“Is it because I fit you? Bless your souls, I buried the ax, handle and all, the minute the last gun was fired, and I gin the shirt on my back for a piller for one of your fellows I found dyin’ in the Wilderness, and I hear his God bless you, just before he died, now. I didn’t blame him an atom, nor you nuther. If I’d been born south I’d of jined you of course. As I was from the north I jined the Federal army and would do it agin; not that I had any spite agin you personally, but for the flag,—the principle,—not the nigger. Da——! I beg pardon, I don’t swear now. I took my chances and got stuck into Libby prison, where I didn’t lead the most luxurious life. But lan, sakes, ’twas the fate of war, and I never complained, nor said a word but once, and that when a chap brought me some beef no human could eat. Says I, ‘No you don’t get that stuff into my stomach. I’m fond of fresh meat, but darned if I’ll eat maggits.’ He smiled and said low: ‘I don’t blame you. It’s the best I can do. Our boys up to Chicago are eatin’ rat pies.’ ‘Rats,’ I said, ‘Lord of heavens, give me rats, by the million. They’re dainties to this vermin.’ ‘You bet,’ he said, and pulled a cracker out of his pocket and handed me on the sly. I guess he had some tobacker in with it by the flavor, but I never tasted a better cracker than that. The first greenback I got after I left Libby I sent to him. He’s up north now, the best reconstructed reb you ever see,—married my sister and got twin boys; calls ’em Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln. That’s the way to do things.”
This speech of Sam’s was received with shouts of laughter and three cheers for the twins, Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis, while one man ordered half of a codfish and another bought a cigar. Here their patronage stopped, but it is a long lane which never turns and Sam’s was destined to turn at last by a few chance words spoken at the right time.
On their way home a knot of men met and seated themselves upon Sam’s benches, eagerly discussing the news of the morning which was in everyone’s mouth and greatly exaggerated by this time. Jack was going to die, and the Colonel had run off with Fanny Hathern against her will. Whether he had married her or not was a question. Probably not, and dire was the vengeance declared against him by the workmen gathered near Sam’s door. Among them sat Sam, a big knife in his hand, and sticking to it a thin slice of rich cream cheese, which he passed from one to another, asking if they ever tasted anything better than that, and telling them Mirandy made it on her father’s farm in Vermont. Among those who denounced Col. Errington no one was louder than Sam.
“I know him, root and branch,” he said, with a flourish of his cheese knife. “I was in his regiment part of the time till I got took and shut up in Libby, and a meaner man never rode a hoss into battle. Brave enough, but has a temper hard and cruel, and no more feelin’ than a stun. Cap’n Fullerton is wuth a thousand such men as Col. Errington, and so Miss Hathern will find to her sorrer. I b’lieve he merried her though. She ain’t the stuff as would go with him without the ceremony, but I tell you agin she’s flung overboard a gentleman for as mean and unprincipled a cuss as ever walked. Smooth and polished outside with his equals, but inwardly,—what’s that the scripter says about inwardly, I or’to know, but my mem’ry fails me.”
The memories of all the audience failed them, if they had any, and, besides, they were rather actively dodging the cheese knife which was flourishing at a great rate as Sam waxed eloquent on the subject of Col. Errington. They knew Sam had been in his regiment and half expected he would try to defend him, but he denounced him more hotly than they had done, and every shred of prejudice, if they really had any, against the kind-hearted man slipped away. He was a good sort after all, and one of them remembered that he wanted some plug tobacco and asked if he had any good.
“Tons of it. Want some?” Sam replied, entering his store and bringing out the tobacco.
Another man suddenly bethought him that his wife had told him not to come home without coffee. He had intended getting it at the Red Cross grocery, where he always traded, but he ordered it of Sam, who, when the scale showed just a pound, put in a little more.
“Good weight is my rule,” he said, as he tied up the package and hastened to weigh out another.
The aroma of his Mocha and Java mixed had filled the store, and his coffee was in great demand, as well as his cheese. Sugar and eggs followed next, and never had he done so thriving a business in any two hours as in the half hour which followed his vituperation against Col. Errington.
“If I keep on this way, I can have Mirandy down next fall,” he thought, as he counted his gains that night and carried his tin box to the little room over his grocery where he had slept for the last four years.