by Jim Tully
The unbeliever was duly immersed amid the laughter, shouting, and tears of the dripping-wet negroes on the shore.
The heavy minister, his clothes clinging tightly to his body, then made for the shore, while the audience sang,
“Yes, we’ll gatheh at the riber,
The beautiful, the beautiful riber,
Gat-her wit’ de saints at the riber,
That flows by de throne of Gawd.
“On de margin ob de riber,
Washin’ up its silber spray,
We will walk an’ talk foreber,
All de happy golden day.”
By this time the minister had reached the shore. His mind at once turned to earthly things, and a startled look came into his eyes as he glanced at the spot where his vest had once been.
“Any de brudders an’ sistehs see mah vest?” he shouted.
“Yes—we did. It was right theah.” All looked incredulously at the bare ground.
“The Lawd won’t forgive sich a action as that,” said the minister with little faith in his flock. “He who steals de clothin’ of the workeh in the vineyahd shall be damned to everlastin’ fi-ah,” he shouted. “De watch de congragation gimme an’ some money de crowd gives me was in theah too, an’ fohteen dollahs o’ my own. Look about you brudders. Look about you sistehs. Maybe it am mislaid.”
“It’s mislaid all right,” said my derelict companion.
The minister and his flock looked about as though not believing their own eyes. The heavy shepherd of dark sheep walked back again and again to the spot where the vest had once been. “It ain’t theah,” he murmured. “It suah ain’t theah.” Then turning to me, he asked, “You no see a vest did you, boy?”
“I did,”. I truthfully answered, “But I don’t now.”
“No, I don’t nuther,” replied the minister.
The members looked at one another with questioning eyes. “Suahly no one would take de clothin’ of the Lawd’s sheph’d. Suahly not,” moaned the minister.
“Maybe a dog carried it off,” suggested a dripping woman.
“Yes, I saw a big dog here a half hour ago. It had a rag, or somethin’ in its mouth. I remember now,” lied the vagrant with me.
“Which way did it go?” asked several members at once.
“Down that way,” he answered, indicating a direction the other way from which Bill had gone.
The weary members of the baptismal party left at once in the direction the imaginary dog had gone.
They merged into the darkness, talking excitedly, while we hurried to find Bill.
That rover was stretched out in some grass at the edge of the railroad yards.
“Let’s beat it to East St. Louis,” he said. “We kin get a drink over there. It’s open on Sunday.”
The three of us hurried to a street car, and were soon in a saloon with drinks in front of us.
“What did you do with the vest?” I asked.
“I threw it in the river. It needed baptizin’,” answered Bill, as he looked at a heavy gold watch. “I got thirty-eight bucks altogether,” he went on. “I’ll give you five,” and he handed a bill to the derelict,” and we’ll go fifty-fifty on the rest, Red.”
The drinks flowed fast, and the derelict became loquacious. He showed us a letter from a jailor in Georgia. The letter stated that the bearer had served eleven months and twenty-nine days with credit, and that, though the bearer had been sentenced for vagrancy, he had proven an admirable worker at all tasks. The derelict was as proud of it as more fortunate men are of degrees which amount to no more.
Within a few days, we were broke again. The rover from the prison in Georgia had left us quite suddenly on the first night. Bill had sent him to a pawnbroker with the hope that he would bring back money for the watch. Bill had a motive.
“A fellow always takes a chance to get nabbed soakin’ some other guy’s watch,” said Bill, as the derelict departed with the time-piece.
“You’re takin’ just as big a chance sendin’ that guy with it,” I returned. He was.
The rover never came back.
CHAPTER VII
FURTHER ESCAPADE
CHAPTER VII
FURTHER ESCAPADE
WE drifted, penniless, about the country for some time, and finally went to work for a farmer called Mabee. We each drove an aged team hitched to a decrepit wagon, which creaked noisily down the road. The harness on our teams was held together by wire and ropes.
We had a bed in the hay-loft above the horses. Rats could be heard scampering about during the still hours of the night, and now and then a bat would fly into the large open space in the loft, and circle swiftly about, squeaking like a rat on wings.
We heard that if a bat once fastened itself on the human body, it could not be removed without the help of a razor, and the loss of the flesh upon which it had alighted, so we would cover ourselves with the blankets until the bat had found the open space again.
Mosquitoes would leave their headquarters near a stagnant pond in search of blood. Their melancholy buzz could be heard throughout the night. They seemed to drill through the blankets, for all parts of our bodies would be swollen from their bites each morning.
Now and then numbers of lightning bugs would fly into the loft and circle about. Sometimes, when their lights would flare simultaneously, the place would be lit up enough to enable us to distinguish objects within.
Mr. Mabee was the father of a daughter whom we never succeeded in meeting face to face. She was always in retreat when we drew near. It became a joke between us—and we used to say each morning, “Well, maybe you’ll see Miss Mabee today, and maybe you won’t.” The nearest we ever came to seeing her was one morning when she had been late setting the breakfast table. We suddenly came into the room in time to see her form going out of the door into the kitchen.
Mrs. Mabee would wait upon the table. She had either been born tired, or became tired soon after birth. No woman could have become so tired without years of experience.
Her face was sallow; her cheeks hollow. It seemed a mighty effort of feeble will for her to keep her eyes open. She would stand near us with a green bush in her hand and move it slowly across the table with the possible intention of keeping the flies away. She failed. The flies would merely light upon the bush and rest their wings until they came nearer to the butter. They would then leave the bush and drop into it.
Mr. Mabee seldom, if ever, talked. He was as tired as his wife.
When Mr. Mabee’s harvesting was done, he helped other farmers for miles around. Or, to put it more precisely, we did.
When the work was done, we would sit on the rickety wagons and hold the lines while the tired horses stumbled tiredly home. We became attached to our teams and were as kind to them as possible. Mr. Mabee would always have the hay and grain ready for them, but after he had gone into the house, we would give them a more generous supply. We could hear the horses munching late into the night, and, somehow, we always enjoyed listening to the noise they made.
There was no social life for us in the country. The snobbery which permeates the American Republic was always in evidence. There was a girl our own age at one farm, who became almost friendly with us. But her horrified mother soon put a stop to her natural impulse of kindness. “Come away from them hoboes,” she commanded. Her daughter obeyed.
We soon left our employer, and were given twenty-four dollars each for our labor. The farmer did not even grunt us a farewell, and neither did the tired woman appear in the doorway as we walked down the road toward the railroad track.
Being always too sentimental for a hobo or a business man, I petted the two decrepit horses before I left. Bill followed my example with his team. The poor horses, galled from the rubbing of the wretched, sweat-stained harness, were possibly losing the best friends they ever had. The human animal must bestow its affection on something, and we had whiled away hours with them.
There followed several days of riotous living in St. Louis. The mone
y for which we had laboured two weeks was soon all gone but a few dollars before we decided to take to the road again. This we did with no remorse.
We left the railroad yards at St. Louis on a freight train with two other men who had never beaten their way before.
All four of us were half drunk. The two men had no money, but they did have two quarts of liquor between them, which their last cent had bought.
We were in an empty coal car. Papers were strewn on the floor of the gondola, across which a heavy wire was stretched in the form of a hammock.
Becoming maudlin with drink, we sat on the wire and sang all the songs we could remember. A brakeman came across the train and stopped in the car with us. He proved to be, in the parlance of the road, a “boomer,” a sort of hobo, or migratory railroad worker. He joined us in a drink, and went on his way across the train. But the gondola had an attraction for him, and he returned quite often.
As the train neared B——, a railroad division, the brakeman warned us that the town was “hostile.”
“This whole country’s hostile now since they found them two guys beat up an’ handcuffed to trees over in C——. Better not ride into the yards, but git off outside and walk on through. The dick don’t come on till ’bout eight o’clock, an’ you kin beat it through and have a feed an’ be at the other end o’ the yards before that.”
We left the train as the engine whistled for the yards. It was still travelling rapidly, and Bill and I jumped first, and ran with the train, thus keeping upright without falling.
The two other rovers left the car suddenly and rolled down the steep embankment. We helped them brush the dirt out of their clothing and hair.
We walked to a railroad restaurant where a boomer waiter took our order.
“She’s a hostile burg,” said the waiter. “This dick here ‘ud pinch his mother if she walked on railroad property. He’s a Mick, an’ he talks with a brogue as thick as butter. But he don’t come around this early, hardly ever. You got time to scoff and beat it down the track ‘afore he does.”
The meal took all but a few cents of our money. The four of us walked down the tracks directly through the yards.
We had not gone many rods, when a man stepped out from between two cars. The moon was just rising above the horizon. Its light was still weak, and the earth was shrouded in almost complete darkness. Some red and green signal lights burned in the yards and made the tops of the steel rails shine a grayish white.
“Where ye goin?” asked the man as he flashed a light in our faces.
“I’m going to Chicago, Mister, to my father,” I lied quickly. “He’s sick in a hospital there, and I’ve been workin’ in the harvest fields up the line to send him money.”
The man searched me, a blackjack hanging from his wrist as he did so. Bill stepped up next and told his story. He had been working with me, and he was helping me get home. “Uh huh,” grunted the man.
Then turning to the other two, “Where ye from?” The men answered him haltingly. They were more honest than we, but still, the detective did not believe their stories as readily.
“Well, come on,” said he. “Ye kin tell your tales to the judge in the mornin’.”
He placed two of us on each side of him, and we walked down the tracks.
There was no chance to talk, but Bill and I did some rapid thinking. We each decided that the detective had neither handcuffs nor revolver, as he would certainly have used them if he did. In an effort to be friendly, and with a double motive, Bill said, “You’re on duty early, ain’t you, Mister?”
“It’s none o’ your business. I’m on early enough to ketch you birds.”
Bill walked two feet from the detective, while I was about four feet from him.
“If he has got a gun,” I thought, “he’s liable to plug me if I run, and that would be worse than a term in jail.”
The moon rose higher, and the rails shone brighter. A “wildcat” engine came screeching down the yards. It was followed by another engine and flat cars with ropes and other wrecking paraphernalia.
“Been a wreck somewhere?” said Bill.
“Shut your mouth, ye damn parrot. Talk to yare ayquals.”
“Ain’t you my equal?” blurted out Bill. It was an unfortunate rejoinder. The man did not answer, but gave him a back-handed slap with the blackjack.
Bill started forward but restrained himself. I was glad of his decision, for we were not over sixty miles from the scene of the fight with the other detectives. If we were caught, it meant a term in jail, or the Pontiac Reform School. Bill must have felt the same way about it. It may be that the detective was more fortunate than he knew, as “road-kids” are relentless and vicious in a fight. They have more initiative and energy than older tramps, and they will fight harder for freedom.
We walked along with the detective, whose thoughts kept rambling on an unpleasant subject. “You kids’ll git Pontiac. That bunk about sick people don’t go wit’ the judge. He’ll soak ye all. If he don’t, I’ll quit. Ye guys are the ruin of the country, a bummin’ honest people, an’ a stealin’ money, an’ a breakin’ into cars, an’ a burnin’ barns.” The detective talked on and on.
A yellow road crossed the tracks. The corn rustled in the fields as the wind blew over it.
“I wonder where the dickens he’s takin’ us?” I thought. And then, “I might as well take a chance.” Suddenly there was a wild yell, “Run, guys—run!!!” thundered Bill. He turned swiftly, and gave my arm a quick jerk, and the two of us were suddenly tearing down the road for dear life.
The man stood in the middle of the tracks, and wailed like a man whose professional pride had been hurt.
“Come here, ye little hobo devils,” he yelled.
We ran about a hundred yards when Bill said, “Duck over’n the cornfield, Red.”
We walked daringly back through the corn toward the tracks at the crossing. No one was there. “The other two guys must of run the other way, and the dick figured he could get them easier,” I whispered.
“Them two’ll knock hell outta him now, if he tries to catch ’em. They’re wise enough to know he ain’t got a gun by this time.”
“I wonder if he thought we’d walk along to jail with him like little lambs,” I laughed.
“He got left if he did. But what was you thinkin’ about while you walked along with the dick?” asked Bill.
“Same thing you were, Bill, I guess. I was prayin’ for a clear track for a getaway.”
“I had a notion to bust him when he hit me with the jack, but I thought I’d better not. I don’t wanta make Pontiac again,” declared Bill.
“I’d have slammed him before we went to jail. Wouldn’t you?” I muttered.
“I’ll say I would, and slammed him hard,” whispered Bill.
The quick footsteps of a man were heard. Then several dogs barked loud and long. “I wish to thunder they’d stop,” sighed Bill.
A man walked from the other direction and stood upon the tracks. He looked about him. We watched him. The dogs stopped barking, and the wind stopped rustling the corn. It became very quiet.
“It’s the dick,” I whispered.
“Sh-shh-shhh,” was Bill’s answer between his teeth.
The man stood awhile, then murmured aloud, “Damn their souls,” and walked slowly back toward the town.
CHAPTER VIII
BILL’S STORY
CHAPTER VIII
BILL’S STORY
CLOUDS formed in the east and bulged upward across the sky. At first they were white and blue dots travelling in regiments of scattered wonder. The largest of them broke as it reached the moon, and trailed a foggish blue and gray mist over it. Then stars and moon seemed to travel rapidly from the clouds, until a great mountain of dark vapour appeared suddenly from the west, and spread like an ocean of ink above the inverted bowl.
An intense darkness covered the earth. Then a tiny white opening appeared in the east, through which one star shone. A swift wind blew acro
ss the corn field, and the blades rustled as though an army marched through it. Another wind followed the first one, and whistled along the track like a gale through an empty barn.
The white opening closed and blotted the star from view. The clouds above scattered, then merged together. A roar of thunder shook the earth, and streaks of lightning blazed jaggedly to the horizon.
“We’d better beat it down the track for shelter,” I suggested.
“Nope,” returned Bill, “we’ll cut through the field. I don’t like to walk along the tracks in a storm. The steel draws the lightnin’. I seen a bum git struck dead on a track once. It turned him blacker’n a Jew’s derby. He jist threw up his hands and fell ker-flop on the ties. It burned his clothes off, too.”
We walked through an open place in the field about a hundred yards from the railroad. One gust of wind followed another, and a few large drops of rain fell. Suddenly a streak of light travelled along the fence with ripping speed. “She hit the wire fence,” said Bill. “It’s a darn good thing we moved from where we were.”
As we came to the edge of the cornfield and observed a straw stack standing a few hundred yards away, Bill said, “Let’s beat it for there and bore in.”
Between flashes of lightning and one thunder clap after another, we ran to the stack and succeeded in making a straw cave before a deluge of rain swept over the field.
We slept soundly.
When morning came, the sky had cleared and rain drops glistened on the wheat stubble under the early risen sun.
A black rooster scratched the ground near a house a short distance away, while several white hens scrambled after the proceeds of his labour.
“I see where we eat,” laughed Bill. “Let’s go.”
As we made our way to the road, we saw a large brick building upon which was a slate roof and many lightning rods. Many smaller brick buildings surrounded the larger one. “Gosh, that looks like Pontiac, but thank the Lord it ain’t,” murmured Bill, as we walked into the yard in front of the house.