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The Underdog

F >> F. Hopkinson Smith >> The Underdog




"Yesterday mornin'--" Jim's voice broke, and he cleared his throat.
"Yesterday mornin' we went down the branch, as ye know, and she was
a-settin' on a log throwin' her fly into the pool, when one o' them
song-sparrows lit on a bush and looked at her, and begin to sing like
he'd bust his little chest, and she sung back at him with her eyes
a-laughin' and her hair a-flyin', and I stood lookin' at her and my
heart choked up in my throat, and I leaned over and took the rod out
o' her hand.

"'Baby-girl,' I says, 'there ain't a bird 'round here that ain't got a
mate; and that's what makes 'em so happy. I ain't got nobody but you,
Ruby--don't go 'way from me, child--stay with me.' And I told her. She
looked at me startled like, same as a deer does when he hears a dog
bark; then she jumped up and begin to cry.

"'Oh, Jim--Jim--dear Jim!' she says. 'I love you so, and you've been so
good to me all my life, but don't--don't never say that to me again.
That can never be--not so long as we live.' And she dropped down on the
ground and cried till she couldn't git her breath. Then she got up and
kissed my hands and went home, leavin' me there alone feelin' like I'd
fell off a scaffoldin' and struck the sidewalk."

Jim arose from his seat and began pacing the platform again. I had not
spoken a word through his long story.

"Jim," I began, "how old are you?"

"Forty-two," he said, in a patient, listless way.

"More than twice as old as Ruby, aren't you? Old enough, really, to be
her father. You love her, don't you--love her for herself--not yourself?
You wouldn't let anything hurt her if you could help it. You were right
when you said every bird has its mate. That's true, Jim, and the way it
ought to be--but they mate with _this_ year's birds, not _last_ year's.
When men get as old as you and I we forget these things sometimes, but
they are true all the same."

"I know it," he broke out, "I know it; you can't tell me nothin' about
it. I thought it all over more'n a hundred times lately. I could bite my
tongue off for sayin' what I did to her, and spilin' her visit, but it's
done now and I can't help it, and I've got to stay here and bear it."

"No, Jim, don't stay here. So long as she sees you around here she'll be
unhappy, and you will be equally miserable. Go away from here; find work
somewhere else."

"When?" he said, quietly.

"Now; right away; before she comes back at Christmas."

"No, I can't do it, and I won't. Not till she graduates and gits her
certificate. That'll be next June."

"What's that got to do with it?"

"Got a good deal to do with it. If I should leave now jes's winter's
comin' on I mightn't git another job, and she'd have to come home and
her eddication be sp'ilt."

"What would bring her home?" I asked in surprise.

"What would bring her home?" he repeated, with some irritation. "Why
they'd send her if the bills warn't paid--that's what Marm Marvin
couldn't help her, and Jed wouldn't give her a cent. Them school-bills,
you know, I've always paid out o' my wages--that's why Jed let her go.
No; I'll stick it out here till she finishes, if it kills me. Baby-girl
sha'n't miss nothin' through me."

One beautiful spring day I swung back the gate of a garden on the
outskirts of the village of Plymouth and walked up a flower-bordered
path to a cottage porch smothered in vines.

Ruby was standing in the door, her hands held out to me. I had not seen
her for years. Her husband had not returned yet from their school, but
she expected him every minute.

"And dear old Jim?" I asked. "What has become of him?"

"Look," she said, pointing to a shambling, awkward figure stooping under
the apple-trees, which were in full bloom. "There he is, picking
blossoms with little Ruby. He never leaves her for a minute."



COMPARTMENT NUMBER FOUR--COLOGNE TO PARIS

He was looking through a hole--a square hole, framed about with mahogany
and ground glass. His face was red, his eyes were black, his
mustache--waxed to two needle-points--was a yellowish brown; his necktie
blue and his uniform dark chocolate seamed with little threads of
vermilion and incrusted with silver poker-chip buttons emblazoned with
the initials of the corporation which he served.

I knew I was all right when I read the initials. I had found the place
and the man. The place was the ticket-office of the International
Sleeping-Car Company. The man was its agent.

So I said, very politely and in my best French--it is a little frayed
and worn at the edges, but it arrives--sometimes----

"A lower for Paris."

The man in chocolate, with touches of the three primary colors
distributed over his person, half-closed his eyes, lifted his shoulders
in a tired way, loosened his fingers, and, without changing the
lay-figure expression of his face, replied:

"There is nothing."

"Not a berth?"

"Not a berth."

"Are they all _paid_ for?" and I accented the word _paid_. I spend
countless nights on Pullmans in my own country and am familiar with many
uncanny devices.

"All but one."

"Why can't I have it? It is within an hour of train-time. Who ordered
it?"

"The Director of the great circus. He is here now waiting for his
troupe, which arrives from Berlin in a special car belonging to our
company. The other car--the one that starts from here--is full. We have
only two cars on this train--Monsieur the Director has the last berth."

He said this, of course, in his native language. I am merely translating
it. I would give it to you in the original, but it might embarrass you;
it certainly would me.

"What's the matter with putting the Circus Director in the special car?
Your regulations say berths must be paid for one hour before train-time.
It is now fifty-five minutes of eight. Your train goes at eight, doesn't
it? Here is a twenty-franc gold piece--never mind the change"--and I
flung a napoleon on the desk before him.

The bunch of fingers disentangled themselves, the shoulders sank an
inch, the waxed ends of the taffy-colored mustache vibrated slightly,
and a smile widened in circles across the flat dulness of his face
until it engulfed his eyebrows, ears, and chin. The effect of the
dropping of the coin had been like the dropping of a stone into the
still smoothness of a pool--the wrinkling wavelets had reached the
uttermost shore-line.

The smile over, he opened a book about the size of an atlas, dipped a
pen in an inkstand, recorded my point of departure--Cologne, and my
point of arrival--Paris; dried the inscription with a pinch of black
sand filched from a saucer--same old black sand used in the last
century--cut a section of the page with a pair of shears, tossed the
coin in the air, listened to its ring on the desk with a satisfied look,
slipped the whole twenty-franc piece into his pocket--regular fare,
fifteen francs, irregular swindle, five francs--and handed me the
billet. Then he added, with a trace of humor in his voice:

"If Monsieur the Director of the Circus comes now he will go in the
special car."

I examined the billet. I had Compartment Number Four, upper berth, Car
312.

I lighted a cigarette, gave my small luggage-checks to a porter with
directions to deposit my traps in my berth when the train was ready--the
company's office was in the depot--and strolled out to look at
the station.

You know the Cologne station, of course. It is as big as the Coliseum,
shaped like an old-fashioned hoop-skirt with a petticoat of glass, and
connects with one of the most beautiful bridges in the world. It has
two immense waiting-rooms, with historical frescos on the walls and two
huge fireplaces supported on nudities shivering with the cold, for no
stick of wood ever blazes on the well-swept hearths. It has also a
gorgeous restaurant, with panelled ceiling, across which skip bunches of
butterfly Cupids in shameless costumes, and an inviting cafe with
never-dying palms in the windows, a portrait of the Kaiser over the
counter holding the coffee-urn, and a portrait of the Kaiserin over the
counter holding the little sticky cakes, the baby bottles of champagne,
and the long lady-finger sandwiches with bits of red ham hanging from
their open ends like poodle-dogs' tongues.

Outside these ponderous rooms, under the arching glass of the station
itself, is a broad platform protected from rushing trains and yard
engines by a wrought-iron fence, twisted into most enchanting scrolls
and pierced down its whole length by sliding wickets, before which stand
be-capped and be-buttoned officials of the road. It is part of the duty
of these gatemen never to let you through these wickets until the
arrival of the last possible moment compatible with the boarding of
your car.

So if you are wise--that is, if you have been left behind several times
depending on the watchfulness of these Cerberi and their promises to let
you know when your train is ready--you hang about this gate and keep an
eye out as to what is going on. I had been two nights on the sleeper
through from Warsaw and beyond, and could take no chances.

Then again, I wanted to watch the people coming and going--it is a habit
of mine; nothing gives me greater pleasure. It has made me an expert in
judging human nature. I flatter myself that I can tell the moment I set
my eyes on a man just what manner of life he leads, what language he
speaks, whether he be rich or poor, educated or ignorant. I can do all
this before he opens his mouth. I have never been proud of this faculty.
I have regarded it more as a gift, as I would an acute sense of color,
or a correct eye for drawing, or the ability to acquire a language
quickly. I was born that way, I suppose.

The first man to approach the wicket was the Director of the Circus. I
knew him at once. There was no question as to _his_ identity. He wore a
fifty-candle-power stone in his shirt-front, a silk hat that shone like
a new hansom cab, and a Prince Albert coat that came below his knees. He
had taken off his ring boots, of course, and was without his whip, but
otherwise he was completely equipped to raise his hat and say: "Ladies
and Gentlemen, the world-renowned," etc., etc., "will now perform the
blood-curdling act of," etc.

He was attended by a servant, was smooth-shaven, had an Oriental
complexion as yellow as the back of an old law-book, black, jet-black
eyes, and jet-black hair.

I listened for some outbreak, some explosion about his bed having been
sold from under him, some protest about the rights of a citizen. None
came. The gateman merely touched his hat, slid back the gate, and the
Director of the Greatest Show on Earth, smiling haughtily, passed in,
crossed the platform and stepped into a _wagon-lit_ standing on the next
track to me labelled "Paris 312," and left me behind. The gateman had
had free tickets, of course, or would have, for himself and family
whenever the troupe should be in Cologne. There was no doubt of it--I
saw it in the smile that permeated his face and the bow that bent his
back as the man passed him. This kind of petty bribery is, of course,
abominable, and should never be countenanced.

Some members of the troupe came next. The gentleman in chocolate with my
five francs in his pocket did not mention the name of any other member
of the troupe except the Director, but it was impossible for me to be
mistaken about these people--I have seen too many of them.

She was rather an imposing-looking woman--not young, not old--dressed in
a long travelling-cloak trimmed with fur (how well we know these
night-cloaks of the professional!), and was holding by a short leash an
enormous Danish hound; one of those great hulking hounds--a hound whose
shoulders shake when he walks, with white, blinky eyes, smooth skin, and
mottled spots--brown and gray--spattered along his back and ribs. Trick
dog, evidently--one who springs at the throat of the assassin (the
assassin has a thin slice of sausage tucked inside his collar-button),
pulls him to the earth, and sucks his life's blood or chews his throat.
She, too, went through with a sweep--the dog beside her, followed by a
maid carrying two band-boxes, a fur boa, and a bunch of parasols closely
furled and tied with a ribbon. I braced up, threw out my shoulders, and
walked boldly up to the wicket. The be-buttoned and be-capped man looked
at me coldly, waved me away with his hand, and said "Nein."

Now, when a man of intelligence, speaking the language of the country,
backed by the police, the gendarmerie, and the Imperial Army, says
"Nein" to me, if I am away from home I generally bow to the will of
the people.

So I waited.

Then I heard the low rumble of a train and a short high-keyed shriek--we
used to make just such shrieking sounds by blowing into keys when we
were boys. The St. Petersburg express was approaching end foremost--the
train with the special sleeping-car holding the balance of the circus
troupe. The next moment it bumped gently into Car No. 312, holding the
Director (I wondered whether he had my berth), the woman with the dog,
and her maid.

The gateman paused until the train came to a dead standstill, waited
until the last arriving passenger had passed through an exit lower down
along the fence, slid back the gate, and I walked through--alone! Not
another passenger either before or behind me! And the chocolate
gentleman told me the car was full! The fraud!

When I reached the steps of Car No. 312 I found a second gentleman in
chocolate and poker-chip buttons. He was scrutinizing a list of sold and
unsold compartments by the aid of a conductor's lantern braceleted on
his elbow. He turned the glare of his lantern on my ticket, entered the
car and preceded me down its narrow aisle and slid back the door of
Number Four. I stepped and discovered, to my relief, my small luggage,
hat-box, shawl, and umbrella, safely deposited in the upper berth. My
night's rest, at all events, was assured.

I found also a bald-headed passenger, who was standing with his back to
me stowing his small luggage into the lower berth. He looked at me over
his shoulder for a moment, moved his bag so that I could pass, and went
on with his work. My sharing his compartment had evidently produced an
unpleasant impression.

I slipped off my overcoat, found my travelling-cap, and was about to
light a fresh cigarette when there came a tap at the door. Outside in
the aisle stood a man with a silk hat in his hand.

"Monsieur, I am the Manager of the Compagnie Internationale. It is my
pleasure to ask whether you have everything for your comfort. I am going
on to Paris with this same train, so I shall be quite within
your reach."

I thanked him for his courtesy, assured him that now that all my traps
were in my berth and the conductor had shown me to my compartment, my
wants were supplied, and watched him knock at the next door. Then I
stepped out into the aisle.

It was an ordinary European Pullman, some ten staterooms in a row, a
lavatory at one end and a three-foot sofa at the other. When you are
unwilling to take your early morning coffee on the gritty, dust-covered,
one-foot-square, propped-up-with-a-leg table in your stuffy compartment,
you drink it sitting on this sofa. Three of these compartment doors were
open. The woman with the dog was in Number One. The big dog and the maid
in Number Two, and the Ring Master in Number Three (his original number,
no doubt; the clerk had only lied)--I, of course, came next in
Number Four.

Soon I became conscious that a discussion was going on in the newly
arrived circus-car whose platform touched ours. I could hear the voice
of a woman and then the gruff tones of a man. Then a babel of sounds
came sifting down the aisle. I stepped over the dog, who had now
stretched himself at full length in the aisle, and out on to
the platform.

A third gentleman in chocolate--the porter of the circus-car and a
duplicate of our own--was being besieged by a group of people all
talking at once and all in different tongues. A mild-eyed, pink-cheeked
young man in spectacles was speaking German; a richly dressed woman of
thirty-five, very stately and very beautiful, was interpolating in
Russian, and a plump, rosy-cheeked, energetic little Englishwoman was
hurling English in a way as pointed as it was forcible. Everybody was
excited and everybody was angry. Standing in the car-door listening
intently was a French maid and two round-faced, wide-collared boys, of
say ten and twelve. The dispute was evidently over these two boys, as
every attack contained some direct allusion to "mes enfants" or "these
children" or "die Kinder," ending in the forefinger of each speaker
being thrust bayonet fashion toward the boys.

While I was making up my mind as to the particular roles which these
several members of the Greatest Show on Earth played, I heard the
English girl say--in French, of course--English-French--with an accent:

"It is a shame to be treated in this way. We have paid for every one of
these compartments, and you know it. The young masters will not go in
those vile-smelling staterooms for the night. It's no place for them. I
will go to the office and complain."

[Illustration: Everybody was excited and everybody was mad.]

The third chocolate attendant, in reply, merely lifted his shoulders. It
was the same old lift--a tired feeling seems to permeate these
gentlemen, as if they were bored to death. A hotel clerk on the Riviera
sometimes has this lift when he tells you he has not a bed in the house
and you tell him he--prevaricates. I knew something of the lift--
had already cost me five francs. I knew, too, what kind of medicine that
sort of tired feeling needed, and that until the bribe was paid the
young woman and her party would be bedless.

My own anger was now aroused. Here was a woman, rather a pretty woman,
an Anglo-Saxon--my own race--in a strange city and under the power of a
minion whose only object was plunder. That she jumped through hoops or
rode bareback in absurdly short clothes, or sold pink lemonade in
spangles, made no difference. She was in trouble, and needed assistance.
I advanced with my best bow.

"Madam, can I do anything for you?"

She turned, and, with a grateful smile, said:

"Oh, you speak English?"

I again inclined my head.

"Well, sir, we have come from St. Petersburg by way of Berlin. We had
five compartments through to Paris for our party when we started, all
paid for, and this man has the tickets. He says we must get out here and
buy new tickets or we must all go in two staterooms, which is
impossible--" and she swept her hand over the balance of the troupe.

The chocolate gentleman again lifted his shoulders. He had been abused
in that way by passengers since the day of his birth.

The richly dressed woman, another Leading Lady doubtless, now joined in
the conversation--she probably was the trained rabbit-woman or the girl
with the pigeons--pigeons most likely, for these stars are always
selected by the management for their beauty, and she certainly was
beautiful.

"And Monsieur"--this in French--again I spare the reader--"I have given
him"--pointing to the chocolate gentleman--"pour boire all the time. One
hundred francs yesterday and two gold pieces this morning. My maid is
quite right--it is abominable, such treatment----"

The personalities now seemed to weary the attendant. His elbows widened,
his shoulders nearly touched his ears, and his fingers opened; then he
went into his closet and shut the door. So far as he was concerned the
debate was closed.

The memory of my own five francs now loomed up, and with them the
recollection of the trick by which they had been stolen from me.

"Madam," I said, gravely, "I will bring the manager. He is here and
will see that justice is done you."

It was marvellous to watch what followed. The manager listened patiently
to the Pigeon Charmer's explanation of the outrage, started suddenly
when she mentioned some details which I did not hear, bowed as low to
her reply as if she had been a Duchess--his hat to the floor--slid back
the closet-door, beckoned me to step in, closed it again upon the three
of us, and in less than five minutes he had the third chocolate
gentleman out of his chocolate uniform and stripped to his underwear,
with every pocket turned inside out, bringing to light the
one-hundred-franc note, the gold pieces, and all five of the circus
parties' tickets.

Then he flung the astonished and humiliated man his trousers, waited
until he had pulled them on, grabbed him by his shirt-collar and marched
him out of the car across the platform through the wicket gate, every
passenger on the train looking on in wonder. Five minutes later the
whole party--the stately Pigeon Charmer, her English maid, the
spectacled German (performing sword-swallower or lightning calculator
probably), and the two boys (tumblers unquestionably), with all their
belongings--were transferred to my car, the Pigeon Charmer graciously
accepting my escort, the passengers, including the bald-headed man--my
room-mate--standing on one side to let us pass: all except the big dog,
who had shifted his quarters, and was now stretched out at the sofa end
of the car.

Then another extraordinary thing happened--or rather a series of
extraordinary things.

When I had deposited the Pigeon Charmer in her own compartment (Number
Five, next door), and had entered my own, I found my bald-headed
room-mate again inside. This time he was seated by the foot-square,
dust-covered table assorting cigarettes. He had transferred my small
luggage--bag, coat, etc.--to the _lower_ berth, and had arranged his own
belongings in the upper one.

He sprang to his feet the instant he saw me.

The bow of the Sleeping-Car Manager to the Pigeon Charmer was but a bend
in a telegraph-pole to the sweep the bald-headed man now made me. I
thought his scalp would touch the car-floor.

"No, your Highness," he cried, "I insist"--this to my protest that I had
come last--that he had prior right--besides, he was an older man, etc.,
etc.--"I could not sleep if I thought you were not most
comfortable--nothing can move me. Pardon me--will not your Highness
accept one of my poor cigarettes? They, of course, are not like the ones
you use, but I always do my best. I have now a new cigarette-girl, and
she rolled them for me herself, and brought them to me just as I was
leaving St. Petersburg. Permit me"--and he handed me a little leather
box filled with Russian cigarettes.

Now, figuratively speaking, when you have been buncoed out of five
francs by a menial in a ticket-office, jumped upon and trampled under
foot by a gate-keeper who has kept you cooling your heels outside his
wicket while your inferiors have passed in ahead of you--to have even a
bald-headed man kotow to you, give you the choice berth in the
compartment, move your traps himself, and then apologize for offering
you the best cigarette you ever smoked in your life--well! that is to
have myrrh, and frankincense, and oil of balsam, and balm of Gilead
poured on your tenderest wound.

I accepted the cigarette.

Not haughtily--not even condescendingly--just as a matter of course. He
had evidently found out who and what I was. He had seen me address the
Pigeon Charmer, and had recognized instantly, from my speech and
bearing--both, perhaps--that dominating vital force, that breezy
independence which envelops most Americans, and which makes them so
popular the world over. In thus kotowing he was only getting in line
with the citizens of most of the other effete monarchies of Europe.
Every traveller is conscious of it. His bow showed it--so did the soft
purring quality of his speech. Recollections of Manila, Santiago, and
the voyage of the Oregon around Cape Horn were in the bow, and Kansas
wheat, Georgia cotton, and the Steel Trust in the dulcet tones of his
voice. That he should have mistaken me for a great financial magnate
controlling some one of these colossal industries, instead of locating
me instantly as a staid, gray-haired, and rather impecunious
landscape-painter, was quite natural. Others before him have made that
same mistake. Why, then, undeceive him? Let it go--he would leave in the
morning and go his way, and I should never see him more. So I smoked on,
chatting pleasantly and, as was my custom, summing him up.

He was perhaps seventy--smooth-shaven--black--coal-black eyes. Dressed
simply in black clothes--not a jewel--no watch-chain even--no rings on
his hands but a plain gold one like a wedding-ring. His dressing-case
showed the gentleman. Bottles with silver tops--brushes backed with
initials--soap in a silver cup. Red morocco Turkish slippers with
pointed toes; embroidered smoking-cap--all appointments of a man of
refinement and of means. Tucked beside his razor-case were some books
richly bound, and some bundles tied with red tape. Like most educated
Russians, he spoke English with barely an accent.

I was not long in arriving at a conclusion. No one would have been--no
one of my experience. He was either a despatch-agent connected with the
Government, or some lawyer of prominence, who was on his way to Paris to
look after the interests of some client of his in Russia. The latter,
probably. The only man on the car he seemed to know, besides myself, was
the Sleeping-Car Manager, who lifted his hat to him as he passed, and
the Ring Master, with whom he stood talking at the door of his
compartment. This, however, was before I had brought the Pigeon Charmer
into the car.

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