The luckless Respectability’s purpose to reach Joe’s stairway had been entirely definite, but upon this violence he forgot it momentarily. It is not easy to keep things in mind when one is violently smitten on mouth, nose, cheek, eye, and ear by a missile large enough to strike them simultaneously. Yelping and half blinded, he deflected to cross Main Street. Judge Pike had elected to cross in the opposite direction, and the two met in the middle of the street.
The encounter was miraculously fitted to the Judge’s need: here was no butterfly, but a solid body, light withal, a wet, muddy, and dusty yellow dog, eminently kickable. The man was heavily built about the legs, and the vigor of what he did may have been additionally inspired by his recognition of the mongrel as Joe Louden’s. The impact of his toe upon the little runner’s side was momentous, and the latter rose into the air. The Judge hopped, as one hops who, unshod in the night, discovers an unexpected chair. Let us be reconciled to his pain and not reproach the gods with it, — for two of his unintending adversary’s ribs were cracked.
The dog, thus again deflected, retraced his tracks, shrieking distractedly, and, by one of those ironical twists which Karma reserves for the tails of the fated, dived for blind safety into the store commanded by the ecstatic and inimical clerk. There were shouts; the sleepy Square beginning to wake up: the boy who had mocked the planing-mill got to his feet, calling upon his fellows; the bench loafers strolled to the street; the aged men stirred and rose from their chairs; faces appeared in the open windows of offices; sales ladies and gentlemen came to the doorways of the trading-places; so that when Respectability emerged from the grocery he had a notable audience for the scene he enacted with a brass dinner-bell tied to his tail.
Another potato, flung by the pimpled, uproarious, prodigal clerk, added to the impetus of his flight. A shower of pebbles from the hands of exhilarated boys dented the soft asphalt about him; the hideous clamor of the pursuing bell increased as he turned the next corner, running distractedly. The dead town had come to life, and its inhabitants gladly risked the dangerous heat in the interests of sport, whereby it was a merry chase the little dog led around the block, For thus some destructive instinct drove him; he could not stop with the unappeasable Terror clanging at his heels and the increasing crowd yelling in pursuit; but he turned to the left at each corner, and thus came back to pass Joe’s stairway again, unable to pause there or anywhere, unable to do anything except to continue his hapless flight, poor meteor.
Round the block he went once more, and still no chance at that empty stairway where, perhaps, he thought, there might be succor and safety. Blood was upon his side where Martin Pike’s boot had crashed, foam and blood hung upon his jaws and lolling tongue. He ran desperately, keeping to the middle of the street, and, not howling, set himself despairingly to outstrip the Terror. The mob, disdaining the sun superbly, pursued as closely as it could, throwing bricks and rocks at him, striking at him with clubs and sticks. Happy Fear, playing “tic-tac-toe,” right hand against left, in his cell, heard the uproar, made out something of what was happening, and, though unaware that it was a friend whose life was sought, discovered a similarity to his own case, and prayed to his dim gods that the quarry might get away.
“MAD DOG!” they yelled. “MAD DOG!” And there were some who cried, “JOE LOUDEN’S DOG!” that being equally as exciting and explanatory.
Three times round, and still the little fugitive maintained a lead. A gray-helmeted policeman, a big fellow, had joined the pursuit. He had children at home who might be playing in the street, and the thought of what might happen to them if the mad dog should head that way resolved him to be cool and steady. He was falling behind, so he stopped on the corner, trusting that Respectability would come round again. He was right, and the flying brownish thing streaked along Main Street, passing the beloved stairway for the fourth time. The policeman lifted his revolver, fired twice, missed once, but caught him with the second shot in a forepaw, clipping off a fifth toe, one of the small claws that grow above the foot and are always in trouble. This did not stop him; but the policeman, afraid to risk another shot because of the crowd, waited for him to come again; and many others, seeing the hopeless circuit the mongrel followed, did likewise, armed with bricks and clubs. Among them was the pimply clerk, who had been inspired to commandeer a pitchfork from a hardware store.
When the fifth round came, Respectability’s race was run. He turned into Main Street at a broken speed, limping, parched, voiceless, flecked with blood and foam, snapping feebly at the showering rocks, but still indomitably a little ahead of the hunt. There was no yelp left in him — he was too thoroughly winded for that, — but in his brilliant and despairing eyes shone the agony of a cry louder than the tongue of a dog could utter: “O master! O all the god I know! Where are you in my mortal need?”
Now indeed he had a gauntlet to run; for the street was lined with those who awaited him, while the pursuit grew closer behind. A number of the hardiest stood squarely in his path, and he hesitated for a second, which gave the opportunity for a surer aim, and many missiles struck him. “Let him have it now, officer,” said Eugene Bantry, standing with Judge Pike at the policeman’s elbow. “There’s your chance.”
But before the revolver could be discharged, Respectability had begun to run again, hobbling on three legs and dodging feebly. A heavy stone struck him on the shoulder and he turned across the street, making for the “National House” corner, where the joyful clerk brandished his pitchfork. Going slowly, he almost touched the pimply one as he passed, and the clerk, already rehearsing in his mind the honors which should follow the brave stroke, raised the tines above the little dog’s head for the coup de grace. They did not descend, and the daring youth failed of fame as the laurel almost embraced his brows. A hickory walking-stick was thrust between his legs; and he, expecting to strike, received a blow upon the temple sufficient for his present undoing and bedazzlement. He went over backwards, and the pitchfork (not the thing to hold poised on high when one is knocked down) fell with the force he had intended for Respectability upon his own shin.
A train had pulled into the station, and a tired, travel-worn young man, descending from a sleeper, walked rapidly up the street to learn the occasion of what appeared to be a riot. When he was close enough to understand its nature, he dropped his bag and came on at top speed, shouting loudly to the battered mongrel, who tried with his remaining strength to leap toward him through a cordon of kicking legs, while Eugene Bantry again called to the policeman to fire.
“If he does, damn you, I’ll kill him!” Joe saw the revolver raised; and then, Eugene being in his way, he ran full-tilt into his stepbrother with all his force, sending him to earth, and went on literally over him as he lay prone upon the asphalt, that being the shortest way to Respectability. The next instant the mongrel was in his master’s arms and weakly licking his hands.
But it was Eskew Arp who had saved the little dog; for it was his stick which had tripped the clerk, and his hand which had struck him down. All his bodily strength had departed in that effort, but he staggered out into the street toward Joe.
“Joe Louden!” called the veteran, in a loud voice. “Joe Louden!” and suddenly reeled. The Colonel and Squire Buckalew were making their way toward him, but Joe, holding the dog to his breast with one arm, threw the other about Eskew.
“It’s a town — it’s a town” — the old fellow flung himself free from the supporting arm— “it’s a town you couldn’t even trust a yellow dog to!”
He sank back upon Joe’s shoulder, speechless. An open carriage had driven through the crowd, the colored driver urged by two ladies upon the back seat, and Martin Pike saw it stop by the group in the middle of the street where Joe stood, the wounded dog held to his breast by one arm, the old man, white and half fainting, supported by the other. Martin Pike saw this and more; he saw Ariel Tabor and his own daughter leaning from the carriage, the arms of both pityingly extended to Joe Louden and his two burdens, while t
he stunned and silly crowd stood round them staring, clouds of dust settling down upon them through the hot air.
XX. THREE ARE ENLISTED
NOW IN THAT blazing noon Canaan looked upon a strange sight: an open carriage whirling through Main Street behind two galloping bays; upon the back seat a ghostly white old man with closed eyes, supported by two pale ladies, his head upon the shoulder of the taller; while beside the driver, a young man whose coat and hands were bloody, worked over the hurts of an injured dog. Sam Warden’s whip sang across the horses; lather gathered on their flanks, and Ariel’s voice steadily urged on the pace: “Quicker, Sam, if you can.” For there was little breath left in the body of Eskew Arp.
Mamie, almost as white as the old man, was silent; but she had not hesitated in her daring, now that she had been taught to dare; she had not come to be Ariel’s friend and honest follower for nothing; and it was Mamie who had cried to Joe to lift Eskew into the carriage. “You must come too,” she said. “We will need you.” And so it came to pass that under the eyes of Canaan Joe Louden rode in Judge Pike’s carriage at the bidding of Judge Pike’s daughter.
Toward Ariel’s own house they sped with the stricken octogenarian, for he was “alone in the world,” and she would not take him to the cottage where he had lived for many years by himself, a bleak little house, a derelict of the “early days” left stranded far down in the town between a woollen-mill and the water-works. The workmen were beginning their dinners under the big trees, but as Sam Warden drew in the lathered horses at the gate, they set down their tin buckets hastily and ran to help Joe lift the old man out. Carefully they bore him into the house and laid him upon a bed in one of the finished rooms. He did not speak or move and the workmen uncovered their heads as they went out, but Joe knew that they were mistaken. “It’s all right, Mr. Arp,” he said, as Ariel knelt by the bed with water and restoratives. “It’s all right. Don’t you worry.”
Then the veteran’s lips twitched, and though his eyes remained closed, Joe saw that Eskew understood, for he gasped, feebly: “Pos-i-tive-ly — no — free — seats!”
To Mrs. Louden, sewing at an up-stairs window, the sight of her stepson descending from Judge Pike’s carriage was sufficiently startling, but when she saw Mamie Pike take Respectability from his master’s arms and carry him tenderly indoors, while Joe and Ariel occupied themselves with Mr. Arp, the good lady sprang to her feet as if she had been stung, regardlessly sending her work-basket and its contents scattering over the floor, and ran down the stairs three steps at a time.
At the front door she met her husband, entering for his dinner, and she leaped at him. Had he seen? What was it? What had happened?
Mr. Louden rubbed his chin-beard, indulging himself in a pause which was like to prove fatal to his companion, finally vouchsafing the information that the doctor’s buggy was just turning the corner; Eskew Arp had suffered a “stroke,” it was said, and, in Louden’s opinion, was a mighty sick man. His spouse replied in no uncertain terms that she had seen quite that much for herself, urging him to continue, which he did with a deliberation that caused her to recall their wedding-day with a gust of passionate self-reproach. Presently he managed to interrupt, reminding her that her dining-room windows commanded as comprehensive a view of the next house as did the front steps, and after a time her housewifely duty so far prevailed over her indignation at the man’s unwholesome stolidity that she followed him down the hall to preside over the meal, not, however, to partake largely of it herself.
Mr. Louden had no information of Eugene’s mishap, nor had Mrs. Louden any suspicion that all was not well with the young man, and, hearing him enter the front door, she called to him that his dinner was waiting. Eugene, however, made no reply and went up-stairs to his own apartment without coming into the dining-room.
A small crowd, neighboring children, servants, and negroes, had gathered about Ariel’s gate, and Mrs. Louden watched the working-men disperse this assembly, gather up their tools, and depart; then Mamie came out of the house, and, bowing sadly to three old men who were entering the gate as she left it, stepped into her carriage and drove away. The new-comers, Colonel Flitcroft, Squire Buckalew, and Peter Bradbury, glanced at the doctor’s buggy, shook their heads at one another, and slowly went up to the porch, where Joe met them. Mrs. Louden uttered a sharp exclamation, for the Colonel shook hands with her stepson.
Perhaps Flitcroft himself was surprised; he had offered his hand almost unconsciously, and the greeting was embarrassed and perfunctory; but his two companions, each in turn, gravely followed his lead, and Joe’s set face flushed a little. It was the first time in many years that men of their kind in Canaan had offered him this salutation.
“He wouldn’t let me send for you,” he told them. “He said he knew you’d be here soon without that.” And he led the way to Eskew’s bedside.
Joe and the doctor had undressed the old man, and had put him into night-gear of Roger Tabor’s, taken from an antique chest; it was soft and yellow and much more like color than the face above it, for the white hair on the pillow was not whiter than that. Yet there was a strange youthfulness in the eyes of Eskew; an eerie, inexplicable, luminous, LIVE look; the thin cheeks seemed fuller than they had been for years; and though the heavier lines of age and sorrow could be seen, they appeared to have been half erased. He lay not in sunshine, but in clear light; the windows were open, the curtains restrained, for he had asked them not to darken the room.
The doctor was whispering in a doctor’s way to Ariel at the end of the room opposite the bed, when the three old fellows came in. None of them spoke immediately, and though all three cleared their throats with what they meant for casual cheerfulness, to indicate that the situation was not at all extraordinary or depressing, it was to be seen that the Colonel’s chin trembled under his mustache, and his comrades showed similar small and unwilling signs of emotion.
Eskew spoke first. “Well, boys?” he said, and smiled.
That seemed to make it more difficult for the others; the three white heads bent silently over the fourth upon the pillow; and Ariel saw waveringly, for her eyes suddenly filled, that the Colonel laid his unsteady hand upon Eskew’s, which was outside the coverlet.
“It’s — it’s not,” said the old soldier, gently— “it’s not on — on both sides, is it, Eskew?”
Mr. Arp moved his hand slightly in answer. “It ain’t paralysis,” he said. “They call it ‘shock and exhaustion’; but it’s more than that. It’s just my time. I’ve heard the call. We’ve all been slidin’ on thin ice this long time — and it’s broke under me—”
“Eskew, Eskew!” remonstrated Peter Bradbury. “You’d oughtn’t to talk that-a-way! You only kind of overdone a little — heat o’ the day, too, and—”
“Peter,” interrupted the sick man, with feeble asperity, “did you ever manage to fool me in your life?”
“No, Eskew.”
“Well, you’re not doin’ it now!”
Two tears suddenly loosed themselves from Squire Buckalew’s eyelids, despite his hard endeavor to wink them away, and he turned from the bed too late to conceal what had happened. “There ain’t any call to feel bad,” said Eskew. “It might have happened any time — in the night, maybe — at my house — and all alone — but here’s Airie Tabor brought me to her own home and takin’ care of me. I couldn’t ask any better way to go, could I?”
“I don’t know what we’ll do,” stammered the Colonel, “if you — you talk about goin’ away from us, Eskew. We — we couldn’t get along—”
“Well, sir, I’m almost kind of glad to think,” Mr. Arp murmured, between short struggles for breath, “that it ‘ll be — quieter — on the— “National House” corner!”
A moment later he called the doctor faintly and asked for a restorative. “There,” he said, in a stronger voice and with a gleam of satisfaction in the vindication of his belief that he was dying. “I was almost gone then. I know!” He lay panting for a moment, then spok
e the name of Joe Louden.
Joe came quickly to the bedside.
“I want you to shake hands with the Colonel and Peter and Buckalew.”
“We did,” answered the Colonel, infinitely surprised and troubled. “We shook hands outside before we came in.”
“Do it again,” said Eskew. “I want to see you.”
And Joe, making shift to smile, was suddenly blinded, so that he could not see the wrinkled hands extended to him, and was fain to grope for them.
“God knows why we didn’t all take his hand long ago,” said Eskew Arp. “I didn’t because I was stubborn. I hated to admit that the argument was against me. I acknowledge it now before him and before you — and I want the word of it CARRIED!”
“It’s all right, Mr. Arp,” began Joe, tremulously. “You mustn’t—”
“Hark to me” — the old man’s voice lifted higher: “If you’d ever whimpered, or give back-talk, or broke out the wrong way, it would of been different. But you never did. I’ve watched you and I know; and you’ve just gone your own way alone, with the town against you because you got a bad name as a boy, and once we’d given you that, everything you did or didn’t do, we had to give you a blacker one. Now it’s time some one stood by you! Airie Tabor ‘ll do that with all her soul and body. She told me once I thought a good deal of you. She knew! But I want these three old friends of mine to do it, too. I was boys with them and they’ll do it, I think. They’ve even stood up fer you against me, sometimes, but mostly fer the sake of the argument, I reckon; but now they must do it when there’s more to stand against than just my talk. They saw it all to-day — the meanest thing I ever knew! I could of stood it all except that!” Before they could prevent him he had struggled half upright in bed, lifting a clinched fist at the town beyond the windows. “But, by God! when they got so low down they tried to kill your dog—”
Collected Works of Booth Tarkington Page 87