Teeftallow/Chapter 12

MR. ZED PARRUM came to Abner's room one afternoon to say that old man Elihu Warrington who lived three miles out on the Florence road was going to give a dance that night, and he insisted that his two friends should go.

There was something about Zed, his roughly hopped humorous face, that suggested country dances. Mr. Tug Beavers immediately began speculating on how he would send word to Mary Lou Meredith. Abner said he would take the note.

"Ain't you goin' to take yore gal, Ab?" asked Tug.

Abner warmed between embarrassment and gratification.

"I don't know whether she'll go or not."

"Do you mean she's one of them damned stuck-up town gals?" asked Zed drily.

None of the trio objected to the adjective Mr. Parrum applied indifferently to all village folk.

"I don't know if she be or not."

"For the love of sukey—don't know whether yore gal's a town gal or a country gal!"

"Go along and send her a note," counselled Tug, "and if she won't go with you, tell her to go to hell."

"We-ell," agreed Abner dubiously, and both the room mates began looking for paper and ink on which Zed Parrum was to write the notes.

This task fell to Zed because the awkward fellow possessed the queer accomplishment of being able to write a copperplate hand. Zed agreed good-naturedly, cleared a space on the boys' dresser, drew up a chair, and assumed what he explained was the "side position." Mr. Parrum had taught ​writing schools in Lane County, and never could write in the presence of any one without explaining how it was done—he rested his arm on the pad of muscles under his forearm, he held his pen so the nails of his little finger and his ringfinger glided smoothly over the paper, thus . . . here Zed broke into easy gyrations with his pen and drew a bewildering bird. The boys were in amazement at his expertness. Then on a page of pink notepaper he reproduced this form from the Ever Ready Letter Writer, or Epistolary Forms for All Occasions:

Without pausing he wrote a duplicate note to Miss Mary Lou Meredith. The two hill youths murmured oaths of admiration at Zed's performance. As a matter of fact, the only form of art ever practised among the hillmen is beautiful writing. This occasionally breaks away into the purely decorative and becomes a floridly drawn bird. It is only through handwriting that the pictorial art can form a liaison with the useful and practical and thus find any lodgment in the culture of Lane County. These narrowly hedged artists pleased that calligraphy will be useful in book-keeping; but none of them ever keep books. It is, in reality, a tiny tendril of pure art creeping up by subterfuge in that arid spiritual soil.

Abner was to carry Tug's note, and Tug, Abner's, to their respective girls. The two young hillmen set out at once, Tug to the Grand, and Abner walked on out of the village to Squire Meredith's place.

The poorhouse boy swung along happily out of the village into the country again. An extraordinary charm had fallen over the world for Abner. The colour of the light falling ​aslant the hills reminded him of Nessie's yellow hair. The musky smell of the weeds which the farmers allowed to overrun their fence corners foreshadowed his coming walk with Nessie through the perfumed summer night. Out of the gladness of his heart he began alternately singing and whistling the refrain of "The Cowboy's Lament":

From the top of the higher hills Abner paused to look back at the village. He could see the dumpy steeple of the church where he had "disturbed public worship," and he reflected with a little thrill that he was indeed getting to be a hellion—gambling, drinking, shooting . . .

A little to the south of the village lay the new railroad, a raw red cut which extended in a level curve around the swell of a distant hill. Here and there were faint yellow cross-hatchings, which Abner knew were piles of ties ready to be laid. Close to village the road was completed, and Mr. Ditmas was expecting a locomotive to haul material from the main line to the labourers.

As Abner looked he saw a feather of smoke on the southern horizon, then a distant shriek told of a freight train coming up the main line. To Abner there was always something wild and terrific in the blast of a far-away train, and now the thought struck him, suppose he and Nessie should find themselves in peril as they crossed the track going to Mr. Warrington's that night. . . . He could see himself seizing Nessie, swinging her to safety while, a second later, the locomotive struck him. . . . A sense of physical crash quivered along Abner's spine; he would be flung to one side, Nessie would ruse to him. . . . lift his dying head in her arms. . . .

Abner moved on, tears prickling his eyes. Around the turn of the road he made out Squire Meredith's house.

The old justice of the peace was throwing corn to his pigs ​over his lot fence into the public road, and Abner received a fleeting impression that the old man had never left off doing this since he had seen him last.

Squire Meredith put down his basket and hailed Abner with pleasure. He began shouting questions in a large out-of-door voice asking Abner how he liked the railroad work, how he liked the town, how he liked his boarding house, did he get a good one, when Abner interrupted to ask for Mary Lou.

Squire Meredith changed from his cordial tone completely.

"Now, look here, you've got a note fer Mary Lou."

"Yes, I have," admitted Abner uncomfortably.

"Is it from that snake-in-the-grass Peck Bradley, or from that low-down, no-'count, whisky-guzzlin' windy-mouthed Tug Beavers?"

Still more reluctantly, Abner acknowledged it was from Tug. "Well, I don't want my gal to go traipsing off with none o' his kind," stated Mr. Meredith flatly.

"Squire Meredith," inquired Abner logically, "who in this neighbourhood can she go with, then?"

"None, I reckon! None a-tall!" stormed the old man, shaking his fist at a reprobate world. "Ever'body an ever'thing's gone to the dawgs, and here it is right at the end of the world—it does look like we're all bound fer destruction together. Oh, my Lord, young man, where air we bound fer! Where air we bound fer!"

Abner recalled with a little shock that the world was indeed to end in October—and he had forgotten it. He was amazed at his own feather-headedness. He said frankly to the Squire, "I be dad blame', do you know, Squire Meredith, I forgot what you tole me about that, shore as God made little apples?"

"You forgot it down in that wicked gamblin' city!" declaimed the old man, "and it's jest where you should have remembered it the most."

"That shore is right," admitted Abner, astonished at his own folly.

"Ay, Lord," sighed the old man, "and Lot prayed if they ​wuz jest ten righteous people in the whole city would He save it, and God said He would, but they wuzn't ten—Ay, Lord! Same here, Abner, jest exactly the same here!" The old man thumped the top rail with his calloused fist and stood shaking his head in the fading sunshine.

Abner hadn't the faintest notion what he was talking about.

Miss Mary Lou Meredith must have heard the noise her father was making and divined its cause, for presently Abner saw her appear in the dark doorway of the farmhouse and then start to the gate with a certain curiosity in her manner.

Squire Meredith broke off his tirade to watch her approach. He remained quite silent until she reached the gate and had come to rest with her hands on its top, then he asked significantly, "Did you want anything, Mary Lou?"

Mary Lou made an unconvincing display of fanning her olive cheeks with her handkerchief. "I jest come out for a breath of air."

Abner began a movement to produce the note when the Squire said flatly, "Well, there is air in all directions, Mary Lou."

Mary Lou's dark brows puckered. "I declare, Pap," she ejaculated sharply, "air you an' Abner Teeftaller talkin' sich secrets I kain't stan' here at my own gate?" Then she changed her tone completely and asked cordially, "How air ye, Abner?"

"I jest come by . . ." began Abner, so embarrassed he could hardly get the note from his pocket.

"Put that right back in yore pocket, Abner," directed the old man sharply.

The girl flared up. "Now there you go ag'in! If the worl' ain't goin' to last but till October I don't see why I should be kep' penned up like fatt'nin' stock!"

The old man smote the top rail. "None o' yore high jinks aroun' me, Mary Lou! I simply ain't goin' to have that Peck Bradley comin' aroun' me!"

​"Peck Bradley!" snapped the girl in sudden scorn. "Do you think I'd look at that murderer! After him killin' ole man Shelton over a pig! A stray pig!" Mary Lou flashed with temper, and it quite astonished Abner that anger could improve a girl's looks.

"Well, that other one, whatever his name is—is jest as bad, he drinks."

"Didn't you drink when you was a-courtin' Mammy?" flared the daughter, "an' would she ever got married to you a'tall if you hadn't been drunk— Oh, that's what made a prohibitionist out o' you!" she pointed the finger scornfully at her father.

Came a pause. Even the leathery old face of the Squire grew duskier.

"You've been listenin' to that cat of a aunt of yours! You kain't believe a word she says, never could! Besides, Mary Lou, it was diff'runt in them days! Whisky was legal then. We had a legal right to drink what an' when we pleased! An' what did the apostle Paul say?—Take a little wine fer your stomick's sake—"

"Well, don't he still say it?"

"I—I don't know."

"Well, did he say git married on it back in them days?" cried the girl satirically.

"My Lord, Mary Lou!" cried the old justice of the peace bitterly, "that happened afore you wuz ever born!"

"I should hope it did!" flamed the girl.

Squire Meredith flung up his weathered hands. "Lord, Abner, what kin I say to sich a gal! You're modern, Mary Lou! You've got a lot of this all-fired modern information in yore head and it's goin' to drag you down to a devil's hell, that's what it's goin' to do. You better pray to God instid of traipsing off to these new-fangled wicked dances!"

"Didn't you go to 'em?" cried Mary Lou in exasperation.

"I'm a man, Mary Lou!"

"Who'd you dance with—other men?"

​"Lord! Lord! Lord!" The Squire looked up at the heavens in genuine dismay, "What a daughter! What a daughter! I don't see where in the worl' you inherited such corruptness of heart—an' this present dispensation nearly finished, too!"

By this time it grew clear to Abner that he was listening to a quarrel which would go on indefinitely. He finally interrupted: "Well, I guess I better be goin' back. I jest come out fer a—er—little walk." He glanced about vaguely as if searching for one.

A moment's silence. Then Mary Lou asked belligerently, "When is it to be, Abner?"

"To-night," replied the youth in a hurried tone.

"Tell him yes," snapped Mary Lou.

"What!" shouted the Squire, outraged. "No, you don't, Abner Teeftaller!" He shook a finger wildly in the air. "You tell that young man if he shows up here, I'll—I'll—Mary Lou! You go right back in that house! Go on back! You're not goin' off with that scapegrace Peck Bradley!"

"It ain't Peck!" screamed Mary Lou. "It's Mr. Beavers! An' he's a gentleman, ever' inch of him! I only wish you had half the polish an' manners . . ."

"You're not goin'!"

"You tell Tug I said yes, Abner!"

"Lord! Lord!" cried the justice, "this is goin' to be a purty howdedo! I saw that Peck Bradley hangin' aroun' my barn the other night!"

"Don't you bother yore head about that!" advised the daughter harshly.

"But there's goin' to be trouble over it, don't I know it!"

"Well, it'll be Peck's trouble! Mr. Beavers can fan out a fiel' full o' Peck Bradleys. He's ten times as stout as Peck ever dared be!"

This last came faintly to Abner as he walked rapidly away. He heard Squire Meredith make some angry answer; the girl replied; he left the feud in progress.

​Abner walked on down the road, wondering at Tug's taste. What a noisy brunette sort of girl compared to the fairness and sweetness of Nessie! He couldn't understand Tug!

When Abner reached the hotel he entered his room and found his friend sitting gloomily on the bed. His first words were,

"I forgot to tell you, Ab, to sort o' shy aroun' the ol' man. I don't guess you got no answer."

"I got a verbal one," grinned Abner. "She said come on."

"What!"

"She yelled at me, 'Tell him, yes!'"

"Tell who yes?"

"Well, if she knowed who she was talkin' 'bout, I reckon you ort to!" and Abner began laughing outright.

Mr. Beavers's spirits improved somewhat, but even at that he fumbled gloomily in his pocket, drew out a very small envelope, and handed it in silence to Abner. With it came a whiff of perfume. It was directed in a girl's large wobbly hand to "Mr. Abner Teeftallow, City." It was unsealed, the flap turned inside.

Abner suddenly became so nervous he could hardly pull out the flap. This tremulousness swiftly spread over his whole body down to his very knees. At last he did have the note out and open in his fingers. He could barely read the unsteady page.

Added to this was a woman's postscript, evidently not copied from the Ever Ready Letter Writer. The postscript said:

Abner continued looking at the fragrant paper for some minutes after he had finished reading it. Tug sat scowling on the bed. From the hall below came the opening and shutting of a door. Both youths involuntarily strained their ears and presently heard a faint careful tiptoeing of someone passing their door.

Tug nodded savagely toward this noise, "There she goes now," he whispered. "Jest step out there in the hall, Abner, an' tell her to—go—to—hell!"