Horatio Alger, Jr. - "Brave and Bold"

F. Colburn Adams - "An Outcast"

Robert Neilson Stephens - "Tales From Bohemia"

W. D. Howells - "The Lady of the Aroostook"

Editorial
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

The Spread Eagle and Other Stories

G >> Gouverneur Morris >> The Spread Eagle and Other Stories




The judge rapped for order upon the head of a flour-barrel behind which
he sat. "Lou Garou," he said, "you are accused of having shot down Ruddy
Boyd in cold blood, after having called him to the door of his cabin for
that purpose on the twenty-ninth of last month. Guilty or not guilty?"

"Sure," said Lou Garou timidly, and nodding his head. "I shot him."

"Why?" asked the judge.

For answer Lou Garou shrugged his shoulders and pointed to the chief
witness, a woman who had wound her head in a dark veil so that her face
could not be seen. "Make her take that veil off," said he in a shrill
voice, "and you'll see why I shot him."

The woman rose without embarrassment and removed her veil. But, unless
in the prisoner's eyes, she was not beautiful.

"Thank you, madam," said the judge, after an embarrassed pause. "Ahem!"
And he addressed the prisoner. "Your answer has its romantic value, Lou
Garou, but the court is unable to attach to it any ethical significance
whatsoever. Did you shoot Ruddy Boyd because of this lady's appearance
in general, or because of her left eye in particular, which I note has
been blackened as if by a blow?"

"Oh, I did that," said Lou Garou naively.

"Sit down!" thundered the judge. The foreman of the jury, a South
Carolinian by birth, had risen, revolver in hand, with the evident
intention of executing the prisoner on the spot. "You have sworn to
abide by the finding of the court," continued the judge angrily. "If you
don't put up that gun I'll blow your damned head off."

The juror, who was not without a sense of the ridiculous, smiled and sat
down.

"You have pleaded guilty," resumed the judge sternly, "to the charge of
murder. You have given a reason. You have either said too much or too
little. If you are unable further to justify your cold-blooded and
intemperate act, you shall hang."

"What do you want me to say?" whined Lou Garou.

"I want you to tell the court," said the judge, "why you shot Ruddy
Boyd. If it is possible for you to justify that act I want you to do it.
The court, representing, as it does, the justice of the land, has a
leaning, a bias, toward mercy. Stand up and tell us your story from the
beginning."

The prisoner once more indicated the woman. "About then," he said, "I
had nothin' but Jenny--and twenty dollars gold that I had loaned to
Ruddy Boyd. Hans"--he pointed to a stout German sitting on the
Carolinian's left--"wouldn't give me any more credit at the store." He
whined and sniffled. "I'm not blaming you one mite, Hans," he said, "but
I had to have flour and bacon, and all I had was twenty dollars gold
that Ruddy owed me. So I says, 'Jenny, I'll step over to Ruddy's shack
and ask him for that money.' She says, 'Think you'd better?' and I says,
'Sure.' So she puts me up a snack of lunch, and I takes my rifle and
starts. Ruddy was in his ditch (having shovelled out the snow), and I
says, 'Ruddy, how about that twenty?' You all know what a nice hearty
way Ruddy had with him--outside. He slaps his thigh, and laughs, and
looks astonished, and then he says: 'My Gawd, Lou, if I hadn't clean
forgot! Now ain't that funny?' So I laughs, too, and says, 'It do seem
kind of funny, and how about it?' 'Now, Lou,' says he, 'you've come on
me sudden, and caught me awkward. I ain't got a dime's worth of change.
But tell you what: I'll give you a check.'

"I says, 'On what bank?'

"He says, 'Oh, Hans over at the store--_he_ knows me--'"

All eyes were turned on the German. Lou Garou continued:

"Ruddy says: 'Hans dassen't not cash it. He's scared of me, the
pot-bellied old fool."

The stout German blinked behind his horn spectacles. He feared neither
God nor man, but he was very patient. He made no remark.

"'If Hans won't,' says Ruddy, 'Stewart sure will!'"

The foreman of the jury rose like a spring slowly uncoiling. He looked
like a snake ready to strike. "May I inquire," he drawled, "what reason
the late lamented gave for supposing that I would honor his
wuffless paper?"

Lou Garou sniffled with embarrassment and looked appealingly at the
judge.

"Tell him," ordered the latter.

"Mind, then," said Lou Garou, "it was him said it, not me."

"What was said?" glinted the foreman.

"Something," said Lou Garou in a small still voice like that which is
said to appertain to conscience, "something about him having give you a
terrible lickin' once, that you'd never got over. He says, 'If Stewart
won't cash it, tell him I'll step over and kick the stuffin' out
of him.'"

The juror on the left end of the front row stood up.

"Did he say anything about me?" he asked.

"Nothin' particular, Jimmy," said Lou Garou. "He only said somethin'
general, like 'them bally-washed hawgs over to the Central Store,' I
think it was."

"The court," said the judge stiffly, "knows the deceased to have been a
worthless braggart. Proceed with your story."

"Long and short of it was," said Lou Garou, "we arranged that Ruddy
himself was to get the check cashed and bring me the money the next
Thursday. He swears on his honor he won't keep me waitin' no longer. So
I steps off and eats my lunch, and goes home and tells Jenny how it was.

"'Hope you get it,' says she. 'I know _him._'

"It so happened," continued Lou Garou, "Thursday come, and no Ruddy. No
Ruddy, Friday. Saturday I see the weather was bankin' up black for snow,
so I says: 'Jenny, it's credit or bust. I'll step up to the store and
talk to Hans.' So Jenny puts me up a snack of lunch, and I goes to see
Hans. Hans," said Lou Garou, addressing that juror directly, "did I or
didn't I come to see you that Saturday?"

Hans nodded.

"Did you or didn't you let me have some flour and bacon on tick?"

"I did nod," said Hans.

Lou Garou turned once more to the judge. "So I goes home," he said, "and
finds my chairs broke, and my table upside down, and the dishes broke,
and Jenny gone."

There was a mild sensation in the court.

"I casts about for signs, and pretty soon I finds a wisp of red hair,
roots an' all, I says, 'Ruddy's hair,' I says. 'He's bin and gone.'

"So I takes my gun and starts for Ruddy's, over the mountain. It's hours
shorter than by the valley, for them that has good legs.

"I was goin' down the other side of the mountain when it seems to me I
hears voices. I bears to the left, and looks down the mountain, and
yonder I sees a man and a woman on the valley path to Ruddy's. The man
he wants the woman to go on. The woman she wants to go back. I can hear
their voices loud and mad, but not their words. Pretty soon Ruddy he
takes Jenny by the arm and twists it--very slow--tighter and tighter.
She sinks to the ground. He goes on twistin'. Pretty soon she indicates
that she has enough. He helps her up with a kick, and they goes on."

The foreman of the jury rose. "Your honor," he said, "it is an obvious
case of _raptae puellae_. In my opinion the prisoner was more than
justified in shooting the man Ruddy Boyd like a dog."

"Sit down," said the judge.

Lou Garou, somewhat excited by painful recollections, went on in a
stronger voice. "I puts up my hind sight to three hundred yards and
draws a bead on Ruddy, between the shoulders. Then I lowers my piece and
uncocks her. 'Stop a bit,' I says. 'How about that twenty?'

It's gettin' dark, and I follows them to Ruddy's. I hides my gun in a
bush and knocks on the door. Ruddy comes out showin' his big teeth and
laughin.' He closes the door behind him.

'Come for that twenty, Lou?' says he.

'Sure,' says I.

He thinks a minute, then he laughs and turns and flings open the door.
'Come in,' he says.

I goes in.

'Hallo!' says he, like he was awful surprised. 'Here's a friend of
yours, Lou. Well, I never!'

I sees Jenny sittin' in a corner, tied hand and foot. I says, 'Hallo,
Jenny'; she says, 'Hallo, Lou.' Then I turns to Ruddy. 'How about that
twenty?' I says.

'Well, I'm damned!' he says. 'All he thinks about is his twenty. Well,
here you are.'

He goes down into his pocket and fetches up a slug, and I pockets it.

'There,' says he; 'you've got yours, and I've got mine.'

I don't find nothin' much to say, so I says, 'Well, good-night all, I'll
be goin'.'

Then Jenny speaks up. 'Ain't you goin' to do nothin'?' she says.

"'Why, Jenny,' says I 'what can _I_ do?'

"'All right for you,' she says. 'Turn me loose, Ruddy; no need to keep
me tied after that.'

"So I says 'Good-night' again and goes. Ruddy comes to the door and
watches me. I looks back once and waves my hand, but he don't make no
sign. I says to myself, 'I can see him because of the light at his back,
but he can't see me.' So I makes for my gun, finds her, turns, and
there's Ruddy still standin' at the door lookin' after me into the dark.
It was a pot shot. Then I goes back, and steps over Ruddy into the shack
and unties Jenny.

"'Lou,' she says, 'I thought I knowed you inside out. But you fooled
_me_!'

"By reason of the late hour we stops that night in Ruddy's shack, and
that's all."

The prisoner, after shuffling his feet uncertainly, sat down.

"Madam," said the judge, "may I ask you to rise?"

The woman stood up; not unhandsome in a hard, bold way, except for her
black eye.

"Madam," said the judge, "is what the prisoner has told us, in so far as
it concerns you, true?"

"Every word of it."

"The man Ruddy Boyd used violence to make you go with him?"

"He twisted my arm and cramped my little finger till I couldn't bear
the pain."

"You are, I take it, the prisoner's wife?"

The color mounted slowly into the woman's cheeks. She hesitated, choked
upon her words. The prisoner sprang to his feet.

"Your honor," he cried, "in a question of life or death like this Jenny
and me we speaks the truth, and nothin' but the truth. She's _not_ my
wife. But I'm goin' to marry her, and make an honest woman of her--at
the foot of the gallows, if you decide that way. No, sir; she was Ruddy
Boyd's wife."

There was a dead silence, broken by the sounds of the horses and cows
munching their fodder. The foreman of the jury uncoiled slowly.

"Your honor," he drawled, "I can find it in my heart to pass over the
exact married status of the lady, but I cannot find it in my heart to
pass over without explanation the black eye which the prisoner confesses
to have given her."

Lou Garou turned upon the foreman like a rat at bay. "That night in the
shack," he cried, "I dreams that Ruddy comes to life. Jenny she hears me
moanin' in my sleep, and she sits up and bends over to see what's the
matter. I think it's Ruddy bendin' over to choke me, and I hits out!"

"That's true, every word of it!" cried the woman. "He hit me in his
sleep. And when he found out what he'd done he cried over me, and he
kissed the place and made it well!" Her voice broke and ran off into
a sob.

The jury acquitted the prisoner without leaving their seats. One by one
they shook hands with him, and with the woman.

"I propose," said the foreman, "that by a unanimous vote we change this
court-house into a house of worship. It will not be a legal marriage
precisely, but it will answer until we can get hold of a minister after
the spring break up."

The motion was carried.

The last man to congratulate the happy pair was the German Hans.
"Wheneffer," he said, "you need a parrel of flour or something, you
comes to me py my store."




THE MONITOR AND THE "MERRIMAC"


THE STORY OF A PANIC

I

Two long-faced young men and one old man with a long face sat upon the
veranda of the Country Club of Westchester, and looked, now into the
depths of pewter mugs containing mint and ice among other things, and
now across Pelham Bay to the narrow pass of water between Fort Schuyler
and Willets Point. Through this pass the evening fleet of Sound steamers
had already torn with freight and passengers for New Haven, Newport,
Fall River, and Portland; and had already disappeared behind City Island
Point, and in such close order that it had looked as if the _Peck_,
which led, had been towing the others. The first waves from the
paddle-wheels of the great ships had crossed the three miles of
intervening bay, and were slapping at the base of the seawall that
supported the country club pigeon grounds and lawn-tennis terraces, when
another vessel came slowly and haughtily into view from between the
forts. She was as black as the king of England's brougham, and as smart;
her two masts and her great single funnel were stepped with the most
insolent rake imaginable. Here and there where the light of the setting
sun smote upon polished brass she shone as with pools of fire.

"There she is," said Powers. He had been sitting in his shirt sleeves,
but now he rose and put on his coat as if the sight of the huge and
proud yacht had chilled him. Brett, with a petulant slap, killed a
swollen mosquito against his black silk ankle bone. The old man,
Callender, put his hand to his forehead as if trying to remember
something; and the yacht, steaming slower and slower, and yet, as it
seemed, with more and more grandeur and pride of place--as if she knew
that she gave to the whole bayscape, and the pale Long Island shore
against which she moved in strong relief, an irrefutable note of
dignity--presently stopped and anchored, midway between the forts and
City Island Point; then she began to swing with the tide, until she
faced New York City, from which she had just come.

Callender took his hand from his forehead. He had remembered.

"Young gentlemen," he said, "that yacht of Merriman's has been reminding
me every afternoon for a month of something, and I've just thought what.
You remember one day the _Merrimac_ came down the James, very slowly,
and sunk the _Cumberland_, and damaged and frightened the Union fleet
into fits, just the way Merriman has been going down to Wall Street
every morning and frightening us into fits? Well, instead of finishing
the work then and there, she suddenly quit and steamed off up the river
in the same insolent, don't-give-a-hoot way that Merriman comes up from
Wall Street every afternoon. Of course, when the _Merrimac_ came down to
finish destroying the fleet the next day, the _Monitor_ had arrived
during the night and gave her fits, and they called the whole thing off.
Anyhow, it's that going-home-to-sleep-on-it expression of the
_Merrimac's_ that I've been seeing in the _Sappho_."

"You were on the _Monitor_, weren't you?" asked Powers cheerfully.

The old man did not answer, but he was quite willing that Powers and
Brett, and the whole world for that matter, should think that he had
been. Powers and Brett, though in no cheerful mood, exchanged winks.

"I don't see why history shouldn't repeat itself," said Powers.

"You don't!" said Brett. "Why, because there isn't any _Monitor_ waiting
for Merriman off Wall Street."

"And just like the Civil War," said Callender, "this trouble in the
street is a rich man's quarrel and a poor man's war. Just because old
Merriman is gunning for Waters, you, and I, and the rest of us are about
to go up the spout."

Callender was a jaunty old man, tall, of commanding presence and smart
clothes. His white mustache was the epitome of close-cropped neatness.
When he lost money at poker his brown eyes held exactly the same twinkle
as when he won, and it was current among the young men that he had
played greatly in his day--great games for great stakes. Sometimes he
had made heavy winnings, sometimes he had faced ruin; sometimes his
family went to Newport for the summer and entertained; sometimes they
went to a hotel somewhere in some mountains or other, where they didn't
even have a parlor to themselves. But this summer they were living on in
the town house, keeping just enough rooms open, and a few servants who
had weathered former panics, and who were willing to eat dry bread in
bad times for the sake of the plentiful golden butter that they knew was
to be expected when the country believed in its own prosperity and
future. Just now the country believed that it was going to the dogs. And
Mr. Merriman, the banker, had chosen the opportunity to go gunning for
Mr. Waters, the railroad man. The quarrel between the great men was
personal; and so because of a couple of nasty tempers people were being
ruined daily, honest stocks were selling far below their intrinsic
value, United States Steel had been obliged to cut wages, there was a
strike on in the Pennsylvania coal fields, and the Callenders, as I have
said, were not even going to the cheapest mountain top for the summer.
Brett alone was glad of this, because it meant that little Miss
Callender would occasionally come out to the country club for a game of
tennis and a swim, and, although she had refused to marry him on twenty
distinct occasions, he was not a young man to be easily put from his
purpose. Nor did little Miss Callender propose to be relinquished by him
just yet; and she threw into each refusal just the proper amount of
gentleness and startled-fawn expression to insure another proposal
within a month.

Brett, looking upon Callender as his probable father-in-law, turned to
the old gentleman and said, with guileful innocence:

"Isn't there anything you can do, sir, to hold Merriman off? Powers and
I are in the market a little, but our customers are in heavy, and the
way things are going we've got to break whether we like it or not."

Ordinarily Callender would have pretended that he could have checkmated
Merriman if he had wanted to--for in some things he was a child, and it
humored him to pretend, and to intimate, and to look wise; but on the
present occasion, and much to Powers's and Brett's consternation, he
began to speak to them gravely, and confidentially, and a little
pitifully. They had never before seen him other than jaunty and
debonair, whether his family were at Newport or in the mountains.

"It's all very well for you boys," he said; "you have youth and
resiliency on your side. No matter what happens to you now, in money or
in love, you can come again. But we old fellows, buying and selling with
one foot in the grave, with families accustomed to luxury dependent on
us"--he paused and tugged at his neatly ordered necktie as if to free
his throat for the passage of more air--"some of us old fellows," he
said, "if we go now can never come again--never."

He rose abruptly and walked into the house without a word more; but
Brett, after hesitating a moment, followed him. Mr. Callender had
stopped in front of the "Delinquent List." Seeing Brett at his elbow, he
pointed with a well-groomed finger to his own name at the beginning
of the C's.

"If I died to-night," he said, neither gravely nor jocosely, but as if
rather interested to know whether he would or would not, "the club would
have a hard time to collect that sixteen dollars."

"Are you serious, sir?" Brett asked.

"If to-morrow is a repetition of to-day," said Mr. Callender, "you will
see the name of Callender & Co. in the evening papers." His lips
trembled slightly under his close-cropped mustache.

"Then," said Brett, "this is a good opportunity to ask you, sir, if you
have any objection to me as a candidate for your youngest daughter."

Mr. Callender raised his eyebrows. So small a thing as contemplated
matrimony did not disturb him under the circumstances.

"My boy," he said, "I take it you are in earnest. I don't object to you.
I am sure nobody does."

"Oh, yes," said Brett; "_she_ does."

He had succeeded in making Mr. Callender laugh.

"But," Brett went on, "I'd like your permission to go on trying."

"You have it," said her father. "Will you and Powers dine with me?"

"No," said Brett. "Speaking as candidate to be your son-in-law, you
cannot afford to give us dinner; and in the same way I cannot afford to
buy dinner for you and Powers. So Powers will have to be host and pay
for everything. I shall explain it to him.... But look here, sir, are
you really up against it?"

To Brett's consternation, Callender suddenly buried his face in his
hands and groaned aloud.

"Don't," said Brett; "some one's coming."

Callender recovered his usual poise with a great effort. But no one
came.

"As far as my wishes go, sir," said Brett, "I'm your son. You never had
a son, did you? If you had a son, and if he were young and resilient,
you'd talk to him and explain to him, and in that way, perhaps, you'd
get to see things so clearly in your own mind that you'd be able to
think a way out. Why don't you talk to me as if I were your son? You see
I want to be so very much, and that's half the battle."

Callender often joked about his affairs, but he never talked about them.
Now, however, he looked for a moment keenly into the young man's frank
and intelligent face, hesitated, and then, with a grave and courtly bow,
he waved his hand toward two deep chairs that stood in the corner of the
room half facing each other, as if they themselves were engaged in
conversation.

Twenty minutes later Callender went upstairs to dress for dinner, but
Brett rejoined Powers on the piazza. He sat down without looking at
Powers or speaking to him, and his eyes, crossing the darkening bay,
rested once more on the lordly silhouette of the _Sappho_. In the
failing light she had lost something of her emphatic outline, and was
beginning to melt, as it were, into the shore.

Brett and Powers were partners. Powers was the floor member of the firm
and Brett ran the office. But they were partners in more ways than the
one, and had been ever since they could remember. As little boys they
had owned things in common without dispute. At St. Marks Powers had
pitched for the nine, and Brett had caught. In their senior year at New
Haven they had played these positions to advantage, both against Harvard
and Princeton. After graduation they had given a year to going around
the world. In Bengal they had shot a tiger, each giving it a mortal
wound. In Siam they had won the doubles championship at lawn tennis.
When one rode on the water wagon the other sat beside him, and vice
versa. Powers's family loved Brett almost as much as they loved Powers,
and if Brett had had a family it would probably have felt about Powers
in the same way.

As far as volume of business and legitimate commissions went, their firm
was a success. It could execute orders with precision, despatch, and
honesty. It could keep its mouth shut. But it had not yet learned to
keep out of the market on its own account. Regularly as a clock ticks
its profits were wiped out in speculation. The young men believed in the
future of the country, and wanted to get rich quick, not because they
were greedy, but because that desire is part of the average American's
nature and equipment. Gradually, however, they were "getting wise," as
the saying is. And they had taken a solemn oath and shaken hands upon
it, that if ever they got out of their present difficulties they would
never again tempt the goddess of fortune.

"Old man's in bad, I guess," said Powers.

"I shouldn't wonder," said Brett, and was ashamed to feel that he must
not be more frank with his partner. "We're all in bad."

"The _Cumberland_ has been sunk," said Powers, "and the rest of us are
aground and helpless, waiting for the _Merrimac_ to come down the river
in the morning." He shook his fist at the distant _Sappho_. "Why," he
said, "even if we knew what he knows it's too late to do anything,
unless _he_ does it. And he won't. He won't quit firing until Waters
blows up."

"I've a good notion," said Brett, "to get out my pigeon gun, take the
club launch, board the _Sappho_ about midnight, hold the gun to old
Merriman's head, and make him promise to save the country; or else make
him put to sea, and keep him there. If he were kidnapped and couldn't
unload any more securities, the market would pull up by itself." The
young men chuckled, for the idea amused them in spite of their troubles.

By a common impulse they turned and looked at the club's thirty-foot
naphtha launch at anchor off the club's dock; and by a common impulse
they both pointed at her, and both exclaimed:

"The _Monitor_!"

Then, of course, they were very careful not to say anything more until
they had crooked together the little fingers of their right hands, and
in silence registered a wish each. Then each spoke the name of a famous
poet, and the spell was ended.

"What did you wish?" said Brett idly.

Powers could be very courtly and old fashioned.

"My dear boy," he said, "I fancy that I wished for you just what you
wished for yourself."

Before this they had never spoken about her to each other.

"I didn't know that you knew," said Brett. "Thanks."

They shook hands. Then Brett broke into his gay, happy laugh.

"That," said he, "is why you have to pay for dinner for Mr. Callender
and me."

"Are we to dine?" asked Powers, "before attacking the _Merrimac_?"

"Always," assented Brett, "and we are to dress first."

The two young men rose and went into the house, Powers resting his hand
affectionately on Brett's further shoulder. It was so that they had come
off the field after striking out Harvard's last chance to score.

At dinner Mr. Callender, as became his age and experience, told the
young men many clean and amusing stories. Though the clouds were thick
about his head he had recovered his poise and his twinkling eye of the
good loser. Let his night be sleepless, let the morrow crush him, but
let his young friends remember that he had gone to his execution calm,
courteous, and amusing, his mustache trimmed, his face close-shaved, his
nails clean and polished. They had often, he knew, laughed at him for
his pretensions, and his affectation of mysterious knowledge, and all
his little vanities and superiorities, but they would remember him for
the very real nerve and courage that he was showing, and knew that he
was showing. The old gentleman took pleasure in thinking that although
he was about to fail in affairs, he was not going to fail in character.
He even began to make vague plans for trying again, and when, after a
long dinner, they pushed back their chairs and rose from the table,
there was a youthful resiliency in the voice with which he challenged
Powers to a game of piquet.

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