Elbow-Room Part 18

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE GOLDFISH TRICK]

Then we undressed him and picked the fish out of his clothes, and we discovered that he had had two dishes full of water and covered with India-rubber tops strapped inside his trousers behind. In his struggle to get at them he had torn the covers to rags. We fixed him up in a pair of Dr. Brown's trousers, which were six inches too short for him, and then he climbed over the back fence and went home. Such misfortunes would have discouraged most men utterly, but Peter was desperately in love; and a week or two later, without stopping to estimate his chances, he proposed to his fair enchantress. She refused him promptly, of course. He seemed almost wild over his defeat, and his friends feared that some evil consequences would ensue. Their apprehensions were realized. Peter called upon young Potts and asked him if he had a revolver, and Potts said he had. Peter asked Potts to lend it to him, and Potts did so. Then Peter informed Potts that he had made up his mind to commit suicide. He said that since Miss Brown had dealt so unkindly with him he felt that life was an insupportable burden, and he could find relief only in the tomb. He intended to go down by the river-sh.o.r.e and there blow out his brains, and so end all this suffering and grief and bid farewell to a world that had grown dark to him. He said that he mentioned the fact to Potts in confidence because he wanted him to perform some little offices for him when he was gone. He entrusted to Potts a sonnet ent.i.tled "A Last Farewell,"

and addressed to Julia Brown. This he asked should be delivered to Miss Brown as soon as his corpse was discovered. He said it might excite a pang in her bosom and induce her to cherish his memory. Then he gave Potts his watch as a keepsake, and handed him forty dollars, with which he desired Mr. Potts to purchase a tombstone. He said he would prefer a plain one with his simple name cut upon it, and he wanted the funeral to be as unostentatious as possible.

Potts promised to fulfill these commissions, and he suggested that he would lend Mr. Lamb a bowie-knife, with which he could slash himself up if the pistol failed.

But the suicide said that he would make sure work with the revolver, although he was much obliged for the offer all the same. He said he would like Potts to go around in the morning and break the news as gently as possible to his unhappy mother, and to tell her that his last thought was of her. But he particularly requested that she would not put on mourning for her erring son.

Then he said that the awful act would be performed on the beach, just below the gas-works, and he wished Potts to come out with some kind of a vehicle to bring the remains home. If Julia came to the funeral, she was to have a seat in the carriage next to the hea.r.s.e; and if she wanted his heart, it was to be given to her in alcohol. It beat only for her. Potts was to tell his employers at the store that he parted with them with regret, but doubtless they would find some other person more worthy of their confidence and esteem. He said he didn't care where he was buried, but let it be in some lonely place far from the turmoil and trouble of the world--some place where the gra.s.s grows green and where the birds come to carol in the early spring-time.

Mr. Potts asked him if he preferred a deep or a shallow grave; but Mr.

Lamb said it made very little difference--when the spirit was gone, the mere earthly clay was of little account. He owed seventy cents for billiards down at the saloon, and Potts was to pay that out of the money in his hands, and to request the clergyman not to preach a sermon at the cemetery. Then he shook hands with Potts and went away to his awful doom.

The next morning Mr. Potts wrote to Julia, stopped in to tell them at the store, and nearly killed Mrs. Lamb with the intelligence. Then he borrowed Bradley's wagon; and taking with him the coroner, he drove out to the beach, just below the gas-works, to fetch home the mutilated corpse. When they reached the spot, the body was not there, and Potts said he was very much afraid it had been washed away by the flood tide. So they drove up to Keyser's house, about half a mile from the sh.o.r.e, to ask if any of the folks there had heard the fatal pistol-shot or seen the body.

On going around to the wood-pile they saw Keyser holding a terrier dog backed close up against a log. The dog's tail was lying across the log, and another man had the axe uplifted. A second later the axe descended and cut the tail off close to the dog, and while Keyser restrained the frantic animal, the other man touched the bleeding stump with caustic. As they let the dog go Potts was amazed to see that the chopper was the wretched suicide. He was amazed, but before he could ask any questions Peter stepped up to him and said, "Hush-sh-s.h.!.+ Don't say anything about that matter. I thought better of it. The pistol looked so blamed dangerous when I c.o.c.ked it that I changed my mind and came over here to Keyser's to stay all night. I'm going to live just to spite that Brown girl."

[Ill.u.s.tration: A CURTAILMENT]

Then the coroner said that he didn't consider he had been treated like a gentleman, and he had half a notion to give Mr. Lamb a pounding.

But they all drove home in the wagon, and just as Mrs. Lamb got done hugging Peter a letter was handed him containing the sonnet he had sent Julia. She returned it with the remark that it was the most dreadful nonsense she ever read, and that she knew he hadn't courage enough to kill himself. Then Peter went back to the store, and was surprised to find that his employers had so little emotion as to dock him for half a day's absence. What he wants now is to ascertain if he cannot compel Potts to give up that watch. Potts says he has too much respect for the memory of his unfortunate friend to part with it, but he is really sorry now that he ordered that tombstone. On the first of May, Peter's bleeding heart had been so far stanched as to enable him to begin skirmis.h.i.+ng around the affections of a girl named Smith; and if she refuses him, he thinks that tombstone may yet come into play.

But we all have our doubts about it.

CHAPTER XVI.

_MR. FOGG AS A SPORTSMAN AND A SPOUSE_.

Game was so plenty about our neighborhood last fall that Mr. Fogg determined to become a sportsman. He bought a double-barrel gun, and after trying it a few times by firing it at a mark, he loaded it and placed it behind the hall door until he should want it. A few days later he made up his mind to go out and shoot a rabbit or two, so he shouldered his gun and strode off toward the open country. A mile or two from the town he saw a rabbit; and taking aim, he pulled the trigger. The gun failed to go off. Then he pulled the other trigger, and again the cap snapped. Mr. Fogg used a strong expression of disgust, and then, taking a pin, he picked the nipples of the gun, primed them with a little powder and made a fresh start. Presently he saw another rabbit. He took good aim, but both caps snapped. The rabbit did not see Mr. Fogg, so he put on more caps, and they snapped too.

Then Mr. Fogg cleaned out the nipples again, primed them and leveled the gun at a fence. The caps snapped again. Then Mr. Fogg became furious, and in his rage he expended forty-two caps trying to make the gun go off. When the forty-second cap missed also, Mr. Fogg thought, perhaps, there might be something the matter with the inside of the gun, and so he sounded the barrels with his ramrod. To his utter dismay, he discovered that both barrels were empty. Mrs. Fogg, who is nervous about firearms, had drawn the loads without telling Fogg. The language used by Mr. Fogg when he made this discovery was extremely disgraceful, and he felt sorry for it a moment afterward. As he grew cooler he loaded both barrels and started afresh for the rabbits. He saw one in a few moments and was about to fire, when he noticed that there were no caps on the gun. He felt for one, and, to his dismay, found that he had snapped the last one off. Then he ground his teeth and walked home. On his way he saw a greater number of rabbits than he ever saw before or is likely to see again, and as he looked at them and thought of Mrs. Fogg he felt mad and murderous. He went gunning eight or ten times afterward that autumn, always with a full supply of ammunition, but he never once saw a rabbit or any other kind of game within gun-shot.

[Ill.u.s.tration: AN INDIGNANT GUNNER]

But he forgave Mrs. Fogg, and for a while their domestic peace was unruffled. One evening, however, while they were sitting together, they got to talking about their married life and their past troubles until both of them grew quite sympathetic. At last Mrs. Fogg suggested that it might help to kindle afresh the fire of love in their hearts if they would freely confess their faults to each other and promise to amend them. Mr. Fogg said it struck him as being a good idea. For his part, he was willing to make a clean breast of it, but he suggested that perhaps his wife had better begin. She thought for a moment, and this conversation ensued:

"Well, then," said Mrs. Fogg, "I am willing to acknowledge that I am the worst-tempered woman in the world."

_Mr. Fogg_ (turning and looking at her). "Maria, that's about the only time you ever told the square-toed truth in your life."

_Mrs. Fogg_ (indignantly). "Mr. Fogg, that's perfectly outrageous. You ought to be ashamed of yourself."

_F_. "Well, you know it's so. You _have_ got the worst temper of any woman I ever saw--the very worst; now haven't you?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: CONFESSING THEIR FAULTS]

_Mrs. F_. "No, I haven't, either. I'm just as good-tempered as you are."

_F_. "That's not so. You're as cross as a bear If you were married to a graven image, you'd quarrel with it."

_Mrs. F_. "That's an outrageous falsehood! There isn't any woman about this neighborhood that puts up with as much as I do without getting angry. You're a perfect brute."

_F_. "It's you that is the brute."

_Mrs. F_. "No, it isn't."

_F_. "Yes, it is. You're as snappish as a mad dog. It's few men that could live with you."

_Mrs. F_. "If you say that again, I'll scratch your eyes out."

_F_. "I dare you to lay your hands on me, you vixen."

_Mrs. F_. "You do, eh? Well, take that! and that" (cuffing him on the head).

_F_. "You let go of my hair, or I'll murder you."

_Mrs. F_. "I will; and I'll leave this house this very night; I won't live any longer with such a monster."

_F_. "Well, quit; get out. The sooner, the better. Good riddance to bad rubbish; and take your clothes with you."

_Mrs. F_. "I'm sorry I ever married you. You ain't fit to be yoked with any decent woman, you wretch you!"

_F_. "Well, you ain't half as sorry as I am. Good-bye. Don't come back soon."

Then Mrs. Fogg put on her bonnet and went around to her mother's, but she came back in the morning. Mr. Fogg hasn't yet confessed what his princ.i.p.al failing is.

Mr. Fogg's life has been very troublous. He told me that he had a fit of sleeplessness one night lately, and after vainly trying to lose himself in slumber he happened to remember that he once read in an almanac that a man could put himself to sleep by imagining that he saw a lot of sheep jumping over a fence, and by counting them as they jumped. He determined to try the experiment; and closing his eyes, he fancied the sheep jumping and began to count. He had reached his one hundred and fortieth sheep, and was beginning to doze off, when Mrs.

Fogg suddenly said,

"Wilberforce!"

"Oh, what?"

"I believe that yellow hen of ours wants to set."

"Oh, don't bother me with such nonsense as that now! Do keep quiet and go to sleep."

Then Mr. Fogg started his sheep again and commenced to count. He got up to one hundred and twenty, and was feeling as if he would drop off at any moment, when, just as his one hundred and twenty-first sheep was about to take that fence, the baby began to cry.

"Hang that child!" he shouted at Mrs. Fogg. "Why don't you tend to it and put it to sleep? Hush, you little imp, or I'll spank you!"

When Mrs. Fogg had quieted it, Mr. Fogg, although a little nervous and excited, concluded to try it again. Turning on the imaginary mutton, he began. Only sixty-four sheep had slid over the fence, when Fogg's aunt knocked at the door and asked if he was awake. When she learned that he was, she said she believed he had forgotten to close the back shutters, and she thought she heard burglars in the yard.