Part 7
_Caesar_: Miss Lucy tetch you on de shoulder, wid a sword, an say: “Ah mek you a knight; rise up, pure an fearless an widout reproach.” Dat what Miss Lucy say. Dat’s been a long time ago, but me nor you ain’t forgot it. An den dar’s another time we ain’t forgot—de time when Miss Lucy lay on her las bed. She sent for Uncle Caesar, an she say: “Uncle Caesar, when Ah die, Ah want you to take good care of Marse Jedge. Seem like”—so Miss Lucy say—“he listen to you mo dan to anybody else. He apt to be mighty fractious sometimes, an maybe he cuss you when you try to suade him, but he need somebody what understan him to be roun wid him. He am like a little child sometimes”—so Miss Lucy say, wid her eyes shinin in her po, thin face—“but he always been”—dem was her words—“my knight, pure an fearless an widout reproach.”
_Judge_: You—you old windbag! I believe you are crazy. I told you to go home, Caesar. Miss Lucy said that, did she? Well, we haven’t kept the scutcheon very clear. Two years ago last week, wasn’t it, Caesar, when she died? Confound it! Are you going to stand there all night gabbing like a coffee-colored gander?
_Caesar_: Marse Jedge, fo Gawd’s sake, doan take dis wid you. Ah knows what’s in it. Don kyar it wid you. Dey’s big trouble in dat valise for you. Hit’s bound to destroy de name of Adair an bow down dem dat own it wid shame and triberlation. Marse Judge, you can kill dis ole nigger ef you will, but don’t take away dis hyar valise. If Ah ever crosses over de Jordan, what Ah gwine to say to Miss Lucy when she ax me: “Uncle Caesar, wharfo didn you take good care of Marse Jedge?”
_Judge_: Caesar, you have overstepped all bounds. You have presumed upon the leniency with which you have been treated to meddle unpardonably. So you know what is in this satchel! Your long and faithful service is some excuse, but—go home, Caesar—not another word!
_Caesar_: Marse Jedge, gimme dis hyar valise. Ah got a right, suh, to talk to you dis hyar way. Ah slaved fo you an tended to you from a child up. I went th’ough de war as yo body-servant tell we whipped de Yankees an sent em back to de No’th. Ah was at yo weddin, an Ah was n fur away when yo Miss Azalea was bawn. Ah been a Adair, all cept in color an ’titlements. Both of us is old, Marse Jedge. Taint goin to be long tell we gwine to see Miss Lucy an has to give an account of our doins. De ole nigger man wont be spected to say much mo dan he done all he could by de famly dat owned him. But de Adairs, dey must say dey been livin pure an fearless an widout reproach. Gimme dis valise, Marse Jedge—Ah’m gwine to hab it. Ah’m gwine to do Miss Lucy’s biddin. Turn er loose, Marse Jedge.
_Judge_: Take it, Caesar. And let the subject drop—now mind! You’ve said quite enough.
_Jennings_ (_calls off right_): Hello, there, Judge! Are you comin? (_enters, as Colonel Gwathmey, in fishing costume, with rods_) We’ll miss that train. What’s the matter here?
_Judge_: Well, Colonel, I’ve been having a little trouble. I came in to get the liquor that I had in this suit-case—
_Caesar_ (_with gestures of amazement and confusion_): What’s dat you say, Marse Jedge?
_Judge_: I said the liquor that I had in this suit-case. What did you think I had in it?
_Caesar_ (_staggered_): Ah—Ah—oh—Ah—dat is—(_recovering himself suddenly_) Dat’s right, Marse Jedge, de liquor. Ah didn’t zacly hear straight, Ah’s gittin so ole—mah ears is wusser an wusser—
_Judge_ (_to Jennings_): Well, this infernally presumptuous old nigger has been breaking up our arrangements. I don’t know how he found out what I was doing—I had the liquor hid in that vault, and was trying to sneak it out, but here he is, and he’s vetoed the proceedings. He means right, and—well, I reckon he _is_ right. He has noticed that I’ve been indulging a little more than a gentleman should, and he has laid for me some reaching arguments.
_Jennings_: Well, I’ll be hornswoggled.
_Judge_: I’m going to quit drinking. I’ve come to the conclusion that a man can’t keep it up and be quite what he’d like to be—“pure and fearless and without reproach”—that’s the way old Caesar quoted it.
_Jennings_: Well, I’ll have to admit that the old darkey’s argument can’t conscientiously be overruled.
_Judge_: Still (_with a ghost of a smile_) there are two quarts of the finest old silk-velvet Bourbon in that satchel you ever wet your lips with. Take it home, Caesar, and put it somewhere I can’t find it!
_Caesar_: Yes, Marse Jedge; thank’ee, Cunnel Gwathmey. Ah hopes you genlemen has a good fishin day. Looks to me like it promise mighty fine weather—de sun sot red las night, an you know what dat means fo fishermen’s luck. Ah members one time when de Jedge an me was youngsters—(_the three of them go off, at right, in the midst of the Negro’s chatter_)
_Porter_ (_wanders about distracted; goes to cashier’s drawer and opens it_): It’s gone! It’s gone! The money isn’t here that ought to be here. And they’ll blame me for it! Oh, why did I ever come into a bank? What do I know about taking care of money? (_he stops and gazes at Athol, who enters right, clad as in Act I_)
_Athol_ (_drifts towards him, dreamlike, silent; at last she whispers_): Will!
_Porter_: Athol! (_with intense distress_) Sweetheart, some of the money is gone from the drawer, and they’re blaming me for it. You know how it is—people take money out, and they’re supposed to put in a slip, but they forget to do it and what can I do?
_Athol_: Will, dear, I love you.
_Porter_: They are going to put me in prison—five years, they’ve sentenced me to. And when I come out, I’ll be an ex-convict. People will brand me with it—I’ll never be able to escape!
_Athol_: Will, dear.
_Porter_ (_sobs_): Sweetheart, I can’t go to prison, oh, I can’t stand it! I’m going to die! I’ll kill myself!
_Athol_ (_gently_): No, Will, you won’t do that. You know that I love you. And there is Margaret—who would take care of her? I can’t last much longer, you know.
_Porter_: Oh, God, I can’t stand being in prison—the things they’ll do to me! They’ll handcuff me, and shave my head, and put me in stripes—they may even beat me! I’ll come out a maniac!
_Athol_: Whatever they do, you will stand it for my sake. And you will come out, and start over, and be yourself. You know my faith in you, Will—and you have to be the thing I have dreamed.
_Porter_ (_with sudden intensity_): Listen, Athol, there is an easy way to die; the thought of it haunts me—to die for the poor devils in prison! That’s what I ought to do—take a stand against the graft and cruelty, and let anything come that will!
_Athol_ (_embraces him, tenderly, as if he were her child_): A man’s wife learns to know him, Will. Listen; you will die many deaths, in your imagination; but always you will live to die others.
_Porter_ (_yielding a little to her beguilement_): Ah, sweetheart, if only I could have your guidance.
_Athol_ (_leads him to chair beside the desk, facing audience; she kneels beside him_): You have it, Will—always; you have everything you’ve ever had, and many things you’ve only dreamed. Precious gifts, you have—fancy, and tenderness—and merry words, a shining flood. You will take them into prison with you, and bring them out unharmed; and you will learn new things, new understanding, new pity—and the future will be before you. You will find a way to help people—your own way; to suggest a little kindness to them, a little humor, in the hope that sometime it will become contagious.
_Porter_: I said those very words in the prison; I am always quoting you.
_Athol_: Once upon a time you told me about some foolish person in New York who talked about the Four Hundred—those few who really counted. You said you would write about the Four Million—they were the ones who counted.
_Porter_: I think of that now and then.
_Athol_: Write about them, Will! Write _for_ them! I see them, eager, hungry, craving just the sort of pity mixed with laughter that is your gift. Yes, I see them! Will! Will—look at them! (_she points; a searchlight behind the scenes is suddenly turned upon the audience through an aperture in the back drop; it plays here and there, and Athol’s voice rises with excitement_) Faces! Faces! Millions of faces—and all of them your lovers! Eager faces, shining, with gratitude, with hope, with fun—all of them ready to cheer you, to shout to you—to tell the affection they bear you! Go forth, Will Porter! Do your work, and take your place as their story teller—the voice of the Four Million!
(_Dulcie enters at right; the little shop-girl, clad in pitiful imitation finery; frail, emaciated, hungry in body and soul; she carries a wreath of laurel_)
_Porter_: Who are you?
_Dulcie_: I am Dulcie, the little shop-girl. Mine is the Unfinished Story, which you will finish. I have never had a true friend—not among men; but you are my friend. (_she puts the wreath upon his head_) Rise, O. Henry, the little shop-girl’s knight! (_he rises, and she steps back a foot or two, and recites_)
He comes with vaudeville, with stare and leer. He comes with megaphone and specious cheer. His troupe, too fat or short or long or lean, Step from the pages of the magazine With slapstick or sombrero or with cane: The rube, the cowboy or the masher vain. They overact each part. But at the height Of banter and of canter and delight The masks fall off for one queer instant there And show real faces: faces full of care And desperate longing: love that’s hot or cold; And subtle thoughts, and countenances bold....
And be it said, mid these his pranks so odd With something nigh to chivalry he trod. And oft the drear and driven would defend— The little shop-girls’ knight unto the end.
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MAMMONART _An Essay in Economic Interpretation_
“_Mammonart_” studies the artists from a point of view entirely new; asking how they get their living, and what they do for it; turning their pockets inside out, seeing what is in them and where it comes from.
“_Mammonart_” puts to painters, sculptors, poets, novelists, dramatists and composers the question already put to priests and preachers, editors and journalists, college presidents and professors, school superintendents and teachers: WHO OWNS YOU, AND WHY?
“_Mammonart_” examines art and literature as instruments of propaganda and repression, employed by ruling classes of the community; or as weapons of attack, employed by new classes rising into power.
“_Mammonart_” challenges the great ones now honored by critical authority and asks to what extent they are servants of ruling-class prestige and instruments of ruling-class safety.
“_Mammonart_” asserts that mankind is today under the spell of utterly false conceptions of what art is and should be; of utterly vicious and perverted standards of beauty and dignity in all the arts.
“_Mammonart_” is a history of culture, and also a battle-cry.
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E. HALDEMAN JULIUS telegraphs: “This is real constructive criticism. My heartiest congratulations.”
GEORGE STERLING writes: “You may not know everything, son, but you can sure turn out interesting stuff!”
400 PAGES. CLOTH $2.00; PAPER $1.00 UPTON SINCLAIR, Pasadena, Calif.
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The Brass Check _A Study of American Journalism_
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Who owns the press and why?
When you read your daily paper, are you reading facts or propaganda? And whose propaganda?
Who furnishes the raw material for your thoughts about life? Is it honest material?
No man can ask more important questions than these; and here for the first time the questions are answered in a book.
The first edition of this book, 23,000 copies, was sold out two weeks after publication. Paper could not be obtained for printing, and a carload of brown wrapping paper was used. The printings to date amount to 144,000 copies. The book is being published in Great Britain and colonies, and in translations in Germany, France, Holland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Italy, Hungary and Japan.
Hermann Bessemer, in the “Neues Journal,” Vienna:
“Upton Sinclair deals with names, only with names, with balances, with figures, with documents, a truly stunning, gigantic fact-material. His book is an armored military train which with rushing pistons roars through the jungle of American monster-lies, whistling, roaring, shooting, chopping off with Berserker rage the obscene heads of these evils. A breath-taking, clutching, frightful book.”
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440 pages. Cloth-bound, $1.50; paper-bound, $1 UPTON SINCLAIR, Pasadena, Calif.
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THE GOSLINGS _A Study of American Schools_ By Upton Sinclair
Who owns the schools, and why?
Are your children getting education, or propaganda? And whose propaganda?
No man can ask more important questions than these; and here for the first time the questions are answered in a book.
H. L. MENCKEN on “The Goslings”: “I’d be recreant to my vows at ordination if I did not commend his volume unqualifiedly as excellent reading. It is, in fact, one of the most interesting books I have got through for months. It presents a vast mass of scandalous and amusing facts, it sorts them out very deftly, and it is very well written. Why he has had to publish it himself I can’t make out. Are all the regular publishers idiots?”
The Los Angeles “Times” on “The Goslings”: “As to the truth of the charges, we have only the author’s word for it.... One would think that if one-half of the charges are true something should be done about it; on the other hand, if they are not true, something should be done to suppress the book.”
From Floyd Dell: “Written with a magnificent and tragic candor.”
“The Goslings,” 464 pages; cloth $2, paper $1 UPTON SINCLAIR, Pasadena, California
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THE GOOSE-STEP _A Study of American Education_ By Upton Sinclair
_Who owns the colleges, and why?_
_Are your sons and daughters getting education, or propaganda?_
_And whose propaganda?_
_No man can ask more important questions than these; and here for the first time the questions are answered in a book._
From H. L. MENCKEN:
“‘The Goose-Step’ came in at last yesterday afternoon, and I fell on it last night. My very sincere congratulations. I have read on and on with constant joy in the adept marshalling of facts, the shrewd presentation of personalities, the lively and incessant humor. It is not only a fine piece of writing; it is also a sound piece of research. It presents a devastating, but, I believe, thoroughly fair and accurate picture of the American universities today. The faults of ‘The Brass Check’ and ‘The Profits of Religion’ are not in it. It is enormously more judicial and convincing than either of those books. You are here complaining of nothing. You simply offer the bald and horrible facts—but with liveliness, shrewdness, good humor. An appalling picture of a moral and mental debasement! Let every American read it and ponder it!”
A few questions considered in “The Goose-Step”: Do you know the extent to which the interlocking directors of railroads and steel and oil and coal and credit in the United States are also the interlocking trustees of American “higher” education? Do you think that our colleges and universities should be modeled on the lines of our government, or on the lines of our department-stores? Do you know that eighty-five per cent of college and university professors are dissatisfied with being managed by floor-walkers? Do you know for how many different actions and opinions a professor may lose his job? Do you know how many professors have to do their own laundry? Do you know why American college presidents with few exceptions are men who do not tell the truth? Do you know to what extent “social position” takes precedence over scholarship in American academic life?
A few of the institutions dealt with:
The University of the House of Morgan; The University of Lee-Higginson; The University of U. G. I.; The Tiger’s Lair; The Bull-dog’s Den; The University of the Black Hand; The University of the Lumber Trust; The University of the Chimes; The Universities of the Anaconda; The University of the Latter Day Saints; The Mining Camp University.
500 pages, cloth $2.00, paper $1.00, postpaid. UPTON SINCLAIR, PASADENA, CALIFORNIA
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Transcriber’s Notes
This file uses _underscores_ to indicate italic text. Itemized changes from the original text:
• Front matter: Added period to match other entries in list (Act. IV) • p. 3: Removed period from “Al. Jennings” • p. 9: Replaced “Misth” with “Misteh” (Ah wants you to know, Misteh Porter) • p. 14: Replaced “offstage” with “off-stage” (a voice calling, off-stage right) • p. 15: Supplied missing opening parenthesis (Uncle Caesar looks about...) • p. 16: Replaced “steal” with “steals” • p. 19: Replaced “galliptious” with “galluptious” • p. 19: Replaced “silk velvet” with “silk-velvet” (silk-velvet Kentucky Bourbon) • p. 30: Removed period from end of stage direction (...fires a shot) • p. 33: Replaced “red hot” with “red-hot” (I’ll mix them red-hot) • p. 36: Replaced “lemon-peel” with “lemon peel” (lemon peel on the cocktail of creation) • p. 40: Substituted em-dash for unclear punctuation in printed text (...teach someone else that trick—) • p. 41: Replaced “ma’m” with “ma’am” (forty-five years, ma’am) • p. 45: Added colon to match format (sings:) • p. 46: Replaced “Well-Fargo” with “Wells-Fargo” • p. 46: Added period after “del amor” to match other occurrences • p. 47: Added italics to stage direction • p. 48: Removed duplicated word “guards” (“prison guards enter”) • p. 52: Replaced “body servant” with “body-servant” (I was goin be yo body-servant) • p.53: Removed duplicated word “in” (“had in that suit-case”) • p.55: Replaced “scuteheon” with “scutcheon” (haven’t kept the scutcheon very clear)
Some other inconsistencies in the original text, including inconsistencies in hyphenation, punctuation in contractions, and variations in spelling in dialect passages, were not corrected.
New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.