STOOP.
Washington Hall was the only place of public congregation, excepting the churches, in the village. It was used on Sunday by a small but clamorous religious sect; on Monday by a lodge of Free Masons; on Tuesday by a lodge of Odd Fellows; on Wednesday by the Sons of Temperance; and for the balance of the week was open to any description of exhibition that came along. It was originally built for a loft, and its reconstruction into a public hall was an afterthought. It was situated over a drug store, and was owned by the druggist, Mr. Boolpin, who was universally regarded as the meanest man in the village.
As the three drew near the door, Mr. Boolpin, strongly smelling of aloes, and carrying a pestle in his hand, came out to greet them. He, in common with all the inhabitants, knew that the "pannyrarmer folks" were in town. The small boys had borne the glad intelligence all abroad. A number of citizens, who had been lying in wait, issued forth with Mr. Boolpin, and looked hard at the three.
"The proprietor of the hall," said Mr. Boolpin, introducing himself.
"My name is Wesley," responded Tiffles. He then introduced Patching as Signor Ceccarini, and Wilkeson as Mr. Wilkes. Patching chuckled inwardly at the thought of the incognito, and imagined the sensation that would be produced by the accidental revelation of his real name. Marcus felt a momentary humiliation at having consented to this innocent imposture.
Mr. Boolpin, having shaken hands solemnly with the three, asked them to walk up stairs and look at the hall. They accordingly followed him up a series of creaking steps.
"Everything in apple-pie order," said Mr. Boolpin. "The three boxes containing the panorama right side up with care, you see. I had them carted from the depot. Cost me a dollar. People thought they were coffins. Ha! ha! Six new tin candlesticks, you observe; also the ceiling whitewashed; also ten extra seats introduced, making the entire capacity of the hall three hundred and fifty--giving twelve inches of sitting room to each person. No extra charge for these fixings, though I made them expressly on your account. There are some things about this hall to which I would call your attention. Boo! Boo! Hallo! Hallo! No echo, you perceive. Likewise notice the fine view from the window." Mr. Boolpin pointed to a swamp which could be distinctly seen over a housetop toward the east. "The ventilation is a great feature, too." Mr. Boolpin directed his pestle toward a trap door in a corner of the ceiling, through which a quantity of rain had come a night or two previous, leaving a large wet patch on the floor. "It's almost too cheap for fifteen dollars a night."
"For what?" asked Tiffles.
"For fifteen dollars," replied Mr. Boolpin, twirling his pestle playfully. "Of course, not reckoning in the one dollar that you owe me for cartage. It's too cheap. I ought to have made it twenty dollars."
"Why, Mr. Persimmon, the postmaster here, engaged the hall for five dollars. Here is his letter mentioning the price." Tiffles produced the letter, and pointed out the numeral in question.
"It's a 5, without any doubt," rejoined Mr. Boolpin; "but Persimmon had no authority to name that price. I distinctly told him fifteen dollars. But here he is. Perhaps he can explain it."
The three turned on their heels, and beheld, standing at the door, a short, dirty man in a faded suit of black, and a cold-shining satin vest. He wore an old hat set well back on a bald head, and his cravat was tied on one side in hangman's fashion. One leg of his trowsers was tucked into the top of his boot; the other hung down in its proper position. The man's face and hands wanted washing. This was Mr. Persimmon, postmaster. The secrets of his popularity were: First, his addiction to dirt; second, his eccentricities of dress, heretofore enumerated; third, a reputation for political craft and long-headedness, not wholly unfounded, as his ingenuity in procuring the passage of resolutions supporting the policy of the Administration, in all the conventions of his party since he became postmaster, fully proved. This political sage walked about town with Post-Office documents and confidential communications from Washington sticking out of all his pockets, and under the edge of his hat. He had a slight stoop in the shoulders, which the local wits said had increased since he undertook to carry the Administration.
"Professor Wesley?" remarked Persimmon, extending a grimy hand. "Happy to see you."
"Your most obedient," said Tiffles, a little stiffly, for the fifteen dollars annoyed him. It was a small sum to borrow, but a large one to pay.
"Have you such a thing as a morning newspaper about you?" asked the postmaster. "Our bundle missed the train. As you may naturally imagine, sir, I am anxious to see how the grand mass meeting went off last night in your city. Perhaps you wos there?"
Tiffles had never attended such a thing in his life; although he was aware that two or three grand mass meetings were held every week about all the year round, and a dozen nightly in times of political excitement. "No," said he; "but will you be good enough to tell me how much you hired this room for?"
Persimmon thought how culpably ignorant some people were of the great political movements of the day, but did not say so. Descending from politics to the subject in hand, he replied:
"Oh! fifteen dollars, of course. You will find it stated in my last letter to you." At this moment (no one of the three observing the act), the long-headed postmaster tipped a slight wink to Mr. Boolpin, who returned that signal of mutual understanding.
Tiffles handed the letter to the postmaster, pointing out the figure 5.
"Can I believe my eyes?" said the postmaster. "True enough, it is a 5. Confound my absent-mindedness in not puttin' down a 1." It may here be said, that similar instances of mental aberration were discovered in Mr. Persimmon's accounts toward the close of his official term.
Tiffles was staggered, as he reflected that it would take sixty full tickets to pay the single item of rent. He had less than half a dollar in his own pocket. Patching was, as usual, reduced to his last five-dollar bill. Marcus had incidentally observed, a few minutes before, that he had left his wallet at home, and had only a handful of small silver about him. Suppose the panorama should fail on the first night, and be detained for debt! Tiffles had not thought of that.
Tiffles remonstrated, entreated, suggested compromises, but all to no purpose. Boolpin was iron. The best arrangement that Tiffles could make, was to postpone the final settlement of the terms until after the performance. To that, Boolpin had not the least objection.
"One thing more," said Boolpin. "If there is a row, and any seats or windows are broken, you are to pay the damages."
Tiffles laughed faintly. "Oh! of course," said he. "But you never have rows here, do you?" He put the question with disguised interest.
"Sometimes," carelessly replied Mr. Boolpin. "There was a legerdemain man got his machinery knocked to pieces, and his head broken. The mob was quite reasonable about the furniture, and smashed only ten seats and sixteen panes of glass. I charged the Professor twenty dollars for damages, but took off two dollars on account of his illness. Poor fellow! he was laid up more than a month. Then there was a band of nigger minstrels, called the 'Metropoliganians.' They were regular humbugs; and so the mob took them, and tarred and feathered them in the back lot. Damage to furniture on that occasion was only sixteen dollars; and I got every cent of it, by holding on to their trunks. There have been a good many such little affairs in this village. I mention these two cases only as examples."
"And yet no people in the world is more peaceable, nor more easily satisfied, than the people of this town," said the postmaster. "They only axes not to be imposed on. That's all."
"A kinder-hearted people don't live on the face of this earth," added Boolpin, stating the case in another way; "but you mustn't give them less than twenty-five cents' worth for a quarter."
Tiffles replied to the effect that he would give them a dollar's worth apiece; but, in his heart, he foresaw, with that remarkable prescience which is occasionally vouchsafed to mortals, that the panorama of Africa was doomed to be a bad failure; and he bitterly regretted that he had not tried some one of a dozen other immense speculations which he had thought of. But he determined to give one night's exhibition, whatever might be the consequences. "I may as well die for an old sheep as a lamb," thought Tiffles.
During this conversation, Patching was secretly studying the effect of the swamp, visible from the eastern windows; and Marcus was looking at the cracked wall in a fit of abstraction.
Tiffles had observed several times, that morning, a youth, or man, of singular aspect, following him. Occasionally, on turning around suddenly, he would see this person at his elbow. Looking behind, at the close of the colloquy with the landlord, he again saw the strange youth, or man. The being was nearly six feet high, and powerfully built, like a strong man of twenty-five. His face was childish even to the degree of silliness. The mouth opened like a flytrap; the eyes were small and intensely guileless. Only a few wrinkles, and a few hairs, which grew wide apart on his cheeks and chin, indicated his manhood. But the oddest feature was the falling away of his forehead, at an angle which a dirty greased cap, pulled over his brow, could not conceal.
"Well, sir, what do you want?" said Tiffles.
"If you please, sir," said the singular being, in a cracked voice, "yure the pannyrarmer, a'n't ye?"
"Not exactly, my lad, but I own it. And who are you?"
"My name's Stoop, if you please, sir."
Mr. Boolpin broke out with a laugh, which made the building reverberate. "It's the village idiot," said he. "He goes by the name of Stoop, which is short for Stupid. Ha! ha! Come, now, clear out, Stupid, and don't be bothering the gentleman."
The boy-man began to whimper, when Tiffles, recollecting an allusion to a semi-idiot in one of the postmaster's letters, said:
"Stay, my lad; I believe I owe you something."
"For pastin' up two hundred posters, fifty cents; and distributin' five hundred bills, twenty-five cents. Totale, seventy-five cents." The idiot did not hold out his hand for the pay, and Tiffles conceived an instant esteem for him. An idea came to Tiffles. This idiot, as he was called, had shown intelligence in reckoning. He might have a deal of good sense under that dull exterior. Tiffles had observed, in his travels, that the idiot which Providence assigns to every town and village, is not always the biggest fool in it. This idiot might have sufficient intellect to turn the crank of the panorama, and render muscular aid in other respects. At any rate, he was able-bodied enough.
"My lad," said Tiffles.
"Stoop, if you please, sir."
"Very good. Stoop, I think I can find some work for you behind the scenes to-night. Can you turn a crank?"
"I've done it to grindstones, sir."
"It's the same principle," said Tiffles, laughing. "I'll engage you."
The idiot took off his greasy cap, and swung it in the air with joy. A smile irradiated his great, coarse face, and his small eyes twinkled. "Gosh golly!" he cried; "I'm goin' to be one of the performers. I'm so glad!"
He said this, in a spirit of juvenile exultation, to the dozen boys who stood gaping in at the doorway. This innocent bit of boasting provoked their derisive laughter, and a quantity of playful epithets and nicknames, which the idiot endured with marvellous patience, until one dirty little boy put the thumb of his left hand to his nose, twirled the fingers, and said, "Boo! boo! boo!" This act had the same effect on poor Stoop as the shaking of a red handkerchief at a bull. It enraged him. He sprang at the youth, and, but for the sudden closing of the door by the offender, who had judiciously kept a hand on the knob, would have chastised him on the spot.
The door not only arrested his progress, but suddenly checked his wrath. "I'm very sorry, indeed, Professor," said he; "but Gorrifus! it makes me so mad!"
Messrs. Boolpin and Persimmon laughed heartily. "He's a perfect idiot, you see," remarked the former. "Coming the nose system at him always makes him mad."
Tiffles did not understand how that was any proof of idiocy; but, to prevent the recurrence of any difficulty between his new assistant and the populace of small boys, he thought it best to take possession of the hall, and lock the door. He therefore signified to Mr. Boolpin that they would at once proceed to put up the panorama. Tiffles threw off his coat, thereby intimating that he would go to work at once.
Messrs. Boolpin and Persimmon inquired, as a matter of form, whether their further assistance was needed, and were answered in the negative. Whereupon they retired--Mr. Boolpin uttering a farewell caution against driving more nails in the wall than were necessary, and not to cut the floor under any circumstances--and the panorama and its adherents were left alone.
Mr. Boolpin had driven the uproarious boys before him with his pestle, administering smart taps to the reluctant ones. Tiffles suffered no further annoyance from them that day, save an occasional "Boo! boo!" shouted through the keyhole, and followed by an immediate scampering of the perpetrators down stairs. This well-known sound always roused the idiot to fury; and the peaceable persuasions, and even the gentle violence of Tiffles, were needed to keep him from relinquishing his work and springing to the door.
He was a most intelligent and useful idiot. He could measure distances more accurately than either of the three, and could ply the saw, hammer, plane, or hatchet (Tiffles brought all these tools with him) like a carpenter. His strength and skill were so great, that Tiffles found himself gratefully relieved from the necessity of lifting, or directing. Marcus Wilkeson, who had also thrown off his coat with a manful determination to do a hard day's work, in the hope of tiring out and driving away the sadness that possessed him, put on the garment again, and sat on a front bench, vacantly staring like an idiot at the idiot, and all the while thinking, gloomily, of New York. Patching stalked about the hall, and criticized the work as it progressed, from numerous angles of observation; but even he confessed that he could make no improvement on Stoop's highly artistic disposition of things.
The idiot worked on steadily and swiftly, and only two things interrupted him. The first was the "Boo!" yelled through the keyhole, as heretofore described. The second was the unrolling of portions of the panorama as they were taken out of the boxes, fastened together, and attached to the rollers.
As the canvas was unwound, Stoop would drop his saw, or hammer, or other tool, and gaze, with his large mouth and small eyes wide open, at the pictorial marvels successively disclosed. "Blame it!" said he; "a'n't that splendid?" or, "By jingo! look at that!" or, "Thunder! don't that beat all?" The tigers' tails and the elephants' trunks, the alligators' snouts and the boa constrictor's convolutions, he recognized at once. He had "read all about 'em in Olney's Jogriffy."
"He is an idiot of taste," thought Patching. "I wonder what they call him an idiot for?" thought Tiffles. "It's a pity all the people aren't idiots," said Marcus Wilkeson to Tiffles. "Your panorama would be patronized and appreciated then." It was Marcus's first approach to a joke that day.
By four o'clock in the afternoon the Panorama of Africa was all up, the rollers and the curtain in good working order, and everything ready for the eventful night. Stoop had taken a lesson at the wheel, and turned it beautifully. Tiffles had arranged a system of signals with him. One cough was "Stop;" two coughs were "Go on;" one stamp was "Slower;" two, stamps were "Faster." Tiffles and Stoop rehearsed the system several times, the one being before the curtain, in the position of the lecturer, and the other behind it, at the crank. Nothing could be more satisfactory.
"Only one thing puzzles me," said Tiffles to his friends. "Why do they call this smart fellow an idiot?"