“Town so still,” observed the landlord,
finally, with a complacent glance at the dessert course
of prunes to which his guests were helping themselves
from a central reservoir, “Town so still, hardly
seems like show-day’s come round again.
Yet there’s be’n some shore signs lately:
when my shavers come honeyin’ up with, ’Say,
pa, ain’t they no urrands I can go for ye, pa?
I like to run ’em for you, pa,’—’relse,
’Oh, pa, ain’t they no water I can haul,
or nothin’, pa?’—’relse,
as little Rosina T. says, this morning, ‘Pa,
I always pray fer you pa,’ and pa this
and pa that-you can rely either Christmas or show-day’s
mighty close.”
William Todd, taking occasion to prove himself recovered
from confusion, remarked casually that there was another
token of the near approach of the circus, as ole Wilkerson
was drunk again.
“There’s a man!” exclaimed Mr. Martin
with enthusiasm. “There’s the feller
for my money! He does his duty as a citizen
more discriminatin’ly on public occasions than
any man I ever see. There’s Wilkerson’s
celebration when there’s a funeral; look at the
difference between it and on Fourth of July.
Why, sir, it’s as melancholy as a hearse-plume,
and sympathy ain’t the word for it when he looks
at the remains, no sir; preacher nor undertaker, either,
ain’t half as blue and respectful.
Then take his circus spree. He come into the
store this afternoon, head up, marchin’ like
a grenadier and shootin’ his hand out before
his face and drawin’ it back again, and hollering
out, ’Ta, ta, ta-ra-ta, ta, ta-ta-ra’—why,
the dumbest man ever lived could see in a minute show’s
‘comin’ to-morrow and Wilkerson’s
playin’ the trombone. Then he’d snort
and goggle like an elephant. Got the biggest
sense of appropriateness of any man in the county,
Wilkerson has. Folks don’t half appreciate
him.”
As each boarder finished his meal he raided the glass
of wooden toothpicks and went away with no standing
on the order of his going; but Martin waited for Harkless,
who, not having attended to business so concisely as
the others, was the last to leave the table, and they
stood for a moment under the awning outside, lighting
their cigars.
“Call on the judge, to-night?” asked Martin.
“No,” said Harkless. “Why?”
“Didn’t you see the lady with Minnie and
the judge at the lecture?”
“I caught a glimpse of her. That’s
what Bowlder meant, then.”
“I don’t know what Bowlder meant, but
I guess you better go out there, young man. She
might not stay here long.”
THE WALRUS AND THE CARPENTER
The Briscoe buckboard rattled along the elastic country-road,
the roans setting a sharp pace as they turned eastward
on the pike toward home and supper.
“They’ll make the eight miles in three-quarters
of an hour,” said the judge, proudly. He
pointed ahead with his whip. “Just beyond
that bend we pass through Six-Cross-Roads.”
