Our Mister Wren Read online

  Standing on the hurricane-deck of the Joy Line boat, with his suit-case guardedly beside him, he crooned to himself

  tuneless chants with the refrain, "Free, free, out to sea. Free, free, that's _me!_" He had persuaded himself that

  there was practically no danger of the boat's sinking or catching fire. Anyway, he just wasn't going to be scared.

  As the steamer trudged up East River he watched the late afternoon sun brighten the Manhattan factories and make

  soft the stretches of Westchester fields. (Of course, he "thrilled.")

  He had no state-room, but was entitled to a place in a twelve-berth room in the hold. Here large farmers without

  their shoes were grumpily talking all at once, so he returned to the deck; and the rest of the night, while the other

  passengers snored, he sat modestly on a canvas stool, unblinkingly gloating over a sea-fabric of frosty blue that was

  shot through with golden threads when they passed lighthouses or ships. At dawn he was weary, peppery- eyed, but

  he viewed the flooding light with approval.

  At last, Boston.

  The front part of the shipping-office on Atlantic Avenue was a glass- inclosed room littered with chairs, piles of

  circulars, old pictures of Cunarders, older calendars, and directories to be ranked as antiques. In the midst of these

  remains a red-headed Yankee of forty, smoking a Pittsburg stogie, sat tilted back in a kitchen chair, reading the

  Boston _American_. Mr. Wrenn delivered M. Baraieff's letter and stood waiting, holding his suit-case, ready to

  skip out and go aboard a cattle-boat immediately.

  The shipping-agent glanced through the letter, then snapped:

  "Bryff's crazy. Always sends 'em too early. Wrenn, you ought to come to me first. What j'yuh go to that Jew first

  for? Here he goes and sends you a day late--or couple days too early. 'F you'd got here last night I could 've sent

  you off this morning on a Dominion Line boat. All I got now is a Leyland boat that starts from Portland Saturday.

  Le's see; this is Wednesday. Thursday, Friday--you'll have to wait three days. Now you want me to fix you up,

  don't you? I might not be able to get you off till a week from now, but you'd like to get off on a good boat

  Saturday instead, wouldn't you?"

  "Oh yes; I _would_. I----"

  "Well, I'll try to fix it. You can see for yourself; boats ain't leaving every minute just to please Bryff. And it's the

  busy season. Bunches of rah-rah boys wanting to cross, and Canadians wanting to get back to England, and Jews

  beating it to Poland--to sling bombs at the Czar, I guess. And lemme tell you, them Jews is all right. They're

  willing to pay for a man's time and trouble in getting 'em fixed up, and so----"

  With dignity Mr. William Wrenn stated, "Of course I'll be glad to--uh-- make it worth your while."

  "I _thought_ you was a gentleman. Hey, Al! _Al!_" An underfed boy with few teeth, dusty and grown out of his

  trousers, appeared. "Clear off a chair for the gentleman. Stick that valise on top my desk.... Sit down, Mr. Wrenn.

  You see, it's like this: I'll tell you in confidence, you understand. This letter from Bryff ain't worth the paper it's

  written on. He ain't got any right to be sending out men for cattle-boats. Me, I'm running that. I deal direct with all

  the Boston and Portland lines. If you don't believe it just go out in the back room and ask any of the cattlemen out

  there."

  "Yes, I see," Mr. Wrenn observed, as though he were ill, and toed an old almanac about the floor. "Uh--Mr.--

  Trubiggs, is it?"

  "Yump. Yump, my boy. Trubiggs. Tru by name and true by nature. Heh?"

  This last was said quite without conviction. It was evidently a joke which had come down from earlier years. Mr.

  Wrenn ignored it and declared, as stoutly as he could:

  "You see, Mr. Trubiggs, I'd be willing to pay you----"

  "I'll tell you just how it is, Mr. Wrenn. I ain't one of these Sheeny employment bureaus; I'm an American; I like to

  look out for Americans. Even if you _didn't_ come to me first I'll watch out for your interests, same's if they was

  mine. Now, do you ant to get fixed up with a nice fast boat that leaves Portland next Saturday, just a couple of

  days' wait?"

  "Oh yes, I _do_, Mr. Trubiggs."

  "Well, my list is really full-- men waiting, too--but if it 'd be worth five dollars to you to----"

  "Here's the five dollars."

  The shipping-agent was disgusted. He had estimated from Mr. Wrenn's cheap sweater-jacket and tennis-shoes that

  he would be able to squeeze out only three or four dollars, and here he might have made ten. More in sorrow than

  in anger:

  "Of course you understand I may have a lot of trouble working you in on the _next_ boat, you coming as late as

  this. Course five dollars is less 'n what I usually get." He contemptuously tossed the bill on his desk. "If you want

  me to slip a little something extra to the agents----"

  Mr. Wrenn was too head-achy to be customarily timid. "Let's see that. Did I give you only five dollars?"

  Receiving the bill, he folded it with much primness, tucked it into the pocket of his shirt, and remarked:

  "Now, you said you'd fix me up for five dollars. Besides, that letter from Baraieff is a form with your name printed

  on it; so I know you do business with him right along. If five dollars ain't enough, why, then you can just go to hell,

  Mr. Trubiggs; yes, sir, that's what you can do. I'm just getting tired of monkeying around. If five _is_ enough I'll

  give this back to you Friday, when you send me off to Portland, if you give me a receipt. There!" He almost

  snarled, so weary and discouraged was he.

  Now, Trubiggs was a warm- hearted rogue, and he liked the society of wha t he called "white people." He laughed,

  poked a Pittsburg stogie at Mr. Wrenn, and consented:

  "All right. I'll fix you up. Have a smoke. Pay me the five Friday, or pay it to my foreman when he puts you on the

  cattle-boat. I don't care a rap which. You're all right. Can't bluff you, eh?"

  And, further bluffing Mr. Wrenn, he suggested to him a lodging- house for his two nights in Boston. "Tell the clerk

  that red- headed Trubiggs sent you, and he'll give you the best in the house. Tell him you're a friend of mine."

  When Mr. Wrenn had gone Mr. Trubiggs remarked to some one, by telephone, "'Nother sucker coming, Blaugeld.

  Now don't try to do me out of my bit or I'll cap for some other joint, understand? Huh? Yuh, stick him for a thirtyfive-

  cent bed. S' long."

  The caravan of Trubiggs's cattlemen who left for Portland by night steamer, Friday, was headed by a bulkyshouldered

  boss, who wore no coat and whose corduroy vest swung cheerfully open. A motley troupe were the

  cattlemen -- Jews with small trunks, large imitation- leather valises and assorted bundles, a stolid prophet-bearded

  procession of weary men in tattered derbies and sweat-shop clothes.

  There were Englishmen with rope-bound pine chests. A lewd-mouthed American named Tim, who said he was a

  hatter out of work, and a loud-talking tough called Pete mingled with a straggle of hoboes.

  The boss counted the group and selected his confidants for the trip to Portland--Mr. Wrenn and a youth named

  Morton.

  Morton was a square heavy-fleshed young man with stubby hands,

  who, up to his eyes, was stolid and solid as a granite monument,

  but merry of eye and hinting friendliness in his tousled

  soft-brown hair. He was always wielding a pipe and artfully

  blowing smoke through his nostrils.

  Mr. Wrenn and he smiled at each other searching
ly as the

  Portland boat pulled out, and a wind swept straight from the

  Land of Elsewhere.

  After dinner Morton, smoking a pipe shaped somewhat like a

  golf-stick head and somewhat like a toad, at the rail of the

  steamer, turned to Mr. Wrenn with:

  "Classy bunch of cattlemen we've got to go with. Not!... My

  name's Morton."

  "I'm awful glad to meet you, Mr. Morton. My name's Wrenn."

  "Glad to be off at last, ain't you?"

  "Golly! I should say I _am!_"

  "So'm I. Been waiting fo r this for years. I'm a clerk for the

  P. R. R. in N' York."

  "I come from New York, too."

  "So? Lived there long?"

  "Uh-huh, I----" began Mr. Wrenn.

  "Well, I been working for the Penn. for seven years now. Now

  I've got a vacation of three months. On me. Gives me a chance

  to travel a little. Got ten plunks and a second-class ticket

  back from Glasgow. But I'm going to see England and France just

  the same. Prob'ly Germany, too."

  "Second class? Why don't you go steerage, and save?"

  "Oh, got to come back like a gentleman. You know. You're from

  New York, too, eh?"

  "Yes, I'm with an art-novelty company on Twenty-eighth Street.

  I been wanting to get away for quite some time, too.... How are

  you going to travel on ten dollars?"

  "Oh, work m' way. Cinch. Always land on my feet. Not on my

  uppers, at that. I'm only twenty-eight, but I've been on my

  own, like the English fellow says, since I was twelve.... Well,

  how about you? Traveling or going somewhere?"

  "Just traveling. I'm glad we're going together, Mr. Morton.

  I don't think most of these cattlemen are very nice. Except for

  the old Jews. They seem to be fine old coots. They make you

  think of -- oh -- you know -- prophets and stuff. Watch 'em, over

  there, making tea. I suppose the steamer grub ain't kosher.

  I seen one on the Joy Line saying his prayers--I suppose he

  was--in a kind of shawl."

  "Well, well! You don't say so!"

  Distinctly, Mr. Wrenn felt that he was one of the gentlemen who,

  in Kipling, stand at steamer rails exchanging observations on

  strange lands. He uttered, cosmopolitanly:

  "Gee! Look at that sunset. Ain't that grand!"

  "Holy smoke! it sure is. I don't see how anybody could believe

  in religion after looking at that."

  Shocked and confused at such a theory, yet excited at finding

  that Morton apparently had thoughts, Mr. Wrenn piped:

  "Honestly, I don't see that at _all_. I don't see how anybody

  could disbelieve anything after a sunset like that. Makes me

  believe all sorts of thing--gets me going--I imagine I'm all

  sorts of places--on the Nile and so on."

  "Sure! That's just it. Everything's so peaceful and natural.

  Just _is_. Gives the imagination enough to do, even by itself,

  without having to have religion."

  "Well," reflected Mr. Wrenn, "I don't hardly ever go to church.

  I don't believe much in all them highbrow sermons that don't

  come down to brass tacks--ain't got nothing to do with real

  folks. But just the same, I love to go up to St. Patrick's

  Cathedral. Why, I get real _thrilled_--I hope you won't think

  I'm trying to get high-browed, Mr. Morton."

  "Why, no. Cer'nly not. I understand. Gwan."

  "It gets me going when I look down the aisle at the altar and

  see the arches and so on. And the priests in their robes--they

  look so--so way up--oh, I dunno just ho w to say it--so kind of

  _uplifted_."

  "Sure, I know. Just the esthetic end of the game. Esthetic,

  you know--the beauty part of it."

  "Yuh, sure, that's the word. 'Sthetic, that's what it is.

  Yes, 'sthetic. But, just the same, it makes me feel's though I

  believed in all sorts of things."

  "Tell you what I believe may happen, though," exulted Morton.

  "This socialism, and maybe even these here International Workers

  of the World, may pan out as a new kind of religion. I don't

  know much about it, I got to admit. But looks as though it might

  be that way. It's dead certain the old political parties are just

  gangs--don't stand for anything except the name. But this comrade

  business--good stunt. Brotherhood of man--real brotherhood. My

  idea of religion. One that is because it's got to be, not just

  because it always has been. Yessir, me for a religion of guys

  working together to make things easier for each other."

  "You bet!" commented Mr. Wrenn, and they smote each other upon

  the shoulder and laughed together in a fine flame of shared hope.

  "I wish I knew something about this socialism stuff," mused Mr.

  Wrenn, with tilted head, examining the burnt-umber edges of the

  sunset.

  "Great stuff. Not working for some lazy cuss that's inherited

  the right to boss you. And _international_ brotherhood, not just

  neighborhoods. New thing."

  "Gee! I surely would like that, awfully," sighed Mr. Wrenn.

  He saw the processional of world brotherhood tramp steadily

  through the paling sunset; saffron-vestured Mandarin marching by

  flax-faced Norseman and languid South Sea Islander--the diverse

  peoples toward whom he had always yearned.

  "But I don't care so much for some of these ranting street-corner

  socialists, though," mused Morton. "The kind that holler `Come

  get saved _our_ way or go to hell! Keep off scab guides to prosperity.'"

  "Yuh, sure. Ha! ha! ha!"

  "Huh! huh!"

  Morton soon had another thought. "Still, same time, us guys

  that do the work have got to work out something for ourselves.

  We can't bank on the rah-rah boys that wear eye- glasses and

  condescend to like us, cause they think we ain't entirely too

  dirty for 'em to associate with, and all these writer guys and

  so on. That's where you got to hand it to the street-corner

  shouters."

  "Yes, that's _so_. Y' right there, I guess, all right."

  They looked at each other and laughed again; initiated friends;

  tasting each other's souls. They shared sandwiches and

  confessions. When the other passengers had gone to bed and the

  sailors on watch seemed lonely the two men were still declaring,

  shyly but delightedly, that "things is curious."

  In the damp discomfort of early morning the cattlemen shuffled

  from the steamer at Portland and were herded to a lunch-room by

  the boss, who cheerfully smoked his corn-cob and ejaculated to

  Mr. Wrenn and Morton such interesting facts as:

  "Trubiggs is a lobster. You don't want to let the bosses bluff

  you aboard the _Merian_. They'll try to chase you in where the

  steers'll gore you. The grub'll be----"

  "What grub do you get?"

  "Scouse and bread. And water."

  "What's scouse?"

  "Beef stew without the beef. Oh, the grub'll be rotten.

  Trubiggs is a lobster. He wouldn't be nowhere if 't wa'n't for me."

  Mr. Wrenn appreciated England's need of roast beef, but he

  timidly desired not to be gored by steers, which seemed

  imminent, before breakfast coffee. The streets were coldly

  empty,
and he was sleepy, and Morton was silent. At the

  restaurant, sitting on a high stool before a pine counter, he

  choked over an egg sandwich made with thick crumby slices of a

  bread that had no personality to it. He roved forlornly about

  Portland, beside the gloomy pipe- valiant Morton, fighting two

  fears: the company might not need all of them this trip, and he

  might have to wait; secondly, if he incredib ly did get shipped

  and started for England the steers might prove dreadfully

  dangerous. After intense thinking he ejaculated, "Gee! it's be

  bored or get gored." Which was much too good not to tell Morton,

  so they laughed very much, and at ten o'clock were signed on for

  the trip and led, whooping, to the deck of the S.S. _Merian_.

  Cattle were still struggling down the chutes from the dock. The

  dirty decks were confusingly littered with cordage and the

  cattlemen's luggage. The Jewish elders stared sepulchrally at

  the wilderness of open hatches and rude passageways, as though

  they were prophesying death.

  But Mr. Wrenn, standing sturdily beside his suit-case to guard

  it, fawned with romantic love upon the rusty iron sides of their

  pilgrims' caravel; and as the _Merian_ left the wharf with no

  more handkerchief-waving or tears than attends a ferry's leaving

  he mumbled:

  "Free, free, out to sea. Free, free, that's _me!_"

  Then, "Gee!... Gee whittakers!"

  CHAPTER IV

  HE BECOMES THE GREAT LITTLE BILL WRENN

  When the _Merian_ was three days out from Portland the frightened

  cattleman stiff known as "Wrennie" wanted to die, for he was now

  sure that the smell of the fo'c'sle, in which he was lying on a

  thin mattress of straw covered with damp gunny-sacking, both

  could and would become daily a thicker smell, a stronger smell,

  a smell increasingly diverse and deadly.

  Though it was so late as eight bells of the evening, Pete, the

  tough factory hand, and Tim, the down-and-out hatter, were still

  playing seven- up at the dirty fo'c'sle table, while McGarver,

  under-boss of the Morris cattle gang, lay in his berth, heavily

  studying the game and blowing sulphurous fumes of Lunch Pail

  Plug Cut tobacco up toward Wrennie.

  Pete, the tough, was very evil. He sneered. He stole. He

  bullied. He was a drunkard and a person without cleanliness of