I want their promise before I go to bed
- I ain't the talking kind, I'm the DOING kind!"
"Yes ... you've come to the right place for that.
When did you arrive?"
"Just an hour ago."
"When are you intending to leave?"
"For New York tomorrow evening - for San Francisco
next morning."
"Just so.... What are you going to do tomorrow?"
"DO! Why, I've got to go to the President with the petition
and the delegation, and get the appointment, haven't I?"
"Yes ... very true ... that is correct. And then what?"
"Executive session of the Senate at 2 P.M. - got to get
the appointment confirmed - I reckon you'll grant that?"
"Yes ... yes," said Riley, meditatively, "you are
right again. Then you take the train for New York in
the evening, and the steamer for San Francisco next morning?"
"That's it - that's the way I map it out!"
Riley considered a while, and then said:
"You couldn't stay ... a day ... well, say two
days longer?"
"Bless your soul, no! It's not my style. I ain't a man
to go fooling around - I'm a man that DOES things,
I tell you."
The storm was raging, the thick snow blowing in gusts.
Riley stood silent, apparently deep in a reverie,
during a minute or more, then he looked up and said:
"Have you ever heard about that man who put up at Gadsby's,
once? ... But I see you haven't."
He backed Mr. Lykins against an iron fence, buttonholed him,
fastened him with his eye, like the Ancient Mariner,
and proceeded to unfold his narrative as placidly
and peacefully as if we were all stretched comfortably
in a blossomy summer meadow instead of being persecuted
by a wintry midnight tempest:
"I will tell you about that man. It was in Jackson's time.
Gadsby's was the principal hotel, then. Well, this man
arrived from Tennessee about nine o'clock, one morning,
with a black coachman and a splendid four-horse carriage and
an elegant dog, which he was evidently fond of and proud of;
he drove up before Gadsby's, and the clerk and the landlord
and everybody rushed out to take charge of him, but he said,
'Never mind,' and jumped out and told the coachman
to wait - said he hadn't time to take anything to eat,
he only had a little claim against the government to collect,
would run across the way, to the Treasury, and fetch
the money, and then get right along back to Tennessee,
for he was in considerable of a hurry.
"Well, about eleven o'clock that night he came back
and ordered a bed and told them to put the horses
up - said he would collect the claim in the morning.
This was in January, you understand - January, 1834
- the 3d of January - Wednesday.
"Well, on the 5th of February, he sold the fine carriage,
and bought a cheap second-hand one - said it would answer
just as well to take the money home in, and he didn't care
for style.
"On the 11th of August he sold a pair of the fine horses
- said he'd often thought a pair was better than four,
to go over the rough mountain roads with where a body
had to be careful about his driving - and there wasn't
so much of his claim but he could lug the money home
with a pair easy enough.
"On the 13th of December he sold another horse - said
two warn't necessary to drag that old light vehicle
with - in fact, one could snatch it along faster than
was absolutely necessary, now that it was good solid
winter weather and the roads in splendid condition.
"On the 17th of February, 1835, he sold the old carriage
and bought a cheap second-hand buggy - said a buggy
was just the trick to skim along mushy, slushy early
spring roads with, and he had always wanted to try
a buggy on those mountain roads, anyway.
"On the 1st August he sold the buggy and bought the
remains of an old sulky - said he just wanted to see
those green Tennesseans stare and gawk when they saw
him come a-ripping along in a sulky - didn't believe
they'd ever heard of a sulky in their lives.
"Well, on the 29th of August he sold his colored
coachman - said he didn't need a coachman for a sulky
- wouldn't be room enough for two in it anyway - and,
besides, it wasn't every day that Providence sent a man
a fool who was willing to pay nine hundred dollars for
such a third-rate negro as that - been wanting to get
rid of the creature for years, but didn't like to THROW him away.
"Eighteen months later - that is to say, on the 15th
of February, 1837 - he sold the sulky and bought
a saddle - said horseback-riding was what the doctor
had always recommended HIM to take, and dog'd if he
wanted to risk HIS neck going over those mountain roads
on wheels in the dead of winter, not if he knew himself.
"On the 9th of April he sold the saddle - said he wasn't
going to risk HIS life with any perishable saddle-girth
that ever was made, over a rainy, miry April road,
while he could ride bareback and know and feel he was
safe - always HAD despised to ride on a saddle, anyway.
"On the 24th of April he sold his horse - said 'I'm just
fifty-seven today, hale and hearty - it would be a PRETTY
howdy-do for me to be wasting such a trip as that and such
weather as this, on a horse, when there ain't anything
in the world so splendid as a tramp on foot through
the fresh spring woods and over the cheery mountains,
to a man that IS a man - and I can make my dog carry my
claim in a little bundle, anyway, when it's collected.
So tomorrow I'll be up bright and early, make my little
old collection, and mosey off to Tennessee, on my own
hind legs, with a rousing good-by to Gadsby's.'
"On the 22d of June he sold his dog - said 'Dern a dog,
anyway, where you're just starting off on a rattling bully
pleasure tramp through the summer woods and hills - perfect
nuisance - chases the squirrels, barks at everything,
goes a-capering and splattering around in the fords
- man can't get any chance to reflect and enjoy nature
- and I'd a blamed sight ruther carry the claim myself,
it's a mighty sight safer; a dog's mighty uncertain
in a financial way - always noticed it - well, GOOD-by,
boys - last call - I'm off for Tennessee with a good
leg and a gay heart, early in the morning.'"
