... Ole Bill Hardy
Cal’late I never seed the likes of Ole Bill Hardy. Yep—he was a humdinger alrite. Thar were a heap of shrewd peddlers ’round about in my day, young feller, and b’lieve me, they were the cagiest bunch of fellers y’ ever see. Y’ had ter watch yer step when y’ were bargainin’ withum, yesseree sir, else ye’d find yerself holdin’ the shy end of the stick. But the feller that uster drive the sharpest dickers was Ole Bill Hardy. ’Twa’nt many wimmin, or men folks either, ’round here that hadn’t been spliced at one time or nuther by Ole Bill.
I ’member one time in partic’lar—happened right here in the village, it did. ’Twas quite a spell ago, when you were no more than a twinkle in the divil’s eye. Wal, seems the folks ’round here were gittin’ some purty high flyin’ idees. Th’ town had a hearse—and a durn good one too—that’d bin used for buryin’s for near thuty years. And some uv these folks begun t’ think that mebbee the old mariah ’twa’nt quite toney enuff for ’em, so they sashayed over to town meetin’ and voted to buy a new one.
One day Ole Bill was a’ drivin’ by the old hearse house. Fust S’lectman Bijah Gibbs was loafin’ round the doorway and spied Bill a’comin’. Thought he’d see ifen he could get Ole Bill’s goat. He hollered out, “Say thar, Bill, what’ll y’ give us fer the old hearse?” But Bill didn’t bite. He jest looked Bijah rite in th’ eye and said, “Wal, I dunno. Don’t seem rightly that yer ought ter sell the mariah. Some folks in town ain’t even had a chanct ter ride in it yit. But if ye be of a mind ter sell it, dunnor ifen I might give five dollars fer it.” And sure nuff, Bill bought the old hearse, hitched it onter hind end of his wagon and druv off.
He wuz drivin’ along, proud as yer please, when he passed Miz Tizra Small. Miz Small was alus collectin’ and buyin’ old stuff—antiques, she called ’em. Ole Bill pulled up near her and hollers, “Here’s nuther antique for ye, Miz Small.” Miz Small didn’t think much of the hearse hitched onto the hind end of his wagon. She wuz mad as a wet hen. “Shet up, you old fool,” she says, and sallied off down the street. Bill jest kinda chuckled.
Wal the next thing y’ know, Ole Bill was using the old hearse for a peddler cart, and the women folk were so scandalized they got up a meetin’ to complain about it. Seems they thought it kinda improper that the hearse thetud carried their mothers and fathers to the grave was bein’ used to cart old brooms and tinware. So they raised twenty-five dollars and bought it back from Ole Bill. He didn’t care a mite. He’d made twenty dollars. The old hearse was put back in the hearse house, and stayed there ’til it rotted apart.
’Member nuther time too. Evryone knew Ole Bill would sell anythin’. One day he was drivin’ along and met two young scalawags who thought they’d have a bit o’ fun with him. They up an’ asked him what he’d take for the pants he was wearin’. “Two dollars,” says Bill, ’thout winkin’ an eyelash. And durned if he didn’t peel ’em right off and hand ’em over to the two young fellers, who were kinda taken back, I can tell ye. “Geeyap,” says Bill, and off he druv down the road, all wrapped up in an ole hoss blanket.
... How Sophie
Got A Husband
Sometimes a good deed done on the spur of the moment by a well-meaning philanthropist can do more harm than good, and lead to exceedingly comical and unexpected complications. For instance, take the case of Squire Nickerson of Orleans, who never knew the repercussions that resulted from a spontaneous act of kindliness to two strangers.
First of all, let me introduce the principals in this little drama: Squire Nickerson, well-to-do, prominent, kindly; a school marm from Boston whom we shall call Sophie, spinster, acid tongued, parched, and taken to drinking lemon juice, which probably accounted for her parchment-like appearance; and Seth, prominent, well-liked and friendly as the Squire, but in very different circles. To be blunt, Seth was an amiable old reprobate. Good people, all of them, but when they were thrown together, they were stirred around in the darndest stew you ever heard of.
Squire Nickerson was driving, one night long enough ago so we can spare embarrassment to those involved, back from a business meeting in Hyannis. The road from Hyannis to Orleans on the backside route is, and was then, winding and dark. Squire Nickerson was dozing in the back of his carriage when he was bumped from his seat by its sudden stop. Looking around, he saw that he was halted not at his home, but in the dip bend of the road by Pleasant Bay.
“What’s wrong Silas?” he asked his driver.
“Well, sir,” replied Silas puzzledly, “There seems to be someone lying smack in the middle of the road!”
Upon examination, the someone proved to be a rather battered elderly gentleman of indeterminate age, and this gentleman was sound, dead, absolutely asleep in the middle of the road. With a few suspicious sniffs, the Squire and Silas determined with surprise that the man was in a state not of intoxication, but of unusual fatigue.
“Pick him up, Si, and put him in the carriage.”
“But Sir—”
“In the carriage, Si. We can leave him at the Inn, poor fellow. It’s a damp night, and surely in this state he can do us no harm.”
And so the unsuspecting somnambulist was transported from the road to a fine carriage.
The Squire’s carriage, with its new occupant, had not rolled down the road more than a few paces, when it stopped again.
“I say, Sir. This ’eres a thing!” said Silas. “There ’pears to be a lady, sir, at the side of the road!”
“A lady? At the side of the road? Walking—why, no, she’s asleep, too!” cried the Squire, peering out of the carriage window. “Why this poor old couple! Probably didn’t have the coppers to pay for carriage to their destination, meant to camp out tonight, and were separated in the fog! We’ll bring both these poor souls to the Inn.” And so they did.
Squire Nickerson made suitable arrangements for food and lodging at the Inn. The old gentleman and lady were put to bed in a fine room, and orders left by the Squire to give them a good breakfast. Leaving extra money with the innkeeper for the two sleepers, and brimming over with self-satisfaction of a good deed well done, Squire Nickerson drove to his home, leaving his newly acquired but unconscious friends snoring peacefully side by side, and never dreaming that there was a possibility that he had joined a pair whom convention and law had not made one.
The fact was, the old man and the old woman were perfect strangers to one another, and their being found in similar situations was purely coincidental. Seth, who by now you know was the old gentleman in question, was very accustomed to spending the night wherever he might be, and Sophie, the lady in the picture, traveling by stage from Boston, had become annoyed and frightened at the antics of a rather tipply driver, and under the impression that it was but a few short miles to Orleans, had left the stage and started to walk. When found by the Squire, she had just stopped at the side of the road to rest, and had fallen into a deep and sound sleep.
And so passed the night. The newly united pair snored and wheezed peacefully beside one another until the early sunlight broke into the room to disclose the shocking and amazing situation. Sophie was the first to awake, stirred from sleep by a sound she had never heard before—that of a man snoring.
Imagine the consternation of the proper spinster when she awoke to find herself side by side in a strange bed with a man! Where she was, or how she got there, she didn’t know. It was clear that she was in bed with a man, and that was an event that had never happened to her before, and undoubtedly never would. She let out a scream that would wake the dead. Old Seth mumbled in his sleep, opened one eye, and then sat bolt upright in bed, staring at Sophie, who, cowering at the bed post, with purple face and tight shut eyes, screamed with the continuous wail of a fire siren. First shock turned to dumb amazement. Sophie stopped her caterwauling and turned her head toward Seth, who by now fully awake, sat frozen with apprehension. She sat bolt upright on one side of the bed, he on the other and, with eyes riveted on one another, and there they sat, transfixed with amazement and shock.
“Madame,” began Seth, remembering his manners even in a situation such as this one, “My name is—”
“Make me an honest woman, you wretch!” cried Sophie, interrupting Seth loudly. It had at last struck her that this was some monster of a man who had succeeded in some horrible design upon her honor. “Make me an honest woman, villain that you are, or I will be the death of you!”
Meanwhile, attracted by Sophie’s first screams, the other occupants of the Inn were peeping in at the door where they saw this amazing scene:
An elderly lady, keeping up a continuous stream of gesticulations, vindictive assertions and loud pleas for aid, was busily dressing herself more suitably for a meeting with a stranger. And in bed, cowering and trembling, and attempting to interject the lady’s hollers, an old man valiantly denied any knowledge of what had occurred.
The Innkeeper at last interfered with the authority of his station. On inquiry, it was found that no breach had been made that could not be easily repaired. Even when told the true story, Sophie would not keep still. The old gentleman, Seth, was then asked if he had any objections to taking his fair bedfellow for a helpmate during the remainder of this life. What else could he do? He stammered out his consent as well as he could, the enraged virgin smoothed down her anger and ruffled feathers, since satisfaction had been made to her injured honor. The bargain was made, a gay but strained pre-nuptial breakfast was held at the Inn, and the happy pair were bundled off to church, amidst the laughing shouts of the strange bridal party and uninvited guests. There the parson waited to make good a match too precipitously formed by the charitable Squire who never knew the outcome of his good deed.
