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Helping the Other Fellow

Short Stories

"Fox-in-the-Morning"

A Bird of Bagdad

A Blackjack Bargainer

A Call Loan

A Chaparral Christmas Gift

A Chaparral Prince

A Comedy in Rubber

A Cosmopolite in a Cafe

A Departmental Case

A Dinner at--------*

A Double-Dyed Deceiver

A Fog in Santone

A Harlem Tragedy

A Lickpenny Lover

A Little Local Colour

A Little Talk about Mobs

A Madison Square Arabian Night

A Matter of Mean Elevation

A Midsummer Knight's Dream

A Midsummer Masquerade

A Municipal Report

A Newspaper Story

A Night in New Arabia

A Philistine in Bohemia

A Poor Rule

A Ramble in Aphasia

A Retrieved Reformation

A Ruler of Men

A Sacrifice Hit

A Service of Love

A Snapshot at the President

A Strange Story

A Technical Error

A Tempered Wind

According to Their Lights

After Twenty Years

An Adjustment of Nature

An Afternoon Miracle

An Apology

An Unfinished Christmas Story

An Unfinished Story

Aristocracy Versus Hash

Art and the Bronco

At Arms With Morpheus

Babes in the Jungle

Best-Seller

Between Rounds

Bexar Scrip No. 2692

Blind Man's Holiday

Brickdust Row

Buried Treasure

By Courier

Calloway's Code

Caught

Cherchez La Femme

Christmas by Injunction

Compliments of the Season

Confessions of a Humorist

Conscience in Art

Cupid a La Carte

Cupid's Exile Number Two

Dickey

Dougherty's Eye-Opener

Elsie in New York

Extradited from Bohemia

Fickle Fortune or How Gladys Hustled

Friends in San Rosario

From Each According to His Ability

From the Cabby's Seat

Georgia's Ruling

Girl

He Also Serves

Hearts and Crosses

Hearts and Hands

Helping the Other Fellow

Holding Up a Train

Hostages to Momus

Hygeia at the Solito

Innocents of Broadway

Jeff Peters as a Personal Magnet

Jimmy Hayes and Muriel

Law and Order

Let Me Feel Your Pulse

Little Speck in Garnered Fruit

Lord Oakhurst's Curse

Lost on Dress Parade

Madame Bo-Peep, of the Ranches

Makes the Whole World Kin

Mammon and the Archer

Man About Town

Masters of Arts

Memoirs of a Yellow Dog

Modern Rural Sports

Money Maze

Nemesis and the Candy Man

New York by Camp Fire Light

Next to Reading Matter

No Story

October and June

On Behalf of the Management

One Dollar's Worth

One Thousand Dollars

Out of Nazareth

Past One at Rooney's

Phoebe

Proof of the Pudding

Psyche and the Pskyscraper

Queries and Answers

Roads of Destiny

Roses, Ruses and Romance

Rouge et Noir

Round the Circle

Rus in Urbe

Schools and Schools

Seats of the Haughty

Shearing the Wolf

Ships

Shoes

Sisters of the Golden Circle

Smith

Sociology in Serge and Straw

Sound and Fury

Springtime a La Carte

Squaring the Circle

Strictly Business

Strictly Business

Suite Homes and Their Romance

Telemachus, Friend

The Admiral

The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes

The Assessor of Success

The Atavism of John Tom Little Bear

The Badge of Policeman O'Roon

The Brief Debut of Tildy

The Buyer From Cactus City

The Caballero's Way

The Cactus

The Caliph and the Cad

The Caliph, Cupid and the Clock

The Call of the Tame

The Chair of Philanthromathematics

The Champion of the Weather

The Church with an Overshot-Wheel

The City of Dreadful Night

The Clarion Call

The Coming-Out of Maggie

The Complete Life of John Hopkins

The Cop and the Anthem

The Count and the Wedding Guest

The Country of Elusion

The Day Resurgent

The Day We Celebrate

The Defeat of the City

The Detective Detector

The Diamond of Kali

The Discounters of Money

The Dog and the Playlet

The Door of Unrest

The Dream

The Duel

The Duplicity of Hargraves

The Easter of the Soul

The Emancipation of Billy

The Enchanted Kiss

The Enchanted Profile

The Ethics of Pig

The Exact Science of Matrimony

The Ferry of Unfulfilment

The Fifth Wheel

The Flag Paramount

The Fool-Killer

The Foreign Policy of Company 99

The Fourth in Salvador

The Friendly Call

The Furnished Room

The Gift of the Magi

The Girl and the Graft

The Girl and the Habit

The Gold That Glittered

The Greater Coney

The Green Door

The Guardian of the Accolade

The Guilty Party - An East Side Tragedy

The Halberdier of the Little Rheinschloss

The Hand that Riles the World

The Handbook of Hymen

The Harbinger

The Head-Hunter

The Hiding of Black Bill

The Higher Abdication

The Higher Pragmatism

The Hypotheses of Failure

The Indian Summer of Dry Valley Johnson

The Lady Higher Up

The Last Leaf

The Last of the Troubadours

The Lonesome Road

The Lost Blend

The Lotus And The Bottle

The Love-Philtre of Ikey Schoenstein

The Making of a New Yorker

The Man Higher Up

The Marionettes

The Marquis and Miss Sally

The Marry Month of May

The Memento

The Missing Chord

The Moment of Victory

The Octopus Marooned

The Passing of Black Eagle

The Pendulum

The Phonograph and the Graft

The Pimienta Pancakes

The Plutonian Fire

The Poet and the Peasant

The Pride of the Cities

The Princess and the Puma

The Prisoner of Zembla

The Proem

The Purple Dress

The Ransom of Mack

The Ransom of Red Chief

The Rathskeller and the Rose

The Red Roses of Tonia

The Reformation of Calliope

The Remnants of the Code

The Renaissance at Charleroi

The Roads We Take

The Robe of Peace

The Romance of a Busy Broker

The Rose of Dixie

The Rubaiyat of a Scotch Highball

The Rubber Plant's Story

The Shamrock and the Palm

The Shocks of Doom

The Skylight Room

The Sleuths

The Snow Man

The Social Triangle

The Song and the Sergeant

The Sparrows in Madison Square

The Sphinx Apple

The Tale of a Tainted Tenner

The Theory and the Hound

The Thing's the Play

The Third Ingredient

The Trimmed Lamp

The Unknown Quantity

The Unprofitable Servant

The Venturers

The Vitagraphoscope

The Voice of the City

The Whirligig of Life

The World and the Door

Thimble, Thimble

Tictocq

To Him Who Waits

Tobin's Palm

Tommy's Burglar

Tracked to Doom

Transformation of Martin Burney

Transients in Arcadia

Two Recalls

Two Renegades

Two Thanksgiving Day Gentlemen

Ulysses and the Dogman

Vanity and Some Sables

What You Want

While the Auto Waits

Whistling Dick's Christmas Stocking

Witches' Loaves







This is the story that William Trotter told me on the beach at Aguas
Frescas while I waited for the gig of the captain of the fruit steamer
Andador which was to take me abroad. Reluctantly I was leaving the Land
of Always Afternoon. William was remaining, and he favored me with a
condensed oral autobiography as we sat on the sands in the shade cast by
the Bodega Nacional.

As usual, I became aware that the Man from Bombay had already written
the story; but as he had compressed it to an eight-word sentence, I have
become an expansionist, and have quoted his phrase above, with apologies
to him and best regards to Terence.


II

"Don't you ever have a desire to go back to the land of derby hats and
starched collars?" I asked him. "You seem to be a handy man and a man of
action," I continued, "and I am sure I could find you a comfortable job
somewhere in the States."

Ragged, shiftless, barefooted, a confirmed eater of the lotos, William
Trotter had pleased me much, and I hated to see him gobbled up by the
tropics.

"I've no doubt you could," he said, idly splitting the bark from a
section of sugar-cane. "I've no doubt you could do much for me. If every
man could do as much for himself as he can for others, every country in
the world would be holding millenniums instead of centennials."

There seemed to be pabulum in W. T.'s words. And then another idea came
to me.

I had a brother in Chicopee Falls who owned manufactories--cotton, or
sugar, or A.A. sheetings, or something in the commercial line. lie was
vulgarly rich, and therefore reverenced art. The artistic temperament of
the family was monopolized at my birth. I knew that Brother James would
honor my slightest wish. I would demand from him a position in cotton,
sugar, or sheetings for William Trotter--something, say, at two hundred
a month or thereabouts. I confided my beliefs and made my large
propositions to William. He had pleased me much, and he was ragged.

While we were talking, there was a sound of firing guns--four or five,
rattlingly, as if by a squad. The cheerful noise came from the direction
of the cuartel, which is a kind of makeshift barracks for the soldiers
of the republic.

"Hear that?" said William Trotter. "Let me tell you about it.

"A year ago I landed on this coast with one solitary dollar. I have the
same sum in my pocket to-day. I was second cook on a tramp fruiter; and
they marooned me here early one morning, without benefit of clergy, just
because I poulticed the face of the first mate with cheese omelette at
dinner. The fellow had kicked because I'd put horseradish in it instead
of cheese.

"When they threw me out of the yawl into three feet of surf, I waded
ashore and sat down under a palm-tree. By and by a fine-looking white
man with a red face and white clothes, genteel as possible, but somewhat
under the influence, came and sat down beside me.

"I had noticed there was a kind of a village back of the beach, and
enough scenery to outfit a dozen moving-picture shows. But I thought, of
course, it was a cannibal suburb, and I was wondering whether I was to
be served with carrots or mushrooms. And, as I say, this dressed-up man
sits beside me, and we become friends in the space of a minute or two.
For an hour we talked, and he told me all about it.

"It seems that he was a man of parts, conscientiousness, and
plausibility, besides being educated and a wreck to his appetites. He
told me all about it. Colleges had turned him out, and distilleries had
taken him in. Did I tell you his name? It was Clifford Wainwright. I
didn't exactly catch the cause of his being cast away on that particular
stretch of South America; but I reckon it was his own business. I asked
him if he'd ever been second cook on a tramp fruiter, and he said no; so
that concluded my line of surmises. But he talked like the encyclopedia
from 'A--Berlin' to 'Trilo--Zyria.' And he carried a watch--a silver
arrangement with works, and up to date within twenty-four hours, anyhow.

"'I'm pleased to have met you,' says Wainwright. 'I'm a devotee to the
great joss Booze; but my ruminating facilities are unrepaired,' says
he--or words to that effect. 'And I hate,' says he, 'to see fools trying
to run the world.'

"'I never touch a drop,' says I, 'and there are many kinds of fools; and
the world runs on its own apex, according to science, with no meddling
from me.'

"'I was referring,' says he, 'to the president of this republic. His
country is in a desperate condition. Its treasury is empty, it's on the
verge of war with Nicamala, and if it wasn't for the hot weather the
people would be starting revolutions in every town. Here is a nation,'
goes on Wainwright, 'on the brink of destruction. A man of intelligence
could rescue it from its impending doom in one day by issuing the
necessary edicts and orders. President Gomez knows nothing of
statesmanship or policy. Do you know Adam Smith?'

"'Lemme see,' says I. 'There was a one-eared man named Smith in Fort
Worth, Texas, but I think his first name was--'

"'I am referring to the political economist,' says Wainwright.

"'S'mother Smith, then,' says I. 'The one I speak of never was
arrested.'

"So Wainwright boils some more with indignation at the insensibility of
people who are not corpulent to fill public positions; and then he tells
me he is going out to the president's summer palace, which is four miles
from Aguas Frescas, to instruct him in the art of running steam-heated
republics.

"'Come along with me, Trotter,' says he, 'and I'll show you what brains
can do.'

"'Anything in it?' I asks.

"'The satisfaction,' says he, 'of redeeming a country of two hundred
thousand population from ruin back to prosperity and peace.'

"Great,' says I. 'I'll go with you. I'd prefer to eat a live broiled
lobster just now; but give me liberty as second choice if I can't be in
at the death.'

"Wainwright and me permeates through the town, and he halts at a
rum-dispensary.

"'Have you any money?' he asks.

"'I have,' says I, fishing out my silver dollar. 'I always go about with
adequate sums of money.'

"'Then we'll drink,' says Wainwright.

"'Not me," says I. 'Not any demon ruin or any of its ramifications for
mine. It's one of my non-weaknesses.'

"'It's my failing,' says he. 'What's your particular soft point?'

"'Industry,' says I, promptly. 'I'm hard-working, diligent, industrious,
and energetic.'

"'My dear Mr. Trotter,' says he, 'surely I've known you long enough to
tell you you are a liar. Every man must have his own particular
weakness, and his own particular strength in other things. Now, you will
buy me a drink of rum, and we will call on President Gomez.'"


III

"Well, sir," Trotter went on, "we walks the four miles out, through a
virgin conservatory of palms and ferns and other roof-garden products,
to the president's summer White House. It was blue, and reminded you of
what you see on the stage in the third act, which they describe as 'same
as the first' on the programs.

"There was more than fifty people waiting outside the iron fence that
surrounded the house and grounds. There was generals and agitators and
epergnes in gold-laced uniforms, and citizens in diamonds and Panama
hats--all waiting to get an audience with the Royal Five-Card Draw. And
in a kind of a summer-house in front of the mansion we could see a
burnt-sienna man eating breakfast out of gold dishes and taking his
time. I judged that the crowd outside had come out for their morning
orders and requests, and was afraid to intrude.

"But C. Wainwright wasn't. The gate was open, and he walked inside and
up to the president's table as confident as a man who knows the head
waiter in a fifteen-cent restaurant. And I went with him, because I had
only seventy-five cents, and there was nothing else to do.

"The Gomez man rises from his chair, and looks, colored man as he was,
like he was about to call out for corporal of the guard, post number
one. But Wainwright says some phrases to him in a peculiarly lubricating
manner; and the first thing you know we was all three of us seated at
the table, with coffee and rolls and iguana cutlets coming as fast as
about ninety peons could rustle 'em.

"And then Wainwright begins to talk; but the president interrupts him.

"'You Yankees,' says he, polite, 'assuredly take the cake for assurance,
I assure you'--or words to that effect. He spoke English better than you
or me. 'You've had a long walk,' says he, 'but it's nicer in the cool
morning to walk than to ride. May I suggest some refreshments?' says he.

"'Rum,' says Wainwright.

"'Gimme a cigar,' says I.

"Well, sir, the two talked an hour, keeping the generals and equities
all in their good uniforms waiting outside the fence. And while I
smoked, silent, I listened to Clifford Wainwright making a solid
republic out of the wreck of one. I didn't follow his arguments with any
special collocation of international intelligibility; but he had Mr.
Gomez's attention glued and riveted. He takes out a pencil and marks the
white linen tablecloth all over with figures and estimates and
deductions. He speaks more or less disrespectfully of import and export
duties and custom-house receipts and taxes and treaties and budgets and
concessions and such truck that politics and government require; and
when he gets through the Gomez man hops up and shakes his hand and says
he's saved the country and the people.

"'You shall be rewarded,' says the president.

"'Might I suggest another--rum?' says Wainwright.

"'Cigar for me--darker brand,' says I.

"Well, sir, the president sent me and Wainwright back to the town in a
victoria hitched to two flea-bitten selling-platers--but the best the
country afforded.

"I found out afterward that Wainwright was a regular beachcomber--the
smartest man on the whole coast, but kept down by rum. I liked him.

"One day I inveigled him into a walk out a couple of miles from the
village, where there was an old grass hut on the bank of a little river.
While he was sitting on the grass, talking beautiful of the wisdom of
the world that he had learned in books, I took hold of him easy and tied
his hands and feet together with leather thongs that I had in my pocket.

"'Lie still,' says I, 'and meditate on the exigencies and irregularities
of life till I get back.'

"I went to a shack in Aguas Frescas where a mighty wise girl named
Timotea Carrizo lived with her mother. The girl was just about as nice
as you ever saw. In the States she would have been called a brunette;
but she was better than a brunette--I should say she was what you might
term an ecru shade. I knew her pretty well. I told her about my friend
Wainwright. She gave me a double handful of bark--calisaya, I think it
was--and some more herbs that I was to mix with it, and told me what to
do. I was to make tea of it and give it to him, and keep him from rum
for a certain time. And for two weeks I did it. You know, I liked
Wainwright. Both of us was broke; but Timotea sent us goat-meat and
plantains and tortillas every day; and at last I got the curse of drink
lifted from Clifford Wainwright. He lost his taste for it. And in the
cool of the evening him and me would sit on the roof of Timotea's
mother's hut, eating harmless truck like coffee and rice and stewed
crabs, and playing the accordion.

"About that time President Gomez found out that the advice of C.
Wainwright was the stuff he had been looking for. The country was
pulling out of debt, and the treasury bad enough boodle in it for him to
amuse himself occasionally with the night-latch. The people were
beginning to take their two-hour siestas again every day--which was the
surest sign of prosperity.

"So down from the regular capital he sends for Clifford Wainwright and
makes him his private secretary at twenty thousand Peru dollars a year.
Yes, sir--so much. Wainwright was on the water-wagon--thanks to me and
Timotea--and he was soon in clover with the government gang. Don't
forget what done it--calisaya bark with them other herbs mixed--make a
tea of it, and give a cupful every two hours. Try it yourself. It takes
away the desire.

"As I said, a man can do a lot more for another party than he can for
himself. Wainwright, with his brains, got a whole country out of trouble
and on its feet; but what could he do for himself? And without any
special brains, but with some nerve and common sense, I put him on his
feet because I never had the weakness that he did--nothing but a cigar
for mine, thanks. And-----"

Trotter paused. I looked at his tattered clothes and at his deeply
sunburnt, hard, thoughtful face.

"Didn't Cartright ever offer to do anything for you?" I asked.

"Wainwright," corrected Trotter. "Yes, he offered me some pretty good
jobs. But I'd have bad to leave Aguas Frescas; so I didn't take any of
'em up. Say, I didn't tell you much about that girl--Timotea. We rather
hit it off together. She was as good as you find 'em anywhere--Spanish,
mostly, with just a twist of lemon-peel on top. What if they did live in
a grass hut and went bare-armed?

"A month ago," went on Trotter, "she went away. I don't know where to.
But--"

"You'd better come back to the States," I insisted. "I can promise you
positively that my brother will give you a position in cotton, sugar, or
sheetings--I am not certain which."

"I think she went back with her mother," said Trotter, "to the village
in the mountains that they come from. Tell me, what would this job you
speak of pay?"

"Why," said I, hesitating over commerce, "I should say fifty or a
hundred dollars a month--maybe two hundred."

"Ain't it funny," said Trotter, digging his toes in the sand, "what a
chump a man is when it comes to paddling his own canoe? I don't know. Of
course, I'm not making a living here. I'm on the bum. But--well, I wish
you could have seen that Timotea. Every man has his own weak spot."

The gig from the Andador was coming ashore to take out the captain,
purser, and myself, the lone passenger.

"I'll guarantee," said I confidently, "that my brother will pay you
seventy-five dollars a month."

"All right, then," said William Trotter. "I'll--"

But a soft voice called across the blazing sands. A girl, faintly
lemon-tinted, stood in the Calle Real and called. She was
bare-armed--but what of that?

"It's her!" said William Trotter, looking. "She's come back! I'm
obliged; but I can't take the job. Thanks, just the same. Ain't it funny
how we can't do nothing for ourselves, but we can do wonders for the
other fellow? You was about to get me with your financial proposition;
but we've all got our weak points. Timotea's mine. And, say!" Trotter
had turned to leave, but he retraced the step or two that he had taken.
"I like to have left you without saying good-bye," said he. "It kind of
rattles you when they go away unexpected for a month and come back the
same way. Shake hands. So long! Say, do you remember them gunshots we
heard a while ago up at the cuartel? Well, I knew what they was, but I
didn't mention it. It was Clifford Wainwright being shot by a squad of
soldiers against a stone wall for giving away secrets of state to that
Nicamala republic Oh, yes, it was rum that did it. He backslided and got
his. I guess we all have our weak points, and can't do much toward
helping ourselves. Mine's waiting for me. I'd have liked to have that
job with your brother, but--we've all got our weak points. So long!"


IV

A big black Carib carried me on his back through the surf to the ship's
boat. On the way the purser handed me a letter that he had brought for
me at the last moment from the post-office in Aguas Frescas. It was from
my brother. He requested me to meet him at the St. Charles Hotel in New
Orleans and accept a position with his house--in either cotton, sugar,
or sheetings, and with five thousand dollars a year as my salary.

When I arrived at the Crescent City I hurried away--far away from the
St. Charles to a dim chambre garnie in Bienville Street. And there,
looking down from my attic window from time to time at the old, yellow,
absinthe house across the street, I wrote this story to buy my bread and
butter.

"Can thim that helps others help thimselves?"




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