“Yes,” admitted the widow, “I heard somethin’ of it, I s’pose.”
“Wa’al,” said Mrs. Bixbee, “you never heard the hull story, ner anybody else really, but I’m goin’ to tell it to ye—”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Cullom assentingly.
Mrs. Bixbee sat up straight in her chair with her hands on her knees and an air of one who would see justice done.
“ ’Lish Harum,” she began, “wa’n’t only half-brother to Dave. He was hull-brother to me, though, but notwithstandin’ that, I will say that a meaner boy, a meaner growin’ man, an’ a meaner man never walked the earth. He wa’n’t satisfied to git the best piece an’ the biggist piece—he hated to hev anyone else git anythin’ at all. I don’t believe he ever laughed in his life, except over some kind o’ suff’rin’—man or beast—an’ what’d tickle him the most was to be the means on’t. He took pertic’ler delight in abusin’ an’ tormentin’ Dave, an’ the poor little critter was jest as ’fraid as death of him, an’ good reason. Father was awful hard, but he didn’t go out of his way; but ’Lish never let no chance slip. Wa’al, I ain’t goin’ to give you the hull fam’ly hist’ry, an’ I’ve got to go into the kitchen fer a while ’fore dinner, but what I started out fer ’s this: ’Lish fin’ly settled over to Whitcom.”
“Did he ever git married?” interrupted Mrs. Cullom.
“Oh, yes,” replied Mrs. Bixbee, “he got married when he was past forty. It’s curious,” she remarked, in passing, “but it don’t seem as if the’ was ever yit a man so mean but he c’d find some woman was fool enough to marry him, an’ she was a putty decent sort of a woman too, f’m all accounts, an’ good lookin’. Wa’al, she stood him six or seven year, an’ then she run off.”
“With another man?” queried the widow in an awed voice. Aunt Polly nodded assent with compressed lips.
“Yes’m,” she went on, “she left him an’ went out West somewhere, an’ that was the last of her; an’ when her two boys got old enough to look after themselves a little, they quit him too, an’ they wa’n’t no way growed up neither. Wa’al, the long an’ the short on’t was that ’Lish got goin’ down hill ev’ry way, health an’ all, till he hadn’t nothin’ left but his disposition, an’ fairly got onter the town. The’ wa’n’t nothin’ for it but to send him to the county house, onless somebody ’d s’port him. Wa’al, the committee knew Dave was his brother, an’ one on ’em come to see him to see if he’d come forwud an’ help out, an’ he seen Dave right here in this room, an’ Dave made me stay an’ hear the hull thing. Man’s name was Smith, I remember, a peaked little man with long chin whiskers that he kep’ clawin’ at with his fingers. Dave let him tell his story, an’ he didn’t say nothin’ fer a minute or two, an’ then he says, ‘What made ye come to me?’ he says. ‘Did he send ye?’
“ ‘Wa’al,’ says Smith, ‘when it was clear that he couldn’t do nuthin’, we ast him if the’ wa’n’t nobody could put up fer him, an’ he said you was his brother, an’ well off, an’ hadn’t ought to let him go t’ the poorhouse.’
“ ‘He said that, did he?’ says Dave.
“ ‘Amountin’ to that,’ says Smith.
“ ‘Wa’al,’ says Dave, ‘it’s a good many years sence I see ’Lish, an’ mebbe you know him better ’n I do. You known him some time, eh?’
“ ‘Quite a number o’ years,’ says Smith.
“ ‘What sort of a feller was he,’ says Dave, ‘when he was somebody? Putty good feller? good citizen? good neighber? lib’ral? kind to his fam’ly? ev’rybody like him? gen’ally pop’lar, an’ all that?’
“ ‘Wa’al,’ says Smith, wigglin’ in his chair an’ pullin’ out his whiskers three four hairs to a time, ‘I guess he come some short of all that.’
“ ’E’umph!’ says Dave, ‘I guess he did! Now, honest,’ he says, ‘is the’ man, woman, or child in Whitcom that knows ’Lish Harum that’s got a good word fer him? or ever knowed of his doin’ or sayin’ anythin’ that hadn’t got a mean side to it some way? Didn’t he drive his wife off, out an’ out? an’ didn’t his two boys hev to quit him soon ’s they could travel? An’,’ says Dave, ‘if anyone was to ask you to figure out a pattern of the meanist human skunk you was capable of thinkin’ of, wouldn’t it—honest, now!’ Dave says, ‘honest, now—wouldn’t it be ’s near like ’Lish Harum as one buckshot ’s like another?’ ”
“My!” exclaimed Mrs. Cullom. “What did Mr. Smith say to that?”
“Wa’al,” replied Mrs. Bixbee, “he didn’t say nuthin’ at fust, not in so many words. He sot fer a minute clawin’ away at his whiskers—an’ he’d got both hands into ’em by that time—an’ then he made a move as if he gin the hull thing up an’ was goin’. Dave set lookin’ at him, an’ then he says, ‘You ain’t goin’, air ye?’
“ ‘Wa’al,’ says Smith, ‘feelin’ ’s you do, I guess my arrant here ain’t goin’ t’ amount to nothin’, an’ I may ’s well.’
“ ‘No, you set still a minute,’ says Dave. ‘If you’ll answer my question honest an’ square, I’ve got sunthin’ more to say to ye. Come, now,’ he says.
“ ‘Wa’al,’ says Smith, with a kind of give-it-up sort of a grin, ‘I guess you sized him up about right. I didn’t come to see you on ’Lish Harum’s
