"It may surprise you," I said, but this is the first time in some dozen years that I've been in a big city like this."
"You hadn't 'ave told us, partner!" said one of them, evidently the wit of the group, in a rich Irish brogue.
"Well," I responded, laughing with the best of them, "you've been living right here all the time, and don't realize how amusing and curious the city looks to me. Why, I feel as though I had been away sleeping for twenty years, like Rip Van Winkle. When I left the city there was scarcely an automobile to be seen anywhere--and now look at them snorting through the streets. I counted twenty-two passing that corner up there in five minutes by the clock."
This was a fortunate remark, for I found instantly that the invasion of the automobile was a matter of tremendous import to such Knights of Bucephalus as these.
At first the wit interrupted me with amusing remarks, as wits will, but I soon had him as quiet as the others. For I have found the things that chiefly interest people are the things they already know about--provided you show them that these common things are still mysterious, still miraculous, as indeed they are.
After a time some one pushed me a stable stool and I sat down among them, and we had quite a conversation, which finally developed into an amusing comparison (I wish I had room to repeat it here) between the city and the country. I told them something about my farm, how much I enjoyed it, and what a wonderful free life one had in the country. In this I was really taking an unfair advantage of them, for I was trading on the fact that every man, down deep in his heart, has more or less of an instinct to get back to the soil--at least all outdoor men have.
And when I described the simplest things about my barn, and the cattle and pigs, and the bees--and the good things we have to eat--I had every one of them leaning forward and hanging on my words.
Harriet sometimes laughs at me for the way I celebrate farm life.
She says all my apples are the size of Hubbard squashes, my eggs all double-yolked, and my cornfields tropical jungles. Practical Harriet! My apples may not ALL be the size of Hubbard squashes, but they are good, sizable apples, and as for flavour--all the spices of Arcady--! And I believe, I KNOW, from my own experience that these fields and hills are capable of healing men's souls.
And when I see people wandering around a lonesome city like Kilburn, with never a soft bit of soil to put their heels into, nor a green thing to cultivate, nor any corn or apples or honey to harvest, I feel--well, that they are wasting their time.
(It's a fact, Harriet!)
Indeed I had the most curious experience with my friend the wit--his name I soon learned was Healy--a jolly, round, red-nosed, outdoor chap with fists that looked like small-sized hams, and a rich, warm Irish voice. At first he was inclined to use me as the ready butt of his lively mind, but presently he became so much interested in what I was saying that he sat squarely in front of me with both his jolly eyes and his smiling mouth wide open.
"If ever you pass my way," I said to him, "just drop in and I'll give you a dinner of baked beans"--and I smacked--"and home made bread" and I smacked again --"and pumpkin pie"--and I smacked a third time--"that will make your mouth water."
All this smacking and the description of baked beans and pumpkin pie had an odd counter effect upon ME; for I suddenly recalled my own tragic state. So I jumped up quickly and asked directions for getting down to the mill neighbourhood, where I hoped to find Bill Hahn. My friend Healy instantly volunteered the information.
"And now," I said, "I want to ask a small favour of you. I'm looking for a friend, and I'd like to leave my bag here for the night."
"Sure, sure," said the Irishman heartily. "Put it there in the office--on top o' the desk. It'll be all right."
So I put it in the office and was about to say good-bye, when my friend said to me:
"Come in, partner, and have a drink before you go"--and he pointed to a nearby saloon.
"Thank you," I answered heartily, for I knew it was as fine a bit of hospitality as he could offer me, "thank you, but I must find my friend before it gets too late."
"Aw, come on now," he cried, taking my arm. "Sure you'll be better off for a bit o' warmth inside."
I had hard work to get away from them, and I am as sure as can be that they would have found supper and a bed for me if they had known I needed either.
"Come agin," Healy shouted after me, "we're glad to see a farmer any toime."
My way led me quickly out of the well-groomed and glittering main streets of the town. I passed first through several blocks of quiet residences, and then came to a street near the river which was garishly lighted, and crowded with small, poor shops and stores, with a saloon on nearly every corner. I passed a huge, dark, silent box of a mill, and I saw what I never saw before in a city, armed men guarding the streets.
Although it was growing late--it was after nine o'clock--crowds of people were still parading the streets, and there was something intangibly restless, something tense, in the very atmosphere of the neighbourhood. It was very plain that I had reached the strike district. I was about to make some further inquiries for the headquarters of the mill men or for Bill Hahn personally, when I saw, not far ahead of me, a black crowd of people reaching out into the street. Drawing nearer I saw that an open space or block between two rows of houses was literally black with human beings, and in the centre on a raised platform, under a gasolene flare, I beheld my friend of the road, Bill Hahn. The overcoat and the hat with the furry ears had disappeared, and the little man stood there bare-headed, before that great audience.
