We sat some time, in meditative silence, listening to the wind and the
roar of the train; then Thompson said, with a good deal of feeling,
“Well-a-well, we’ve all got to go, they ain’t no getting around it. Man
that is born of woman is of few days and far between, as Scriptur’ says.
Yes, you look at it any way you want to, it’s awful solemn and cur’us:
they ain’t nobody can get around it; all’s got to go–just everybody, as
you may say. One day you’re hearty and strong”–here he scrambled to his
feet and broke a pane and stretched his nose out at it a moment or two,
then sat down again while I struggled up and thrust my nose out at the
same place, and this we kept on doing every now and then–” and next day
he’s cut down like the grass, and the places which knowed him then knows
him no more forever, as Scriptur’ says. Yes’ndeedy, it’s awful solemn
and cur’us; but we’ve all got to go, one time or another; they ain’t no
getting around it.”
There was another long pause; then,–
“What did he die of?”
I said I didn’t know.
“How long has he ben dead?”
It seemed judicious to enlarge the facts to fit the probabilities; so I
said,
“Two or three days.”
But it did no good; for Thompson received it with an injured look which
plainly said, “Two or three years, you mean.” Then he went right along,
placidly ignoring my statement, and gave his views at considerable length
upon the unwisdom of putting off burials too long. Then he lounged off
toward the box, stood a moment, then came back on a sharp trot and
visited the broken pane, observing,
“‘Twould ‘a’ ben a dum sight better, all around, if they’d started him
along last summer.”
Thompson sat down and buried his face in his red silk handkerchief, and
began to slowly sway and rock his body like one who is doing his best to
endure the almost unendurable. By this time the fragrance–if you may
call it fragrance–was just about suffocating, as near as you can come at
it. Thompson’s face was turning gray; I knew mine hadn’t any color left
in it. By and by Thompson rested his forehead in his left hand, with his
elbow on his knee, and sort of waved his red handkerchief towards the box
with his other hand, and said,–
“I’ve carried a many a one of ’em,–some of ’em considerable overdue,
too,–but, lordy, he just lays over ’em all!–and does it easy Cap., they
was heliotrope to HIM!”
This recognition of my poor friend gratified me, in spite of the sad
circumstances, because it had so much the sound of a compliment.
Pretty soon it was plain that something had got to be done. I suggested
cigars. Thompson thought it was a good idea. He said,
“Likely it’ll modify him some.”
We puffed gingerly along for a while, and tried hard to imagine that
things were improved. But it wasn’t any use. Before very long, and
without any consultation, both cigars were quietly dropped from our
nerveless fingers at the same moment. Thompson said, with a sigh,
“No, Cap., it don’t modify him worth a cent. Fact is, it makes him
worse, becuz it appears to stir up his ambition. What do you reckon we
better do, now?”
I was not able to suggest anything; indeed, I had to be swallowing and
swallowing, all the time, and did not like to trust myself to speak.
Thompson fell to maundering, in a desultory and low-spirited way, about
the miserable experiences of this night; and he got to referring to my
poor friend by various titles,–sometimes military ones, sometimes civil
ones; and I noticed that as fast as my poor friend’s effectiveness grew,
Thompson promoted him accordingly,–gave him a bigger title. Finally he
said,
“I’ve got an idea. Suppos’ n we buckle down to it and give the Colonel a
bit of a shove towards t’other end of the car? –about ten foot, say. He
wouldn’t have so much influence, then, don’t you reckon?”
I said it was a good scheme. So we took in a good fresh breath at the