Beggars of Life (4 page)

W
HEN
spring reached Chicago, it lost me.

I planned a trip to Omaha with a lad of my own age. We left the Northwestern station one night just at dark. Bill had beaten his way on mail trains before.

We waited a few hundred feet from the station, until the train was well on its way. The engine came thundering down the track at a fast rate of speed, and rolled by our hiding place with a great blowing of steam and shrieking of whistle. The engine and first coach were enveloped in white and dark clouds of smoke and steam. We felt our way through the clouds and were soon aboard the train.

My heart beat fast with the thrill of adventure. We reached De Kalb without mishap, and ran for a dark place to hide while the train stopped at the depot. When the engine steamed away, we were aboard the first blind. Another man was there ahead of us.

Great clouds of steam and smoke fell all around us. A faded yellow moon would now and then shine through the vapour. The train ran a few miles until it came to a siding. It stopped for a signal, and was slowly starting up again when the third person spoke. “You guys hold up your hands,” he said, as he pointed a long, dark revolver at us.

We did as we were told, and the man hastily handcuffed our wrists together. “We'll ride nice and easy on into Clinton, 'Boes, and I'll see that you get the rock pile for a couple o' months.” When the fireman opened the firebox to shovel in coal, a streak of light enveloped the blind baggage.

The man with the gun turned his back on us, and looked out at the passing landscape as the train slowly gained momentum. As he did so, Bill held tightly to the rung of the iron ladder with his free hand, and kicked the majesty of railroad law in the south as he looked north.

The man shot excitedly into the air as he fell from the train. One shot, then several more blazed up at the moon, but the train now sped through the open country at sixty miles an hour.

“Say, Bill, how'll we get these danged handcuffs off?” I asked.

“We'll let a train run over 'em,” laughed Bill, and then seriously, “by thunder, we're in a hell of a fix. We'll have to beat it from the train away out from Clinton, 'cause that's where she stops first. That dick'll wire on ahead, if he didn't bust his leg or somethin'.”

We pulled at the handcuffs. “He sure spliced us easy, didn't he, Bill?” I said.

“Yeah, but he was a mail order dick at that—'cause a good detective don't turn his back on a guy.”

The wind swept around the train and blev smoke and steam-blended clouds across the Illinois fields.

Our minds were busy with the immediate problem ahead—that of getting off a hastily moving train while handcuffed together. We both felt that to leave the train the minute the whistle blew for the yards at Clinton was the only safe thing to do.

We resolved to take any chance rather than be arrested for attacking an officer. Bill talked over details with me, and I said, “It'd be a devil of a note, if we got hurt an' pinched, too.”

“Columbus took a chance, an' he didn't have jail starin' him in the mug, either,” blurted Bill.

Within an hour the engine whistle blew for the yards at Clinton. “Maybe the dick ain't got to a telegraph yet, but we better not ride on, anyhow,” said Bill.

The train slowed up a trifle as we climbed down on the one iron step attached to the car. We looked at the ground that seemed to be rolling swiftly with the train. “We can't make it yet,” shouted Bill, while he touched his foot on the ground as if to test the speed. “We'd break our rough necks.” There was a nervous silence for some moments. “Now, when you jump, Red, be sure you're clear of the train. Don't get your foot caught, for God's sake. I don't wanta die with you. Throw yourself when I do,” commanded Bill.

“Be sure and pick a soft place to land, Bill,” I suggested.

“Any place's softer'n jail, old boy. We'd better beat it now. We're sure to roll away from the train on this bank. That'll beat rollin' under. We'll soon be in the yards now.”

We held to the train with our shackled hands. Bill had me take the position furthest from the car so that chances of a mishap would be lessened.

“Now, when I count three, let go,” yelled Bill. “One—two—” We came to a bridge which crossed a body of water. On the other side Bill yelled, “Three,” and we let go of the train simultaneously. Somehow I fell and dragged Bill with me. He soon had me sitting upright. The handcuffs had torn the flesh from our wrists. Otherwise we were unhurt.

We walked along the bank of the Mississippi river, and hunted for two heavy rocks under the blurred light of the moon.

“We'll lay our mitts on one rock, and I'll crack the handcuffs with the other rock,” suggested Bill.

“That suits me,” I replied.

We found a flat rock imbedded in the earth, and after another search, a smaller rock was found.

Bill used the smaller rock as a hammer. He became excited once, and missed the handcuff, and hit my wrist. “Hey, you cock-eyed boob, watch what you're doin',” I yelled.

“Well, you hit 'em then,” suggested Bill.

I took the rock and pounded the irons until they spread and broke. We moved our free wrists again and laughed like children.

Bill took the broken handcuffs and tossed them into the river. They fell into the water with a loud plunking sound.

“Hope a carp eats 'em for bait,” said Bill, as he looked at the river. “I got an idea,” he continued, “we'll get a job in vaudeville, Houdini an' Kellar, the handcuff kings.”

“We better watch out, Bill. We ain't outta this burg, yet.”

“All we have to do's lay low. They never pinch the right tramp when anything's done. They just pinches the first guy they sees and says to themself, ‘Well, he's a tramp, anyhow, an' we'll stick 'im up for sixty days,'” said Bill.

“I know, but it'd be tough for a couple o' guys to be sent up for what we done,” I said.

“It's all'n the game, Red. When you're on the bum long enough someone'll stick you up for somethin' some other guy done. The big trick's don't let 'em ketch you.”

Bill was from the reform school at Pontiac, Illinois. He had served two terms, the first term for vagrancy, and the second for cutting a negro with a knife.

Bill had blond hair, and a sharp face. He had blue eyes, a straight nose, and a square chin. He was a heavy-set youth, and his shoulders were broad and powerful. He had no morals at all, and was as irresponsible as the wind. He had two fine traits, being free-hearted and cheerful always. He never thought of himself first, whether it was the sharing of a dollar, or a slice of bread. His bodily cleanliness amounted to a passion. He was quick in movement and daring in resolve.

We walked along the Mississippi for some time without speaking. Then Bill said, “I'll tell you, Red, I'll stick a knife in any dick that tries to catch me before I spend all summer in jail.”

“Sure thing,” I replied, “only a guy's safer bustin' 'em in the jaw, or kickin' 'em off a train.”

“Maybe you're right,” returned Bill, “but the next guy that sticks me in jail's got a battle on his hands. I been in jail five years. That's enough.”

We came to an old flat-boat that rose and fell with the waves. We walked out to it on a board that stretched from the bank. With coats over our shoulders and our shoes for pillows, we watched the stars and listened to the lapping of the waves against the boat until we fell asleep.

The sun climbed early over a wood nearby and threw its rays upon our faces. We sat erect and sleepily watched the peaceful scene around us. Some geese were swimming in circles in the middle of the river. A passenger train thundered over the railroad bridge on its way to Chicago. The frogs still croaked along the bank as we left the boat.

We walked away from the railroad tracks for several hundred feet. Smoke curled through the air at the edge of a wood. As we drew near, we smelt the odour of frying meat and boiling coffee.

Five hoboes sat around the fire, Indian fashion. Another stood above the fire and turned meat in an immense iron skillet. The men looked at each other as we approached. The tramps were quickly put at their ease as soon as Bill had spoken a few words to them.

A box-car door was laid upon some railroad ties to serve as a table. Some battered tin dishes were upon it.

The man who cooked the food was a tall angular hobo, with an eagle face that wore a constant sneer. His nature was as cold as though ice had frozen about his heart. He did not speak to us at all. A bleared, one-armed man, with heavy body, and heavier stomach rose from his seat. He stood in front of us, and asked, “You kids runaways?”

“Nope, you got us wrong. We ain't got nothin' to run away from.”

“Hey, Lanky,” yelled the one-armed tramp to the cook, “Kin these kids eat?”

“Are they broke?” asked another tramp, when Lanky ignored the question.

“We're flatter'n feet wit' broken arches,” replied Bill.

“Come an' eat then,” said the one-armed man.

A breeze came up and swayed the tops of the trees in the woods. The sun threw leafy shadows across the car-door table. The greed of hungry men was the only thing that spoiled the scene. Birds darted over the landscape and flew low across the broad river. The geese swam leisurely in the direction of the tramps.

The one-armed man looked up from his food and noticed the handsome buff-colored goose that swam in the lead. He spoke aloud as if in warning to the goose, “Come aroun' to-night, old feller, an' we'll make a stew outta yu.”

The men talked but little at first, but when their hunger was appeased, the conversation became livelier. Even Lanky, the cook, was moved to speak once or twice.

“Which way you kids come from?” asked one of the men.

“From Chi,” answered Bill.

“Where you goin'?” asked another.

“Just driftin' around for the summer,” I answered.

“I beat it through De Kalb last night on the rods of a manerfest meat train, an' I hears 'em talkin' in the yards 'bout some dick 'at got kicked off Number One.”

“This country'll be hostile now,” said the one-armed man. “Clinton allus was a tough town for the 'boes. Maybe we'd better mooch on outta here.”

“We will like the devil,” spoke up another tramp. “If any dick comes 'round here, we'll make 'im swim like one o' them geese. We'll make 'im gurgle water like a crab.”

The one-armed man left the table and settled himself under the shade of a large white-oak tree. He deftly filled a corncob pipe with his one hand, and lit the match quickly by the twist of his thumb nail, and in another moment was the picture of solid contentment.

I stretched out upon the ground near the one-armed man, and lost myself in the contents of the magazines scattered under the tree. Bill soon walked over toward us. He lingered for a few minutes, but being unable to stay long in one place, he soon rose and walked about through the woods. In a short time, he returned, carrying a broomstick, which he laughingly twirled as a cane.

The hoboes scattered within an hour and returned to camp late in the afternoon. They were heavily laden with food which they had bought and begged.

Bill begged eighty cents on the main street of Clinton, and I begged fifty cents from a red-faced man who was drunk. The man was moved by the tragic story which I told, and he took me into a nearby saloon with him. Bill, who was begging on the other side of the street, was quick to size up the situation, and followed us into the saloon.

I introduced Bill at once, without giving the man a name. He shook hands with Bill and invited him to drink also. The bartender became interested in the tales of tramping we told, and when we left, he gave each of us a pint of whiskey. So with a dollar and thirty cents and two pints of red-eye between us, and with our heads teeming with liquor, we headed for the hobo camp.

It was mid-afternoon when we arrived at the camp and contributed the liquor as our share of the day's spoils. The angular hobo cook smiled crookedly as he saw the red fluid in the bottles. He quickly opened the first one, saying, “You kids're dern good moochers.” The whiskey rattled down his boney throat, until another tramp grabbed the bottle from him. “What you t'ink it is, your birt'day, Lanky?” he sneered.

The tramp held the bottle up so all could see. Lanky had drained a half pint of it. “We got a pint an' a half o' this now, an' I got a pint o' gin, and there's six oranges here a grocery guy give me. So I'll boil a couple a gallons o' water, and pound the oranges in it, and mix up the gin and red-eye. That'll give us some highballs. You guys willin'?”

All consented, and the tramp soon busied himself mixing the strange concoction. “You oughta put some ker-sene in it,” suggested another tramp.

“I'll put some rough-on-rats in it for Lanky,” volunteered the mixer.

The concoction was ready in a short time, and the rovers drank it out of dented tin cups made rusty by the rain.

Forgetful of the law, and of wasted lives, the men were soon singing ribald hobo songs that would have delighted Rabelais. They sang a song which contained many verses. The hero went through all the adventure of a hobo Don Juan, and at last ended in peace and quiet, and this part of his career can be printed:

HE SETTLED DOWN

Where the cigarettes grow near the lemonade springs,

In the big potato mountains.

Where the ham an' eggs grow on trees,

And bread grows from the ground,

An' the springs squirt booze to your knees,

An' there's more than enough to go 'round.

Where the chickens crawl into the skillet,

An' cook 'emselves up nice an' brown,

An' the cows churn their butter'n the mornin',