The Complete Works of Stephen Crane (60 page)

As we ambled our way agreeably out of Bath, Paddy and I employed ourselves in worthy speech. He was not yet a notable horseman, but his Irish adaptability was so great that he was already able to think he would not fall off so long as the horse was old and tired.

“Paddy,” said I, “how would you like to be an Englishman? Look at their cities. Sure, Skibbereen is a mud-pond to them. It might be fine to be an Englishman.”

“I would not, your honour,” said Paddy. “I would not be an Englishman while these grand — But never mind; ’tis many proud things I will say about the English considering they are our neighbours in one way; I mean they are near enough to come over and harm us when they wish. But any how they are a remarkable hard-headed lot, and in time they may come to something good.”

“And is a hard head such a qualification?” said I.

Paddy became academic. “I have been knowing two kinds of hard heads,” he said. “Mickey McGovern had such a hard skull on him no stick in the south of Ireland could crack it, though many were tried. And what happened to him? He died poor as a rat. ’Tis not the kind of hard head I am meaning. I am meaning the kind of hard head which believes it contains all the wisdom and honour in the world. ’Tis what I mean. If you have a head like that, you can go along blundering into ditches and tumbling over your own shins, and still hold confidence in yourself. ’Tis not very handsome for other men to see; but devil a bit care you, for you are warm inside with complacence.”

“Here is a philosopher, in God’s truth,” I cried. “And where were you learning all this? In Ireland?”

“Your honour,” said Paddy firmly, “you yourself are an Irishman. You are not for saying there is no education in Ireland, for it educates a man to see burning thatches and such like. One of them was my aunt’s, Heaven rest her!”

“Your aunt?” said I. “And what of your aunt? What have the English to do with your aunt?”

“That’s what she was asking them,” said Paddy; “but they burned her house down over a little matter of seventeen years’ rent she owed to a full-blooded Irishman, may the devil find him!”

“But I am for going on without an account of your burnt-thatch education,” said I. “You are having more than two opinions about the English, and I would be hearing them. Seldom have I seen a man who could gain so much knowledge in so short a space. You are interesting me.”

Paddy seemed pleased. “Well, your honour,” said he confidentially, “’tis true for you. I am knowing the English down to their toes.”

“And if you were an Englishman, what kind of an Englishman would you like to be?” said I.

“A gentleman,” he answered swiftly. “A big gentleman!” Then he began to mimic and make gestures in a way that told me he had made good use of his eyes and of the society of underlings in the various inns. “Where’s me man? Send me man! Oh, here you are! And why didn’t you know I wanted you? What right have you to think I don’t want you? What? A servant dead? Pah! Send it down the back staircase at once and get rid of it. Bedad!” said Paddy enthusiastically, “I could do that fine!” And to prove what he said was true, he cried “Pah!” several times in a lusty voice.

“I see you have quickly understood many customs of the time,” said I. “But ’tis not all of it. There are many quite decent people alive now.”

“’Tis strange we have never heard tell of them,” said Paddy musingly. “I have only heard of great fighters, blackguards, and beautiful ladies, but sure, as your honour says, there must be plenty of quiet decent people somewhere.”

“There is,” said I. “I am feeling certain of it, although I am not knowing exactly where to lay my hand upon them.”

“Perhaps they would be always at mass,” said Paddy, “and in that case your honour would not be likely to see them.”

“Masses!” said I. “There are more masses said in Ireland in one hour than here in two years.”

“The people would be heathens, then?” said Paddy, aghast.

“Not precisely,” said I. “But they have reformed themselves several times, and a number of adequate reformations is a fine thing to confuse the Church. In Ireland we are all for being true to the ancient faith; here they are always for improving matters, and their learned men study the Sacred Book solely with a view to making needed changes.”

“’Tis heathen they are,” said Paddy with conviction. “I was knowing it. Sure, I will be telling Father Corrigan the minute I put a foot on Ireland, for nothing pleases him so much as a good obstinate heathen, and he very near discourses the hair off their heads.”

“I would not be talking about such matters,” said I. “It merely makes my head grow an ache. My father was knowing all about it; but he was always claiming that if a heathen did his duty by the poor he was as good as anybody, and that view I could never understand.”

“Sure, if a heathen gives to the poor, ’tis poison to them,” said Paddy. “If it is food and they eat it, they turn black all over and die the day after. If it is money, it turns red-hot and burns a hole in their hand, and the devil puts a chain through it and drags them down to hell, screeching.”

“Say no more,” said I. “I am seeing you are a true theologian of the time. I would be talking on some more agreeable topic, something about which you know less.”

“I can talk of fishing,” he answered diffidently. “For I am a great fisherman, sure. And then there would be turf-cutting, and the deadly stings given to men by eels. All these things I am knowing well.”

“’Tis a grand lot to know,” said I, “but let us be talking of London. Have you been hearing of London?”

“I have been hearing much about the town,” said Paddy. “Father Corrigan was often talking of it. He was claiming it to be full of loose women, and sin, and fighting in the streets during mass.”

“I am understanding something of the same,” I replied. “It must be an evil city. I am fearing something may happen to you, Paddy, — you with your red head as conspicuous as a clock in a tower. The gay people will be setting upon you and carrying you off. Sure there has never been anything like you in London.”

“I am knowing how to be dealing with them. It will be all a matter of religious up-bringing, as Father Corrigan was saying. I have but to go to my devotions, and the devil will fly away with them.”

“And supposing they have your purse?” said I. “The devil might fly away with them to an ill tune for you.”

“When they are flying away with my purse,” he replied suggestively, “they will be flying away with little of what could be called my ancestral wealth.”

“You are natural rogues,” said I, “you and Jem Bottles. And you had best not be talking of religion.”

“Sure a man may take the purse of an ugly old sick monkey like him, and still go with an open face to confession,” rejoined Paddy, “and I would not be backward if Father Corrigan’s church was a mile beyond.”

“And are you meaning that Father Corrigan would approve you in this robbery?” I cried.

“Devil a bit he would, your honour,” answered Paddy indignantly. “He would be saying to me: ‘Paddy, you limb of Satan, and how much did you get?’ I would be telling him. ‘Give fifteen guineas to the Church, you mortal sinner, and I will be trying my best for you,’ he would be saying. And I would be giving them.”

“You are saved fifteen guineas by being in England, then,” said I, “for they don’t do that here. And I am thinking you are traducing your clergy, you vagabond.”

“Traducing?” said he. “That would mean giving them money. Aye, I was doing it often. One year I gave three silver shillings.”

“You’re wrong,” said I. “By ‘traducing’ I mean speaking ill of your priest.”

“‘Speaking ill of my priest’?” cried Paddy, gasping with amazement. “Sure, my own mother never heard a word out of me!”

“However,” said I, “we will be talking of other things. The English land seems good.”

Paddy cast his eye over the rainy landscape. “I am seeing no turf for cutting,” he remarked disapprovingly, “and the potatoes would not be growing well here. ’Tis a barren country.”

At nightfall we came to a little inn which was ablaze with light and ringing with exuberant cries. We gave up our horses and entered. To the left was the closed door of the taproom, which now seemed to furnish all the noise. I asked the landlord to tell me the cause of the excitement.

“Sir,” he answered, “I am greatly honoured to-night. Mr. O’Ruddy, the celebrated Irish swordsman, is within, recounting a history of his marvellous exploits.”

“Indeed!” said I.

“Bedad!” said Paddy.

Paddy was for opening his mouth wide immediately, but I checked him. “I would see this great man,” said I to the landlord, “but I am so timid by nature I fear to meet his eagle eye. Is there no way by which we could observe him in secret at our leisure?”

“There be one way,” remarked the landlord after deliberation. I had passed him a silver coin. He led us to a little parlour back of the taproom. Here a door opened into the tap itself, and in this door was cut a large square window so that the good man of the inn could sometimes sit at his ease in his great chair in the snug parlour and observe that his customers had only that for which they were paying. It is a very good plan, for I have seen many a worthy man become a rogue merely because nobody was watching him. My father often was saying that if he had not been narrowly eyed all his young life, first by his mother and then by his wife, he had little doubt but what he might have been engaged in dishonest practices sooner or later.

A confident voice was doing some high talking in the taproom. I peered through the window, but at first I saw only a collection of gaping yokels, poor bent men with faces framed in straggly whiskers. Each had a pint pot clutched with a certain air of determination in his right hand.

Suddenly upon our line of vision strode the superb form of Jem Bottles. A short pipe was in his mouth, and he gestured splendidly with a pint pot. “More of the beer, my dear,” said he to a buxom maid. “We be all rich in Ireland. And four of them set upon me,” he cried again to the yokels. “All noblemen, in fine clothes and with sword-hilts so flaming with jewels an ordinary man might have been blinded. ‘Stop!’ said I. ‘There be more of your friends somewhere. Call them.’ And with that—”

“‘And with that’?” said I myself, opening the door and stepping in upon him. “‘And with that’?” said I again. Whereupon I smote him a blow which staggered him against the wall, holding his crown with both hands while his broken beer-pot rolled on the floor. Paddy was dancing with delight at seeing some other man cuffed, but the landlord and the yokels were nearly dead of terror. But they made no sound; only the buxom girl whimpered.

“There is no cause for alarm,” said I amiably. “I was only greeting an old friend. ’Tis a way I have. And how wags the world with you, O’Ruddy?”

“I am not sure for the moment,” replied Jem Bottles ruefully. “I must bide till it stops spinning.”

“Truth,” cried I. “That would be a light blow to trouble the great O’Ruddy. Come now; let us have the pots filled again, and O’Ruddy shall tell us more of his adventures. What say you, lads?”

The yokels had now recovered some of their senses, and they greeted my plan with hoarse mutterings of hasty and submissive assent.

“Begin,” said I sternly to the highwayman. He stood miserably on one foot. He looked at the floor; he looked at the wall; from time to time he gave me a sheep’s glance. “Begin,” said I again. Paddy was wild with glee. “Begin,” said I for the third time and very harshly.

“I—” gulped out the wretched man, but he could get no further.

“I am seeing I must help you,” said I. “Come now, when did you learn the art of sticadoro proderodo sliceriscum fencing?”

Bottles rolled the eyes of despair at me, but I took him angrily by the shoulder. “Come now; when did you learn the art of sticadoro proderodo sliceriscum fencing?”

Jem Bottles staggered, but at last he choked out: “My mother taught me.” Here Paddy retired from the room, doubled in a strong but soundless convulsion.

“Good,” said I. “Your mother taught you. We are making progress any how. Your mother taught you. And now tell me this: When you slew Cormac of the Cliffs, what passado did you use? Don’t be stuttering. Come now; quick with you; what passado did you use? What passado?”

With a heroism born of a conviction that in any event he was a lost man, Jem Bottles answered: “A blue one.”

“Good,” I cried cheerfully. “‘A blue one’! We are coming on fine. He killed Cormac with a blue passado. And now I would be asking you—”

“Master,” interrupted the highwayman with sudden resolution. “I will say no more. I have done. You may kill me an it pleases you.”

Now I saw that enough was enough. I burst into laughter and clapped him merrily on the shoulder. “Be cheery, O’Ruddy,” I cried. “Sure an Irishman like you ought to be able to look a joke in the face.” He gave over his sulks directly, and I made him buy another pint each for the yokels. “’Twas dry work listening to you and your exploits, O’Ruddy,” said I.

Later I went to my chamber, attended by my followers, having ordered roast fowls and wine to be served as soon as possible. Paddy and Jem Bottles sat on stools one at each side of the fireplace, and I occupied a chair between them.

Looking at my two faithful henchmen, I was suddenly struck by the thought that they were not very brisk servants for a gentleman to take to fashionable London. I had taken Paddy out of his finery and dressed him in a suit of decent brown; but his hair was still unbarbered, and I saw that unless I had a care his appearance would greatly surprise and please London. I resolved to have him shorn at the first large town.

As for Jem Bottles, his clothes were well enough, and indeed he was passable in most ways unless it was his habit, when hearing a sudden noise, to take a swift dark look to the right and to the left. Then, further, people might shrewdly note his way of always sitting with his back to the wall and his face to the door. However, I had no doubt of my ability to cure him of these tricks as soon as he was far enough journeyed from the scenes of his earlier activity.

But the idea I entertained at this moment was more to train them to be fine grand servants, such as I had seen waiting on big people in Bath. They were both willing enough, but they had no style to them. I decided to begin at once and see what I could teach them.

“Paddy,” said I, taking off my sword and holding it out to him. “My sword!”

Paddy looked at it. “It is, sir,” he answered respectfully.

“Bad scran to you, Paddy!” I cried angrily. “I am teaching you your duties. Take the sword! In both hands, mind you! Now march over and lay it very tenderly on the stand at the head of the bed. There now!”

I now turned my attention to Jem Bottles.

“Bottles,” said I peremptorily, “my coat and waistcoat.”

“Yes, sir,” replied Bottles quickly, profiting by Paddy’s lesson.

“There now,” said I, as Bottles laid the coat and waistcoat on a dresser. “’Tis a good beginning. When supper comes I shall teach you other duties.”

The supper came in due course, and after the inn’s man had gone I bid Jem and Paddy stand one on either side of my chair and a little way back. “Now,” said I, “stand square on your feet, and hold your heads away high, and stick your elbows out a little, and try to look as if you don’t know enough to tell fire from water. Jem Bottles has it. That’s it! Bedad! look at the ignorance on him! He’s the man for you, Paddy! Wake up now, and look stupid. Am I not telling you?”

“Begor!” said Paddy dejectedly, “I feel like the greatest omadhaun in all the west country, and if that is not being stupid enough for your honour I can do no better.”

“Shame to you, Paddy, to let an Englishman beat you so easily,” said I. “Take that grin off your face, you scoundrel! Now,” I added, “we are ready to begin. Wait, now. You must each have something to hold in your fist. Let me be thinking. There’s only one plate and little of anything else. Ah, I have it! A bottle! Paddy, you shall hold one of the bottles. Put your right hand underneath it, and with your left hand hold it by the neck. But keep your elbows out. Jem, what the devil am I to give you to hold? Ah, I have it! Another bottle! Hold it the same as Paddy. Now! Stand square on your feet, and hold your heads away high, and stick your elbows out a little, and look stupid. I am going to eat my supper.”

I finished my first and second bottles with the silence only broken by the sound of my knife-play and an occasional restless creaking of boots as one of my men slyly shifted his position. Wishing to call for my third bottle, I turned and caught them exchanging a glance of sympathetic bewilderment. As my eye flashed upon them, they stiffened up like grenadier recruits.

But I was not for being too hard on them at first. “’Tis enough for one lesson,” said I. “Put the bottles by me and take your ease.”

With evident feelings of relief they slunk back to the stools by the fire, where they sat recovering their spirits.

After my supper I sat in the chair toasting my shins and lazily listening to my lads finishing the fowls. They seemed much more like themselves, sitting there grinding away at the bones and puffing with joy. In the red firelight it was such a scene of happiness that I misdoubted for a moment the wisdom of my plan to make them into fine grand numskulls.

I could see that all men were not fitted for the work. It needed a beefy person with fat legs and a large amount of inexplicable dignity, a regular God-knows-why loftiness. Truth, in those days, real talent was usually engaged in some form of rascality, barring the making of books and sermons. When one remembers the impenetrable dulness of the great mass of the people, the frivolity of the gentry, the arrogance and wickedness of the court, one ceases to wonder that many men of taste took to the highway as a means of recreation and livelihood. And there I had been attempting to turn my two frank rascals into the kind of sheep-headed rubbish whom you could knock down a great staircase, and for a guinea they would say no more. Unless I was the kicker, I think Paddy would have returned up the staircase after his assailant. Jem Bottles probably would have gone away nursing his wrath and his injury, and planning to waylay the kicker on a convenient night. But neither would have taken a guinea and said no more. Each of these simple-hearted reprobates was too spirited to take a guinea for a kick down a staircase.

Any how I had a mind that I could be a gentleman true enough without the help of Jem and Paddy making fools of themselves. I would worry them no more.

As I was musing thus my eyes closed from a sense of contented weariness, but I was aroused a moment later by hearing Paddy address Jem Bottles in a low voice. “’Tis you who are the cool one, Jem!” said he with admiration, “trying to make them think you were
him
!” Here I was evidently indicated by a sideways bob of the head. “Have you not been seeing the fine ways of him? Sure, be looking at his stride and his habit of slatting people over the head, and his grand manners with his food. You are looking more like a candlestick than you are looking like him. I wonder at you.”

“But I befooled them,” said Bottles proudly. “I befooled them well. It was Mr. O’Ruddy here, and Mr. O’Ruddy there, and the handsome wench she gave me many a glance of her eye, she did.”

“Sorrow the day for her, then,” responded Paddy, “and if you would be cozening the girls in the name of
him
there, he will be cozening you, and I never doubt it.”

“’Twas only a trick to make the time go easy, it was,” said Bottles gloomily. “If you remember, Master Paddy, I have spent the most of my new service waiting under oak-trees; and I will not be saying that it rained always, but oft-times it did rain most accursedly.”