Mitch Miller Part 1

Mitch Miller.

by Edgar Lee Masters.

Supposin' you was lyin' in a room and was asleep or pretty near asleep; and bein' asleep you could hear people talkin' but it didn't mean nothin' to you--just talk; and you kind of knew things was goin' on around you, but still you was way off in your sleep and belonged to yourself as a sleeper, and what was goin' on didn't make no difference to you; and really, supposin' you was tryin' to get back into deeper sleep before you heard these things. And then, supposin' now and then as your eyes rolled back into your head while sleepin' you saw through the lids--not tryin' to look, but your eyes just saw as they rolled past the open place between the lids--and you saw squares of light and dark, or maybe roundish blurs. And then supposin' sometimes you heard a noise, and as it turned out it was somebody goin' in and out of the room, or somebody closin' or openin' a door. And supposin' these here people were not tip-toein' exactly, but were kind of watchin' and laughin' a little maybe to see what you would do when you woke up. And finally one of your eyes kind of opened and you saw your ma sittin' in the corner, sewin', or peelin' apples maybe; and you saw your pa goin' out of a door, and your sister came up to you and looked clost to see when you was goin' to wake up. And supposin' after a bit you sat up and rubbed your eyes, and looked around and you was in a room, and the room was in your ma's house, and your ma sat there, sure enough, and your pa was goin' out of the door, and your sister was lookin' at you. And supposin' then you went out-doors and there was a yard and you saw the house from the outside, and there was a house near and other houses, and a fence in front, and wagons goin' by and people. And then supposin' by and by you found out that a railroad ran right by the side fence, and a great big black thing makin' a noise and blowin' out smoke came close to the fence sometimes, and a man would be ridin' in a little house on top of this big black thing, who talked to you, and laughed when you showed him a pipe made out of a cork and a match, and a cherry-seed put in a hollowed-out place of the cork for tobacco.

And then supposin' other children came around, and finally you went out on to a sidewalk and saw lots of houses, and by and by ran away and saw stores all around a lovely square and a great court house in the center.

And supposin' you found out that there was a river just under the hills you could see beyond the railroad, and by and by you heard your folks say Petersburg; and by and by you knew that was the name of this town.

And sometimes you could see more of the town, because your grandpa and grandma came with a carriage and drove clear through the town so as to get to the country and out to the farm where they lived.

And then supposin' one day all the things in the house was loaded on a wagon and you rode with your ma up the hill to a better house and a bigger yard with oak trees, and the things were put in the house and you began to live here, and saw different houses around, and different children came to play; and supposin' there was a girl named Cooster McCoy that used to come to the fence and make faces and say awful words which your ma told you was wicked and would make G.o.d punish you if you said 'em: and then supposin' you began to hear your pa and ma talk of Mr. Miller and what a wonderful man he was, and Mrs. Miller and what a good woman she was, and about the Miller girls, how funny and smart they was, and about Mitch Miller, the wonderfulest boy in town. And supposin'

you went with your ma to visit 'em and when you got there you saw Mr.

Miller readin' to Mrs. Miller, and you saw the Miller girls playin', and you saw Mitch Miller chewin' gum and readin' a book, and was so taken with the book he wouldn't play with you, but finally said he'd read to you, and so began to read from a book which he said was "Tom Sawyer,"

which was all about a boy just our age. And supposin' you got the book after a while and you read it too, but you understood it only because after a while Mitch explained it to you.

Well, this is the way it began: first the room, then the house--then the town in a way--and then Mitch--but I got acquainted with him really and he became my friend as I tell about after a while. Only now I just tell how things began to clear up as I came out of sleep, as you might say.

And onct when I was up to Mr. Miller's and he was readin' from Shakespeare to Mrs. Miller he came to a place where it says, "Our little life is rounded by a sleep." I remember this because Mr. Miller stopped and began to talk about it; and Mitch looked up from readin' "Tom Sawyer," and I began to think about the sleep I came out of, and how things at first seemed kind of double and like you had taken so-and-so's cure for consumption which ma says has opium in it. For when I took it for a cold, things kind of swum around me like a circular looking-gla.s.s, that you could see through somehow, and everything seemed kind of way off and funny and somethin' to laugh at and not treat as real.

Well, at first, too, everything seemed alive--even sticks and stones; and the broomstick I made into a gun seemed to have a life or kind of a memory of somethin'. And when I told Mr. Miller this he says, you're a savage, or you've been one in some other life, or else maybe you're repeatin' the life of a savage, and he called it filogenesis, or somethin' like that.

But anyway, your town comes to you at last; at least the town as it is then and seems to you then with all the folks in it, and your relatives, and all their ways and all the stories about 'em. And you get your place and find your friends, and you find one friend as I found Mitch. And so you're awake, or as much awake, we'll say, as you are at first in the morning when you first stretch out of bed. And so you get ready for the day and the next sleep----

CHAPTER I

I got acquainted with Mitch this way: In the first place when we moved to Petersburg and got into our house and was settled, one day Bob Pendleton came to see me. He said he'd come to call--that's the word he used. You see right in front of our house was Mr. Montgomery's house--an awful big brick house, with a big yard; and the back of it was in front of our house with a tall hedge; but there was a place to go through the hedge, through a grape arbor up to the house, and around to the front yard. Next to Mr. Montgomery's yard was Bucky Gum's pasture where he kept his cows. But if you stood down by the pasture away from Mr.

Montgomery's hedge, you could look across and see Mr. Pendleton's fine brick house where Bob, this boy, lived. Mr. Pendleton kept a store and a bank and was awful rich; and when Bob came to call on me my ma was tickled most to death. She wanted me to have nice friends, boys who would grow up and be prominent in the world. And when Bob first came she went to the door and let him in and then came to me and made me wash and comb my hair. So I went in and here was Bob.

He had on a new suit and s.h.i.+ny shoes and a bow necktie, and he had a little ring on his finger. But he was so thin that he had to stand up twice to make a shadow. So he set there and nothin' much was said. I was afraid to ask him to swing, or to go to the barn, or anything. By and by he asked me if I had read "Little Men." I said no. Then he asked me if I had read the Pansy series. I said no to that; then he asked me if I subscribed to "Our Youth," which was a boys' paper full of good stories about nice girls and boys. I'd never heard of it. Then he asked me if I liked to play ball, and of course I did. And he said he had a ball ground in his orchard and to come over some time. Myrtle, my sister, liked nice boys, but she thought Bob was not the right kind of nice. But ma urged the friends.h.i.+p on me. And so it began.

And I must say Bob was a good boy, and I have no complaints to make; but I didn't know Mitch then, and so didn't see the difference so much.

Well, Bob liked me and he kept havin' me over to his house. He had a big yard with trees in it, and a fountain with a stone figure of a little boy, not much clothes on, holdin' an urn. Bob's pa was the leadin'

member of the Baptist Church and awful strict; and as Mitch's father was a Congregational preacher, Mr. Pendleton didn't like him on account of differin' with him about baptism.

Bob's house was just full of fine things--oil paintings of his father and mother, his sisters and himself; fine furniture all in horsehair; lots of silver for the table; and they kept two girls and had had 'em for years; and Mrs. Pendleton watched Bob very careful so he wouldn't catch cold or anything, because he had a weak chest. And Bob would take me down to his father's store where we got raisins and candy, and we played ball in the orchard.

Everything Bob had was brand new, and you had to be careful of it. He had a new ball; and on the day I met Mitch we was pitchin' ball--Bob and me, in the orchard--and Bob kept saying to be careful and not let it roll in the gra.s.s or get in the mud, that he wanted to keep it white and clean. Well, of course, I missed now and then and Bob seemed displeased.

And when it rolled into the mud he came up and took the ball and wiped it off and looked mad. Just then he said: "There comes that Mitch Miller, and I think we'd better quit playin' anyway." I knew Mitch's name and had seen him, but we hadn't run together yet.

Mitch climbed over the fence into the orchard, and Bob began to kind a move away. I could see that Bob didn't want him, for he said, "Come on, Arthur." Everybody called me Skeet, though my name was Arthur, which I hated. Bob always called me Arthur and made me call him Robert, though his nickname was "Shadder." When Bob said to come on to me, Mitch says, "Wait a minute, Skeet, I've somethin' to tell you." So I said to Bob, "Wait a minute, Robert," and Bob said, "You're comin' now or not at all." That made me mad, so I stood there. Bob went on and Mitch came up.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Mitch Climbed over the Fence]

"Let him go," said Mitch. "You don't care, do you?"

"Not much," says I.

"Well, I hope not," says Mitch. "He's a sissy--spoiled by his ma. And you don't call this any fun, do you, pitchin' ball with a ball so good that you da.s.sn't let it roll on the ground? Now, I've seen you around, Skeet, and I like you, and if you like me, we'll be chums, and go havers on everything, and if anybody fights you he'll have to fight me, and the same way with me, and I'll bet we'll have more fun together in a day than you could have with Shadder Pendleton in a year. Do you agree?" I said, "Yes, I agree," for I liked Mitch--I liked his name, I liked his way, and his face, his voice, everything about him right then; and I knew what I was promisin'.

Mitch says, "Do you want to have some fun?" I says, "You bet I do."

"Well," Mitch says, "there's more goin' on in this town than you ever saw, if you only keep your eyes open. But I'll bet Shadder never hears of it, and if you run with him you'll never hear of it either. Do you know what's goin' to happen to-day?" "No," says I.

"Well," says Mitch, "Jack Plunkett, who was town marshal here once, and Ruddy Hedgpeth are goin' to have a fight to see which can whip the other."

"Where?" says I.

"Down near Old Salem," says Mitch, "on the flat sand by the river, clost to the mill. And I want to see it, and so do you."

"You bet I want to see it," I said.

So Mitch went on to tell me that Jack Plunkett had never been whipped and neither had Ruddy Hedgpeth. They had whipped everybody but each other. And each said he could whip the other. And last Sat.u.r.day Ruddy was in town and went around the square sayin' he could whip Jack, and Jack heard it and sent back word he'd fight him a week off, on a Sat.u.r.day, and this is the Sat.u.r.day. And Mitch said we'd better hurry so as to get there before the fight was over, Old Salem bein' about a mile from town.

By this time Shadder had walked out of the orchard and was pretty near to the house and Mitch said, "Now he's gone, let him go, and come on. If he ever says you left him, you can say he left you, for he did."

It was a spring day--it was April--and we walked as fast as we could, runnin' part of the time. Mitch was wild about the country, about trees, birds, the river and the fields. And he whistled and sang. On the way out he began to talk to me about "Tom Sawyer," and asked me if I had read the book. This was one of the books I _had_ read; so I said so. And Mitch says, "Do you know we can do exactly what Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn did?"

"What's that?" I said.

"Why, find treasure. It's just as surely here as anything. Of course there ain't no caves around here, at least I don't know of any. But think of the old houses--look at that old house down there by the ravine that goes into the river across from Mr. Morris' wagon shop. Think of those old houses clost to the Baptist Church; and think of the dead limbs on the trees in Montgomery's woods. But of course if we go into this, no one must know what we are doin'. We must keep still and if they catch us diggin', we must lie. If you don't know how to lie very well, Skeet, just listen to me and foller the story I tell."

I agreed to this. And Mitch went on.

"And by and by, we'll find treasure and divide it, for I have taken you for my chum and half of mine is yours, and a half of yours is mine."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Looking down on the Sand Bank]

By this time we had come to a pretty high bank about a hundred yards from the mill. We heard voices and looked down on the sand bank, and there were about fifty men sittin' or standin' around. And there was my pa. So I says, "I can't go down there, Mitch, my pa will whip me or drive me away. I know for certain he wouldn't want me to see this."

"Well," says Mitch, "what's the difference? We're not more'n 75 feet away from 'em and can see everything and hear everything if there's anything to hear. So let's just lie down here in the gra.s.s and take it easy, and look down on 'em and watch it." So we did. There seemed to be some arrangin' of things. My pa seemed to be standin' clost to Ruddy Hedgpeth and talkin' to him and kind of advisin' him or takin' care of him. And George Montgomery was doin' the same for Jack Plunkett. Mitch says, "They're the seconds."

"What's that?" says I.

"Why," says Mitch, "seconds see that everything is fair, and no foolin'."

We could hear most everything they said, and they were talkin' about whether Jack Plunkett could choke Ruddy Hedgpeth if he got him. My pa said not; and Jack Plunkett said it was a fight to see who could whip the other, and if he got Ruddy so he could lay his hands on him and choke him until he gave up, that was fair and he insisted on it. Then Ruddy and my pa stepped to one side and talked secret; and then my pa said out loud that it was all right, and chokin' would not be barred; but of course what one could do, the other could. Jack Plunkett laughed at this an awful mockin' laugh, because he was the most terrible choker in the county and felt he could get the best of anybody in a chokin'

match.

Then Jack and Ruddy began to undress, that is, they took off everything but their pants. Jack had a beard and a big square face, and a chest as thick as a horse and arms as big as a man's legs. And Ruddy was about as big only a little shorter, but he wore no beard, but his face and chest looked clean and slick and he was known to be an awful hard hitter. Then they got out on a flat place, level and hard sand, and began, my pa and George Montgomery takin' care of them and about fifty others watchin' as I said.

They stood and eyed each other and walked around and watched for a chance. Pretty soon Ruddy hit Jack on the chin and sent his head back and Jack rushed on Ruddy and got his hands on him, but Ruddy slipped away. Then Jack hit Ruddy, and Ruddy kind of wheeled around; and Jack rushed for Ruddy again, and again got his hands on him, but they slipped off. Then they seemed to get close together and just pound each other; and pretty soon Ruddy hit Jack and knocked him down. But Jack got right up and grabbed Ruddy and got an awful grip on him. "He's goin' to choke him now. He'll get him now, sure." And they tusseled for a while, Jack tryin' to get Ruddy's throat, but Ruddy always keepin' away, though pretty near gettin' it. Finally Ruddy broke clear loose and hit Jack an awful blow right in the chest. Then Jack went crazy mad. He rushed on Ruddy and got him by the throat and began to choke him. Meanwhile Ruddy was fightin' Jack's hands away and finally slipped 'em off again and as Jack came for him, Ruddy hit him and knocked Jack down again. Then he rushed on Jack and was about to choke him too, but Jack hopped up and kind of run off a little, then turned around and made for Ruddy again and struck Ruddy and knocked him into a heap. This was the first time for Ruddy; and he got right up and as Jack came up, he just rained the blows on Jack until Jack began to wilt and finally he came up with a regular sledge hammer and Jack fell over on the sand flat on his back, and lay there, his big white chest just goin' up and down like a bellows. I forgot to say that Harold Carman was there; and every time one was knocked down, he began to count. Mitch said if they counted 25 and you didn't get up, you was whipped. Well, this time Harold Carman counted 25 and then went on and counted 50 and still Jack didn't get up, but lay there his breast goin' up and down for air. Then everybody began to laugh. And the fight was given to Ruddy Hedgpeth; and when it was, Jack got up and picked up a club and started for Ruddy to kill him. So all the men pitched on to Jack and began to hold him; and Jack was b.l.o.o.d.y and was swearin' and sayin' he had been tricked and that he could lick Ruddy with one hand in a fair fight. "Ruddy Hedgpeth is a coward,"

says Jack; "he put sweet oil on his chest and throat so I couldn't choke him when I got my hands on him. He's a coward and I've been tricked."

My pa was not a very big man, but he warn't afraid of no one. And he says: "Anything was fair, so as to whip, and you're whipped and you'd better shut up." So Jack made for my pa and pa stooped down and picked up a rock and stood his ground. The other men interfered; and George Montgomery said the sweet oil was fair and they all turned on Jack and he had to take his medicine. Then they broke up and started to climb the bank; and Mitch and me ran into the woods at the side of the road and waited until they went.

"How was that?" said Mitch.