||||
<p>The company is the most aristocratic and wealthy in Paris.</p>
|
||||
@ -74,7 +74,7 @@
|
||||
<p>Twenty minutes later a dark and muffled figure was seen to emerge from a recess in the mullioned wall of the Arc de Triomphe and pass rapidly northward.</p>
|
||||
<p>It was no other than Tictocq, the detective.</p>
|
||||
<p>The network of evidence was fast being drawn about the murderer of Marie Cusheau.</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>It is midnight on the steeple of the Cathedral of Notadam.</p>
|
||||
<p>It is also the same time at other given points in the vicinity.</p>
|
||||
<p>The spire of the Cathedral is 20,000 feet above the pavement, and a casual observer, by making a rapid mathematical calculation, would have readily perceived that this Cathedral is, at least, double the height of others that measure only 10,000 feet.</p>
|
||||
@ -94,7 +94,7 @@
|
||||
<p>The Gray Wolf carefully adjusts the climbers on his feet and descends the spire.</p>
|
||||
<p>Tictocq takes out his notebook and writes in it.</p>
|
||||
<p>“At last,” he says, “I have a clue.”</p>
|
||||
<hr class="tiny"/>
|
||||
<hr/>
|
||||
<p>Monsieur le Compte Carnaignole Cusheau, once known as the Gray Wolf, stands in the magnificent drawing-room of his palace on East 47th Street.</p>
|
||||
<p>Three days after his confession to Tictocq, he happened to look in the pockets of a discarded pair of pants and found twenty million francs in gold.</p>
|
||||
<p>Suddenly the door opens and Tictocq, the detective, with a dozen gensd’arme, enters the room.</p>
|
||||
|
||||
@ -14,7 +14,118 @@
|
||||
<a href="text/imprint.xhtml">Imprint</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/chapter-1.xhtml"><span epub:type="z3998:roman">I</span>: CHAPTER_TITLE</a>
|
||||
<a href="text/.xhtml">The editor’s own statement of his aims</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/.xhtml">INTRODUCTION</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/a-dinner-at-3.xhtml">A DINNER AT ⸻<a href="#footnote3">[3]</a></a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/a-fog-in-santone.xhtml">A Fog in Santone</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/a-ruler-of-men.xhtml">A Ruler of Men</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/a-snapshot-at-the-president.xhtml">A Snapshot at the President</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/a-strange-story.xhtml">A Strange Story</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/an-apology.xhtml">An Apology</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/an-unfinished-christmas-story.xhtml">An Unfinished Christmas Story</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/aristocracy-versus-hash.xhtml">Aristocracy Versus Hash</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/bexar-scrip-no-2692.xhtml">Bexar Scrip No. 2692</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/fickle-fortune-or-how-gladys-hustled.xhtml">Fickle Fortune or How Gladys Hustled</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml">Helping the Other Fellow</a>
|
||||
<ol>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml#helping-the-other-fellow-2" epub:type="z3998:roman">II</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml#helping-the-other-fellow-3" epub:type="z3998:roman">III</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml#helping-the-other-fellow-4" epub:type="z3998:roman">IV</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
</ol>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml">Lord Oakhurst’s Curse</a>
|
||||
<ol>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml#lord-oakhursts-curse-1" epub:type="z3998:roman">I</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml#lord-oakhursts-curse-2" epub:type="z3998:roman">II</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml#lord-oakhursts-curse-3"><span epub:type="z3998:roman">III</span>: The Curse</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
</ol>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/queries-and-answers.xhtml">Queries and Answers</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/sound-and-fury.xhtml">Sound and Fury</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/sound-and-fury.xhtml#sound-and-fury">Scene—<i>Workroom of</i> <abbr>Mr.</abbr> Penne’s<i> popular novel factory</i>.</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/the-atavism-of-john-tom-little-bear.xhtml">The Atavism of John Tom Little Bear</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/the-dream.xhtml">The Dream</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/the-friendly-call.xhtml">The Friendly Call</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/the-marionettes.xhtml">The Marionettes</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/the-marquis-and-miss-sally.xhtml">The Marquis and Miss Sally</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/the-prisoner-of-zembla.xhtml">The Prisoner of Zembla</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/the-unprofitable-servant.xhtml">The Unprofitable Servant</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/tictocq.xhtml">Tictocq</a>
|
||||
<ol>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/tictocq.xhtml#tictocq-1" epub:type="z3998:roman">I</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/tictocq.xhtml#tictocq-2" epub:type="z3998:roman">II</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/tictocq.xhtml#tictocq-3" epub:type="z3998:roman">III</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
</ol>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/tracked-to-doom.xhtml">Tracked to Doom</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/endnotes.xhtml">Endnotes</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/colophon.xhtml">Colophon</a>
|
||||
@ -34,7 +145,7 @@
|
||||
<a href="text/imprint.xhtml" epub:type="frontmatter imprint">Imprint</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/chapter-1.xhtml" epub:type="bodymatter z3998:fiction">WORK_TITLE</a>
|
||||
<a href="text/.xhtml" epub:type="bodymatter z3998:fiction">Rolling Stones</a>
|
||||
</li>
|
||||
<li>
|
||||
<a href="text/colophon.xhtml" epub:type="backmatter colophon">Colophon</a>
|
||||
|
||||
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