Pippin; A Wandering Flame Part 3

"The chaplain used to come and see me once or twice a week, and he give me papers to read--nice papers they was, too; I liked 'em--and said I was in a bad way and didn't I repent, and I said no, I didn't, and he'd shake his head and say, 'Hardened! hardened!' kind of sad, and go away.

He'd ben there a long time, and it had soaked into him, as you may say.

He'd lost his spring, if ever he had any. Well! come one day--I'll never forget that day! bright, suns.h.i.+ny day it was, just like this--I went to chapel as usual. I liked to go to chapel, 'count of the singin'. I'd rather sing than eat, any day. I never noticed the words, you understand, but I liked the tunes, and I sang out good whenever I got a chance. So I went in with the rest, like a sheep, and sat down, never lookin' up. I'd got a piece of string, and a feller had showed me a new knot, and I sat tyin' it, waitin' for the singin'. I never took no notice of anything else. Then a voice spoke, and I jumped, and looked up. It was a strange voice, and a strange man. Tall and well set up, he was, kind o' sandy hair and beard, and eyes that looked right through you and counted the b.u.t.tons on the back of your s.h.i.+rt. Yes, and his voice went through you, too; it wasn't loud nor yet sharp, but you couldn't help but listen. '_The Lord is here!_' he said. He let that sink in a minute; then, 'Right here,' he said, 'in this chapel. And what's more, you left Him behind you in your cell. And what's more, you'll find Him there when you go back. _You can't get away from Him!_'

I can't tell you all he said, but every word come straight as a rifle bullet. I wasn't the only one that sat up, I tell ye! 'Twas different talk from what we was used to. He spoke about ten minutes, and it didn't seem three; then he stops short and says, 'That's enough. Now let's sing! Hymn 464!' Well, there was some sung, like me, because they liked it, and there was a few here and there was professors, but half of 'em didn't pay no attention special, just sat there. After the first verse he held up his hand. 'I said _sing_!' says he. 'And when I say sing I mean _sing_! Never mind whether you know how or not; _make a noise_! I ain't goin' to sing alone!'

"Gorry! I can see him now, standin' there with his head up, clappin' two hymn books together to beat the time and singin' away for all he was worth. In two minutes every man in the place was singin', or crowin', or gruntin', or makin' what kind of noise was give him to make. Yes, sir!

that was Elder Hadley all over. I let out my voice to the last hole; I expect I bellered like a bull, for he looked at me kind o' quick; then in another minute he looked again, and that time he saw all there was to see. I felt it crinkle down to my toes, so to say. Bimeby, as we were goin' out, after service, he come down and shook hands with us all, every man Jack, and said somethin' pleasant. Come to me, he looks me right through again, and says he, 'Well, boy, what are _you_ doin'

here?' I choked up, and couldn't say a word. It wasn't so much what he said, mind you, as the way he said it. Why, you was a real person, and he _cared_; you bet he cared! Well, sir, 'twould take the day to tell what that man did for me. He told me that 'twas true, the Lord _was_ there. And that--that _He_ cared too. It took a long time to get that into my head. I'd been kicked about from one gutter to another; n.o.body ever had cared--except old Granny Faa; she give me snuff sometimes, when she was sober, and she kep' Bashford off me as much as she could--but still--

"Well! I'll bile it down. Come one day, somethin' started me wrong; I don't know what it was. My head ached, and the mush was burnt, and I didn't give a tinker's d.a.m.n for anything or anybody. I did what I had to, and then I sat down and just grouched, the way I told you. Crooks is childish, as I said; maybe other folks is too, I dono. Well! So Elder Hadley come along, and he says, 'h.e.l.lo, Pippin! What's the matter? You look like you'd been frostbit!' he says. I tried to fetch a grin, but it wouldn't come. 'Nothin' doin', Elder!' I says.

"'What's the matter?' he says again, his kind way.

"'h.e.l.l's the matter!' I says. I used language, them days; never have since, but I did then.

"He sits down and looks me over careful. 'What's "h.e.l.l"?' he says.

"'Everything's h.e.l.l!' I says: and then I biled over, and I guess that mush was burnt all right. He listened quiet, his head kind o' bent down.

At last he says, 'How about takin' the Lord into this, and askin' Him to help?'

"'Nothin' doin'!' I says. 'There's no Lord in mine!'

"'_Stop that!_' says he. I looked up; and his eyes was like on fire, but yet they was lovin' too, and--I dono--somethin' in his look made me straighten up and hold up my head. 'None of that talk!' he said. 'That's no talk for G.o.d's boy. Now, hark to me! You like me, don't you, Pippin?'

"'You bet I like you, Elder!' I says. 'There's nothin' doin' in your line here, but you bet I like you. You've treated me white, and you're a gentleman besides.'

"'Now,' he says, slow and careful, 'what you like in me is just the little bit of G.o.d that's in me. The little bit that's in you finds the little bit that's in me, do you see? And _likes_ it, because they belong together. There's another bit in the Warden, and another in Tom Clapp there, though I'll own he doesn't look it (and he didn't); and there's a bit in everybody here and elsewhere. And that's not all! Go you out into that field yonder and sit there for an hour, and you'll find other little bits, see if you don't! And see if they don't fit together.'

"He pointed out of the window to a field a little ways off: I could see the b.u.t.tercups s.h.i.+nin' in it from where I sat. I stared at him. 'Go along!' says he. 'What do you mean?' I says. 'I mean _go_!' he says.

'I've the Warden's leave for you whenever I see fit, and I see fit now.'

I looked at him, and I see 'twas true. I got up kind o' staggerin', like, and he tucked his arm into mine, and he opened the door and we went out. Out! I'd been in there a year, sir. I don't believe you could guess what 'twas like. He marched me over to that field--we clum over the fence, and _that_ done me a sight of good--and told me to set down.

Then he give me his watch--gold watch and chain, handsome as they make 'em--and said, 'Come back in an hour. Good-by, boy!' and he went off and left me there. Green gra.s.s! do you understand? He never turned round even. He left _me_--a crook, a guttersnipe, a jailbird--out there alone in the suns.h.i.+ne, with the b.u.t.tercups all round me."

Pippin's voice broke. Mr. Bailey produced a voluminous bandanna handkerchief and blew his nose loudly. There was silence for a few moments. Pippin went on.

"Then, after a while, I found the Lord, like the Elder said. He come all round me, like the air; I couldn't get away from Him. A little bird come and tilted on a bush by where I was sittin', and he sang, and there was a bit of the Lord in him, and he said so, over and over, plain, and I heard him. And the sun s.h.i.+ned on the b.u.t.tercups, and they had a bit too, and appeared like they knowed it, and kind o' nodded and was pleased; and the leaves on the trees rustled, and they appeared pleased, too. And like a voice said inside me, 'It all belongs, and you belong too!' and all at once I was down on my knees. 'It's the Lord!' I says. 'I've found Him, and He's the Whole Show!'"

CHAPTER III

PIPPIN FINDS A TRADE, "TEMP'RY"

There was a silence when Pippin finished his story. He had no more to say. He sat erect, looking straight before him, with parted lips and s.h.i.+ning eyes. Jacob Bailey glanced at him once or twice, and cleared his throat as if to speak, but no words came. Again he looked his horse over, slowly and critically, as if he rather expected to see something out of place.

"That strap's worked a mite loose!" he muttered. "He crabs along so, you can't keep the straps in place."

Finally he blew his nose with much deliberation, and turned toward his companion. "Young man," he said, "I'd like to shake hands with you!" He held out a brown, knotty hand, and Pippin grasped it eagerly. "I believe every word you say, and I thank the Lord for you. I--I'd ought to have trusted you from the beginning, same as your face told me to, but--"

Pippin shook his head emphatically. "I couldn't ask no more than what you've done. I thank you, sir! I thank you much!" he cried. "You've listened real kind and patient, and it sure has done me good, gettin'

this off my chest, like; a heap of good! It has so! And how could you tell? I've seen crooks looked like--well, real holy and pious, different from me as a dove from a crow, and they wasn't, but the reverse.

Behooved you be careful, is what I say."

"Especially being guardian of the poor!" said Jacob Bailey. "Yes, son, I run the Poor Farm, up to Cyrus. It's as pretty a piece of farm land as there is in the state, and a pleasant place whatever way you take it.

Now--you say you are lookin' for a trade? How about farmin'? Ever think of that?"

Pippin pondered. "I never had any experience farmin'," he said, "but I love to see things grow, and I love the smell of the earth, and like that. I should think 'twould be a dandy trade all right."

"Well!" Jacob Bailey's eyes began to s.h.i.+ne too. "Now, young feller, I tell you what! I--I take to you, some way of it. I don't take to everybody right away like this; I'm some slow as a rule; but--what I would say is this: I'm kinder short-handed just now at the Farm, and unless you find something you like better, why, you might come and have a try at that."

"You're awful good!" cried Pippin. "Say, you are, Mr. Bailey, no mistake. I feel to thank you, sir. As if you hadn't done me good enough, lettin' me blow off steam, without this!"

"Nuff said about that!" Bailey spoke with the gruffness of a shy man.

"You done me good too, so call it square. Well, you think it over, that's all. No hurry! I'm there right along, and so's the Farm; and farmin' is as good, clean, pleasant a trade as a man can find--or so I hold, and I've farmed thirty years."

"I'll bet it is!" Pippin climbed down from the wagon, and the two men shook hands again, looking each other in the face with friendly eyes.

"I'll bet it is, and I wouldn't wonder a mite but I might take you up some day, Mr. Bailey. I only want to make sure what it's meant I should do, and if it is farmin' I'd be real pleased, I wouldn't wonder. And anyway, I'll look you up some day, sir. I will, sure."

"So do! So do, son! Good luck to you, Pippin, if that's your name. Git up, Nelson!"

Pippin returned the greetings with enthusiasm, and Jacob Bailey drove off with many a backward wave and glance.

"Real nice man!" said Pippin. "Ain't it great meetin' up with folks like that? Now behooves me hasten just a mite, if I'm goin' to get to Kingdom before sundown! He said 'twas about a mile further. h.e.l.lo! What's goin'

on here?"

Pippin was not to get to Kingdom before sundown. He stopped short. A man was lying beside the road, motionless, his feet in the ditch, his head on a tuft of gra.s.s: asleep, it seemed. An elderly man, gray and wizened, his face seamed with wrinkles of greed and cunning. Near him on the dusty gra.s.s lay a scissor-grinder's wheel. Pippin bent over him, looked, looked again, then knelt down in the dust.

"It's Nipper Crewe!" he said. "He's--no, he isn't! Hi, there! Crewe!

Hold up! What's the matter?"

"Some kind of fit!" said Pippin. "There's no liquor in him. Here, Crewe, wake up!"

He shook the man gently: the lids quivered, opened; the bleared eyes wandered, then fixed, and recognition crept into them.

"Pippin!" he said faintly.

"That's right! It's Pippin, all right. How you feelin', Nipper?"

"What's the matter?"

"Search me!" said Pippin cheerfully. "You appear to have had a fit, or something. You'll come out all right."

"Where is it?"

"Where's what? Your wheel? Right handy by; I expect it dropped when you did, but it looks to be all O.K. Took up grindin', eh? Good trade, is it?"

A cunning look crept into the dim eyes.