Skippy Bedelle Part 42

Miss Tupper, in whom a slight suspicion was beginning to grow as to the exact motives back of the sudden conversion, hesitated, but finally put forth her hand a third time.

"I promise," said Skippy, drawing a deep breath and sailing away on perfumed clouds to an invisible choir. "I want to make this something terrific; it's the most important you know. I promise for the s.p.a.ce of one year,--so long as you care enough to answer my letters, that's only fair you know--I promise never to touch a drop of beer or ale, or whiskey, or rum, or brandy, or sherry, or port, or . . ."

"Alcohol in any form," said Miss Tupper, the color of the rambler.

"In any form. So help me G.o.d," said Skippy slowly.

"There," said Miss Tupper, somewhat thrilled herself. "And now don't you feel better, much, much better for having done it?"

And Skippy answered truthfully,

"You bet I feel better."

Skippy, indeed, would have sworn to anything just for the look that lighted up the velvety eyes in the joy of salvation. It is doubtful if he even heard half of the program of his future existence. There was something irresistible in the softness of her eyes and the fascinating lisp. He was face to face at last with a good influence. He had met, not the type of girl that men play with lightly or madly for a month or a day, but a woman, the kind rough coa.r.s.e men look up to as to a polar star, the kind of woman you think of winning after years of struggle, that keeps men straight and their thoughts on higher things, the kind of woman that pulls a drunkard out of the gutter, reclaims him and makes a genius out of the wreck. He would be saved by her, he was bound he would--no matter what sacrifices he would have to make to keep in proper sinful condition.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

SUDDEN INTEREST IN THE BIBLE

SNORKY GREEN had experienced so many shocks in his intimate contact with his chum's imagination that he had come to believe the future could hold no surprises for him. But that evening Skippy after a long searching through bookcases said with a worried air:

"I say, Snorky, where do you keep the Bible?"

"The--the Bible?" said Snorky faintly.

"Sure, the Bible."

Snorky's first thought was that Skippy must be the victim of a secret malady and ready to make his will. His next was even more alarming.

"You're not thinking of anything rash, are you, old horse?"

"What the deuce?"

"You and Jennie?"

"What the Sam Blazes are you driving at?"

"Thought you were looking up the marriage service," said Snorky facetiously.

"Shucks, no. Nothing of the sort. I just, I just want to look up a reference."

"What reference?"

"It's of a personal nature, very personal," said Skippy.

At the end of an hour's search Snorky finally produced a Bible from the cook and watched Skippy turn through the pages in a perplexed manner.

"I've watched that coot do some queer things," he thought, scratching his ear, "but I'll be jiggswiggered if I can figure out what he's up to now."

At the end of half an hour Skippy looked up nonplussed.

"What do you know about the Bible, anyhow?"

"I know a lot," said Snorky astutely.

"Where do you get the ten commandments, anyhow?"

Snorky repeated the question, more and more perplexed.

"Why it's in Genesis isn't it?"

"Naw, I looked all through that."

"How about Solomon? He was wise to everything."

"Who was the guy who went up to Heaven? Perhaps he got 'em."

"Let's ask the cook."

Which was done.

"Now what in the Sam Hill has Skippy to do with the ten commandments or the ten commandments with Skippy?" said Snorky, observing the extraordinary concentration on his chum's face as he considered them carefully one by one. "Perhaps the heat has. .h.i.t him and he's going in for religion."

The explanation of Skippy's eccentric taste was a perfectly simple one.

No sooner had he departed from the lovely presence of Miss Jennie Tupper with only the vaguest idea of what he had pledged himself not to do, but with the liveliest and most disturbing memory of the softest of hands, than he had bitterly repented the prodigal manner in which he had thrown away his opportunities.

"Why the deuce didn't I save something out," he said to himself angrily, with a sudden recollection of moonlight nights to come. "My aunt's cat's pants, but I certainly went to sleep."

From the parsonage to the Greens', from the soup to the watermelon, but one idea obsessed him: how was he to find something else to swear off?

For instinct, which supplants reason in such sentimental voyages, warned him that to such a professional reformer as Miss Jennie Tupper his sole fascination lay in a lively display of original sin.

The more he thought it over the more depressed he had become. The truth was that he had outrageously neglected his opportunities and had little to offer. All he could do was to fall back on his imagination and such knowledge of the world as returned to him from an extensive preparation in modern fiction. The trouble with his imagination was it worked too spontaneously. How much better he could have done with a little more preparation!

"Gee, I never knew a hand could give you such a fuzzy feeling," he said with a heavy sigh.

It was then that he had thought of the Bible and the ten commandments with much resulting perplexity to Snorky.

"Well, I'll be eternally dog-switched," he said all at once. "I never would have believed it!"

"Believed what?" said Snorky, who was waiting patiently.

"Say, these are the ten commandments, aren't they?"