Джером К. Джером
Смешные рассказы / The Funny Stories
3. The letter
Bill and I got a piece of paper and a pencil and wrote the letter this way:
Ebenezer Dorset:
We have your boy in a place far from Summit. It is useless for you or the most skilful detectives to try to find him. The only term on which we will return the boy is this: we want fifteen hundred dollars. If you agree, send your answer in writing tonight at half-past eight. After crossing Owl Creek, on the road to Poplar Cove, there are three large trees, close to the fence of the wheat field[11]. There you will find a small box. The messenger will place the answer in this box and return immediately to Summit.
If you attempt any treachery, you will never see your boy again.
If you pay the money, he will be returned to you safe in three hours. These terms are final, and if you do not accept them, no further communication will be attempted.
TWO DESPERATE MEN.
I addressed this letter to Dorset, and put it in my pocket. As I was about to start[12], the kid comes up to me and says:
“Aw, Snake-eye, you said I could play the Black Scout while you were gone.”
“Play it, of course, Mr. Bill will play with you. What kind of a game is it?”
“I'm the Black Scout,” says Red Chief, “and I have to ride to warn the settlers that the Indians are coming. I'm tired of playing Indian myself. I want to be the Black Scout.”
“All right,” I say. “It sounds nice to me. I guess Mr. Bill will help you.”
“What am I to do?” asks Bill, looking at the kid suspiciously.
“You are the horse,” says Black Scout. “Get down on your hands and knees. How can I ride without a horse?”
Bill gets down on his all fours[13].
“How far is it, kid?” he asks.
“Ninety miles,” says the Black Scout. “And you have to get there on time. Whoa!”
The Black Scout jumps on Bill's back and digs his heels in his side.
Bill says, “Hurry back, Sam, as soon as you can.”
When I got back to the cave Bill and the boy were not there. So I lighted my pipe and sat down to wait.
In half an hour I heard the noise in the bushes, and Bill came out. Behind him was the kid, stepping softly like a scout, with a broad grin on his face. Bill stopped, took off his hat and wiped his face with a red handkerchief. The kid stopped about eight feet behind him.
“Sam,” says Bill, “The boy is gone. I have sent him home.”
“What's the problem, Bill?” I ask him.
“I was rode,” says Bill, “the ninety miles. Then, when the settlers were saved, the boy gave me some sand to eat. And then, for an hour I had to try to explain him why there is nothin' in holes, how a road can run both ways and what makes the grass green. I took him by the neck and dragged him down the mountain.
“Now he's gone,” – continues Bill – “Gone home. I showed him the road to Summit and kicked him about eight feet nearer there at one kick. I'm sorry we lose the ransom.”
Bill was puffing, but there was a look of peace and content[14] on his rose-pink face.
4. The answer
“Bill,” I say, “Don't you have any heart diseases?”
“No, why[15]?”
“Then you should turn around”.
Bill turns and sees the boy, sits down on the ground and begins to pluck at grass and little sticks. For an hour I was afraid for his mind. And then I told him that my plan was to make the whole job immediately and that we would get the ransom by midnight. So Bill agreed to give the kid a smile and a promise to play the Russian in a Japanese war with him as soon as he felt a little better.
Exactly on time, a boy rides up the road on a bicycle, sees the box, puts a piece of paper into it and pedals away back to Summit.
I waited for an hour and then I got down from the tree, got the note and was back at the cave in another half an hour. I opened the note and read it to Bill.
Two Desperate Men.
Gentlemen: I got your letter. I think you ask too much, and I make you my offer, which I believe you will accept. You bring Johnny home and pay me two hundred and fifty dollars, and I agree to take him back. I advise you to come at night, because the neighbours believe he is lost, and I couldn't be responsible for what they would do to anybody who brought him back.
Very respectfully,EBENEZER DORSET.
“Sam,” said Bill, “what's two hundred and fifty dollars? We've got the money. One more night of this kid will send me in Bedlam. You aren't going to let the chance go[16]?”
I wasn't.
We took him home that night. We made him go by telling him that his father bought a silver-mounted gun and a pair of moccasins for him, and we were going to hunt bears the next day.
When the kid found out that we were going to leave him at home, he started to cry and grabbed Bill's leg. His father peeled him away gradually, like a plaster.
“How long can you hold him?” asks Bill.
“I'm not as strong as I used to be,” says old Dorset, “but I think I can promise you ten minutes.”
“Enough,” says Bill. “In ten minutes I can cross the Central, Southern, Middle Western States and get to the Canadian border.”
And, as dark as it was, and as fat as Bill was, and as good a runner as I am, he was a mile and a half out of Summit before I could catch up with him.
Luck
Mark Twain
1. The student
It was at a banquet in London in honor of one of the two or three English military names of this generation. For some reasons I will not tell his real name and titles, and call him Lieutenant-General Lord Arthur Scoresby… What a fascination there is in a famous name!
I looked, and looked, and looked at him, searching, noting: the quietness, the noble gravity; the simple honesty.
The priest at my left was my friend – priest now, but he spent the first half of his life in the camp and field, and as an instructor in the military school at Woolwich. Just at the moment I was talking about, a singular light blinked in his eyes, and he leaned down and whispered to me – pointing at the hero of the banquet: 'Privately – his glory is an accident – just a result of luck.'
This was a great surprise to me. If its subject was Napoleon, or Socrates, or Solomon, my shock could not be greater.
Some days later came the explanation of this strange phrase, and this is what my friend told me.
“About forty years ago I was an instructor in the military academy at Woolwich. I was in one of the sections when young Scoresby passed his examination. Other students answered brightly, while he – dear me, he didn't know anything. He was good, and sweet, and lovable; and so it was painful to see him stand there and give stupid answers. I said to myself, that after the next exam he could be excluded; so it will be an act of charity to help him as much as I can.
I found out that he knew a little of Caesar's history; and he didn't know anything else. I trained him like a slave on questions about Caesar, which I knew would be used in test. If you'll believe me, he passed the exam brilliantly! He even got compliments, while others, who knew a thousand times more than he, were criticized. By some strangely lucky accident – an accident that happens once in a century – he was not asked any other questions except from those he prepared.
Well, during his course I helped him, with the feeling which a mother feels for a crippled child; and he always saved himself – just by miracle.
The exam that would kill him was mathematics. I decided to make his death as easy as I could; so trained him, just on the questions which the examiner would certainly use. Well, sir, try to guess the result: to my horror, he took the first prize!
Sleep! There was no more sleep for me for a week. My conscience tortured me day and night. What have I done! I only wanted to ease the poor youth's fall – I never dreamed of such results. I felt as the creator of Frankenstein. Here was a wooden-head and I give him the chance to make a brilliant career.”
2. The soldier
“The Crimean war just started. I waited for the news. It came. And it shocked me. He was a captain now! Better men grow old in the service before they get a rank like that. Who could know that they put such responsibility on his green shoulders! I thought my hair would turn white.
I said to myself that I am responsible for this, and I must go with him and protect the country from him. So I took my poor little capital that I saved up through years of work and economy and bought a place in his regiment.
And there – oh dear, it was awful. Mistakes? All he did was a mistake. But, you see, nobody understood his secret – they took his idiotic mistakes for inspirations of genius; they did! His smallest mistakes could make a normal man cry; and they made me cry. And the strangest thing was the fact that every new mistake he made increased his reputation! I said to myself: he'll get so high that when they finally understand everything, it will be like the sun fell out of the sky.
He still went up, over the dead bodies, until at last, in the hottest moment of the battle our colonel died, and my heart jumped into my mouth, because Scoresby was next in rank!
The battle was awfully hot; the allies were giving way all over the field[17]. Our regiment occupied a very important position; one mistake could destroy everything. At this critical moment, our fool orders the regiment to change its place and occupy a neighboring hill. 'This is the end,' I said to myself.
And we went away, and were very close to the hill. And what did we find? An entire Russian army! And what happened? Were we killed? That is what would happen in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred. But no; those Russians thought that a single regiment would not walk around there at such a time. It must be the whole English army; so they turned and ran away, and we after them; and the defeat of the allies turned into a victory! Marshal Canrobert sent for Scoresby, and hugged him, and awarded him on the field in presence of all the armies!
And what was Scoresby's mistake? Just the mistaking his right hand and his left – that was all. An order came to him to support our right; and instead he went to the left. But he won the name as a military genius, and his glory will never end.
He is good and sweet and lovable, but he doesn't know enough to come in home when it rains[18]. He was a soldier in all our wars for half a generation; he made all the mistakes he could, but never made a mistake that didn't make him a knight or a baronet or a lord or something. Look at his chest; at his medals. Well, sir, each of them is a proof of a stupidity; and, together, they are proof that the best thing in the world is to be born lucky.
