“‘MEX’ IT SHALL BE!”
In the meantime, on Bleeker’s Island, the Sheriff, shoving back under his armpit his gun, which persisted in ever moving out over his chest, had been saying:
“I know now—fur as much of a sartinty as a man ever kin know—which man hyar is ‘Actor’ Hart! Not that they is any one hund’ed p’cent sartinty in the Unyverse. But before I give my verdic’—an’ partic’ly why it’s what it is—all o’ which I now calcilate to give to the entire world—I—”
“I beg pardon, Sheriff,” said the man in the tight yellow derby hat, at the Sheriff’s right, “but we all know, too—with you—which is Actor Hart, and—”
“Do you, Hick?” said the Sheriff, unsmilingly.
“Why—of course! For our verdict was being formed even as yours was. But on behalf of myself and—well, just myself—might I ask how—with no transmitting apparatus on this island—you—you can render your verdict to—to the entire world?”
“I ’spect to tell you that in a minute, Hick,” said the Sheriff cryptically. “But sence all the ev’dence is in—and all the observers in this impryvised co’te I’ve sot up air in a sense jurymen as well as sospects, be there an’body who wants to axe anybody else any questions?”
“I do—yes,” said the man in the derby. And turned so as to directly face the Mexican-clad man who sat across from him. “Just what, Hart, do you think you’ve accomplished by that ta—”
“Now hold that,” replied the man addressed. “I’m not Hart. I just told who I—”
“Do you think I’d address you, you piece of scum, by the phony identity you just gave? I’ll be goddamned if I—”
“Well—will you at least call me then by my phony identity of ‘Mex’? For I’ll be damned myself if I’ll let you call me Hart. I’ll—”
“And Hart, by God, I’ll call you, for—”
“Hyar!” ordered the Sheriff. “Stop all argiments. Fur’s names goes, we’ve called yander man Mex all mo’nin’—and so we’ll continue thataway so’s we don’t git bollixed up. An’ quite whether he’s Hart—or whether he ain’t—the which I’m the on’y pusson on this island who’s p’epared to say. Fur—”
But his words were interrupted by the man in the derby hat, who tossed back, at the subject under discussion: “A-all right—Me-e-x! So all I want to ask is: Have you got anything at all on you—to bolster up your story?”
“No more than you had,” was the other’s retort.
“But my story, you rat, was confirmed by Sheriff Brister. And yours isn’t. And so what have you got?”
“Nothing, of course. Only this Yale key which I held up as I talked. Which might be any key. Instead of a lockbox key. And the check—”
“Oh, hell—your story was built to account for that check,” said the other. “You’re a damned murdering rat of a crim—”
“Hold it, now, Hick,” ordered the Sheriff. “Let the jedge do the d’liverin’ of verdicts around hyar.”
“Yes—let’s!” said the man in the lineman habiliments which were not lineman habiliments. “And I’ll ask a question. And it’s this: I hope, Sheriff, that you’re not such a fool as to believe one word of this smooth lying tale we’ve just hea—”
The Sheriff raised his stubby-fingered hand wearily. Being a man of 41 years of age, he felt that had he ever been a fool in his life he had left that behind with his salad years; that his four decades, plus a tenth of one, had given him a meed of discrimination and judgment. But he was not ready to hold arguments at this juncture.
“I’ve made my ’cision,” he said stonily. “And I’m ready to rend it. And mo’over, to prove why it’s what ’tis. On’y—”
“Only—what?” demanded the man who was called Hick.
“On’y,” said the Sheriff, scratching his chin, “sence a suttin’ man what’s schedooled to git no life belt—caze I claim him to be Mist-er Al Hart—an’ is schedooled tharfo’ to git drownded and cons’quently to get et up by garfish ’way down-river, they’ll be lots o’ dirty dogs ’ll say he wan’t Al Hart ’tall. They’ll even be skunks as ’ll claim I was a bloody murderer to let him drownd—others sayin’ on’y as I was a sap—”
“But with the possibilities of any man drowning—even with a life belt,” said the man with the silken kerchief around his neck, “you will have to be prepared, Sheriff, for doubters—always. For instance: If I got drowned—in spite of the life belt I know I’ll have, on a submerged stump or whirlpool—in reality, I know I’ll make it, all right, but this is just hypothetical—well if, as I say, I got drowned—and, being thus drowned, got nibbled away at by the garfish far, far down in the south—there would always be those who would claim I was a fake Gilbert Blake—and since my body wouldn’t then be available for comparison with the newspaper pictures of me, such as the one you have in your pocket—and which I just saw you re-comparing while Hart there spieled his piece—they’d claim I was a fake Blake—and that the real one was remaining in hiding to take advantage of—”
The Sheriff again raised his hand.
“When it comes to makin’ it soccessfully down-river in a belt,” he said gloomily, though it was noticeable he spoke to no one person in particular, “I’m the one as ’ll fail to make it. Fur I’m a older man by 11 full years than ever’body on this island. And much less ’ficient—sartinly at least so fur’s m’ wind goes. It’s me who hain’t no ’surance o’ gittin’ th’ough. Fur I’m the man who mebbe cain’t omangle hisse’f from a su-merged stump—count o’ not being able to git ’long on what air happens to be in his lungs—or beat his way out of a whir’pool. And sence sich o’ th’ world as exists after a man’s daid is, fur him, his ‘Poster’ty’—Poster’ty is who I’m thinkin’ ’bout now! And so fur Poster’ty—ef it’s writ to be that way—I intend now to set fo’th why I’m doin’ what I’m goin’ to do. Sence—” He turned to the man at his right.
“Hick, I ’uz able to confirm yo’re story t’day ’bout yo’re bein’ Abner Ezra Hick.1 And why you air out hyar. And so yo’re out o’ this whole thing. You git a life belt, see? Yes. But you said in that story that you had t’uk a high-school course at a plenty good school. Now I don’t ’spose, by any chance, you l’arned sho’thand, did you? Fur—”
“Yes, I did. And I’m—I’m a whiz at it. For I had nothing to do in the long winters up there in Northern Michigan but practice at it—with an Indian hired hand who used to help me by dictating to me.”
“Good! That makes it perfect, Hick. Hick, I’m goin’ to dictate—best I kin—a brief statement to the world—an’ the press too—of how we-all got out hyar on Bleeker’s Island—and how we all knowed how Mister Al Hart was ’mongst us, but yet couldn’t ’dentify him; and how and why I finally ’warded the life belts so’s that one man hatter drownd—that man bein’, of co’se, Hart. Sence—but get out that fat—an’ onused—notebook I found in yo’re hip pocket when I sarched you—with the pencil in it.”
In a trice, Hick had extricated them from his hip pocket. The pencil could be seen to be nicely sharp.
“But wha—what is your decision to be?” asked the silken-neckerchiefed lineman, his face getting a little puzzled.
“I ’spect to give it when I git to the point whar it would come in,” said the Sheriff, cryptically. “But will first hatter com-plete my statement. Fur when the hist’ry o’ Destiny’s Stage is someday writ by some historian, the drama what t’uk place on it t’day will hatter be part of it—and I got to ’zonerate myse’f—in case I hain’t thar to read it!”
“But Sheriff—wait!” interpolated the man Hick. “This notebook, with my notes, would only go down with you if you drowned—or soak to illegibility in your poss—”
“Them notes won’t go down-river ’ith me” said the Sheriff calmly. “They’re goin’ to go down-river ’ith a yonger and more wiry man. In sho’t—yo’rese’f, Hick. And they won’t soak to illigybility, becaze—” He was fumbling in his pocket as he talked, and was now withdrawing the empty rubber tobacco pouch he had there, following it with a short piece of string he’d also felt there not long before. “The pages containin’ them notes, Hick, will be put, atter you’ve transcribed ’em, into this pouch—its neck tied ’ith the string—an’ give to you. Fur you’ll make it a’right. Yo’re strong and wiry, an’ you’ll onloose yo’rese’f a’right ef’n you git snared on a stump, an’ you’ll paddle out ef’n you git draw’d into a whir’pool. And when you do—” He put the two articles back in his right-hand coat pocket.
“Yes, Sheriff—what?”
“Yo’re to inter-prete ’em fur any newspaper man what will ’gree to skindycate ’em all over the kentry as the complete an’ final statement of the man who was a self-’pinted jedge of a co’te of life an’ death on Bleeker’s Island. And then—”
“But see here, Sheriff,” began the man with the silken neckerchief, “isn’t this more or less unnecess—”
The Sheriff raised a hand. “Don’t int’rrupt, please, when I’m takin’ care of myse’f—’ith Poster’ty. And then, Hick,” he went on, to the man at his right, “yo’re to hold the ’riginal notes fur identyfication befur the Supreme Co’te o’ the United States.”
“The—Supreme Court—of the United States?”
“Ezackly! Fur they’ll be lawsuits a-plenty out’n a case like this—whar them as gits drownded gits et up, ’way downriver, and thus cain’t be ’dentyfied—heirs of some of you’ll git sued by heirs o’ others—people’ll sue my heirs—and, by God, the valid’ty o’ my ’cision’ll fin’lly reach the Supreme Co’te of the United States. So my statement ain’t to be jest a statement to the Press—it’s to be my statement to th’ 10 Wise Old Men.”
“Yes, I see,” agreed Hick, “Well—I’m ready.”
“And—I,” said the Sheriff. “And keep yo’re places—all—’caze I got my hand moughty clost to m’ gun. And the minute I’m done, the distrybution o’ them lifebelts is goin’ to take place on this hyar island. And—no—more—nonsense! And the man who hain’t none will hatter go up to the p’int o’ the island and—and—and make his peace ’ith God.”
“Well, just one caution, Sheriff,” said the man Hick. “I had a book at home called How to Write for Newspapers and Syndicates. And it says that for a statement to be syndicated over the entire country, it must be put in no more than 600 words.”
“Six hund’ed words?” echoed the Sheriff scornfully. “Hell-f’ar an’ damnation—I’ll put th’ whole thing in 300. An’ hyar goes. An’ don’t nobody make fur them belts while I’m a-talkin’!”
1 Publisher’s note: The entire story of Abner Ezra Hick of Bad Axe, Michigan, and the Sheriff’s confirmation of it, is set forth in an earlier novel by Mr. Keeler called The Portrait of Jirjohn Cobb.