Charles William Burkett - "Agriculture for Beginners"

Unknown - "A Museum for Young Gentlemen and Ladies"

Richard Kaufmann - "Fra det moderne Frankrig"

Ernest Seton Thompson - "The Biography of a Grizzly"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
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.

Torchy, Private Sec.

S >> Sewell Ford >> Torchy, Private Sec.




"Gather up those papers and come along," says he. "I think we're ready
now to talk to Gedney Nash."

I smothered a gasp. Was he nutty, or what? You know you don't drop in
offhand on a man like Gedney Nash, same as you would on a shrimp bank
president, or a corporation head. You hear a lot about him, of
course,--now givin' a million to charity, then bein' denounced as a
national highway robber,--but you don't see him. Anyway, I never knew of
anyone who did. He's the man behind, the one that pulls the strings.
Course, he's supposed to be at the head of International Utilities, but
he claims not to hold any office. And you know what happened when
Congress tried to get him before an investigatin' committee. All that
showed up was a squad of lawyers, who announced they was ready to
answer any questions they couldn't file an exception to, and three
doctors with affidavits to prove that Mr. Nash was about to expire from
as many incurable diseases. So Congress gave it up.

Yet here we was, pikin' downtown without any notice, expectin' to find
him as easy as if he was a traffic cop on a fixed post. Well, we didn't.
The minute we blows into the arcade and begins to ask for him, up slides
a smooth-talkin' buildin' detective who listens polite what I feed him
and suggests that if we wait a minute he'll call up the gen'ral offices.
Which he does and reports that they've no idea where Mr. Nash can be
found. Maybe he's gone to the mountains, or over to his Long Island
place, or abroad on a vacation.

"Tommyrot!" says Old Hickory. "Gedney Nash never took a vacation in his
life. I know he's in New York now."

The gentleman sleuth shrugs his shoulders and allows that if Mr. Ellins
ain't satisfied he might go up to Floor 11 and ask for himself. So up we
went. Ever in the Tractions Buildin'? Say, it's like bein' caught in a
fog down the bay,--all silence and myst'ry. I expect it's the
headquarters of a hundred or more diff'rent corporations, all tied up
some way or other with I. U. interests; but on the doors never the name
of one shows: just "Mr. So-and-So," "Mr. Whadye Callum," "Mr.
This-and-That." Clerks hurry by you with papers in their hands, walkin'
soft on rubber heels. They tap respectful on a door, it opens silent,
they disappear. When they meet in the corridors they pass without
hailin', without even a look. You feel that there's something doin'
around you, something big and important. But the gears don't give out
any hum. It's like a game of blind man's bluff played in the dark.

And the sharp-eyed, gray-haired gent we talked to through the brass
gratin' acted like he'd never heard the name Gedney Nash before. When
Old Hickory cuts loose with the tabasco remarks at him he only smiles
patient and insists that if he can locate Mr. Nash, which he doubts,
he'll do his best to arrange an interview. It may take a day, or a week,
or a month, but----

"Bah!" snorts Old Hickory, turnin' on his heel, and he cusses eloquent
all the way down and out to the taxi.

"Seems to me I've heard how Mr. Nash uses a private elevator," I
suggests.

"Quite like him," says Old Hickory. "Think you could find it?"

"I could make a stab," says I.

But at that I knew I was kiddin' myself. Why not? Ain't there been times
when whole bunches of live-wire reporters, not to mention relays of
court deputies, have raked New York with a fine-tooth comb, lookin' for
Gedney Nash, without even gettin' so much as a glimpse of his limousine
rollin' round a corner.

"Suppose we circle the block once or twice, while I tear off a few
Sherlock Holmes thoughts?" says I.

Mr. Ellins sniffs scornful; but he'd gone the limit himself, so he gives
the directions. I leaned back, shut my eyes, and tried to guess how a
foxy old guy like Nash would fix it up so he could do the unseen duck
off Broadway into his private office. Was it a tunnel from the subway
through the boiler basement, or a bridge from the next skyscraper,
or---- But the sight of a blue cap made me ditch this dream stuff. Funny
I hadn't thought of that line before--and me an A. D. T. once myself!

"Hey, you!" I calls out the window. "Wait up, Cabby, while we take on a
passenger. Yes, you, Skinny. Hop in here. Ah, what for would we be
kidnappin' a remnant like you? It's your birthday, ain't it? And the
gentleman here has a present for you--a whole dollar. Eh, Mr. Ellins?"

Old Hickory looks sort of puzzled; but he forks out the singleton, and
the messenger climbs in after it. A chunky, round-faced kid he was too.
I pushed him into one of the foldin' front seats and proceeds to apply
the pump.

"What station do you run from, Sport?" says I.

"Number six," says he.

"Oh, yes," says I. "Just back of the Exchange. And is old Connolly chief
down there still?"

"Yes, Sir," says he.

"Give him my regards when you get back," says I, "and tell him Torchy
says he's a flivver."

The kid grins enthusiastic.

"By the way," I goes on, "who's he sendin' out with the Nash
work--Gedney Nash's, you know?"

"Number 17," says he, "Loppy Miller."

"What!" says I. "Old Loppy carryin' the book yet? Why, he had grown kids
when I wore the stripes. Well, well! Cagy old duffer, Loppy. Ever ask
him where he delivers the Nash business?"

"Yep," says the youngster, "and he near got me fired for it."

"But you found out, didn't you?" says I.

He glances at me suspicious and rolls his eyes. "M-m-m-m," says he,
shakin' his head.

"Ah, come!" says I. "You don't mean that a real sure-fire like you could
be shunted that way? There'd be no harm in your givin' a guess, and if
it was right--well, we could run that birthday stake up five more;
couldn't we, Mr. Ellins?"

Old Hickory nods, and passes me a five-spot prompt.

"Well?" says I, wavin' it careless.

The kid might have been scared, but he had the kale-itch in his fingers.
"All I know," says he, "is that Loppy allus goes into the William Street
lobby of the Farmers' National."

"Go on!" says I. "That don't come within two numbers of backin' against
the Traction Buildin'."

"But Loppy allus does," he insists. "There's a door to the right, just
beyond the teller's window. But you can't get past the gink in the gray
helmet. I tried once."

"Secret entrance, eh?" says I. "Sounds convincin'. Anyway, I got your
number. So here's your five. Invest it in baby bonds, and don't let on
to Mother. You're six to the good, and your job safe. By-by!"

"What now?" says Old Hickory. "Shall we try the secret door?"

"Not unless we're prepared to do strong arm work on the guard," says I.
"No. What we got to frame up now is a good excuse. Let's see, you can't
ring in as one of the fam'ly, can you?"

"Not as any relative of Gedney's," says Old Hickory. "I'm not built
right."

"How about his weak points?" says I. "Know of any fads of his?"

"Why," says Mr. Ellins, "he is a good deal interested in landscape
gardening, and he goes in for fancy poultry, I believe."

"That's the line!" says I. "Poultry! Ain't there a store down near
Fulton Market where we could buy a sample?"

I was in too much of a rush to go into details, and it must have seemed
a batty performance to Old Hickory; but off we chases, and when we drove
up to the Farmers' National half an hour later I has a wicker cage in
each hand and Mr. Ellins has both fists full of poultry literature
displayed prominent. Sure enough too, we finds the door beyond the
teller's window, also the gink in the gray helmet. He's a husky-built
party, with narrow-set, suspicious eyes.

"Up to Mr. Nash's," says I casual, makin' a move to walk right past.

"Back up!" says he, steppin' square across the way. "What Mr. Nash?"

"Whadye mean, what Mr. Nash?" says I. "There ain't clusters of 'em, are
there? Mr. Gedney Nash, of course."

"Wrong street," says he. "Try around on Broadway."

"What a kidder!" says I. "But if you will delay the champion hen expert
of the country," and I nods to Old Hickory, "just send word up to Mr.
Nash that Mr. Skellings has come with that pair of silver-slashed blue
Orpingtons he wanted to see."

"Blue which?" says the guard.

"Ah, take a look!" says I. "Ain't they some birds? Gold medal winners,
both of 'em."

I holds open the paper wrappings while he inspects the cacklers. And,
believe me, they was the fanciest poultry specimens I'd ever seen!
Honest, they looked like they'd been got up for the pullets' annual
costume ball.

"And Mr. Nash," I goes on, "said Mr. Skellings was to bring 'em in this
way."

The guard takes another glance at Old Hickory, and that got him; for in
his high-crowned Panama the boss does look more like a fancy farmer than
he does like the head of the Corrugated.

"I'll see," says he, openin' a little closet and producin' a 'phone. He
was havin' some trouble too, tellin' someone just who we was, when I
cuts in.

"Ah, just describe the birds," says I. "Silver-slashed blue Orpingtons,
you know."

Does it work? Say, in less than two minutes we was being towed through a
windin' passage that fin'lly ends in front of a circular shaft with a
cute little elevator waitin' at the bottom.

"Pass two," says the guard.

Another minute and we're bein' shot up I don't know how many stories,
and are steppin' out into the swellest set of office rooms I was ever
in. A mahogany door opens, and in comes a wispy, yellow-skinned,
dried-up little old party with eyes like a rat. Didn't look much like
the pictures they print of him, but I guessed it was Gedney.

"Some prize Orpingtons, did I understand?" says he, in a soft, purry
voice. "I don't recall having----" Then he gets a good look at Old
Hickory, and his tone changes sudden. "What!" he snaps. "You, Ellins?
How did you get in here?"

"With those fool chickens," says the boss.

"But--but I didn't know," goes on Mr. Nash, "that you were interested in
that sort of thing."

"Glad to say I'm not," comes back Old Hickory. "Just a scheme of my
brilliant-haired young friend here to smuggle me into the sacred
presence. Great Zacharias, Nash! why don't you shut yourself in a steel
vault, and have done with it?"

Gedney bites his upper lip, annoyed. "I find it necessary," says he, "to
avoid interruptions. I presume, however, that you came on some errand of
importance?"

"I did," says Old Hickory. "I want to get a renewal of that Manistee
terminal lease."

Say, of all the scientific squirmin', Gedney Nash can put up the
slickest specimen. First off he lets on not to know a thing about it.
Well, perhaps it was true that International Utilities did control those
wharves: he really couldn't say. And besides that matter would be left
entirely to the discretion of----

"No, it won't," breaks in Old Hickory, shakin' a stubby forefinger at
him. "It's between us, Nash. You know what those terminal privileges
mean to us. We can't get on without them. And if you take 'em away, it's
a fight to a finish--that's all!"

"Sorry, Ellins," says Mr. Nash, "but I can do nothing."

"Wait," says Old Hickory. "Did you know that we held a big block of your
M., K. & T.'s? Well, we do. They happen to be first lien bonds too. And
M., K. & T. defaulted on its last interest coupons. Entirely
unnecessary, I know, but it throws the company open to a foreclosure
petition. Want us to put it in?"

"H-m-m-m!" says Mr. Nash. "Er--won't you sit down?"

Now if it had been two common, everyday parties, debatin' which owned a
yellow dog, they'd gone hoarse over it; but not these two plutes. Gedney
Nash asks Old Hickory only three more questions before he turns to the
wicker cages and begins admirin' the fancy poultry.

"Excellent specimens, excellent!" says he. "And in the pink of condition
too. I have a few Orpingtons on my place; but--oh, by the way, Ellins,
are these really intended for me?"

"With Torchy's compliments," says Old Hickory.

"By Jove!" says Gedney. "I--I'm greatly obliged--truly, I am. What
plumage! What hackles! And--er--just leave that terminal lease, will
you? I'll have it renewed and sent up. Would you mind too if I sent you
out by the Broadway entrance?"

I didn't mind, for one, and I guess the boss didn't; for the last office
we passes through was where the gray-haired gent camped watchful behind
the brass gratin'.

"Well, wouldn't that crimp you?" I remarks, givin' him the passin' grin.
"Our old friend Ananias, ain't it?"

And he never bats an eyelash.

But Gedney wa'n't in that class. Before closin' time up comes a
secretary with the lease all signed. I was in the boss's room when it's
delivered.

"Gee, Mr. Ellins!" says I. "You don't need any more mud baths, I guess."

All the rise that gets out of him is a flicker in the mouth corners.
"Young man," says he, "whose idea was it, taking you off the gate?"

"Mr. Robert's," says I.

"I am glad to learn," says he, "that Robert had occasional lapses into
sanity while I was away. What about your salary? Any ambitions in that
direction?"

"I only want what I'm worth," says I.

"Oh, be reasonable, Son," says he. "We must save something for the
stockholders, you know. Suppose we double what you're getting now? Will
that do?"

And the grin I carries out is that broad I has to go sideways through
the door.




CHAPTER V

SHOWING GILKEY THE WAY


I got to say this about Son-in-Law Ferdie: He's a help! Not constant,
you know; for there's times when it seems like his whole scheme of
usefulness was in providin' something to hang a pair of shell-rimmed
glasses on, and givin' Marjorie Ellins the right to change her name. But
outside of that, and furnishin' a comic relief to the rest of the
fam'ly, blamed if he don't come in real handy now and then.

Last Friday was a week, for a sample. I meets up with him as he's
driftin' aimless through the arcade, sort of caromin' round and round,
bein' bumped by the elevator rushers and watched suspicious by the floor
detective.

"What ho, Ferdie!" I sings out, grabbin' him by the elbow and swingin'
him out of the line of traffic. "This ain't no place to practice the
maxixe."

"I--I beg--oh, it's you, Torchy, is it?" says he, sighin' relieved.
"Where do I go to send a telegram?"

"Why," says I, "you might try the barber shop and file it with the
brush boy, or you could wish it on the candy-counter queen over there
and see what would happen; but the simple way would be to step around to
the W. U. T. window, by the north exit, and shove it at Gladys."

"Ah, thanks," says he, "North exit, did you say? Let's see, that
is--er----"

"'Bout face!" says I, takin' him in tow. "Now guide right! Hep, hep,
hep--parade rest--here you are! And here's the blank you write it on.
Now go to it!"

"I--er--but I'm not quite sure," protests Ferdie, peelin' off one of his
chamois gloves, "I'm not quite sure of just what I ought to say."

"That bein' the case," says I, "it's lucky you ran into me, ain't it?
Now what's the argument?"

Course it was a harrowin' crisis. Him and Marjorie had got an invite
some ten days ago to spend the week-end at a swell country house over on
Long Island. They'd hemmed and hawed, and fin'lly ducked by sendin' word
they was so sorry, but they was expectin' a young gent as guest about
then. The answer they got back was, "Bring him along, for the love of
Mike!" or words to that effect. Then they'd debated the question some
more. Meanwhile the young gent had canceled his date, and the time has
slipped by, and here it was almost Saturday, and nothin' doing in the
reply line from them. Marjorie had thought of it while they was havin'
lunch in town, and she'd chased Ferdie out to send a wire, without
tellin' him what to say.

"And you want someone to make up your mind for you, eh?" says I. "All
right. That's my long suit. Take this: 'Regret very much unable to
accept your kind invitation'--which might mean anything, from a previous
engagement to total paralysis."

"Ye-e-es," says Ferdie, hangin' his bamboo stick over his left arm and
chewin' the penholder thoughtful, "but Marjorie'll be awfully
disappointed. I think she really does want to go."

"Ah, squiffle!" says I. "She'll get over it. Whose joint is it, anyway?"

"Why," says he, "the Pulsifers', you know."

"Eh?" says I. "Not the Adam K.'s place, Cedarholm?"

Ferdie nods. And, say, it was like catchin' a chicken sandwich dropped
out of a clear sky. The Pulsifers! Didn't I know who was there? I did!
I'd had a bulletin from a very special and particular party, sayin' how
she'd be there for a week, while Aunty was in the Berkshires. And up to
this minute my chances of gettin' inside Cedarholm gates had been null
and void, or even worse. But now--say, I wanted to be real kind to
Ferdie!

"One or two old friends of Marjorie's are to be there," he goes on
dreamy.

"They are?" says I. "Then that's diff'rent. You got to go, of course."

"But--but," says he, "only a moment ago you----"

"Ah, mooshwaw!" says I. "You don't want Marjorie grumpin' around for the
next week, do you, wishin' she'd gone, and layin' it all to you?"

Ferdie blinks a couple of times as the picture forms on the screen.
"That's so," says he. "She would."

"Then gimme that blank," says I. "Now here, how's this, 'Have at last
arranged things so we can come. Charmed to accept'? Eh?"

"But--but there's Baby's milk," objects Ferdie. "Marjorie always watches
the nurse sterilize it, you know."

"Do up a gallon before you leave," says I.

"It's such a puzzling place to get to, though," says Ferdie. "I'm sure
we'd never get on the right train."

"Whadye mean, train," says I. "Ah, show some class! Go in your
limousine."

"So we could," says Ferdie. "But then, you know, they'll be expectin' us
to bring an extra young man."

"They needn't be heartbroken over that," says I. "You didn't say who he
was, did you?"

"Why, no," says Ferdie; "but----"

"Since you press me so hard," says I, "I'll sub for him. Guess you need
me to get you there, anyway."

"By Jove!" says Ferdie, as the proposition percolates through the
hominy. "I wonder if----"

"Never waste time wonderin'," says I. "Take a chance. Here, sign your
name to that; then we'll go hunt up Marjorie and tell her the glad
news."

Ferdie was still in a daze when we found the other three-quarters of the
sketch, and Marjorie was some set back herself when I springs the
scheme. But she's a good sport, Marjorie is, and if she was hooked up to
a live one she'd travel just as lively as the next heavyweight.

"Oh, let's!" says she, clappin' her hands. "You know we haven't been
away from home overnight for an age. And Edna Pulsifer's such a dear,
even if her father is a grouchy old thing. We'll take Torchy along too.
What do you say, Ferdie?"

Foolish question! Ferdie was still dazed. And anyhow she had said it
herself.

So that's how it happens I'm one of the chosen few to be landed under
the Cedarholm porte-cochere that Saturday afternoon. Course the
Pulsifers ain't reg'lar old fam'ly people, like Ferdie's folks. They
date back to about the last Broadway horse-car period, I understand,
when old Adam K. begun to ship his Cherryola dope in thousand-case lots.
Now, you know, it's all handled for him by the drug trust, and he only
sits by the safety-vault door watchin' the profits roll in. But with his
name still on every label you could hardly expect the Pulsifers to
qualify for Mrs. Astor's list.

Seems Edna went to the same boardin' school as Marjorie and Vee, though,
and neither of 'em ever thinks of throwin' Cherryola at her. And as far
as an establishment goes, Cedarholm is the real thing. Gave me quite
some thrill to watch two footmen in silver and baby blue pryin' Marjorie
out of the limousine.

"Gee!" thinks I, glancin' around at the deep verandas, the swing seats,
and the cozy corner nooks. "If Vee and I can't get together for a few
chatty words among all this, then I'm a punk plottist!"

These country house joints are so calm and peaceful too! It's a wonder
anybody could work up a case of nerves, havin' this for a steady thing.
But Edna and Mrs. Pulsifer acted sort of restless and jumpy. She's a
tall, thin, hollow-eyed dame, Mrs. Pulsifer is, with gray hair and a
smooth, easy voice. Miss Edna must take more after her Pa; for she's
filled out better, and while she ain't what you'd call mug-mapped, she
has one of these low-bridge noses and a lot of oily, dark red hair that
she does in a weird fashion of her own with a side part. Seems shy and
bashful too, except when she snuggles up on the lee side of Marjorie and
trails off with her.

The particular party I was strainin' my eyesight for ain't in evidence,
though, and all the hint I gets of her bein' there was hearin' a ripply
laugh at the far end of the hallway when she and Marjorie go to a fond
clinch. That was some comfort, though,--she was in the house!

As I couldn't very well go scoutin' around whistlin' for her to come
out, I does the next best thing. After bein' shown my room I drifts
downstairs and out on the lawn where I'd be some conspicuous. Course I
wa'n't suggestin' anything, but if somebody should happen to see me and
judge that I was lonesome, they might wander out that way too. Sure
enough somebody did,--Ferdie.

"I thought you had to take a nap before dinner," says I, maybe not so
cordial.

"Bother!" says he. "There's no such thing as that possible with those
three girls chattering away in the next room."

"Well, they ain't been together for some time, I expect," says I.

"It's worse than usual," says Ferdie. "A man in the case, you might
know."

"Eh?" says I, prickin' up my ears. "Whose man?"

"Oh, Edna Pulsifer's absurd ditch digger," says Ferdie. "He's a young
engineer, you know, that she's been interested in for a couple of years.
Her father put a stop to it once; kept her in Munich for ten months--and
that's a perfectly deadly place out of season, you know. But it doesn't
seem to have done much good."

I grins. Surprisin' how cheerful I could be so long as it was a case of
Miss Pulsifer's young man. I pumps the whole tale out of Ferdie,--how
this Mr. Bert Gilkey--cute name too--had been writin' her letters all
the time from out West, how he'd been seized with a sudden fit, wired on
that he must see her once more, and had rushed East. Then how Pa
Pulsifer had caught 'em lalligaggin' out by the hedge, had talked real
rough to Gilkey, and ordered him never to muddy his front doormat again.

"And now," goes on Ferdie, "he sends word to Edna that he means to try
it once more, no matter what happens, and everyone is all stirred up."

"So that accounts for the nervous motions, eh?" says I. "What does Pa
Pulsifer have to say to this defi?"

"Goodness!" says Ferdie, shudderin'. "He doesn't know. No one dares tell
him a word. If he found out--well, it would be awful!"

"Huh!" says I. "One of these fam'ly ringmasters, is he?"

That was it, and from Ferdie's description I gathered that old Adam K.
was a reg'lar domestic tornado, once he got started. Maybe you know the
brand? And it seems Pa Pulsifer was the limit. So long as things went
his way he was a prince,--right there with the jolly haw-haw, fond of
callin' wifey pet names before strangers, and posin' as an easy
mark,--but let anybody try to pull off any programme that didn't jibe
with his, and black clouds rolled up sudden in the West.

"I do hope," goes on Ferdie, "that nothing of that sort occurs while we
are here."

So did I, for more reasons than one. What I wanted was peace, and plenty
of it, with Vee more or less disengaged.

Nothin' could have been more promisin' either than the openin' of that
first dinner party. Pa Pulsifer had showed up about six o'clock from the
Country Club, with his rugged, hand-hewed face tinted up cheery. Some of
it was sunburn, and some of it was rye, I expect, but he was glad to see
all of us. He patted Marjorie on the cheek, pinched Vee by the ear, and
slapped Ferdie on the back so hearty he near knocked the breath out of
him. So far as our genial host could make it, it was a gay and festive
scene. Best of all too, I'd been put next to Vee, and I was just workin'
up to exchangin' a hand squeeze under the tablecloth when, right in the
middle of one of Pa Pulsifer's best stories, there floats in through the
open windows a crash that makes everybody sit up. It sounds like
breakin' glass.

"Hah!" snorts Pulsifer, scowlin' out into the dark. "Now what in blazes
was that?"

"I--I think it must have been something in the kitchen, Dear," says Mrs.
Pulsifer. "Don't mind."

"But I do mind," says he. "In the first place, it wasn't in the kitchen
at all, and if you'll all excuse me, I'll just see for myself."

Meanwhile Edna has turned pale, Marjorie has almost choked herself with
a bread stick, and Ferdie has let his fork clatter to the floor. Ma
Pulsifer is bitin' her lip; but she's right there with the soothin'
words.

"Please, Dear," says she, "let me go. They want you to finish your
story."

It was a happy touch, that last. Pa Pulsifer recovers his napkin,
settles back in his chair, and goes on with the tale, while Mother slips
out quiet. She comes back after a while, springs a nervous little
laugh, and announces that it was only the glass in one of the hotbed
frames.

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