Friar Tuck

by Robert Alexander Wason

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  THE TRADE-RAT'S CHRISTMAS-GIFT

  Trade-rats haven't as much idee of real music as coyotes have.Ninety-one verses of that infernal cow-song, sung in Horace'snose-tenor, was enough to drive bed-bugs out of a lumber-camp; butthat night the trade-rat worked harder than ever. We had hid our stuffan' fastened it down, an' used every sort of legitimate means tocircumvent the cuss; but he beat us to it every time, an' switched ourstuff around scandalous.

  "Merry Christmas!" yelled Spider Kelley, holdin' up a rusty sardinecan.

  The trade-rat had remembered us all in some the same way, but werecalled what day it was an' took it in good part; until, all of asudden, ol' Tank gave a whoop, an' held up a brown buck-skin bag. Wecrowded around an' wanted him to open it up an' see what was inside;but he said it most probably belonged to Olaf or Kit or the Friar; sowe toted it into the cabin an' asked the one who could identify it tostep out an' claim his diamonds.

  Then we had a surprise--not one o' the bunch could identify the bag!We stood around an' looked at the bag for as much as five minutes,tryin' to figure out how the deuce even a trade-rat could spring stuffon us none of us had ever seen before.

  "This is a real trade, sure enough," sez Horace.

  "I tell ya what this is," sez I. "This is a Christmas-gift for theFriar. Go on an' open it, Friar."

  The' was some soft, Injun-tanned fawn-skin inside, wrappin' up acouple o' papers, an' two photographs, and an old faded letter. "Idon't think we have the right to look at these," sez the Friar.

  "How'll we ever find out who they belong to, then?" asked Horace."Look at the letter anyway."

  It was in a blank envelope, an' it began, "My dear son," and ended,"Your lovin' mother." The letter was just the same as all motherswrite to their sons, I reckon: full of heartache, an' tenderness, an'good advice, an' scoldin'; but nothin' to identify nobody by; so wesaid 'at the Friar should read the papers. One of 'em was an honorabledischarge from the army; but all the names an' dates an' localitieshad been crossed out. It was what they call an "Excellent" discharge,which is the best they give, an' you could tell by the thumb print 'atthis part had been read the most by whoever had treasured it.

  The other paper was simply a clippin' from a newspaper. It was acolumn of items tellin' about Dovey wishin' to see Tan Shoes at thesame place next Sunday, an' such things. The Friar said 'at this wasthe personal column, an' he sure labeled it; 'cause if a feller choseto guess any, some o' those items was personal enough to make abar-tender blush; but they didn't convey any news to us as to wherethe trade-rat had procured the buck-skin bag.

  The photographs were wrapped in tissue paper an' then tied togetherwith pink string, face to each. The Friar balked a little at openin''em up; but we deviled him into it. The first he opened was a cheap,faded little one of an old lady. She had a sad, patient face, an'white hair. Horace was standin' on a chair, lookin' over the Friar'sshoulder, an' he piped out that the photograph had been took in NewYork, an' asked if we knew any one who lived there, which most of usdid; but not the subject of the photograph.

  Then the Friar opened the other one. He took one look at it, an' thenhis face turned gray. "This one was took in Rome," sez Horace. "Doesany one here have a list o' friends livin' in Rome, Italy?"

  He hadn't looked at the face on the photograph, nor at the Friar'sface; but when we didn't answer, he looked up, saw that we had soberedin sympathy with the Friar, an' then he looked at the face on thephotograph an' got down off the chair. The face was of a beautifullady in a low-necked, short-sleeved dress. Not as low nor as short assome dresses I've seen in pictures, but still a purty generousoutlook.

  The Friar's hands shook some; but he gradually got a grip on himself,an' purty soon, he sez in a steady voice: "This is a picture ofSignorina Morrissena. Does any one here know of her?"

  Well, of course none of us had ever heard of her; so the Friar wrappedup the package again an' put it back into the buck-skin bag. We hadexpected to have some high jinks that day, an' Kit had baked a lot o'vinegar pies for dinner, we had plenty o' fresh deer-meat, an' we hadagreed to let the Friar hold a regular preachin' first; but when wesaw how the picture had shook him up we drifted back to our own shackan' sat talkin' about where the deuce that blame trade-rat couldpossibly have got a holt o' the buck-skin bag. I was purty sure thatit was a picture o' the Friar's girl, the extra trimmin's on the namenot bein' much in the way of a disguise, an' as soon as I got a chanceto see Horace I questioned him, an' he said it was the girl, allright; but that she had developed a lot.

  The Friar had taken a hoss an' gone up into the mountains, an' hadleft word that he didn't want any dinner. We were as full o' sympathywith him as we could stand, but not in the mood to sidestep such ameal as Kit had framed up; so we ate till after three in theafternoon. We didn't want to do anything to fret him a speck; so wehardly knew what to do. Generally it tickled him to have us ask him topreach to us; but we couldn't tell how he'd feel about it now, and wewere still discussin' it about the fire when the Friar came back.

  He looked mighty weary, an' we knew he had been drivin' himself purtyhard, although it wasn't just tiredness which showed in his face.Still, the' was a sort of peace there, too; so after he'd warmedhimself a while, ol' Tank asked him if he wouldn't like to preach tous a bit.

  The Friar once said that back East some folks used good manners asclothin' for their souls, but that out our way good-heartedness wasthe clothin', an' good manners nothin' more than a silver band aroundthe hat. "And some o' the bands are mighty narrow, Friar," I added todraw him out. "Yes," sez he, "but the hats are mighty broad."

  You just couldn't floor the Friar in a case like this. He knew 'at thepoliteness an' the good-heartedness in Tank's request was divided offabout the same as the band an' the hat; and that all we wanted was toease off the Friar's mind an' let him feel contented; so he heaved asigh and shook his head at Tank.

  When a blacksmith goes out into company, folks don't pester him withquestions as to why tempered steel wasn't stored up in handy caves,instead of havin' nothin' but rough ore hid away in the cellar of amountain; and a carpenter is not held responsible because a sharp sawcuts better 'n a dull one; but it seems about next to impossible for ahuman bein' to pass up a parson without insultin' him a little aboutthe ways o' Providence, and askin' him a lot o' questions which wouldmoult feathers out o' the ruggedest angel in the bunch.

  We could all see 'at the Friar had been havin' a rough day of it; soTank began by askin' him questions simply to toll him away fromhimself; but soon he was shootin' questions into the Friar as roughshod as though they was both strangers to each other.

  "You say it was sheep-herders what saw the angels that night the Lordwas born," sez Tank. "How come the' wasn't any cow-punchers saw 'em?"Tank had about the deep-rootedest prejudice again' sheep-herders Iever saw.

  "The' wasn't any cow-punchers in that land," sez the Friar. "It was ahilly land an'--"

  "Well I'd like to know," broke in ol' Tank, "why the Lord picked outsuch a place as that, when he had the whole world to choose from."

  O' course the Friar tried his best to smooth this out; but by the timehe was through, Tank had got tangled up with another perdicament."Then, there was ol' Faro's dream," he said, "the one about the sevenlean cows eatin' the seven fat ones. I've punched cows all my life,and I saw 'em so thin once, when the snow got crusted an' the chinookgot switched off for a month, that the spikes on their backbonespunched holes through their hides; but they'd as soon thought o'flyin' up an' grazin' on clouds, as to turn in an' eat one another."

  By the time the Friar had got through explainin' the differencebetween dreams and written history, Tank was ready with another query."I heard tell once 'at the Bible sez, 'If thy eye offends thee, pluckit out.' Does the Bible say this?"

  "Well, it does," admitted the Friar; "but you see--"

  "Well, my free eye offends me," broke in Tank. "It never did offend meuntil Spike Groogan tried to pluck it out, and it don't off
end me nowas much as it does other folks. Still, I got to own up 'at the blamething does offend me whenever I meet up with strangers, 'cause itallus runs wilder in front of a stranger 'n at airy other time. Now,what I want to know is, why an' when an' how must I pluck out thateye--specially, when it sez in another place that if a man's eye issingle his whole body is full o' light. My eye is single enough tosuit any one. Fact is, it's so blame single that some folks call itsingular; but the' ain't no more light in my body 'n there is in airyother man's."

  You couldn't work off any spiritual interpretation stuff on Tank. Hethought an allegory was the varmint which lives in the Florida swamps.Well, as far as that goes, I did, too, until the Friar pointed outthat it was merely a falsehood used to explain the truth; but Tank, hedidn't join in with any new-fangled notions, an' a feller had to talkto him as straight out as though talkin' to a hoss. The' was lots oftimes I didn't envy the Friar his job.

  But after he had satisfied Tank that it wasn't required of him todiscard either of his lamps, especially the free one, he drifted offinto tellin' us how he had spent the day--and then I envied him alittle, for he certainly did have the gift o' wranglin' words.

  He told about havin' rode up the mountain as far as he could go, andthen climbin' as far as he could on foot. He showed how hard it was totell either a man or a mountain by the lines in their faces, and hewent on with this till he made a mountain almost human. Then heswitched around and showed how much a mountain was like life, ambitionbein' like pickin' out the mountain, the easy little foothills bein'the start, the summit allus hid while a feller was climbin', and eachlittle plateau urgin' him to give up there and rest. He compared lifeand a mountain, until it seemed that all a feller needed for a fulledication, was just to have a mountain handy. Then he wound up bysayin' that he hadn't been able to reach the peak. He had sat in asheltered nook for a time, gazin' up at the face of a cliff with anoverhangin' bank o' snow on top, the wind swirlin' masses o' snow downabout him, and everything tryin' to point out that he had been afailure, and might as well give up in disgust. He stopped here, and wewere all silent, for, as was usual with him, he had led us along towhere we could see life through his eyes for a space.

  "After a time," sez the Friar as soon as he saw we were in the rightmood, "I caught my breath again and followed the narrow ledge I was onaround to where I could see the highest peak stand out clear andsolitary; and from my side of it, it wasn't possible for any man toreach it. There was no wind here, the air was as sweet and pure as atthe dawn o' creation, and everywhere I looked I met glory heaped onglory. A gray cloud rested again' the far side o' the peak, and backo' this was the sun. Ah, there was a silver and a golden linin' bothto this cloud; and all of a sudden I was comforted.

  "I had done all I could do, and this was my highest peak. Whatever wasthe highest peak for others, this was the highest peak for me; andthere was no more bitterness or envy or doubt or fear in my heart. Istood for a long time lookin' up at the gray cloud with its dazzlingedges, and some very beautiful lines crept into my memory--'The pathswhich are trod, by only the evenin' and mornin', and the feet of theangels of God.'"

  The Friar had let himself out a little at the end, and his eyes wereshinin' when he finished. "I guess I have given you a sermon, afterall, boys," he said, "and I hope you can use it to as good advantageas I did when it came to me up on the mountain. We all have thoughtswe can't put into words, and so I've failed to give you all 'at wasgiven me; but it's some comfort to know that, be they big or be theylittle, we don't have to climb any mountains but our own, and whetherwe reach the top or whether we come to a blind wall first, the mainthing is to climb with all our might and with a certain faith thatthose who have earned rest shall find it, after the sun has set."

  This was one of the days when the magic of the Friar's voice didstrange things to a feller's insides. We knew 'at he was talkin' inparables, an' talkin' mostly to himself; but each one of us knew ourown little mountains, an' it was darn comfortin' to understand thatthe Friar could have as tough a time on his as we had on ours.

  We all sat silent, each feller thinkin' over his own problems; andafter a time, the Friar sang the one beginnin', "O little town ofBethlehem!" It was dark by this time, but the firelight fell on hisface, an' made it so soft-like an' tender that ol' Tank Williamssniffled audible once, an' when the song was finished he piled a lotmore wood on the fire, an' pertended 'at he was catchin' cold. WhenKit called us in to supper, we all sat still for a full minute, beforewe could get back to our appetites again.