Part 2

Now Timmy was not one of those shoemakers who stick eternally to their bench like a ball of wax. In fact, Timmy made a habit of carrying his work to his customer’s house, partly for assurance of perfect fit and partly for company. Then, too, he always stopped at the tavern on his way home from work for sociability and to inquire about the day’s news. It was here especially that Timmy found his size unfortunate, for here gathered all the jokers and wags of the neighborhood, as well as the notoriously teasing and practical joking peddlers. Although Timmy felt as uncomfortable as a short-tailed horse in fly time in this company, he loved to be there and reveled in the conversation and the stories that were told.

Unfortunately for Timmy, however, the peddlers took the keenest delight in imposing on his credulity as well as on his stature. They always seemed to have the most amazing conglomeration of tall stories at hand, but also seemed to have even more amazing ones when the gullible Timmy was present. They had learned long before that Timmy was not to be toyed with about his height, but still retained their practice of goading him on to believe their incredibly tall tales. And there was no one who can describe an incredible fact with more plausibility than a peddler. His profession alone had taught him to maintain an iron gravity when selling his wares, which, with very few exceptions, could certainly not sell themselves. Thus their tales, sufficient in themselves to embarrass any other narrator, carried great conviction.

But there was a joke which the peddlers played on Timmy that carried itself out far beyond any and all expectations. Many and diverse were the pranks played on Timmy the gullible, but never before one with such repercussions as this one, which, from the start, seemed made to order for him.

A fashionable tailor in the neighboring and larger village decided to advertise in Chatham, thereby bringing to himself trade from the small community and others like it. This tailor took it on himself to have a large and flaming advertisement made which was posted in the tavern which Timmy frequented on his way home from the shoe shop. The advertisement excited general interest, for the tailor asserted to have, at greatly reduced prices, a splendid assortment of coats, pantaloons and waistcoats of all colors and fashions, as well as a great variety of trimmings such as tape, thread, buckram, ribbons, and--this last item was especially stressed--“frogs,” those cord material hooks in the shape of that deep-throated and squat reptile.

The next time Timmy appeared at the tavern, his associates and peddler hecklers pointed out to him the advertisement, with special stress on the “frogs.” They reminded him of the plenteous supply of these frogs to be found in his own neighboring Lily Pond.

“Why, Timmy,” they said, “this is the chance of a life time. If you were to give up shoemaking and take to frog catching, you would make your tarnal fortune!”

“How so?” asked Timmy.

“Why, lad,” spoke up one of the peddlers, “can’t you see by that poster that frogs are in great demand in fashionable tailoring?”

“Yes, Timmy,” spoke up still another conspirator in the joke, “you might bag a thousand in half a day, and folks say they will bring a dollar a thousand!”

It was obvious that these words had a great effect on Timmy, for he was carefully considering the suggestion, and could see the money pouring already into his outstretched hands.

“There’s frogs enough in Lily Pond,” he mused, “but it’s tarnation hard work to catch ’em. I swaggers! They’re plaguey slippery fellows!”

Then up spoke Joe Gawky, by far the most infamous practical jokester in the company. “Never mind, Timmy. Take a fish net and scoop ’em up. You must have ’em alive, and fresh.” And then, drawing Timmy aside, Joe whispered, “Tell you what I’ll do. I’ll go you shares. Say nothing of it to anyone. Tomorrow night I’ll come up and help you catch a goodly batch, and we’ll divide the gain.”

Timmy was in raptures. But he was, as you will soon see, counting his frogs before they were caught.

As Timmy walked home that night, a cagy thought, upon which he inwardly prided himself, came into his head. Thought Timmy, “These ’ere frogs in a manner belong to me, since my shop stands near Lily Pond. Why should I make two bites at a cherry and divide profits with Joe Gawky? By gravy! I’ll get up early in the morning, and be off with a batch of them to the tailor’s before sunrise, and so keep the money all to myself!”

And so he did. Never before had there been such a stir among the placid frogs of Lily Pond. In fact, they were taken quite by surprise, and with no little difficulty. Timmy captured a huge bag of them and set off on his journey to the tailor’s.

Mr. Buckram, the fashionable tailor, was an elderly gentleman, and a nervous one, and, when disturbed, inclined to be peevish. Mr. Buckram was also very particular both about his own attire and that of his customers, and prided himself on the neat-as-a-pin appearance of his shop.

The unsuspecting Mr. Buckram was busily engaged in making a waistcoat for a Harwich gentleman when Timmy entered the shop. The sight of Timmy alone was enough to make anyone take notice, but Timmy, together with a large and curiously jumping bag slung over his shoulder was indeed a sight to see. Timmy wasted no time in preliminaries, perhaps under the impression that big business needed no introduction. Since the tailor had not noticed or seemingly did not hear his entrance into the quiet shop, Timmy assumed that the elderly man was deaf. So, without further ado, Timmy leaned down, and, pressing his mouth near the old man’s head, bellowed at the top of his lungs, “Do you want any frogs today?”

The old gentleman dropped his shears and jumped clear off his stool in astonishment, viewing Timmy with a mixture of amazement and alarm. “Eh? Any frogs? What in tarnation for?”

“I’ve got a fine lot here,” persisted Timmy, thinking the tailor was being shrewd. “They are jest from the pond, and lively as grasshoppers!”

Mr. Buckram was plainly confused. “Don’t bellow in my ears,” he exclaimed. “I’m not deaf! Tell me what you want and then be off.”

“I want to sell you these frogs. You shall have them at a bargain. Only one dollar a hundred. I won’t take a cent less. Do you want them or not? If I can’t get satisfaction here, I shall go elsewhere, and you shall miss out on a great bargain!”

Mr. Buckram thought he was face to face with a miniature mad man, and attempted to rid himself of the small nuisance with bravado. “No, I don’t want any frogs. Now get out of my shop, you young fool!”

“I say you do want ’em!” shouted Timmy, “but you’re playing offish-like to beat down my price. I won’t take a cent less, I tell you!”

The conversation went on like this for fully ten minutes, and finally Timmy, puzzled, mortified, and angry, slowly withdrew. “He won’t buy ’em,” thought Timmy “for what they are worth. And as for taking nothing for them, I won’t. And yet, I don’t want to lug them back to Lily Pond again. Curse the old man anyway. I’ll try him once more, and be durned if I’ll ever plague myself this way again!”

And once more he entered the tailor shop.

“Mr. Buckram, this is absolutely your last chance. Are you willing to give me anything for these frogs?”

The old man was goaded beyond endurance. He sprang from his work and took after Timmy with his long shears.

“Well, then” said Timmy bitterly, as he backed away, “Take ’em among ye for nothing,” and so saying, emptied the contents of the bag on the floor of the shop and marched indignantly away.

Well, you can imagine the confusion that followed. One hundred live bull frogs had a marvelous time jumping about the shop. Every nook and corner had a bull frog in it, and to make matters worse and add to the confusion, they set up a loud and indignant cacophony of chug-a-lums.

And thus dissolved the golden visions of Timmy the Frog Catcher.

After this affair, Timmy could not bear the thought, sight, sound, or mention of a frog. He never admitted that a joke had been played on him, but his associates would not let him forget the incident. They referred constantly to the matter. He was rarely seen now at the tavern, and even the town children called after him on the street--“There goes the frog catcher.” You see the story had spread up and down the Cape, and Timmy had no peace.

The sound of frogs singing in the Lily Pond incensed Timmy to such a degree that he would run out of the shop and pelt the poor things with stones to stop their noise. It seemed after a while that their song, which he heard both day and night, had definite words in it, and contained his own name.

On one night in particular, Timmy was awakened from sound sleep by a tremendous bellowing directly under his window. It seemed as if all the frogs in the world were clearing their throats for a mass chug-a-lum. He listened with amazement, and could soon distinguish--

Boooooooo Timmy Drew-o-o-o I can make a shoe-o-o-o As well as you-o-o-o And better too-o-o-o Timmy Drew-o-o-o Boooooooo

Timmy was certain no ordinary frogs could pipe out such a song at that rate. He leaped out of bed and rushed from the house. “I’ll teach those rascals to come around plaguing me,” he said. But no one could be seen. It was a clear bright night, all was solitary and still, save for an occasional rumble from the sleeping frogs. After throwing a few stones into the bushes, Timmy retired once more and fell into uneasy sleep.

The amazing concert continued night after night, swelling on the evening breeze, and then sinking away into the distance. Again and again Timmy attempted to discover who were the perpetrators of the nightly serenading. They could not be found. He began to feel certain that he was to be forever haunted by the music. His friends sympathized with him, but Timmy was too upset to sense the mischief in the air.

The next time Timmy stopped at the tavern, he found all in earnest consultation.

“Here he comes,” said one, as soon as Timmy entered.

“Have you heard the news?” inquired the tavern keeper.

“No,” said Timmy with a groan.

“Joe Gawky ’as seen sech a critter in the pond! A monstrous large frog, as big as an ox, with eyes as large as a horse. I never heard of no such thing in all my born days!”

“Nor I,” said Sam Greening.

“Nor I,” said Josh Whiting.

“Nor I,” said Tom Bizbee.

“I have heard tell of sech a critter in Ohio,” said Eb Crawley. “Frogs have been seed there, as big as a suckling pig, but not in these ’ere parts.”

“Mrs. Timmings,” said Sam Greening, “feels quite melancholy about it. She guesses as how it’s a sign of some terrible thing that’s going to happen.”

“I was fishing for pickerel,” said Joe Gawky, who, by the way, was a tall, spindle-shanked fellow, with a white head, and who stooped in the chest like a crook-necked squash. “I was after pickerel, and had a frog’s leg for bait. There was a tarnation big pickerel just springing at the line, when out sailed this great he-devil from under the bank. By the living hokey! He was as large as a small-sized man! Such a straddle-bug I never seed! I up line, and cleared out like a blue fish, I can tell you!”

Timmy searched anxiously the faces of all present for some sign of spoofing, but he could see only sober concern that credited the story. He began to feel very uneasy.

“That must be the critter I heard t’other night in the pond!” exclaimed Josh Whiting. “I swanny, he roared louder than a bull.”

This last statement aroused in Timmy divers emotions, all connected with the serenading that had been his for the past many nights. In vain, the company questioned him concerning his knowledge of the matter. He would not say a word.

After this introduction, the conversation took naturally to discussion of the supernatural. Each one had some story to tell of witches, ghosts and goblins. By degrees, the company dispersed, until Timmy Drew found himself quite alone. He found it difficult to get up and start home, for the conversation had impressed him more than he would admit at the time, and the walk home by the Lily Pond was nothing he cared to consider.

At length, he got up courage and started home. His course lay over a solitary road, darkened by over-shadowing trees. A tomb-like silence, heightened by his thoughts, prevailed, disturbed only by his echoing foot-steps. Timmy Drew marched straight ahead with a stealthy pace, not daring to look behind, yet dreading to proceed by Lily Pond. At last he reached the top of the hill at the foot of which were his house and Lily Pond. He had just about reached his door, when a sudden rustle of leaves by the pond brought his heart dry and bitter to his mouth. At this moment, the moon slipped aside a cloud and seemed to focus on an object that turned Timmy to stone on the spot. An unearthly monster, in the shape of a mammoth bull frog, sat on its ugly haunches, glaring at him with eyes like burning coals. With a single leap, it was by Timmy’s side, and he felt one of his ankles caught in a cold wet grasp. Terror gave him strength. With a howl and a Herculean effort, he pulled himself away from the monster’s clutches and tore up the hill.

“By the living hokey!” said Joe Gawky, slowly rising from the ground and arranging his clothing. “Who’d uv guessed thet this ’ere old pumpkin head atop my shoulder with a candle a-burning in it would have set old Timmy’s stiff knees a-goin’ at that rate! I couldn’t see him travel for the dust his boots rose!”

It is hardly necessary to add that Cape Cod saw no more of the Frog Catcher from Chatham, Timothy Drew.

... The Wrong Gulls

Cap’n Caleb Nickerson of Truro, master of a large ship which oftentimes took on young boys as apprentices and cabin boys, was sailing home to the Cape after a long journey. When the ship was almost to P’town, Cap’n Nick, bone-weary and worn from the long run, decided to turn the wheel over to young David, a youth who had shipped out with him to learn the fine art of seamanship.

“But, Cap’n Nickerson,” the boy demurred, “I don’t know much about navigation yet, and the compass is still strange to me.”

“Don’t worry, Lad,” said Caleb reassuringly. “See them gulls over there? Wal, just folly them right along, and they’ll take ye right home to port.”

With these words, Cap’n Nickerson went below to his quarters for a snooze. When he awoke a few hours later, he peered out of the porthole and was dumfounded to find himself still out in the open ocean, when the ship should have arrived in Provincetown long before. Rushing madly topside, the cap’n grabbed poor Dave by the nape of the neck, and in a few choice mariner’s words, demanded what in tarnation he thought he was doing.

“But, Cap’n,” exclaimed the perplexed boy, “you told me to folly them gulls over there, and I’ve been right on their trail!”

Cap’n Nick grabbed the telescope, took one squint-eyed look at the gulls, and then bellowed, “Why you durn fool! Them’s Chatham gulls, not Truro gulls!”

... She Had the Last Word

A Cape Cod widow, whose married life had been far from peaceful and happy, refused to let the minister write a flowery tribute for her husband’s gravestone, as was the custom.

But propriety and convention of the times insisted that something appear carved on the headstone, and so the indomitable woman left the choice of verse entirely up to the local stone-cutter. He resorted to the stock phrase:

“As I am now, so you will be-- Prepare for death and follow me.”

Convention thus being satisfied, no more was thought of the matter, but when friends and relatives paid their next visit to the grave, they were shocked and stunned to see, carved beneath the stone-cutter’s verse, these lines:

“To follow you I’ll not consent, Because--I know which way you went!”

... The Singular Case of the Young Anatomist

Fate, that capricious ruler of the tides that governs our lives, arranged a meeting on the wild, windswept Hill of Storms in Truro on Cape Cod; a meeting so strange that, for the sake of credulity, I must withhold the name of the earthly being who took part in it. For it was on a dark Fall night, long ago, that a Cape Cod boy, with nothing in his pockets but his dreams and a burning ambition, met and talked with a live skeleton, and, caught up on the crest of Fate’s precarious wave, was swept high to Fame and Fortune.

We will call him Tom, and nothing else, this young and ardent hero of our story, for if, in the telling of this strange tale, which I swear to be true, the real name of the young man were disclosed, you, gentle reader, would scoff and read no further.

A look at young Tom as this amazing story unfolds would reveal a singularly insignificant youth, dreamy of eye and slight of form. Tom burned with that white flame of ambition thwarted by a financial standing about equal to that of a beachcomber, and a scanty country education. But youth has strange ways of overcoming such obstacles, and Tom’s energies, rather than diminishing, seemed to gather momentum and strength from the meagre stuff upon which they were fed. Why or how, cut off as he was from higher learning, Tom chose Anatomy as his field to conquer, no one knows, but chose it he did. He spent every waking hour and every dream yearning for the day when he would be able to buy for himself the text books that would pave his rocky road to Success. A penny here, and, a week later, a penny there--finally Tom was able to purchase a small text on Anatomy. In less than three weeks, he had memorized, with the correct Latin names thrown in for good measure, every word, every definition, every diagram in the text book. This subject was his life, and he wrapped himself so completely in his fierce desires that to shake hands with a man became not merely a gesture of friendship, but a good chance to feel the finger bones manipulate. But, happily, Tom was too intelligent not to know that this knowledge, although he could describe exactly the position, use, and articulation of every bone in the human body, did not make him an anatomist. For his descriptions were merely a repetition of the words in the small book which had become his bible. His burning desires now changed course to those of seeing and examining an actual skeleton, and these thoughts buzzed around in his mind like a swarm of angry bees.

A pensive, solitary figure, Tom sat one night by the huge fireplace in the local Inn, lost in thought and dream. The flames in the fire before him took the shape of grinning, cavorting skeletons. He was so absorbed in his dream-world that the noisy animation and conversation about him pricked his consciousness no harder than a fly on an elephant’s hide. The men were talking, as they had for weeks, about old Cyrus Goodestone, a man always thought of as rich, but who had died without a trace of money to be found anywhere, much to the distress of his creditors.

But when, during one of those violent and sudden early Spring rain storms, the door of the Inn flew open, and a hooded and cloaked stranger strode into the room, even Tom took notice. For the stranger stood before the fire, his back to the company, and neither spoke nor turned when greeted. The storm stopped as suddenly as it had started, and when the moonlight shone once more through the window, the stranger heeled about, gathered his voluminous cloak more closely about him, and left. An eeler, sitting near Tom, spoke up:

“That be a queer chap. I’m a-goin’ to see what he’s about,” and with these words, he too left the Inn.

Less than five minutes later, he returned, white as a flounder’s belly. He made a beeline for the table, and gulped down a glass of rum. Then, gasping, partly from fright and partly from the raw drink of rum, he spoke.

“Udds hiddikins! Old chap just gone out--got no proper face like--only a Death’s head--looked me square in the face in the moonlight, he did, and I c’n tell ye, I waited to see no more!”

At this startling tale, Tom sprang from his lethargy like a man possessed, and clutching the terrified eeler by the coat lapels, he yelled, “You mean--he was a skeleton?” When the answer was a startled “yes,” Tom shouted, “Which way did he go?”

“Why, down towards the graveyard, sure,” said the eeler. But Tom was out the door before the words had barely tickled the lips of the eeler.

No thought that the eeler might have been “seein’ things” entered Tom’s mind and he tore down the road toward the graveyard on Truro’s Hill of Storms. The wild wind, the scudding clouds that made the night a night of shadows, the bony-fingered branches that picked at his face as he ran through the shortcut in the woods--of these things Tom was unaware. For on the Hill of Storms, midst gravestones battered by sea winds and spray, was his heart’s desire!

Tom stood at the top of the hill, bracing himself against the sea wind. His heart thudded against his ribs like the heavy breakers that boomed against the rocks below. His wild eyes swept the graveyard, and then, in the split second when the clouds parted, and the moon shone through, Tom saw, still enveloped in the cloak, the figure from the Inn, gazing sorrowfully down at the new grave marker of Cyrus Goodestone. Then, in a sudden sweep of wind, the cloak billowed up, fell to the ground--and left, gleaming phosphorously in the misty moonlight, the unbelievable figure of a Skeleton!

“Thank my stars!” yelled Tom. “I have found my Skeleton at last!”

“Young man,” said the Skeleton in a hollow voice, clacking his hideous hinged jaws, “Attend!”

“How beautifully,” cried Tom, ignoring the command, “can I see the play of the lower maxilliary!”

“Attend, I say!” repeated the Skeleton, in a still more frightening voice. And then, turning, “Rash boy, what are you about?” exclaimed the bony apparition. The fact is, our enthralled hero was busily running his fingers up and down the vertebrae of the Skeleton, counting them to see if they corresponded with the number given in his book, and muttering gleefully, “Seven cervical, twelve dorsal--just right!”

The Skeleton, angered and shocked speechless, raised his arm and shook his fist at the absorbed Tom, who, with his eyes fixed on the bony elbow, merely shouted joyfully, “The gingyloid movement is perfect!”

The Skeleton was plainly confused. Never before had he, accustomed to scaring the wits out of people, encountered any such attitude as this, for Tom stood before him completely unafraid. He was amazed at the scientific stand taken by our young anatomist. As a matter of fact, the skeleton began to feel a little wary himself, and moved away from Tom, darting in and out from behind the gravestones in an effort to get away. But Tom was not to be put off at this late date, and overtaking the Skeleton, grabbed on and held for all he was worth.

The ensuing conversation, however, was friendly, and the Skeleton explained that he was old Cyrus Goodestone himself. He had, he said, buried his money underground, and could not rest in peace until he had dug it up and paid off his creditors. This he asked Tom to do. Tom consented, upon one condition, which he laid in a very businesslike manner before the Skeleton.

“It will be some trouble,” he said, “and the affair is none of mine, but look ye--I’m willing to comply with your request, if, as a reward, you will allow me to come here and study you every night for the next month. You may then retire to rest for as long a time as you please.”

“Agreed!” cried the Skeleton, and, recovering from his original alarm, shook hands with the exultant Tom to seal this strange bargain.