The Portygee Part 23

"Ye-es, and if I do he'll keep on writin' more. That's exactly what I don't want him to do. Come now, Mother, be sensible. This piece of his may be good or it may not, _I_ wouldn't undertake to say. But this I do know: I don't want the boy to spend his time writin' poetry slush for that 'Poets' Corner.' Let.i.tia Makepeace did that--she had a piece in there about every week--and she died in the Taunton asylum."

"But, Zelotes, it wasn't her poetry got her into the asylum."

"Wan't it? Well, she was in the poorhouse afore that. I don't know whether 'twas her poetryin' that got her in there, but I know darned well it didn't get her out."

"But ain't you goin' to say one word? 'Twould encourage him so."

"Good Lord! We don't want to encourage him, do we? If he was takin' to thievin' you wouldn't encourage him in that, would you?"

"Thievin'! Zelotes Snow, you don't mean to say you compare a poet to a THIEF!"

The captain grinned. "No-o, Mother," he observed drily. "Sometimes a thief can manage to earn a livin' at his job. But there, there, don't feel bad. I'll say somethin' to Al, long's you think I ought to."

The something was not much, and yet Captain Zelotes really meant it to be kindly and to sound like praise. But praising a thing of which you have precious little understanding and with which you have absolutely no sympathy is a hard job.

"See you had a piece in the Item this week, Al," observed the captain.

"Why--yes, sir," said Albert.

"Um-hm. I read it. I don't know much about such things, but they tell me it is pretty good."

"Thank you, sir."

"Eh? Oh, you're welcome."

That was all. Perhaps considering its source it was a good deal, but Albert was not of the age where such considerations are likely to be made.

Helen's praise was warm and enthusiastic. "I knew you could do it if you only would," she declared. "And oh, I'm SO glad you did! Now you must keep on trying."

That bit of advice was quite superfluous. Young Speranza having sampled the sublime intoxication of seeing himself in print, was not ready to sober off yet a while. He continued to bombard the Item with verses.

They were invariably accepted, but when he sent to a New York magazine a poem which he considered a gem, the promptness with which it was returned staggered his conceit and was in that respect a good thing for him.

However, he kept on trying. Helen would not have permitted him to give up even if he had wished. She was quite as much interested in his literary aspirations as he was himself and her encouragement was a great help to him. After months of repeated trial and repeated rejection he opened an envelope bearing the name of a fairly well-known periodical to find therein a kindly note stating that his poem, "Sea s.p.a.ces" had been accepted. And a week later came a check for ten dollars. That was a day of days. Incidentally it was the day of a trial balance in the office and the a.s.sistant bookkeeper's additions and multiplications contained no less than four ghastly errors.

The next afternoon there was an interview in the back office. Captain Zelotes and his grandson were the partic.i.p.ants. The subject discussed was "Business versus Poetry," and there was a marked difference of opinion. Albert had proclaimed his triumph at home, of course, had exhibited his check, had been the recipient of hugs and praises from his grandmother and had listened to paeans and hallelujahs from Mrs. Ellis.

When he hurried around to the parsonage after supper, Helen had been excited and delighted at the good news. Albert had been patted on the back quite as much as was good for a young man whose b.u.mp of self-esteem was not inclined toward under-development. When he entered the private office of Z. Snow and Co. in answer to his grandfather's summons, he did so light-heartedly, triumphantly, with self-approval written large upon him.

But though he came like a conquering hero, he was not received like one.

Captain Zelotes sat at his desk, the copy of the Boston morning paper which he had been reading sticking out of the waste basket into which it had been savagely jammed a half hour before. The news had not been to the captain's liking. These were the September days of 1914; the German Kaiser was marching forward "mit Gott" through Belgium, and it began to look as if he could not be stopped short of Paris. Consequently, Captain Zelotes, his sympathies from the first with England and the Allies, was not happy in his newspaper reading.

Albert entered, head erect and eyes shining. If Gertie Kendrick could have seen him then she would have fallen down and worshiped. His grandfather looked at him in silence for a moment, tapping his desk with the stump of a pencil. Albert, too, was silent; he was already thinking of another poem with which to dazzle the world, and his head was among the rosy clouds.

"Sit down, Al," said Captain Zelotes shortly.

Albert reluctantly descended to earth and took the battered armchair standing beside the desk. The captain tapped with his pencil upon the figure-covered sheet of paper before him. Then he said:

"Al, you've been here three years come next December, ain't you?"

"Why--yes, sir, I believe I have."

"Um-hm, you have. And for the heft of that time you've been in this office."

"Yes, sir."

"Yes. And Labe Keeler and I have been doin' our best to make a business man out of you. You understand we have, don't you?"

Albert looked puzzled and a little uneasy. Into his roseate dreams was just beginning to filter the idea that his grandfather's tone and manner were peculiar.

"Why, yes, sir, of course I understand it," he replied.

"Well, I asked you because I wasn't quite sure whether you did or not.

Can you guess what this is I've got on my desk here?"

He tapped the figure-covered sheet of paper once more. Before Albert could speak the captain answered his own question.

"I'll tell you what it is," he went on. "It's one of the latest samples of your smartness as a business man. I presume likely you know that Laban worked here in this office until three o'clock this mornin', didn't you?"

Albert did not know it. Mr. Keeler had told him nothing of the sort.

"Why, no," he replied. "Did he? What for?"

"Ye-es, he did. And what for? Why, just to find out what was the matter with his trial balance, that's all. When one of Labe's trial balances starts out for snug harbor and ends up on a reef with six foot of water in her hold, naturally Labe wants to get her afloat and pumped dry as quick as possible. He ain't used to it, for one thing, and it makes him nervous."

Albert's uneasiness grew. When his grandfather's speech became sarcastic and nautical, the young man had usually found that there was trouble coming for somebody.

"I--I'm sorry Laban had to stay so late," he stammered. "I should have been glad to stay and help him, but he didn't ask me."

"No-o. Well, it may possibly be that he cal'lated he was carryin' about all your help that the craft would stand, as 'twas. Any more might sink her. See here, young feller--" Captain Zelotes dropped his quiet sarcasm and spoke sharp and brisk: "See here," he said, "do you realize that this sheet of paper I've got here is what stands for a day's work done by you yesterday? And on this sheet there was no less than four silly mistakes that a child ten years old hadn't ought to make, that an able-bodied idiot hadn't ought to make. But YOU made 'em, and they kept Labe Keeler here till three o'clock this mornin'. Now what have you got to say for yourself?"

As a matter of fact, Albert had very little to say, except that he was sorry, and that his grandfather evidently did not consider worth the saying. He waved the protestation aside.

"Sorry!" he repeated impatiently. "Of course you're sorry, though even at that I ain't sure you're sorry enough. Labe was sorry, too, I don't doubt, when his bedtime went by and he kept runnin' afoul of one of your mistakes after another. I'm sorry, darned sorry, to find out that you can make such blunders after three years on board here under such teachin' as you've had. But bein' sorry don't help any to speak of. Any fool can be sorry for his foolishness, but if that's all, it don't help a whole lot. Is bein' sorry the best excuse you've got to offer? What made you make the mistakes in the first place?"

Albert's face was darkly red under the lash of his grandfather's tongue.

Captain Zelotes and he had had disagreements and verbal encounters before, but never since they had been together had the captain spoken like this. And the young fellow was no longer seventeen, he was twenty.

The flush began to fade from his cheeks and the pallor which meant the rise of the Speranza temper took its place.

"What made you make such fool blunders?" repeated the captain. "You knew better, didn't you?"

"Yes," sullenly, "I suppose I did."

"You know mighty well you did. And as nigh as I can larn from what I got out of Laban--which wasn't much; I had to pump it out of him word by word--this ain't the first set of mistakes you've made. You make 'em right along. If it wasn't for him helpin' you out and coverin' up your mistakes, this firm would be in hot water with its customers two-thirds of the time and the books would be fust-rate as a puzzle, somethin' to use for a guessin' match, but plaguey little good as straight accounts of a goin' concern. Now what makes you act this way? Eh? What makes you?"

"Oh, I don't know. See here, Grandfather--"

"Hold on a minute. You don't know, eh? Well, I know. It ain't because you ain't smart enough to keep a set of books and keep 'em well. I don't expect you to be a Labe Keeler; there ain't many bookkeepers like him on this earth. But I do know you're smart enough to keep my books and keep 'em as they'd ought to be, if you want to keep 'em. The trouble with you is that you don't want to. You've got too much of your good-for-nothin--" Captain Lote pulled up short, cleared his throat, and went on: "You've got too much 'poet' in you," he declared, "that's what's the matter."

Albert leaned forward. "That wasn't what you were going to say," he said quickly. "You were going to say that I had too much of my father in me."