“Penrod!” She spoke warningly.
“No’m; I didn’t. I had a cake and I just put a spoonful of red pepper and a little tabasco in the middle of it, and—”
“And you gave such a horrible thing as that to—”
“No’m. He came and grabbed it away from me, and ate it up before I could stop him!”
Mrs. Schofield shook her head sorrowfully. “We knew it must have been pepper,” she said. “Penrod, I don’t know what your father means to do to you.”
However, just at this moment, Mr. Passloe and Mr. Schofield passed through the hall. “I was looking out of the window,” Penrod and his mother heard Mr. Passloe say, “and I saw Ronald snatch it out of Penrod’s hand. Served him right; he has a disgusting trick of snatching. And anyhow, we’ll have one meal in peace; he won’t be down to dinner.”
“Is he still suffering a little?” Mr. Schofield asked, and no one could have mistaken the hopefulness in his voice for anything else.
“Oh, I think he’s convalescent.”
There came a smothered laugh from each of these gentlemen; they seemed to be in the best of spirits, indeed. And then, as they were heard descending the stairs, Mrs. Schofield turned to Penrod with a last attempt to preserve her severity. “Penrod, you did a very dangerous thing to let poor little Ronald eat—”
“I didn’t ‘let’ him.”
“He’s a very nice little boy,” she said. “It was a shame!”
But a strange thing happened as she was speaking. Her words and her expression were at complete variance. The befogged Penrod saw this extraordinary contrast plainly, as she opened the door and the light from the hall fell upon her face. He perceived that she could not speak of poor little Ronald’s sufferings without smiling.
CHAPTER VII
HERMAN MISSES A TREAT
THE NEXT DAY at noon Penrod came home from church, accompanying his mother and sister, and walking sedately, pleased to be wearing an entirely new straw hat that was circled with a blue and white ribbon. Little Ronald sat between Mr. Passloe and Mr. Schofield upon the verandah and without apparent emotion watched the arrival of the small party from church; but after a moment he got up and quietly followed Penrod into the hall.
“Let me try on that new hat to see if it’d fit me?” he said, in a tone almost respectful. “Will you, Penrod?”
“No, I will not,” Penrod returned promptly, and, as he put the new hat upon the hall table, he added with severity, “You let that hat alone!”
“Of course, if you say so,” the little cousin said, curiously meek. “Penrod, what’s it mean out on that ole horness-closet in the stable where it’s painted up ‘George B. Jash-her’ and all that stuff?”
“Never mind! You ‘tend to your own affairs.”
“All right,” Ronald said thoughtfully. “I guess you got the paint for it from those cans in the woodshed, didn’t you, Penrod?”
“You ‘tend to your own affairs!”
“I will. Did you know I and Papa are goin’ away on the railroad train right after lunch, Penrod? I guess maybe after I’m gone away you’ll be sorry you played that trick on me and made me sick yesterday, won’t you, Penrod? Maybe sumpthing’ll happen that’ll make you feel sorry about that.” Then, as Penrod only stared at him, he turned toward the open front door, intending to rejoin his father and Mr. Schofield on the verandah; but paused. “Sump-thing might make you sorry, don’t you think so, Cousin Penrod?”
He spoke so gently that Penrod almost felt a pang of remorse; Ronald’s meekness perplexed him, and so did the little boy’s well-behaved silence at luncheon. Afterward, when a taxicab came to take the visitors away, Ronald could not be found immediately and failed to respond even when impatient calls for him resounded through the house; however, he made his appearance rather suddenly, running from the back yard where he had gone, he said, “To say goodbye to Duke.” Then, having expressed his farewells courteously to all the members of the Schofield family, he followed his father into the taxicab and drove away, with a final gesture that strikingly nullified the good impression he had just begun to make. Leaning from the open window of the taxicab, with his thumb to his nose and spread fingers wiggling, he tauntingly and insultingly squealed “Yah! Yah! Yah!” over and over until the vehicle passed out of hearing.
Something triumphant in this departing cry brought misgiving to the heart of his boy cousin, and Penrod remembered little Ronald’s interest in the new straw hat. The hat was not upon the hall table where it had been left, nor did a search of the house reveal its whereabouts; but Penrod had a fatal premonition when he discovered Duke in the back yard trying to remove a variegated coat of paint by rolling himself passionately in the grass. The new hat was in the woodshed, and only a glance at it was needed to show that the paint upon Duke had been little Ronald’s mere afterthought. Penrod lifted the wreck upon the point of a stick, carried it round the house to the verandah where he found his father and mother, lodged a formal but indignant protest against the vandalism of the recent guest, and received some sympathy. Then he returned gloomily to the back yard, left the ruined hat in the woodshed, and went to seek Sam Williams.
Sam was not at home, and Penrod returned by way of the alley. Upon the doorstep of a humble cottage that faced the Schofields’ stable Herman sat sleepily, his eyes half closed, enjoying the strong sunshine of the afternoon. “Hey, whi’ boy,” he said in a drowsy voice.
Penrod stopped for converse. “Where’s Verman?”
“Verman way down in Tennasee. Mammy done tuck an’ gone way down to Tennasee ‘cause Gran’mammy up an’ tuck sick, an’ Mammy gone to take keer of her an’ tucken Verman along wif her.”
“When’s he comin’ back?”
“Come back soon as Gran’mammy git well. What you want o’ Verman?”
“Well—” Penrod said, and paused to frown importantly. “I kind of wanted both of you, maybe. I was thinkin’ about tellin’ you about it last week; but I had a little cousin visitin’ me that made a lot o’ trouble around here and’s goin’ to grow up to be proba’ly the worst crook in the United States, I expeck. Anyhow, I guess there’s mighty few crooks that could behave any worse than he did. It was sumpthing like that I was goin’ to tell you and Verman about, Herman.”
“Like what? Like you havin’ a mean l’il whi’ boy come to visit you?”
“No. I mean about crooks. You know what they are, don’t you, Herman? I mean if we got after one, f’r instance—”
“Where any?” Herman inquired, but without much interest, for he continued to be drowsy. “Where any we go’ to git after?”
Penrod scraped the dust with the side of his shoe. “Well, there wouldn’t be any trouble about that if I made up my mind to tell you and Verman about it when Verman comes back. This is the way it is, you see, Herman, about shadowin’ crooks: I got to decide first what gang o’ crooks we better go after; then maybe sometime I’ll let you and Verman and Sam Williams maybe get on their trail or sumpthing when I’m busy.”
Herman appeared to be too languid to make any response; one of his eyes had closed entirely and the drowsy lid hung low upon the other. He muttered indistinguishably; but, after a time, roused himself enough to make an inquiry. “Whut ‘at l’il whi’ boy done do to you?”
Penrod gave an account of the spitefulness of the recent visitor’s final exploit. “I bet you never had anybody visit you that was as mean as that little Ronald,” he said in conclusion. “I bet you never had any little cousin that painted a brand new hat and your dog, and then went away makin’ that sign at you and your whole family, the way he did!”
Herman roused himself a little more. “‘At ain’ nuff’m. Pappy tuck an’ stay all night one time where my Uncle Ben live’. When night come Pappy tuck his coat an’ pants an’ stuck ’em under his haid to sleep on ‘cause his pants had fo’teen dolluhs in ’em. When he wake up nex’ day he ain’ got nuff’m under him but a bundle o’ rags — coat an’ pants an’ fo’teen dolluhs done gone. ‘Whe
re my coat an’ pants an’ fo’teen dolluhs done gone?’ he ast Uncle Ben. Uncle Ben say they done gone. ‘I knows they gone,’ Pappy say. ‘Whut I wan’ to know is where is they gone!’ Uncle Ben say Oofus got ’em.”
“Who?” Penrod asked, struck by this name. “Who was Oof us? Did he mean somebody named Rufus?”
“How I know?” Herman said. “All I know is Uncle Ben say Oofus done tuck an’ come an’ git ’em. He say Oofus done come an’ tuck ‘at coat an’ pants an’ fo’teen dolluhs while Pappy’s sleepin’, an’ tuck an’ gone outdoors an’ buil’ him a bonfire an’ burn ‘at coat an’ pants an’ fo’teen dolluhs all up. Pappy say, ‘Where’s ’em ashes? Where’s ’em ashes?’ Pappy say. Ef Oofus done tuck an’ buil’ him a bonfire an’ burn my pants an’ coat an’ fo’teen dolluhs all up, where’s ’em ashes?’ Uncle Ben say Oofus done tuck an’ scatter all ’em ashes. Uncle Ben say he len’ Pappy pair of overalls to go home in. ‘Tain’ his fault, Uncle Ben say, ‘cause he cain’ he’p whut Oofus do.”
Penrod felt that little Ronald’s vandalism was outmatched by the misbehaviour of Oofus; Herman seemed to have scored a point of superiority in possessing a relative more damaging than young Master Passloe. However, the point was not entirely settled in Herman’s favour. “Listen, Herman, was Oofus your Uncle Ben’s little boy?”
“How I know? Uncle Ben ain’ say who Oofus is. All he say, ‘Oofus done tuck an’ buil’ him a bonfire an’ burn”em all up’.”
“Well, then,” Penrod returned, “he proba’ly wasn’t your father’s little cousin or else your Uncle Ben would of told him he was, so I guess that proves it, Herman.”
“Prove whut?” Herman inquired sleepily, and now both his eyelids were closed. “Who prove whut?” he murmured.
“Your Uncle Ben would of told your father that Oofus was his little boy if he had been, wouldn’t he? So that proves you haven’t got any little cousin as bad as the one that’s just been visitin’ at our house. Oofus must of been a pretty mean person but he wasn’t any relation to your father, or to you either, Herman.” Penrod undoubtedly found a little solace in this thought; his voice took on the tone of one who triumphs in an argument. “It doesn’t matter how bad this Oofus was, Herman. I got the worst little cousin in the world, and I bet I can prove it, because Oofus wasn’t your father’s cousin, and anyhow proba’ly your father’s clothes were kind of old. Oofus didn’t ruin anything that was brand new, the way Ronald ruined my hat, and Oofus didn’t cover a poor ole dog that couldn’t help himself with a lot of sticky paint and ail different colours and everything. Besides, Oofus didn’t make any sign at your father with his thumb on his nose, and ride away in a taxicab yelling ‘Yah! Yah! Yah!’ at him and all his family, the way my little cousin Ronald did. Oofus might of been a crook maybe, Herman; but I bet he wouldn’t of been very hard to manage if your father had known how. That’s what you haf to know about managin’ crooks, Herman; you haf to know how to do it.” Here Penrod became mysterious; he glanced up and down the alley, frowned and passed his right hand over the left part of his chest under his jacket. “Herman,” he said confidentially, in a low voice, “I got a notion to show you sumpthing, if you’ll never tell. It’s a secret; but it’s got sumpthing to do with what I was tellin’ you about a while ago. It’s got sumpthing to do with what I said maybe I’d tell you and Verman and Sam Williams some day, if I decide to. I guess you’ll be surprised, Herman; but I’ll show it to you.” Again he glanced under a frowning brow to right and left, up and down the alley; then dramatically tossed back the left side of his jacket, exposing, for one moment only, the shield upon his breast, “Look, Herman!”
The effect was disappointing; Herman was not surprised, nor impressed, nor moved in any manner whatever. He was now sound asleep, a fact that slowly and somewhat chillingly became apparent. Penrod was disconcerted; the feeling he experienced was not wholly unlike that of an actor who finds himself minus an audience at a moment of crisis. He buttoned his jacket, scuffed dust again with the side of his shoe, and, oddly embarrassed, seemed to need to do or say something that would reduce a mortifying effect of anticlimax. He looked down darkly upon the unconscious figure on the doorstep.
“Huh!” he said grimly. “I guess it’s a good thing for you I didn’t let you see this badge, you old Herman you!” Then, not quite sure what he meant by that threatening exit-speech, but nevertheless restored by it to a Jashberish frame of mind, he strode away, to fill in an hour of this long Sunday afternoon with a bath for Duke. “I guess you better not try to go to sleep while I’m talkin’ to you,” he said fiercely to the gayly coloured little dog, as he drew him toward the necessary bucket of soapy water. “You hold still, you ole crook you!”
CHAPTER VIII
WAYS OF KNOWING THINGS
THE JUNE-TIME MOON hung over the town, and, in a wicker chair upon the ample front verandah of Mr. Schofield’s house, a young man sat and sometimes struck little harmonies and chimes from the strings of a light guitar; sometimes, too, he sang to this accompaniment in an unobtrusive tenor voice, and at other times — and oftener — made as much love as she would permit to Mr. Schofield’s pretty daughter. But in this he encountered difficulties that presently became part of a crisis.
“I can’t and I won’t,” she said, after listening patiently to an appeal that would easily have reached those heights defined as “impassioned oratory”, if it had not been delivered in a whisper. “It’s just ridiculous, Robert. You’ve only had your Bachelor’s degree three or four days, and next fall you’ve got to begin law school for three years, and after that you’ve got to go into somebody’s office and wait to get a practice. I won’t hear of such nonsense — not now.”
“But why not?” Mr. Robert Williams urged huskily.
“Good gracious!” Margaret cried. “Haven’t I just told you? It would be absurd for us to consider ourselves absolutely engaged. You ought to have your utter freedom.”
“I?” he said, astonished. “I ought to? But I don’t want to have my utter freedom!”
“Yes; you might,” she returned gently. “You might see somebody else you wanted to marry, and you ought to be entirely free of all entanglements until you’re established as a lawyer.”
“But if I should see somebody else and wanted to marry her—”
“You see!” Margaret cried triumphantly. “You admit right away that you might!”
“I don’t anything of the kind; I was just arguing. I was pointing out that if I got engaged to somebody else, as you say I ought to have the right to, I wouldn’t be ‘free’ from entanglements, as you say I should be, until I’m an established lawyer.”
“I never heard anything so mixed up,” she declared.
“Neither did I,” Robert returned, with some bitterness. “That’s just what I’m trying to make clear. You say I ought to be free—”
“Of course you ought! At your age, a man just starting in the world, and with his way to make, ought not to have the burden of any obliga—”
“Well, what would I be asking you for, if it were a burden?”
“It’s no use, Robert,” she said firmly. “If I let you hamper yourself with this engagement now, I couldn’t look your mother and father in the face, and I nearly always see both of them three or four times a day. I couldn’t face them, knowing that I had allowed their only son—”
“Margaret!” he protested. “What is the matter with you? When I was home at Christmas you didn’t talk through your hat like this.”
“Well, perhaps not an only son,” she admitted placidly. “I just said that, and, besides, Sam’s so much younger he doesn’t count. Anyhow, it can’t affect the truth of what I was saying. I simply couldn’t look your mother and father in the face if I let you saddle yourself with—”
“Margaret!” he interrupted, in a voice of such feeling that she paused to listen. “Margaret, you’re only making excuses for something you don’t want to confess — something in your own soul.”
Margaret sat up
straight in her chair. “I think,” she said, with sudden frigidity, “I think when you bring such charges against me, you had better explain what you mean.”
“Why, I wasn’t bringing any charges,” Robert protested unhappily. “I only meant that last summer I thought you were pretty fond of me, and when I came home for the holidays, you were so — so—”
“So what?” she inquired sharply. “What was I?”
“So — so friendly — that I thought we’d pretty well settled things. And your letters, up to three weeks ago, were — were the same way. Then you didn’t write any more—”
“I knew your time was occupied with Commencement.”
“It wasn’t,” said Robert. “Not for three whole weeks. Didn’t I write to you — seven or eight long letters?”
“You should have been working on your thesis or something,” she returned primly. “You shouldn’t have been hampered—”
This word at such a juncture was too much for Robert. “Hampered!” he cried indignantly. “Margaret, how can you sit there and go on with such barefaced hypocrisy?”
“What!” she said. “‘Hypocrisy’? Is that what you’re charging me with?”
“You know it! You’ve changed toward me — that’s the truth of it — and you’re ashamed to admit it. You don’t want to be engaged to me, and you put it on the score of my future, so you can take a high, altruistic ground, instead of confessing that there’s somebody else!”
“What!”
“It’s true! It’s you who want to be free, for your own sake, not mine. I feared it; but I wouldn’t believe it, not even when I was told so!”
“‘Told so’!” she echoed sharply. “Who told you?”
“I decline to state. But it’s true. I was told yesterday that you’d gone everywhere for the last four or five weeks with a new man that’s come here to live, named Dade.”
“Mr. Dade!” Margaret cried angrily. “He has nothing whatever to do with it, and I wish you’d please leave Mr. Herbert Hamilton Dade out of this conversation. Besides that, I wish you would kindly use a little self-control — unless you want father and mother to overhear you inside the house. With all this fuss and excitement you’re making, I should think you’d prefer that they didn’t.”
Collected Works of Booth Tarkington Page 440