My Monks of Vagabondia 3

My Monks of Vagabondia 3

"Then he can get a free shave at the Barbers' School," I suggested.

 

"That only helps for a day or two," he went on. "Better throw up your

hands at once and have it over. What man half ill with worry cares to

listen to some ambitious pupil say, 'Teacher, shall I shave the right

side of his face up, or shave it down?'--and, 'Teacher, how do you

shave the upper lip without cutting it?' and, 'Teacher, if I do cut it,

shall I disinfect it with carbolic or peroxide before I put on the new

skin?'--No Barbers' School for me. It is better to turn philosopher on

the instant--the old philosophers and prophets grew long beards....

Talk about getting next to Nature in about three days after a man

has sold his razor, Nature will get next to him, and if he is not as

beardless as an American Indian, he will be convinced when he sees

himself in a mirror, of the truth of the Darwinian theory."

 

"In Russia," I said, "the beard is the patriarch's badge of sanctity."

 

"So it is in Jersey and several other States," he replied. "Many

a so-called hobo with two weeks' growth of beard on his face may

be at heart only a conscientious respecter of the law--for it is a

misdemeanor in New Jersey to carry a razor. It is legally declared to

be a concealed weapon. Many a poor rascal against whom a charge of

vagrancy could not be maintained has found it so much the worse for

him, and has been forced to go to prison for carrying concealed weapons

in the form of a razor. So you see in Jersey, as well as in Russia, a

beard may be only proof of honor.... The cleanly shaven man who knocks

at your side door and wins the unsuspecting wife's confidence with that

time-worn platitude of Vagabondia, 'Lady, all I want is work,' may

have a weapon concealed upon his person, while the unshaven wanderer,

the sight of whom makes the women folks bolt doors, may be a homeless

fellow who really wants work, and would rather be unkempt in appearance

than chance a prison-term for carrying a razor."

 

"So you have sold your razor?" I asked.

 

"Not because I am trying to compete with your Russian patriarch in

sanctity. I sold it because I'm desperate."

 

"Then you were not afraid of the misdemeanor charge?"

 

He replied with a laugh that I did not like, and I felt quickly to see

if my watch was still in my possession.

 

"I don't want your watch," he said, "but it isn't the fear of doing

time that holds me back. I know what my friend wrote about me. I have

made up my mind to play square. You may not believe it. You have heard

too many mission testimonies to believe much in them. But if I live

right--it isn't because my heart is softened, my heart is cold and hard

as a paving block."

 

"Your friend wrote that you weren't such a bad fellow."

 

"Don't believe him. In Elmira they have a scheme of percentage, and if

a man gets above a certain percent he can win his freedom. In the four

years I was there I was safely within the required percentage--all I

had to do was to continue my good behavior. I was within a few days of

freedom. Did you ever sense hatred--pure hatred? Shylock felt it when

he refused to accept money to cancel Antonio's bond; when he would not

listen to threats or entreaties, but only muttered, 'I'll have my pound

of carrion flesh.' I know what he felt. In the night, after weeks and

weeks of patient study and labor--after months of good conduct, when I

played their game and won the chance of freedom. In the night, without

reason, I jumped from my bed and battered at the bars and yelled and

cursed at them all, until they put me in the dungeon and took from me

my high percent. I lost a year that time."

 

"Do the prison bars still hold you," I asked him.

 

"What do you mean?"

 

"You act like a mad man when you talk of the past. Some men can never

throw off the thought of their imprisonment. It rules their life. They

think only of prison and the crimes that follow such thinking. There is

no hope for them. Can't you see it is your ideals that enslave or make

you free? Can't you see you are free?"

 

"It's mighty hard," he said, "but I want to forget. My friend sent me

to you. He said you knew the path to freedom, and would help me. Days

and days I have waited for you to come to me. My father would not have

me at home, my friends left me, my money grew less and less--my clothes

went, my razor--everything. And still you did not come. Sometimes I'd

meet a boy that told me of your work. Sometimes I would doubt all I had

heard, and then I would become indifferent--mutter a prayer or plan a

crime. At last the letter came. I knew I was being put to the test, and

I sought to be firm. Oh, God, such a test! What is it holds a man? I

was hungry, yet I knew how to steal; I needed money, and I knew where

I could rob with reasonable safety. What is it holds a man like me? At

times I have thought it was my belief in you."

 

"You mean our Colony held out a hope to you."

 

"Yes," he said.

 

"I am afraid to take you into my Family," I told him.

 

"For fear I'll steal from you?" he said, coldly.

 

"No, not that; I fear you cannot leave your prison thoughts behind you

when you enter the Colony."

 

"If you help me," he said, thoughtfully, "I think I can begin anew."

 

"Will you promise never to speak to me or anyone of your past life?"

 

"I will not speak of it again."

 

"Then you may go to the entrance gate with me, and there I will decide

if I can take you in."

 

We talked on the way to the farm about many things--for he had read and

traveled much. We made no mention of the Family or its work, but as we

came near the Colony House I stopped.

 

"Tell me," I said, "did they teach you a trade at Elmira?"

 

"I'm a metal roofer by trade," he said.

 

"Did you learn the trade in prison?" I asked him.

 

"I think you mistake me for some other man," he replied, quietly. "I

know nothing about prison life."

 

"What do you mean, not only your friend told me that you had served a

term, but you told me yourself?" I said, severely.

 

He looked calmly into my face, but there were tears in his eyes.

 

"I could not have told you, for had I told you such a foolish falsehood

I would have remembered it. Let us talk of something else."

 

"Very good," I said, pleasantly. He was trying to forget the past.

 

At that moment there came to us the vigorous clamor of an old cow bell.

 

"It is the bell that calls the boys to their evening meal."

 

"Yes?"

 

"Come, let us hurry, so we may be served at the first table, for you

are hungry."

 

 

II

 

The holy Vedas teach us that as we pass from life to life, Time places

gentle fingers over the eyes of memory, lest we become disheartened by

past errors and falter enslaved by the fears of what we have been. Like

the child who, having worked out a problem on his slate, erases it all,

keeping only the answer, so we have within our soul-life the result of

our past experiences; all the rest is erased.

 

Who cares about the detailed account of all the happenings along the

path we have traveled? We know intuitively that much of the past must

be condemned, but that which concerns us vitally is the life we aim to

live to-day.

 

Night closes on the sorrows of yesterday. Dawn is radiant with the

promise of a better day.

 

Our friend, "Slippery Jim," tried to believe all this, and to look with

hope towards the future, but he kept much to himself. He would take

long walks into the woods.

 

It disturbed me to see him so slow to take the boys into his confidence.

 

"I never see you reading with the other men in the evening," I told

him. "Men who love solitude are either very good or very bad."

 

"I will try to do better," he answered, "but for so many years I have

been used to being by myself."

 

"Still one has to live in the world--and our world here is rather

small," I said. "Cheerfulness is a duty one owes to his own soul."

 

"And to others," he added.

 

"Yes, and to others," I replied.

 

"I am inclined to view lightly my duty to others. I owed a debt--a

great debt once--to others, and I have paid it. They measured it out of

my life, the payment they demanded. I have paid it--paid it in tears

and wretchedness--paid it out of my heart and soul. Now I prefer to

live apart.... The Indians, so the poet says, when on the march, leave

their old and sick alone to die. I am a sick savage, and as such, I ask

my rights."

 

"Do you believe in the Great Spirit and the Happy Hunting Grounds?" I

asked gently, for I knew he had no Indian blood in his veins.

 

"Their religion is as good as many another, and quite as poetical."

 

"Then go into the forest and pray to your Great Spirit," I said. "Only

don't discredit him by being inconsiderate of others who would be kind

to you."

 

"Do I not do my work?" he asked, with rising anger.

 

"You are expected to do your work, but I am not speaking to you on that

subject. I want to know what you are thinking about while you are at

work."

 

"If you please, that is my own affair."