HOW TO TELL A STORY
AND OTHERS
by Mark Twain
Contents
HOW TO TELL A STORY
The Humorous Story an American Development.—Its Difference
from Comic and Witty Stories.
I do not claim that I can tell a story as it ought to be told. I only
claim to know how a story ought to be told, for I have been almost daily
in the company of the most expert story-tellers for many years.
There are several kinds of stories, but only one difficult kind—the
humorous. I will talk mainly about that one. The humorous story is
American, the comic story is English, the witty story is French. The
humorous story depends for its effect upon the manner of the telling; the
comic story and the witty story upon the matter.
The humorous story may be spun out to great length, and may wander around
as much as it pleases, and arrive nowhere in particular; but the comic and
witty stories must be brief and end with a point. The humorous story
bubbles gently along, the others burst.
The humorous story is strictly a work of art—high and delicate art—and
only an artist can tell it; but no art is necessary in telling the comic
and the witty story; anybody can do it. The art of telling a humorous
story—understand, I mean by word of mouth, not print—was
created in America, and has remained at home.
The humorous story is told gravely; the teller does his best to conceal
the fact that he even dimly suspects that there is anything funny about
it; but the teller of the comic story tells you beforehand that it is one
of the funniest things he has ever heard, then tells it with eager
delight, and is the first person to laugh when he gets through. And
sometimes, if he has had good success, he is so glad and happy that he
will repeat the "nub" of it and glance around from face to face,
collecting applause, and then repeat it again. It is a pathetic thing to
see.
Very often, of course, the rambling and disjointed humorous story finishes
with a nub, point, snapper, or whatever you like to call it. Then the
listener must be alert, for in many cases the teller will divert attention
from that nub by dropping it in a carefully casual and indifferent way,
with the pretence that he does not know it is a nub.
Artemus Ward used that trick a good deal; then when the belated audience
presently caught the joke he would look up with innocent surprise, as if
wondering what they had found to laugh at. Dan Setchell used it before
him, Nye and Riley and others use it to-day.
But the teller of the comic story does not slur the nub; he shouts it at
you—every time. And when he prints it, in England, France, Germany,
and Italy, he italicizes it, puts some whooping exclamation-points after
it, and sometimes explains it in a parenthesis. All of which is very
depressing, and makes one want to renounce joking and lead a better life.
Let me set down an instance of the comic method, using an anecdote which
has been popular all over the world for twelve or fifteen hundred years.
The teller tells it in this way:
THE WOUNDED SOLDIER.
In the course of a certain battle a soldier whose leg had been shot off
appealed to another soldier who was hurrying by to carry him to the rear,
informing him at the same time of the loss which he had sustained;
whereupon the generous son of Mars, shouldering the unfortunate, proceeded
to carry out his desire. The bullets and cannon-balls were flying in all
directions, and presently one of the latter took the wounded man's head
off—without, however, his deliverer being aware of it. In no-long
time he was hailed by an officer, who said:
"Where are you going with that carcass?"
"To the rear, sir—he's lost his leg!"
"His leg, forsooth?" responded the astonished officer; "you mean his head,
you booby."
Whereupon the soldier dispossessed himself of his burden, and stood
looking down upon it in great perplexity. At length he said:
"It is true, sir, just as you have said." Then after a pause he added,
"But he TOLD me IT WAS HIS LEG—"
Here the narrator bursts into explosion after explosion of thunderous
horse-laughter, repeating that nub from time to time through his gaspings
and shriekings and suffocatings.
It takes only a minute and a half to tell that in its comic-story form;
and isn't worth the telling, after all. Put into the humorous-story form
it takes ten minutes, and is about the funniest thing I have ever listened
to—as James Whitcomb Riley tells it.
He tells it in the character of a dull-witted old farmer who has just
heard it for the first time, thinks it is unspeakably funny, and is trying
to repeat it to a neighbor. But he can't remember it; so he gets all mixed
up and wanders helplessly round and round, putting in tedious details that
don't belong in the tale and only retard it; taking them out
conscientiously and putting in others that are just as useless; making
minor mistakes now and then and stopping to correct them and explain how
he came to make them; remembering things which he forgot to put in in
their proper place and going back to put them in there; stopping his
narrative a good while in order to try to recall the name of the soldier
that was hurt, and finally remembering that the soldier's name was not
mentioned, and remarking placidly that the name is of no real importance,
anyway—better, of course, if one knew it, but not essential, after
all—and so on, and so on, and so on.
The teller is innocent and happy and pleased with himself, and has to stop
every little while to hold himself in and keep from laughing outright; and
does hold in, but his body quakes in a jelly-like way with interior
chuckles; and at the end of the ten minutes the audience have laughed
until they are exhausted, and the tears are running down their faces.
The simplicity and innocence and sincerity and unconsciousness of the old
farmer are perfectly simulated, and the result is a performance which is
thoroughly charming and delicious. This is art and fine and beautiful, and
only a master can compass it; but a machine could tell the other story.
To string incongruities and absurdities together in a wandering and
sometimes purposeless way, and seem innocently unaware that they are
absurdities, is the basis of the American art, if my position is correct.
Another feature is the slurring of the point. A third is the dropping of a
studied remark apparently without knowing it, as if one were thinking
aloud. The fourth and last is the pause.
Artemus Ward dealt in numbers three and four a good deal. He would begin
to tell with great animation something which he seemed to think was
wonderful; then lose confidence, and after an apparently absent-minded
pause add an incongruous remark in a soliloquizing way; and that was the
remark intended to explode the mine—and it did.
For instance, he would say eagerly, excitedly, "I once knew a man in New
Zealand who hadn't a tooth in his head"—here his animation would die
out; a silent, reflective pause would follow, then he would say dreamily,
and as if to himself, "and yet that man could beat a drum better than any
man I ever saw."
The pause is an exceedingly important feature in any kind of story, and a
frequently recurring feature, too. It is a dainty thing, and delicate, and
also uncertain and treacherous; for it must be exactly the right length—no
more and no less—or it fails of its purpose and makes trouble. If
the pause is too short the impressive point is passed, and [and if too
long] the audience have had time to divine that a surprise is intended—and
then you can't surprise them, of course.
On the platform I used to tell a negro ghost story that had a pause in
front of the snapper on the end, and that pause was the most important
thing in the whole story. If I got it the right length precisely, I could
spring the finishing ejaculation with effect enough to make some
impressible girl deliver a startled little yelp and jump out of her seat—and
that was what I was after. This story was called "The Golden Arm," and was
told in this fashion. You can practise with it yourself—and mind you
look out for the pause and get it right.
THE GOLDEN ARM.
Once 'pon a time dey wuz a monsus mean man, en he live 'way out in de
prairie all 'lone by hisself, 'cep'n he had a wife. En bimeby she died, en
he tuck en toted her way out dah in de prairie en buried her. Well, she
had a golden arm—all solid gold, fum de shoulder down. He wuz
pow'ful mean—pow'ful; en dat night he couldn't sleep, Gaze he want
dat golden arm so bad.
When it come midnight he couldn't stan' it no mo'; so he git up, he did,
en tuck his lantern en shoved out thoo de storm en dug her up en got de
golden arm; en he bent his head down 'gin de win', en plowed en plowed en
plowed thoo de snow. Den all on a sudden he stop (make a considerable
pause here, and look startled, and take a listening attitude) en say: "My
LAN', what's dat!"
En he listen—en listen—en de win' say (set your teeth together
and imitate the wailing and wheezing singsong of the wind), "Bzzz-z-zzz"—en
den, way back yonder whah de grave is, he hear a voice! he hear a voice
all mix' up in de win' can't hardly tell 'em 'part—"Bzzz-zzz—W-h-o—g-o-t—m-y—g-o-l-d-e-n
arm?—zzz—zzz—W-h-o g-o-t m-y g-o-l-d-e-n arm!" (You must
begin to shiver violently now.)
En he begin to shiver en shake, en say, "Oh, my! OH, my lan'!" en de win'
blow de lantern out, en de snow en sleet blow in his face en mos' choke
him, en he start a-plowin' knee-deep towards home mos' dead, he so sk'yerd—en
pooty soon he hear de voice agin, en (pause) it 'us comin' after him!
"Bzzz—zzz—zzz—W-h-o—g-o-t m-y—g-o-l-d-e-n—arm?"
When he git to de pasture he hear it agin closter now, en a-comin'!—a-comin'
back dah in de dark en de storm—(repeat the wind and the voice).
When he git to de house he rush up-stairs en jump in de bed en kiver up,
head and years, en lay dah shiverin' en shakin'—en den way out dah
he hear it agin!—en a-comin'! En bimeby he hear (pause—awed,
listening attitude)—pat—pat—pat—hit's acomin'
up-stairs! Den he hear de latch, en he know it's in de room!
Den pooty soon he know it's a-stannin' by de bed! (Pause.) Den—he
know it's a-bendin' down over him—en he cain't skasely git his
breath! Den—den—he seem to feel someth' n c-o-l-d, right down
'most agin his head! (Pause.)
Den de voice say, right at his year—"W-h-o g-o-t—m-y—g-o-l-d-e-n
arm?" (You must wail it out very plaintively and accusingly; then you
stare steadily and impressively into the face of the farthest-gone auditor—a
girl, preferably—and let that awe-inspiring pause begin to build
itself in the deep hush. When it has reached exactly the right length,
jump suddenly at that girl and yell, "You've got it!")
If you've got the pause right, she'll fetch a dear little yelp and spring
right out of her shoes. But you must get the pause right; and you will
find it the most troublesome and aggravating and uncertain thing you ever
undertook.
MENTAL TELEGRAPHY AGAIN
I have three or four curious incidents to tell about. They seem to come
under the head of what I named "Mental Telegraphy" in a paper written
seventeen years ago, and published long afterwards.—[The paper
entitled "Mental Telegraphy," which originally appeared in Harper's
Magazine for December, 1893, is included in the volume entitled The
American Claimant and Other Stories and Sketches.]
Several years ago I made a campaign on the platform with Mr. George W.
Cable. In Montreal we were honored with a reception. It began at two in
the afternoon in a long drawing-room in the Windsor Hotel. Mr. Cable and I
stood at one end of this room, and the ladies and gentlemen entered it at
the other end, crossed it at that end, then came up the long left-hand
side, shook hands with us, said a word or two, and passed on, in the usual
way. My sight is of the telescopic sort, and I presently recognized a
familiar face among the throng of strangers drifting in at the distant
door, and I said to myself, with surprise and high gratification, "That is
Mrs. R.; I had forgotten that she was a Canadian." She had been a great
friend of mine in Carson City, Nevada, in the early days. I had not seen
her or heard of her for twenty years; I had not been thinking about her;
there was nothing to suggest her to me, nothing to bring her to my mind;
in fact, to me she had long ago ceased to exist, and had disappeared from
my consciousness. But I knew her instantly; and I saw her so clearly that
I was able to note some of the particulars of her dress, and did note
them, and they remained in my mind. I was impatient for her to come. In
the midst of the hand-shakings I snatched glimpses of her and noted her
progress with the slow-moving file across the end of the room; then I saw
her start up the side, and this gave me a full front view of her face. I
saw her last when she was within twenty-five feet of me. For an hour I
kept thinking she must still be in the room somewhere and would come at
last, but I was disappointed.
When I arrived in the lecture-hall that evening some one said: "Come into
the waiting-room; there's a friend of yours there who wants to see you.
You'll not be introduced—you are to do the recognizing without help
if you can."
I said to myself: "It is Mrs. R.; I shan't have any trouble."
There were perhaps ten ladies present, all seated. In the midst of them
was Mrs. R., as I had expected. She was dressed exactly as she was when I
had seen her in the afternoon. I went forward and shook hands with her and
called her by name, and said:
"I knew you the moment you appeared at the reception this afternoon." She
looked surprised, and said: "But I was not at the reception. I have just
arrived from Quebec, and have not been in town an hour."
It was my turn to be surprised now. I said: "I can't help it. I give you
my word of honor that it is as I say. I saw you at the reception, and you
were dressed precisely as you are now. When they told me a moment ago that
I should find a friend in this room, your image rose before me, dress and
all, just as I had seen you at the reception."
Those are the facts. She was not at the reception at all, or anywhere near
it; but I saw her there nevertheless, and most clearly and unmistakably.
To that I could make oath. How is one to explain this? I was not thinking
of her at the time; had not thought of her for years. But she had been
thinking of me, no doubt; did her thoughts flit through leagues of air to
me, and bring with it that clear and pleasant vision of herself? I think
so. That was and remains my sole experience in the matter of apparitions—I
mean apparitions that come when one is (ostensibly) awake. I could have
been asleep for a moment; the apparition could have been the creature of a
dream. Still, that is nothing to the point; the feature of interest is the
happening of the thing just at that time, instead of at an earlier or
later time, which is argument that its origin lay in thought-transference.
My next incident will be set aside by most persons as being merely a
"coincidence," I suppose. Years ago I used to think sometimes of making a
lecturing trip through the antipodes and the borders of the Orient, but
always gave up the idea, partly because of the great length of the journey
and partly because my wife could not well manage to go with me. Towards
the end of last January that idea, after an interval of years, came
suddenly into my head again—forcefully, too, and without any
apparent reason. Whence came it? What suggested it? I will touch upon that
presently.
I was at that time where I am now—in Paris. I wrote at once to Henry
M. Stanley (London), and asked him some questions about his Australian
lecture tour, and inquired who had conducted him and what were the terms.
After a day or two his answer came. It began:
"The lecture agent for Australia and New Zealand is par
excellence Mr. R. S. Smythe, of Melbourne."
He added his itinerary, terms, sea expenses, and some other matters, and
advised me to write Mr. Smythe, which I did—February 3d. I began my
letter by saying in substance that while he did not know me personally we
had a mutual friend in Stanley, and that would answer for an introduction.
Then I proposed my trip, and asked if he would give me the same terms
which he had given Stanley.
I mailed my letter to Mr. Smythe February 6th, and three days later I got
a letter from the selfsame Smythe, dated Melbourne, December 17th. I would
as soon have expected to get a letter from the late George Washington. The
letter began somewhat as mine to him had begun—with a
self-introduction:
"DEAR MR. CLEMENS,—It is so long since Archibald Forbes and I
spent that pleasant afternoon in your comfortable house at
Hartford that you have probably quite forgotten the occasion."
In the course of his letter this occurs:
"I am willing to give you" [here he named the terms which he
had given Stanley] "for an antipodean tour to last, say, three
months."
Here was the single essential detail of my letter answered three days
after I had mailed my inquiry. I might have saved myself the trouble and
the postage—and a few years ago I would have done that very thing,
for I would have argued that my sudden and strong impulse to write and ask
some questions of a stranger on the under side of the globe meant that the
impulse came from that stranger, and that he would answer my questions of
his own motion if I would let him alone.
Mr. Smythe's letter probably passed under my nose on its way to lose three
weeks traveling to America and back, and gave me a whiff of its contents
as it went along. Letters often act like that. Instead of the thought
coming to you in an instant from Australia, the (apparently) unsentient
letter imparts it to you as it glides invisibly past your elbow in the
mail-bag.
Next incident. In the following month—March—I was in America.
I spent a Sunday at Irvington-on-the-Hudson with Mr. John Brisben Walker,
of the Cosmopolitan magazine. We came into New York next morning, and went
to the Century Club for luncheon. He said some praiseful things about the
character of the club and the orderly serenity and pleasantness of its
quarters, and asked if I had never tried to acquire membership in it. I
said I had not, and that New York clubs were a continuous expense to the
country members without being of frequent use or benefit to them.
"And now I've got an idea!" said I. "There's the Lotos—the first New
York club I was ever a member of—my very earliest love in that line.
I have been a member of it for considerably more than twenty years, yet
have seldom had a chance to look in and see the boys. They turn gray and
grow old while I am not watching. And my dues go on. I am going to
Hartford this afternoon for a day or two, but as soon as I get back I will
go to John Elderkin very privately and say: 'Remember the veteran and
confer distinction upon him, for the sake of old times. Make me an
honorary member and abolish the tax. If you haven't any such thing as
honorary membership, all the better—create it for my honor and
glory.' That would be a great thing; I will go to John Elderkin as soon as
I get back from Hartford."
I took the last express that afternoon, first telegraphing Mr. F. G.
Whitmore to come and see me next day. When he came he asked: "Did you get
a letter from Mr. John Elderkin, secretary of the Lotos Club, before you
left New York?"
"Then it just missed you. If I had known you were coming I would have kept
it. It is beautiful, and will make you proud. The Board of Directors, by
unanimous vote, have made you a life member, and squelched those dues;
and, you are to be on hand and receive your distinction on the night of
the 30th, which is the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of the
club, and it will not surprise me if they have some great times there."
What put the honorary membership in my head that day in the Century Club?
for I had never thought of it before. I don't know what brought the
thought to me at that particular time instead of earlier, but I am well
satisfied that it originated with the Board of Directors, and had been on
its way to my brain through the air ever since the moment that saw their
vote recorded.
Another incident. I was in Hartford two or three days as a guest of the
Rev. Joseph H. Twichell. I have held the rank of Honorary Uncle to his
children for a quarter of a century, and I went out with him in the
trolley-car to visit one of my nieces, who is at Miss Porter's famous
school in Farmington. The distance is eight or nine miles. On the way,
talking, I illustrated something with an anecdote. This is the anecdote:
Two years and a half ago I and the family arrived at Milan on our way to
Rome, and stopped at the Continental. After dinner I went below and took a
seat in the stone-paved court, where the customary lemon-trees stand in
the customary tubs, and said to myself, "Now this is comfort, comfort and
repose, and nobody to disturb it; I do not know anybody in Milan."
Then a young gentleman stepped up and shook hands, which damaged my
theory. He said, in substance:
"You won't remember me, Mr. Clemens, but I remember you very well. I was a
cadet at West Point when you and Rev. Joseph H. Twichell came there some
years ago and talked to us on a Hundredth Night. I am a lieutenant in the
regular army now, and my name is H. I am in Europe, all alone, for a
modest little tour; my regiment is in Arizona."
We became friendly and sociable, and in the course of the talk he told me
of an adventure which had befallen him—about to this effect:
"I was at Bellagio, stopping at the big hotel there, and ten days ago I
lost my letter of credit. I did not know what in the world to do. I was a
stranger; I knew no one in Europe; I hadn't a penny in my pocket; I
couldn't even send a telegram to London to get my lost letter replaced; my
hotel bill was a week old, and the presentation of it imminent—so
imminent that it could happen at any moment now. I was so frightened that
my wits seemed to leave me. I tramped and tramped, back and forth, like a
crazy person. If anybody approached me I hurried away, for no matter what
a person looked like, I took him for the head waiter with the bill.
"I was at last in such a desperate state that I was ready to do any wild
thing that promised even the shadow of help, and so this is the insane
thing that I did. I saw a family lunching at a small table on the veranda,
and recognized their nationality—Americans—father, mother, and
several young daughters—young, tastefully dressed, and pretty—the
rule with our people. I went straight there in my civilian costume, named
my name, said I was a lieutenant in the army, and told my story and asked
for help.
"What do you suppose the gentleman did? But you would not guess in twenty
years. He took out a handful of gold coin and told me to help myself—freely.
That is what he did."
The next morning the lieutenant told me his new letter of credit had
arrived in the night, so we strolled to Cook's to draw money to pay back
the benefactor with. We got it, and then went strolling through the great
arcade. Presently he said, "Yonder they are; come and be introduced." I
was introduced to the parents and the young ladies; then we separated, and
I never saw him or them any m—-
"Here we are at Farmington," said Twichell, interrupting.
We left the trolley-car and tramped through the mud a hundred yards or so
to the school, talking about the time we and Warner walked out there years
ago, and the pleasant time we had.
We had a visit with my niece in the parlor, then started for the trolley
again. Outside the house we encountered a double rank of twenty or thirty
of Miss Porter's young ladies arriving from a walk, and we stood aside,
ostensibly to let them have room to file past, but really to look at them.
Presently one of them stepped out of the rank and said:
"You don't know me, Mr. Twichell; but I know your daughter, and that gives
me the privilege of shaking hands with you."
Then she put out her hand to me, and said:
"And I wish to shake hands with you too, Mr. Clemens. You don't remember
me, but you were introduced to me in the arcade in Milan two years and a
half ago by Lieutenant H."
What had put that story into my head after all that stretch of time? Was
it just the proximity of that young girl, or was it merely an odd
accident?
THE INVALID'S STORY
I seem sixty and married, but these effects are due to my condition and
sufferings, for I am a bachelor, and only forty-one. It will be hard for
you to believe that I, who am now but a shadow, was a hale, hearty man two
short years ago, a man of iron, a very athlete!—yet such is the
simple truth. But stranger still than this fact is the way in which I lost
my health. I lost it through helping to take care of a box of guns on a
two-hundred-mile railway journey one winter's night. It is the actual
truth, and I will tell you about it.
I belong in Cleveland, Ohio. One winter's night, two years ago, I reached
home just after dark, in a driving snow-storm, and the first thing I heard
when I entered the house was that my dearest boyhood friend and
schoolmate, John B. Hackett, had died the day before, and that his last
utterance had been a desire that I would take his remains home to his poor
old father and mother in Wisconsin. I was greatly shocked and grieved, but
there was no time to waste in emotions; I must start at once. I took the
card, marked "Deacon Levi Hackett, Bethlehem, Wisconsin," and hurried off
through the whistling storm to the railway station. Arrived there I found
the long white-pine box which had been described to me; I fastened the
card to it with some tacks, saw it put safely aboard the express car, and
then ran into the eating-room to provide myself with a sandwich and some
cigars. When I returned, presently, there was my coffin-box back again,
apparently, and a young fellow examining around it, with a card in his
hands, and some tacks and a hammer! I was astonished and puzzled. He began
to nail on his card, and I rushed out to the express car, in a good deal
of a state of mind, to ask for an explanation. But no—there was my
box, all right, in the express car; it hadn't been disturbed. [The fact is
that without my suspecting it a prodigious mistake had been made. I was
carrying off a box of guns which that young fellow had come to the station
to ship to a rifle company in Peoria, Illinois, and he had got my corpse!]
Just then the conductor sung out "All aboard," and I jumped into the
express car and got a comfortable seat on a bale of buckets. The
expressman was there, hard at work,—a plain man of fifty, with a
simple, honest, good-natured face, and a breezy, practical heartiness in
his general style. As the train moved off a stranger skipped into the car
and set a package of peculiarly mature and capable Limburger cheese on one
end of my coffin-box—I mean my box of guns. That is to say, I know
now that it was Limburger cheese, but at that time I never had heard of
the article in my life, and of course was wholly ignorant of its
character. Well, we sped through the wild night, the bitter storm raged
on, a cheerless misery stole over me, my heart went down, down, down! The
old expressman made a brisk remark or two about the tempest and the arctic
weather, slammed his sliding doors to, and bolted them, closed his window
down tight, and then went bustling around, here and there and yonder,
setting things to rights, and all the time contentedly humming "Sweet By
and By," in a low tone, and flatting a good deal. Presently I began to
detect a most evil and searching odor stealing about on the frozen air.
This depressed my spirits still more, because of course I attributed it to
my poor departed friend. There was something infinitely saddening about
his calling himself to my remembrance in this dumb pathetic way, so it was
hard to keep the tears back. Moreover, it distressed me on account of the
old expressman, who, I was afraid, might notice it. However, he went
humming tranquilly on, and gave no sign; and for this I was grateful.
Grateful, yes, but still uneasy; and soon I began to feel more and more
uneasy every minute, for every minute that went by that odor thickened up
the more, and got to be more and more gamey and hard to stand. Presently,
having got things arranged to his satisfaction, the expressman got some
wood and made up a tremendous fire in his stove.
This distressed me more than I can tell, for I could not but feel that it
was a mistake. I was sure that the effect would be deleterious upon my
poor departed friend. Thompson—the expressman's name was Thompson,
as I found out in the course of the night—now went poking around his
car, stopping up whatever stray cracks he could find, remarking that it
didn't make any difference what kind of a night it was outside, he
calculated to make us comfortable, anyway. I said nothing, but I believed
he was not choosing the right way. Meantime he was humming to himself just
as before; and meantime, too, the stove was getting hotter and hotter, and
the place closer and closer. I felt myself growing pale and qualmish, but
grieved in silence and said nothing.
Soon I noticed that the "Sweet By and By" was gradually fading out; next
it ceased altogether, and there was an ominous stillness. After a few
moments Thompson said,
"Pfew! I reckon it ain't no cinnamon 't I've loaded up thish-yer stove
with!"
He gasped once or twice, then moved toward the cof—gun-box, stood
over that Limburger cheese part of a moment, then came back and sat down
near me, looking a good deal impressed. After a contemplative pause, he
said, indicating the box with a gesture,
"Friend of yourn?"
"Yes," I said with a sigh.
"He's pretty ripe, ain't he!"
Nothing further was said for perhaps a couple of minutes, each being busy
with his own thoughts; then Thompson said, in a low, awed voice,
"Sometimes it's uncertain whether they're really gone or not,—seem
gone, you know—body warm, joints limber—and so, although you
think they're gone, you don't really know. I've had cases in my car. It's
perfectly awful, becuz you don't know what minute they'll rise up and look
at you!" Then, after a pause, and slightly lifting his elbow toward the
box,—"But he ain't in no trance! No, sir, I go bail for him!"
We sat some time, in meditative silence, listening to the wind and the
roar of the train; then Thompson said, with a good deal of feeling,
"Well-a-well, we've all got to go, they ain't no getting around it. Man
that is born of woman is of few days and far between, as Scriptur' says.
Yes, you look at it any way you want to, it's awful solemn and cur'us:
they ain't nobody can get around it; all's got to go—just everybody,
as you may say. One day you're hearty and strong"—here he scrambled
to his feet and broke a pane and stretched his nose out at it a moment or
two, then sat down again while I struggled up and thrust my nose out at
the same place, and this we kept on doing every now and then—"and
next day he's cut down like the grass, and the places which knowed him
then knows him no more forever, as Scriptur' says. Yes'ndeedy, it's awful
solemn and cur'us; but we've all got to go, one time or another; they
ain't no getting around it."
There was another long pause; then,—
"What did he die of?"
I said I didn't know.
"How long has he ben dead?"
It seemed judicious to enlarge the facts to fit the probabilities; so I
said,
"Two or three days."
But it did no good; for Thompson received it with an injured look which
plainly said, "Two or three years, you mean." Then he went right along,
placidly ignoring my statement, and gave his views at considerable length
upon the unwisdom of putting off burials too long. Then he lounged off
toward the box, stood a moment, then came back on a sharp trot and visited
the broken pane, observing,
"'Twould 'a' ben a dum sight better, all around, if they'd started him
along last summer."
Thompson sat down and buried his face in his red silk handkerchief, and
began to slowly sway and rock his body like one who is doing his best to
endure the almost unendurable. By this time the fragrance—if you may
call it fragrance—was just about suffocating, as near as you can
come at it. Thompson's face was turning gray; I knew mine hadn't any color
left in it. By and by Thompson rested his forehead in his left hand, with
his elbow on his knee, and sort of waved his red handkerchief towards the
box with his other hand, and said,—
"I've carried a many a one of 'em,—some of 'em considerable overdue,
too,—but, lordy, he just lays over 'em all!—and does it easy
Cap., they was heliotrope to HIM!"
This recognition of my poor friend gratified me, in spite of the sad
circumstances, because it had so much the sound of a compliment.
Pretty soon it was plain that something had got to be done. I suggested
cigars. Thompson thought it was a good idea. He said,
"Likely it'll modify him some."
We puffed gingerly along for a while, and tried hard to imagine that
things were improved. But it wasn't any use. Before very long, and without
any consultation, both cigars were quietly dropped from our nerveless
fingers at the same moment. Thompson said, with a sigh,
"No, Cap., it don't modify him worth a cent. Fact is, it makes him worse,
becuz it appears to stir up his ambition. What do you reckon we better do,
now?"
I was not able to suggest anything; indeed, I had to be swallowing and
swallowing, all the time, and did not like to trust myself to speak.
Thompson fell to maundering, in a desultory and low-spirited way, about
the miserable experiences of this night; and he got to referring to my
poor friend by various titles,—sometimes military ones, sometimes
civil ones; and I noticed that as fast as my poor friend's effectiveness
grew, Thompson promoted him accordingly,—gave him a bigger title.
Finally he said,
"I've got an idea. Suppos' n we buckle down to it and give the Colonel a
bit of a shove towards t'other end of the car?—about ten foot, say.
He wouldn't have so much influence, then, don't you reckon?"
I said it was a good scheme. So we took in a good fresh breath at the
broken pane, calculating to hold it till we got through; then we went
there and bent over that deadly cheese and took a grip on the box.
Thompson nodded "All ready," and then we threw ourselves forward with all
our might; but Thompson slipped, and slumped down with his nose on the
cheese, and his breath got loose. He gagged and gasped, and floundered up
and made a break for the door, pawing the air and saying hoarsely, "Don't
hender me!—gimme the road! I'm a-dying; gimme the road!" Out on the
cold platform I sat down and held his head a while, and he revived.
Presently he said,
"Do you reckon we started the Gen'rul any?"
I said no; we hadn't budged him.
"Well, then, that idea's up the flume. We got to think up something else.
He's suited wher' he is, I reckon; and if that's the way he feels about
it, and has made up his mind that he don't wish to be disturbed, you bet
he's a-going to have his own way in the business. Yes, better leave him
right wher' he is, long as he wants it so; becuz he holds all the trumps,
don't you know, and so it stands to reason that the man that lays out to
alter his plans for him is going to get left."
But we couldn't stay out there in that mad storm; we should have frozen to
death. So we went in again and shut the door, and began to suffer once
more and take turns at the break in the window. By and by, as we were
starting away from a station where we had stopped a moment, Thompson
pranced in cheerily and exclaimed,
"We're all right, now! I reckon we've got the Commodore this time. I judge
I've got the stuff here that'll take the tuck out of him."
It was carbolic acid. He had a carboy of it. He sprinkled it all around
everywhere; in fact he drenched everything with it, rifle-box, cheese and
all. Then we sat down, feeling pretty hopeful. But it wasn't for long. You
see the two perfumes began to mix, and then—well, pretty soon we
made a break for the door; and out there Thompson swabbed his face with
his bandanna and said in a kind of disheartened way,
"It ain't no use. We can't buck agin him. He just utilizes everything we
put up to modify him with, and gives it his own flavor and plays it back
on us. Why, Cap., don't you know, it's as much as a hundred times worse in
there now than it was when he first got a-going. I never did see one of
'em warm up to his work so, and take such a dumnation interest in it. No,
Sir, I never did, as long as I've ben on the road; and I've carried a many
a one of 'em, as I was telling you."
We went in again after we were frozen pretty stiff; but my, we couldn't
stay in, now. So we just waltzed back and forth, freezing, and thawing,
and stifling, by turns. In about an hour we stopped at another station;
and as we left it Thompson came in with a bag, and said,—
"Cap., I'm a-going to chance him once more,—just this once; and if
we don't fetch him this time, the thing for us to do, is to just throw up
the sponge and withdraw from the canvass. That's the way I put it up." He
had brought a lot of chicken feathers, and dried apples, and leaf tobacco,
and rags, and old shoes, and sulphur, and asafoetida, and one thing or
another; and he, piled them on a breadth of sheet iron in the middle of
the floor, and set fire to them.
When they got well started, I couldn't see, myself, how even the corpse
could stand it. All that went before was just simply poetry to that smell,—but
mind you, the original smell stood up out of it just as sublime as ever,—fact
is, these other smells just seemed to give it a better hold; and my, how
rich it was! I didn't make these reflections there—there wasn't time—made
them on the platform. And breaking for the platform, Thompson got
suffocated and fell; and before I got him dragged out, which I did by the
collar, I was mighty near gone myself. When we revived, Thompson said
dejectedly,—
"We got to stay out here, Cap. We got to do it. They ain't no other way.
The Governor wants to travel alone, and he's fixed so he can outvote us."
And presently he added,
"And don't you know, we're pisoned. It's our last trip, you can make up
your mind to it. Typhoid fever is what's going to come of this. I feel it
acoming right now. Yes, sir, we're elected, just as sure as you're born."
We were taken from the platform an hour later, frozen and insensible, at
the next station, and I went straight off into a virulent fever, and never
knew anything again for three weeks. I found out, then, that I had spent
that awful night with a harmless box of rifles and a lot of innocent
cheese; but the news was too late to save me; imagination had done its
work, and my health was permanently shattered; neither Bermuda nor any
other land can ever bring it back tome. This is my last trip; I am on my
way home to die.
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