Part 8

She never cared much for readin' novels and story papers, she tells me. What she wants is somethin' that has got some true information in it, about the way the sun rises, and the tides in the oceans she has never saw, and when the eclipses is going to be, and different kinds of diseases new and old, and receipts for preserves and true stories about how this or that wonderful remedy come to be discovered. Mebby it was discovered by the Injuns in this country, or mebby it was discovered by them there Egyptians in the old country away back in King Pharaoh's time, and mebby she's got some of the same sort of yarbs and plants right there in her own woods. Well, Widder Watson, she likes that kind o' readin', and she knows all about the Seven Wonders of the World, and all the organs and ornaments inside the human carcass, and the kind o' pains they are likely to have and all about what will happen to you if the stars says this or that and how long the Mississippi River is and a lot of them old-time prophecies of signs and marvels what is to come to pass yet. You know about what the readin' is in them almanacs, mebby.

Widder Watson, she has got a natural likin' for fine words, jist the same as some has got a gift for hand-paintin' or playin' music or recitin' pieces of poetry or anything like that. And so it was quite natural, when her kids come along, she names 'em after the names in her favourite readin' matter. And she gets so she thinks more of the names of them kids than of nearly anything else. I ain't sayin' she thinks more of the names than she does of the kids, but she likes the names right next to the kids. Every time she had a baby she used to sit and think for weeks and weeks, so she tells me, for to get a good name for that baby, and select and select and select out of them almanacs.

Her oldest girl, that everybody calls Zody, is named Zodiac by rights. And then there's Carty, whose real name is Cartilege, and Anthy, whose full name is Anthrax, and so on. There's Peruna and Epidermis and Epidemic and Pisces.

I dunno as I can remember all them swell names. There's Perry, whose real name is Perihelion, and there's Whitsuntide and Tonsillitis and Opodeldoc and a lot more--I never could remember all them kids.

And there ain't goin' to be no more on 'em, for the fact of the matter seems to be that Widder Watson ain't likely to ever get another husband. It's been about four years since Jim Watson, her last one, died, and was buried in there amongst the hickory second-growth and hazel bushes, and since that day there ain't nobody come along that road a-courtin' Widder Watson. And that's what makes her sad. She can't understand it, never havin' been without a husband for so long before, and she sets and grieves and grieves and smokes her corn-cob pipe and speculates and grieves some more.

Now, don't you get no wrong idea about Widder Watson. She ain't so all-fired crazy about men. It ain't that. That ain't what makes her grieve. She is sad because she wants another baby to pin a name to.

For she has got the most lovely name out of a new almanac for that there kid that will likely never be born, and she sets there day after day, and far into the night, lookin' at them graves in the brush, and talkin' to the clouds and stars, and sayin' that name over and over to herself, and sighin' and weepin' because that lovely name will be lost and unknown and wasted forevermore, with no kid to tack it on to.

And she hopes and yearns and grieves for another man to marry her and wonders why none of 'em never does. Well, I can see why they don't. The truth is, Widder Watson don't fix herself up much any more. She goes barefooted most of the time in warm weather, and since she got so sad-like she don't comb her hair much. And them corn-cob pipes of hern ain't none too savory. But I 'spose she thinks of herself as bein' jist the same way she was the last time she took the trouble to look into the lookin' glass and she can't understand it.

“Damn the men, Ben,” she says to me, the last time I was by there, “what's the matter with 'em all? Ain't they got no sense any more? I never had no trouble ketchin' a man before this! But here I been settin' for three or four years, with eighty acres of good land acrost the road there, and a whole passel o' young uns to work it, and no man comes to court me. There was a feller along here two-three months ago I did have some hopes on. He come a-palaverin' and a-blarneyin' along, and he stayed to dinner and I made him some apple dumplin's, and he et an' et and palavered.

“But it turned out he was really makin' up to that gal, Zody, of mine. It made me so darned mad, Ben, I runned him off the place with Jeff Parker's shotgun that is hangin' in there, and then I took a hickory sprout to that there Zody and tanned her good, for encouragin' of him. You remember Jeff Parker, Ben? He was my second. You wasn't thinkin' of gettin' married ag'in yourself, was you, Ben?”

I told her I wasn't. That there eighty acres is good land, and they ain't no mortgages on it, nor nothin', but the thought of bein' added to that collection in amongst the hazel brush and hickory sprouts is enough for to hold a man back. And the Widder Watson, she don't seem to realize she orter fix herself up a little mite. But I'm sorry for her, jist the same. There she sets and mourns, sayin' that name over and over to herself, and a-grievin' and a-hopin', and all the time she knows it ain't much use to hope. And a sadder sight than you will see over there to Hickory Grove ain't to be found in the whole of the State of Illinois.

“That is a mighty sad picture you have drawed,” said the stranger, when Ben Grevis had finished, “but I'm a sadder man for a man than that there woman is for a woman.”

He wrinkled all over, he almost grinned, if one could think of him as grinning, when he mentioned “that there woman.” It was as if he tasted some ulterior jest, and found it bitter, in connection with “that there woman.” After a pause, in which he sighed several times, he remarked in his tired and gentle voice:

“There's two kinds of sadness, gentlemen. There is the melancholy sadness that has been with you for so long that you have got used to it and kind o' enjoy it in a way. And then there's the kind o' sadness where you go back on yourself, where you make your own mistakes and fall below your own standards, and that is a mighty bitter kind of sadness.”

He paused again, while the skin wreathed itself into funeral wreaths about his face, and then he said, impressively:

“Both of them kinds of sadness I have known. First I knowed the melancholy kind, and now I know the bitter kind.”

The first sadness that I had lasted for years (said the stranger with the strange skin). It was of the melancholy kind, tender and sort o' sweet, and if I had been the right kind of a man I would 'a' stuck to it and kept it. But I went back on it. I turned my face away from it. And in going back on it I went back on all them old, sad, sweet memories, like the songs tell about, that was my better self. And that is what caused the sadness I am in the midst of now. It's the feelin' that I done wrong in turnin' away from all them memories that makes me as sad as you see me to-day. I will first tell you how the first sadness come on to me, and secondly I will tell you how I got the sadness I am in the midst of now.

Gentlemen, mebby you have noticed that my skin is kind o' different from most people's skin. That is a gift, and there was a time when I made money off'n that gift. And I got another gift. I'm longer and slimmer than most persons is. And besides them two gifts, I got a third gift. I can eat glass, gentlemen, and it don't hurt me none. I can eat glass as natural and easy as a chicken eats gravel. And them three gifts is my art.

I was an artist in a side-show for years, gentlemen, and connected with one of the biggest circuses in the world. I could have my choice of three jobs with any show I was with, and there ain't many could say that. I could be billed as the India Rubber Man, on account of my skin, or I could be billed as the Living Skeleton, on account of my framework, or I could be billed as the Glass Eater. And once or twice I was billed as all three.

But mostly I didn't bother much with eating glass or being a Living Skeleton. Mostly I stuck to being an India Rubber Man. It always seemed to me there was more art in that, more chance to show talent and genius. The gift that was given to me by Providence I developed and trained till I could do about as much with my skin as most people can with their fingers. It takes constant work and practice to develop a skin, even when Nature has been kind to you like she has to me.

For years I went along contented enough, seein' the country and being admired by young and old, and wondered at and praised for my gift and the way I had turned it into an art, and never thinkin' much of women nor matrimony nor nothing of that kind.

But when a man's downfall is put off, it is harder when it comes. When I fell in love I fell good and hard. I fell into love with a pair of Siamese twins. These here girls was tied together somewheres about the waist line with a ligament of some kind, and there wasn't no fake about it--they really was tied. On account of motives of delicacy I never asked 'em much about that there ligament. The first pair of twins like that who was ever on exhibition was from Siam, so after that they called all twins of that kind Siamese twins. But these girls wasn't from none of them outlandish parts; they was good American girls, born right over in Ohio, and their names was Jones. Hetty Jones and Netty Jones was their names.

Hetty, she was the right-hand twin, and Netty was the left-hand twin. And you never seen such lookers before in your life, double nor single. They was exactly alike and they thought alike and they talked alike. Sometimes when I used to set and talk to 'em I felt sure they was just one woman. If I could 'a' looked at 'em through one of these here stereoscopes they would 'a' come together and been one woman, I never had any idea about 'em bein' two women.

Well, I courted 'em, and they was mighty nice to me, both of 'em. I used to give 'em candy and flowers and little presents and I would set and admire 'em by the hour. I kept gettin' more and more into love with them. And I seen they was gettin' to like me, too.

So one day I outs with it.

“Will you marry me?” says I.

“Yes,” says Hetty. And, “Yes,” says Netty. Both in the same breath! And then each one looked at the other one, and they both looked at me, and they says, both together:

“Which one of us did you ask?”

“Why,” says I, kind o' flustered, “there ain't but one of you, is they? I look on you as practically one woman.”

“The idea!” says Netty.

“You orter be ashamed of yourself,” says Hetty.

“You didn't think,” says Netty, “that you could marry both of us, did you?”

Well, all I had really thought up to that time was that I was in love with 'em, and just as much in love with one as with the other, and I popped the question right out of my heart and sentiments without thinking much one way or the other. But now I seen there was going to be a difficulty.

“Well,” I says, “if you want to consider yourself as two people, I suppose it would be marryin' both of you. But I always thought of you as two hearts that beat as one. And I don't see no reason why I shouldn't marry the two of you, if you want to hold out stubborn that you _are_ two.”

“For my part,” says Hetty, “I think you are insulting.”

“You must choose between us,” says Netty.

“I would never,” says Hetty, “consent to any Mormonous goings-on of that sort.”

They still insisted they was two people till finally I kind o' got to see their side of the argyment. But how was I going to choose between them when no matter which one I chooses she was tied tight to the other one?

We agreed to talk it over with the Fat Lady in that show, who had a good deal of experience in concerns of the heart and she had been married four or five times and was now a widder, having accidental killed her last husband by rolling over on him in her sleep. She says to me:

“How happy you could be with either, Skinny, were t'other dear charmer away!”

“This ain't no jokin' matter, Dolly,” I tells her. “We come for serious advice.”

“Skinny, you old fool,” she says, “there's an easy way out of this difficulty. All you got to do is get a surgeon to cut that ligament and then take your choice.”

“But I ain't really got any choice,” I says, “for I loves 'em both and I loves 'em equal. And I don't believe in tamperin' with Nature.”

“It ain't legal for you to marry both of 'em,” says the Fat Lady.

“It ain't moral for me to cut 'em asunder,” I says.

I had a feelin' all along that if they was cut asunder trouble of some kind would follow. But both Hetty and Netty was strong for it. They refused to see me or have anything to do with me, they sent me word, till I give up what they called the insultin' idea of marryin' both of 'em. They set and quarrelled with each other all the time, the Fat Lady told me, because they was jealous of each other. Bein' where they couldn't get away from each other even for a minute, that jealousy must have et into them something unusual. And finally, I knuckled under. I let myself be overrulled. I seen I would lose both of 'em unless I made a choice. So I sent 'em word by the Fat Lady that I would choose. But I knowed deep in my heart all the time that no good would come of it. You can't go against Scripter and prosper; and the Scripter says: “What God has joined together, let no man put asunder.”

Well, we fixed it up this way: I was to pay for that there operation, having money saved up for to do it with, and then I was to make my choice by chance. The Fat Lady says to toss a penny or something.

But I always been a kind of a romantic feller, and I says to myself I will make that choice in some kind of a romantic way. So first I tried one of these ouija boards, but all I get is “Etty, Etty, Etty,” over and over again, and whether the ouija left off an H or an N there's no way of telling. The Fat Lady, she says: “Why don't you count 'em out, like kids do, to find out who is It?”

“How do you mean?” I asks her.

“Why,” says she, “by saying, 'Eeny meeny, miney, mo!' or else 'Monkey, monkey, bottle of beer, how many monkeys have we here?' or something like that.”

But that ain't romantic enough to suit me and I remember how you pluck a daisy and say: “She loves me! She loves me not!” And I think I will get an American beauty rose and do it that way. Well, they had the operation, and it was a success. And about a week later I'm to go to the hospital and tell 'em which one has been elected to the holy bonds of matrimony. I gets me a rose, one of the most expensive that money can buy in the town we was in, and when I arrive at the hospital I start up the front steps pluckin' the leaves off and sayin' to myself: “Hetty she is! Netty she is! Hetty she is!”--and so on. But I never got that rose all plucked.

I knowed all along that it was wrong to put asunder what God had joined together, and I orter stuck to the hunch I had. You can't do anything to a freak without changing his or her disposition some way. You take a freak that was born that way and go to operating on him, and if he is good-natured he'll turn out a grouch, or if he was a grouch he'll turn out good-natured. I knowed a dog-faced boy one time who was the sunniest critter you ever seen. But his folks got hold of a lot of money and took him out of the business and had his features all slicked up and made over, and what he gained in looks he lost in temper and disposition. Any tinkering you do around artists of that class will change their sentiments every time.

I never got that rose all plucked. At the top of the steps I was met by Hetty and Netty, just cornin' out of the hospital and not expectin' to see me. With one of them was a young doctor that worked in the hospital and with the other was a patient that had just got well. They explained to me that as soon as they had that operation their sentiments toward me changed. Before, they had both loved me. Afterwards, neither one of 'em did. They was right sorry about it, they said, but they had married these here fellows that morning in the hospital, with a double wedding, and was now starting off on their wedding trips, and their husbands would pay back the operation money as soon as they had earned it and saved it up.

Well, I was so flabbergasted that my skin stiffened up on me, and it stayed stiff for the rest of that day. I never said a word, but I turned away from there a sad man with a broken heart in my bosom. And I quit bein' an artist. I didn't have the sperrit to be in a show any more.

And through all the years since then I been a saddened man. But as time went by there come a kind of sweetness into that sadness, too. It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all, like the poet says. I was one of the saddest men in the world, but I sort o' enjoyed it, after a few years. And all them memories sort o' kept me a better man.

I orter stuck to that kind of sweet sadness. I orter knowed that if I went back on all them beautiful memories of them girls something bitter would come to me.

But I didn't, gentlemen. I went back on all that sentiment and that tenderness. I betrayed all them beautiful memories. Five days ago, I went and married. Yes, sir, I abandoned all that sweet recollection. And I been livin' in hell ever since. I been reproachin' myself day and night for not provin' true and trustworthy to all that romantic sadness I had all them years. It was a sweet sadness, and I wasn't faithful to it. And so long as I live now I will have this here bitter sadness.

The stranger got up and sighed and stretched himself. He took a fresh chew of tobacco, and began to crank his flivver.

“Well,” said Ben Grevis, “that is a sad story. But I don't know as you're sadder, at that, than the Widder Watson is.”

The stranger spat colourfully into the road, and again the faint semblance of a smile, a bitter smile, wreathed itself about his mouth.

“Yes, I be!” he said, “I be a sadder person than the Widder Watson. It was her I married!”

DOGS AND BOYS (As told by the dog)

If you are a dog of any sense, you will pick you out a pretty good sort of a boy and stick to him. These dogs that are always adopting one boy after another get a bad name among the humans in the end. And you'd better keep in with the humans, especially the grown-up ones. Getting your scraps off a plate at the back door two or three times a day beats hunting rabbits and ground-squirrels for a living.

What a dog wants is a boy anywhere from about nine to about sixteen years old. A boy under nine hasn't enough sense, as a rule, to be any company for an intelligent dog. And along about sixteen they begin to dress up and try to run with the girls, and carry on in a 'way to make a dog tired. There are exceptions of course--one of the worst mistakes some dogs make is to suppose that all boys are alike. That isn't true; you'll find just as much individuality among boys as there is among us dogs, if you're patient enough to look for it and have a knack for making friends with animals. But you must remember to be kind to a boy if you're going to teach him anything; and you must be careful not to frighten him.

At the same time, you must keep a boy in his place at once. My boy--Freckles Watson is his name--understands just how far he can go with me. But some dogs have to give their boys a lesson now and then. Jack Thompson, who is a fine, big, good-natured dog, has a boy like that. The boy's name is Squint--Squint Thompson, he is--and he gets a little overbearing at times. I remember one Saturday afternoon last summer in particular. There were a lot of us dogs and boys fooling around up at Clayton's swimming-hole, including some stray boys with no dogs to look after them, when Squint began to show off by throwing sticks into the water and making Jack swim in and get 'em. Jack didn't mind that, but after a while he got pretty tired and flopped down on the grass, and wouldn't budge.

“Grab him by the tail and the scruff of the neck, and pitch him in, Squint,” says my boy, Freckles. “It's a lot of fun to duck a dog.”

Squint went over to where Jack was lying and took hold of the scruff of Jack's neck. Jack winked at me in his good-natured way, and made a show of pulling back some, but finally let Squint pitch him into the deepest part of the swimming-hole. His head went clear under--which is a thing no dog likes, let alone being picked up that way and tossed about. Every boy there set up a shout, and when Jack scrambled up the bank, wagging his tail and shaking the water off himself, the humans all yelled, “Sling him in again, Squint!”

Jack trotted over to where he had a bone planted at the foot of a walnut tree, and began to dig for it. Squint followed, intending to sling him in again. I wondered if old Jack would stand for any more of it. Jack didn't; but before he got that fool boy to give up his idea he had to pretend like he was actually trying to bite him. He threw a good scare into the whole bunch of them, and then made out like he'd seen a rabbit off through the trees, and took after it. Mutt Mulligan and I went with him, and all the boys followed, naked, and whooping like Indians, except two that stayed behind to tie knots in shirts. When we three dogs had given the whole bunch of them the slip, we lay down in the grass and talked.

“Some day,” says Jack to me, “I'm afraid I'm really going to have to bite that Squint boy, Spot.”

“Don't do it,” says I, “he's just a fool boy, and he doesn't really mean anything by it.”

“The thing to do,” says Mutt Mulligan, “is to fire him--just turn him loose without a dog to his name, and pick up another boy somewhere.”

“But I don't like to give Squint up,” says Jack, very thoughtful. “I think it's my duty to stick to him, even if I have to bite him once or twice to keep him in his place.”

“You see,” Jack went on, “I'm really _fond_ of Squint. I've had him three years now, and I'm making a regular boy of him. He was a kind of a sissy when I took charge of him. His folks made him wear long yaller curls, and they kept him in shoes and stockings even in the summer-time, and they dressed him up in little blouses, and, say, fellows, you'd never guess what they called him!”

“What?” says I.

“Percival,” says Jack. “And they wouldn't let him fight. Well, I've seen him turn into a real boy, a bit it a time, and I think it's up to me to stick to the job and help with his education. He chews tobacco now,” says Jack very proudly, “and he can smoke a corncob pipe without getting sick; and I'll tell you what, Spot, he can lick that Freckles boy of yours to a frazzle.”

“Huh!” says I, “there's no boy of his age in town that dast to knock a chip off that Freckles boy's shoulder.”