“Was that all you did?”
“What else could I do?” demanded Mr. Loop in some surprise.
“Why, you could have tackled him right then an’ there, couldn’t you?”
“Didn’t I tell you there was two of ’em?”
“Two men?”
“No. Him an’ Anna. You don’t suppose I could lick both of ’em, do you? I bet there ain’t a man in town—’cept that blacksmith, Bill Kepsal—that c’n lick Anna single-handed. Besides, I ain’t half the man I used to be. I’m purty nigh eighty, Anderson. If I’d been four or five years younger, I’d ha’ showed him, you bet.”
“Umph!” was Mr. Crow’s comment. “How long did they set there?”
“I can’t just perzactly say. They was gone when I woke up!”
“When you what?”
“Woke up. It was gittin’ purty late, long past my bedtime, an’ I’d had a hard day’s work. I guess I muster fell asleep.”
“Was Mrs. Loop up when you got back home?”
“Yes, she was up.”
“What did you say to her?”
“I—I didn’t git a chance to say anything,” said Eliphalet mournfully. “All three of ’em was eatin’ breakfast, an’ I got the most awful tongue-lashin’ you ever heard. ‘Cused me of everything under the sun. I couldn’t eat a mouthful.”
“Served you right,” said Anderson sternly. “Well, did you ever see him ag’in?”
“I ain’t sayin’ as it was the same feller,” qualified Mr. Loop, “but last night I seen a man streakin’ through the potato-patch lickety-split some’eres round nine o’clock. He was carryin’ a bundle an’ was all stooped over. I yelled at him to stop er I’d fire. That seemed to make him run a little faster, so I took after him, an’ run smack into Anna comin’ round the corner of the hen-roost. Soon as I got my breath, I asked her what in tarnation she was doin’ out at that time o’ night.”
“Well, go on. What did she say?” demanded Anderson as Mr. Loop paused to wipe his forehead.
“She—she insulted me,” said Mr. Loop.
“How?” inquired Marshal Crow sceptically.
“She called me a skunk.”
Mr. Crow was silent for some time, tugging at his whiskers. He stared intently at the upper corner of Dr. Brown’s cottage. His lip twitched slightly. Presently, feeling that he could trust his voice, he asked:
“Why don’t you offer a reward, Liff?”
“I thought of doin’ that,” said Mr. Loop, but a trifle half-heartedly.
“If you offer a big enough reward, I’ll find out who the feller is,” said Anderson. “Course, you understand it ain’t my duty as marshal to ferret out matrimonial mysteries. I’d have to tackle it in my capacity as a private detective. An’ you couldn’t hardly expect me to do all this extry work without bein’ paid fer it.”
Mr. Loop scratched his head. Then he scratched a small furrow in the gravel roadway with the toe of one of his boots.
“Well, you see, I got to pay a lawyer right smart of a fee; an’ besides—”
Anderson interrupted him sternly. “You owe it to your feller-citizens to clear up this mystery. You surely don’t think it is fair to your friends, do you, ‘Liphalet Loop? Purty nigh every man in town is bein’ suspicioned, an’—”
“That ain’t any business o’ mine,” snapped Eliphalet, showing some ire. “If they feel as though the thing ought to be cleared up jest fer their sakes, why don’t they git together an’ offer a reward? I don’t see why I ought to pay out money to ‘stablish the innocence of all the men in Tinkletown. Let them do it if they feel that way about it. I got no objection to the taxpayers of Tinkletown oppropriatin’ a sum out of the town treasury to prove they’re innocent. Why don’t you take it up with the selectmen, Anderson. I’m satisfied to leave my complaint as it is. I’ve been thinkin’ it over, an’ I believe I’d ruther git my divorce without knowin’ who’s the cause of it. The way it is now, I’m on friendly terms with every man in town, an’ I’d like to stay that way. It would be mighty onpleasant to meet one of your friends on the street an’ not be able to speak to him. Long as I don’t know, why—”
“Wait a minute, Liff Loop,” broke in Anderson sternly. “Don’t say anything more. All I got to say is that it wasn’t you your wife insulted when she called you a skunk. Good mornin’, sir.”
He turned and strode away, leaving the amazed Mr. Loop standing with his mouth open. Some time later that same afternoon Eliphalet succeeded in solving the problem that had been tantalizing him all day. “By gum,” he bleated, addressing the high heavens, “what a blamed old fool he is! Anybody with any sense at all knows that you can’t insult a skunk.”
* * * *
Briefly, Mr. Loop’s fifth matrimonial experience had been, in the strictest sense, a venture. After four discouraging failures in the effort to obtain a durable wife from among the young women of Tinkletown and vicinity, he had resolved to go farther afield for his fifth. So he advertised through a New York matrimonial bureau for the sort of wife he might reasonably depend upon to survive the rigours of climate, industry and thrift. He made it quite plain that the lucky applicant would have to be a robust creature, white, sound of lung and limb, not more than thirty, and experienced in domestic economy. Nationality no object. Mr. Loop’s idea of the meaning of domestic economy was intensely literal. Also she would have to pay her own railroad fare to Boggs City, no matter whence she came, the same to be refunded in case she proved acceptable. He described himself as a widower of means, young in spirit though somewhat past middle age, of attractive personality and an experienced husband.
The present Mrs. Loop was the result of this spirit of enterprise on his part. She came from Hoboken, New Jersey, and her name was Anna Petersen before it was altered to Loop. She more than fulfilled the requirements. As Mr. Loop himself proclaimed, there wasn’t “a robuster woman in Bramble County;” she was exceedingly sound of lung, and equally sound of limb. What pleased him more than anything else, she was a Swede. He had always heard that the Swedish women were the most frugal, the most industrious, and a shade more amenable to male authority than any others.
Anna was a towering, rather overdeveloped female. She revealed such astonishing propensities for work that she had been a bride but little more than a week when Eliphalet decided that he could dispense with the services of a hired man. A little later he discovered, much to his surprise, that there really wasn’t quite enough work about the house to keep her occupied all the time, and so he allowed her to take over some of the chores he had been in the habit of performing, such as feeding the horses and pigs, and ultimately to chop and carry in the firewood, wash the buckboard, milk the cows, and—in spare moments—to weed the garden. He began to regard himself as the most fortunate man alive. Anna appeared to thrive where her predecessors had withered and wasted away. True, she ate considerably more than any of them, but he was willing to put up with that, provided she didn’t go so far to eat as much as all of them. There were times, however, when he experienced a great deal of uneasiness on that score.
The fly avoided his ointment for something like three months. Then it came and settled and bade fair to remain and thrive upon the fat of his land. Anna’s mother came to live with them. He now realized that he had been extremely shortsighted. He should have stipulated in his advertisement that none except motherless young women need apply.
Mrs. Petersen was his fifth mother-in-law, and he dolefully found himself contending with the paraphrase: like mother, like daughter. His latest mother-in-law proved to be a voracious as well as a vociferous eater. She fell little short of Anna in physical proportions, but his wife assured him that it would be no time at all before she’d have her as plump as a partridge! Mr. Loop undertook the experiment of a joke. He asked her if partridge was the Swede word for hippopotamus. After that he kept his jokes to himself.
A year and a half went by. Then Miss Gertie Petersen came up from Hoboken for a flying visit. She was a very tall and
lean young woman. Mr. Loop shuddered. The process of developing her into a partridge was something horrible to contemplate. But Anna was not dismayed. She insisted that the country air would do her sister a world of good. Mr. Loop was a pained witness to the filling out of Gertrude, but something told him that it wasn’t the country air that was doing it. She weighed in the neighbourhood of one hundred and fifty pounds when she flew in for the visit. At the end of six months she strained the scales at two hundred and twenty. There was a good deal of horse-sense in his contention that if all this additional weight was country air, she’d have to be pretty securely anchored or she’d float away like a balloon.
But he did not openly complain. He had acquired the wisdom of the vanquished. He was surrounded by conquerors. Moreover, at butchering-time, he had seen his wife pick up a squealing shoat with one hand and slit its throat with the other in such a skilful and efficient manner that gooseflesh crept out all over his body when he thought of it.
And during those long, solitary nights in the barn he thought of it so constantly that everything else, including the encroachment of the home-wrecker, slipped his mind completely. He never ceased wondering how he screwed up the courage to institute proceedings against Anna, notwithstanding the fact that the matter had been vicariously attended to by his lawyer and a deputy from the county sheriff’s office.
* * * *
Marshal Crow fell into a state of profound cogitation after leaving Mr. Loop. The old man had put a new idea into his head. Late in the afternoon he decided to call a meeting of citizens at the town hall for that night. He drafted the assistance of such able idlers as Alf Reesling, Newt Spratt, Rush Applegate, Henry Plumb and Situate M. Jones, and ordered them to impress upon all male citizens of Tinkletown between the ages of twenty-one and seventy-five the importance of attending this meeting. Ebenezer January, the barber, and George Washington Smith, the garbage-wagon driver, were the only two men in town whose presence was not considered necessary. They, with their somewhat extensive families, represented the total coloured population of Tinkletown.
When the impromptu gathering was called to order that night by Ezra Pounder, the town clerk (acting in an unofficial capacity), there were nearly two hundred and fifty men present, including Messrs. January and Smith. Uncle Dad Simms, aged eighty-four, was present, occupying a front seat. He confessed for the first time in his life that he was a little “hard o’ hearin’.” This was a most gratifying triumph for his fellow-citizens, who for a matter of twenty years had almost yelled their lungs out advising him to get an ear-trumpet, only to have him say: “What in thunder are you whisperin’ about?”
The three clergymen of the town put in an appearance, and Elmer K. Pratt, the photographer, brought his seven-months-old baby, explaining that it was his night to take care of her. He assured the gentlemen present that they were at liberty to speak as freely and as loudly as they pleased, so far as his daughter was concerned; if she got awake and started to “yap,” he’d spank the daylights out of her, and if that didn’t shut her up he’d take her home.
Anderson Crow, wearing all his decorations, occupied a chair between Mr. Pounder and Harry Squires, the Banner reporter. By actual count there were seven badges ranging across his chest. Prominent among them were the familiar emblems of the two detective associations to which he paid annual dues. Besides these, one could have made out the star of the town marshal, the shield of the fire chief, badges of the Grand Army of the Republic, Sons of Veterans, Sons of the Revolution, and the Tinkletown Battlefield Association.
Harry Squires, at the request of Mr. Crow, arose and stated the object of the meeting.
“Gentlemen,” he began, “the time has come for action. We have been patient long enough. A small committee of citizens got together today, and acting upon the suggestion of our distinguished Marshal, decided to make a determined effort to restore peace and confidence into the home of practically every gentleman in this community. It is a moral certainty that all of us can’t be the individual in Mr. Loop’s woodpile, but it is also more or less an immoral certainty that Mrs. Loop obstinately refuses to vindicate an overwhelming majority of the citizens of this town.
“The situation is intolerable. We are in a painful state of perplexity. One of us, gentlemen, appears to be a Lothario. The question naturally arises: which one of us is it? Nobody answers. As a matter of fact, up to date, nobody has actually denied the charge. Can it be a matter of false pride with us? Ahem! However, not only does Mrs. Loop decline to lift the shadow of doubt, but Mr. Loop has assumed a most determined and uncharitable attitude toward his friends and neighbours. He positively refuses to come to our rescue. We have put up with Mr. Loop for a great many years, gentlemen, and what do we get for our pains? Nothing, gentlemen, nothing except Mr. Loop’s cheerful wink when he passes us on the street. Our esteemed Marshal today proposed to Mr. Loop that he offer a suitable reward for the apprehension of the man in the case. He gave him the opportunity to do something for his friends and acquaintances. What does Mr. Loop say to the proposition? He was more than magnanimous. He as much as said that he couldn’t bear the idea that any one of his numerous friends was innocent.
“Now, while Mr. Loop may feel that he is being extremely generous, we must feel otherwise. Gentlemen, we have arrived at the point where we must take our reputations out of Eliphalet Loop’s hands. We cannot afford to let him trifle with them any longer. Mr. Loop refuses to employ a detective. Therefore it is up to us to secure the services of a competent, experienced sleuth who can and will establish our innocence. It will cost us a little money, possibly fifty cents apiece; but what is that compared to a fair name? I am confident that there isn’t a man here who wouldn’t give as much as ten dollars, even if he had to steal it, in order to protect his honour. Now, gentlemen, you know what we are here for. The meeting is open for suggestions and discussion.”
He sat down, but almost instantly arose, his gaze fixed on an object in the rear of the hall.
“I see that Mr. Loop has just come in. Perhaps he has some news for us. Have you anything to say, Mr. Loop?”
Mr. Loop got up and cleared his throat.
“Nothin’,” said he “except that I’m as willin’ as anybody to subscribe fifty cents.”
Harry Squires suddenly put his hand over his mouth and turned to Marshal Crow. The Marshal arose.
“This ain’t no affair of yours, Liff Loop. Nobody invited you to be present. You go on home, now. Go on! You’ve contributed all that’s necessary to this here meetin’. Next thing we know, you’ll be contributin’ your mother-in-law too. Get out, I say. Open the door, Jake, an’ head him that way. Easy, now! I didn’t say to stand him on his head. He might accidently squash that new fewdory hat he’s wearin’.”
After Mr. Loop’s unceremonious departure, the Marshal resumed his seat and fell to twisting his sparse whiskers.
“What is your opinion, Mr. Crow,” inquired Harry Squires, “as to the amount we would have to pay a good detective to tackle the job?”
Mr. Crow ran a calculating eye over the crowd. He did not at once reply. Finally he spoke.
“Between a hundred and five an’ a hundred an’ seven dollars,” he said. “It might run as high as hundred and ten,” he added, as two or three belated citizens entered the hall.
“Can we get a goot man for dot amoundt?” inquired Henry Wimpelmeyer, the tanyard man.
“Well, we can get one that c’n tell whether it’s daylight or dark without lightin’ a lantern to find out,” said Mr. Crow in a slightly bellicose tone.
“I ain’t so sure aboudt dot,” said Henry, eying the Marshal skeptically. He had had it in for Marshal Crow ever since that official compelled him to hang an American flag in front of his tanyard.
Luckily Uncle Dad Simms, who had not heard a word of the foregoing remarks, piped up.
“This ain’t no time to be thinkin’ of unnecessary improvements, what with peace not signed yet, an’ labor an’ material so high. I don’t see
that there’s any call for a new roof, anyway. S’posin’ it does leak a little once in a while. We’ve all got umbrellas, I guess, an’—”
“Wake up, wake up!” bawled Alf Reesling, close to the old man’s ear. “We ain’t talkin’ about a roof. Loop! That’s what we’re talkin’ about!”
“What say?” squealed Uncle Dad, putting his hand to his ear. “My hearin’ is a little bad lately.”
“I said you was the derndest old nuisance in town; that’s what I said—an’ I don’t care whether you hear me or not,” roared Alf in exasperation.
“That’s better,” said Uncle Dad, nodding his head approvingly. “But I wish you wouldn’t chaw tobacker, Alf,” he added rather plaintively.
“Order!” commanded Marshal Crow, pounding on the table with his cane. “Now, feller-citizens, let us git down to business. Most of us have got to be home before nine o’clock, or the dickens will be to pay. All those in favour of employin’ a detective to unearth this dark mystery raise their right hands.”
“Just a moment, please,” called out the Reverend Mr. Maltby, of the Congregationalist church. “I presume I am safe in saying that Father Maloney, the Reverend Mr. Downs and myself are hardly to be regarded as interested parties—”
He was interrupted by Father Maloney, who sprang to his feet and shouted in his most jovial voice:
“Nonsense, my dear Maltby! I consider it a great honour to be considered in the list of suspects. Nothing could give me more pleasure than the feeling that my parishioners trusted me sufficiently to take me to their hearts and say: ‘He is one of us.’ I should consider myself very badly treated if they were to leave me out of the case. Come—join me. Let us get all we can out of a most delicate situation. What do you say, friend Downs?”
The George Barr McCutcheon Megapack: 25 Classic Novels and Stories Page 276