CHAPTER VII
THE DECANTERBURY PILGRIMS
Through a dreary waste of devastated country a little group of refugeesplodded in silence. All about them lay fields and orchards which hadbeen torn and uprooted as though by some unbelievable whirlwind. At awatering trough along the road they halted, facing the sign:
COMPULSORY DRINKING STATION
Adults, 1 quart Children, 1 pint
THIRST FORBIDDEN BETWEEN HERE AND THE NEXT STATION
Under the eye of an armed chuff, who watched them suspiciously, thewretched wanderers drank the water in silence, but without enthusiasm.Then they shuffled on down the road.
At the front of the small procession a slender girl, in a much-stainedsports suit, rode on a tall black horse. Beside the horse trudged abulky man in a grotesque garb of dirty lavender quilting. A mattedwhisk of coarse beard drooped from his chin, but his blue eyes burnedbrightly in his sunburnt face. Over his shoulder he carried a six footlength of brass railing, a small folding table, and a shabby knapsack.
Behind the horse limped a lean, dyspeptic-colored individual in a PalmBeach suit that would have been a social death-warrant on the shiningsands of its name-place. There is no form of sartorialism that takes onsuch utter humility as a Palm Beach suit gone wrong. This particularvestment was spotted with ink, with mud, with fruit-juices, with everykind of stain; it was punctured with perforations that might have beendue to fallen tobacco tinder. The individual within this travesty ofclothing was painfully propelling a wheelbarrow, in which rode (notwithout complaint) a substantial woman and a baby. An older childtrailed from the Palm Beach coat-tail.
These jovial vagabonds, as the reader will have suspected, were noother than Theodolinda Chuff, Virgil Quimbleton, and the family ofBleaks.
Affairs had gone steadily from bad to worse. After the incident--or, assome blasphemously called it, the miracle--at Cana, Bishop Chuff hadcommenced ruthless warfare. Enraged beyond control by the perfidy ofhis daughter, he had sent out the armies of the Pan-Antis to wreakvengeance on every human enterprise that could be suspected ofcomplicity in the matter of fermentation. Not only had the countrysidebeen laid waste, but the printing press had been abolished and allpublishing trades were now a thing of the past. This, of course, hadthrown Dunraven Bleak out of a job. He had retrieved his wife andchildren from the seashore, and in company with Quimbleton and MissChuff, and the noble and faithful horse John Barleycorn, they had led anomad existence for weeks, flying from bands of pursuing chuffs, andbravely preaching their illicit gospel of good cheer in the face ofterrible dangers.
The girl, who was indeed the Jeanne d'Arc of their cause, was theirsole means of subsistence. It was her psychic powers that made itpossible for them, in a furtive way, to give their littleentertainments. Their method was, on reaching a village where therewere no chuff troops, to distribute certain handbills which Bleak hadbeen able to get printed by stealth. These read thus:
THE SIX QUIMBLETONS or The Decanterbury Pilgrims In Their ArtisticRevival Of Old and Entertaining Customs, Tableaux Vivants VanishedArts, Folklore Games and Conjuring Tricks Such as The Drinking ofHealths, Toasts, Nosepainting, The Lifted Elbow, Let's Match For It,Say When, Light or Dark? and This One's On Me. COMMUNION WITH DEPARTEDSPIRITS Please Do Not Leave Before the Hat Goes Round
Having taken their station in some not too prominent place, Bleak wouldmount the wheelbarrow and play Coming Through the Rye on a jew's-harp.This, his sole musical accomplishment, was exceedingly distasteful tohim: all his training had been in the anonymity of a newspaper office,and he felt his public humiliation bitterly.
When a crowd had gathered, Quimbleton would ascend the barrow and makea brief speech (of a highly inflammatory and treasonable nature) afterwhich he would set up the small table and the brass rail, produce awhite apron and a tumbler from his knapsack, and introduce Theodolindafor an alcoholic trance. It was found that the public entered into thespirit of these seances with great gusto, and often the collectiontaken up was gratifyingly large. However, the life was hazardous in theextreme, and they were in perpetual danger of meeting secret serviceagents. It was only by repeated private trances of their own that theywere able to keep up their morale.
Reaching a bend in the way, where a grove of trees cast a gratefulshade, the Decanterbury Pilgrims halted to rest. Quimbleton helpedTheodolinda down from her horse, and they all sat sadly by the roadside.
"Theo," said Quimbleton, as he wiped his brow, "do you think, dear,that if I set up the table you could give us a little trance? Upon mysoul, I am nearly done in."
"Darling Virgil," said Theodolinda, "I really can't do it. You knowI've given you four trances already this morning, and you have communedwith the soul of Wurzburger at least a dozen times. Then, as you know,I have put Mr. Bleak in touch with a julep six or seven times. All thattakes it out of me dreadfully. I really must consider my art a bit: Idon't want to be a mere psychic bartender, a clairvoyant distiller."
"You are quite right, dear girl," said Quimbleton remorsefully. "But Icouldn't help thinking how agreeable a psychical seidel of dark beerwould be just now. You are our little Jeanne Dark, you know," he added,with an atrocious attempt at pleasantry.
"That's all very well," said Bleak (who preferred julep to beer), "butif we don't look out Miss Chuff will go into a permanent trance. I'venoticed it has been harder and harder to bring her back from thesestates of suspended sobriety. You know, if we crowd these phantasms ofthe grape upon her too fast, she might pass over altogether, and staybehind the bar for good. We are deeply indebted to Miss Chuff for heradorable willingness to act as a kind of bunghole into the spiritworld, but we don't want her to slip through the hole and evaporate."
"Safety thirst!" cried Quimbleton, raising his loved one to his lips.
"We can't go on like this indefinitely," continued Bleak. "I don't mindbeing a mountebank, but mountebanks don't pay much interest. I'd ratherbe a safe deposit somewhere out of Chuff's reach. There's too muchdrama in this way of living."
"I can stand the drama as long as I get the drams," said theunrepentant Quimbleton.
"Well, _I_ won't stand it!" exclaimed Mrs. Bleak, shrilly. "Look whatyour insane schemes have brought us to! You and my husband seem to findcomfort in your psychical toping, but I don't notice any psychicalmillinery being draped about for Miss Chuff or myself. And look at thechildren! They're simply in rags. If you really loved Miss Chuff Ishould think you'd be ashamed to use her as a spiritual demijohn!You've alienated her from her father, and reduced my husband frommanaging editor of a leading paper to managing jew's-harpist of a gangof psychic bootleggers." She burst into angry tears.
Quimbleton groaned, and turned a ghastly fade upon Bleak.
"It's quite true," he said.
In the excitement Miss Chuff had turned very pale.
"Virgil," she said faintly, "I believe I feel a trance coming on."
"Great grief!" cried the harassed leader. "Not now, my darling! I thinkI see some troops in the distance. Quick, try to concentrate your mindon lemonade, on buttermilk, on beef tea!"
Happily this crisis passed. Theodolinda had presence of mind enough topull out a little photograph of her father from some secret hidingplace, and by putting her mind on it shook off the dominion of theother world.
Quimbleton spoke with anguished remorse.
"Mrs. Bleak is right. I've been trying to hide it from myself, but Ican do so no longer. This monkey business--what we might call thisgorilla warfare--must stop. We will only land in front of a firingsquad. I have only one idea, which I have been saving in case all elsefailed."
The Bleaks were too discouraged to comment, but Theodolinda smiledbravely.
"Virgil dear," she said, "your ideas are always so original. What isit?"
Quimbleton stood up, unconsciously putting one foot on the portablebrass rail which rested on its six-inch legs by the roadside. His tiredeyes shone anew with characteristic enthusiasm. It was plain that heimagined himself before
a large and sympathetic audience.
"My friends," he said, "the secret of eloquence is to know yourfacts--or, as the all-powerful Chuff would amend it, to know yourtracts. One fact, I think I may say, is plain. The jig is up, or (moreliterally), the jag is up. I can see now that alcohol will never bemore than a memory. Principalities and powers are in league against us.If the malt has lost its favor, wherewith shall it be malted?"
He paused a moment, as though expecting a little applause, andTheodolinda murmured an encouraging "Here, here."
With rekindled eye he resumed.
"Alcohol, I say, will never be more than a memory. Yet even a memorymust be kept alive. The great tradition must not die. For the very sakeof antiquarian accuracy, for the instruction of posterity, some exactrecord must be kept of the influence of alcohol upon the human soul.How can this be preserved? Not in books, not in the dead mummies of amuseum. No, not in dead mummies, indeed, but in living rummies. Thatbrings me to my great idea, which I have long cherished.
"I propose, my dear friends, that in some appropriate shrine,surrounded by all the authentic trappings and utensils, some chosenindividual be maintained at the public charge, to exhibit for thecontemplation of a drouthing world the immortal flame of intoxication.He will be known, without soft concealments, as the Perpetual Souse. Inhis little bar, served by austere attendants, he will be kept in astate of gentle exhilaration. Nothing gross, nothing unseemly, Iinsist! In that state of sweetly glowing mind and heart, in thatineffable blossoming of all the nobler qualities of human dignity, thispriest of alcohol will represent and perpetuate the virtues of thegrape. Booze, in the general sense, will have gone West, but ah howfair and ruddy a sunset will it have in the person of this its vicar!There he will live, visited, studied, revered, a living memorial. Therehe will live, perpetually in a mellow fume of bliss, trailing clouds ofglory, as if--as some poet says,
As if his whole vocation Were endless intoxication.
And now, my friends--not to weary you with the minor details of thisfar-reaching proposal--let me come to the point. For so gravelyresponsible a post, for an office so representative of the ideals andambitions of millions, the choice cannot be cast haphazard. The choicemust fall upon one qualified, confirmed, consecrated to this end. Thisdeeply significant office must be conferred by the people themselves.It must be conferred by popular election. Candidates must be nominated,must stump the country explaining their qualifications. And let me saythat, upon looking over the whole field, I see one man, who by the juryof his peers--or shall I say by the jury of his beers?--is supremelyfitted for this post. It is my intention to nominate Mr. Dunraven Bleakfor the office of Perpetual Souse."
There was a moment of complete silence while his hearers considered thevast scope of this remarkable suggestion. It is only fair to say thatMr. Bleak's face had at first lighted up, but then he glanced at hiswife and his countenance grew pinched. He spoke hastily:
"A very generous thought, my dear fellow; but I feel that you would befar more competent for this form of public service than I could hope tobe."
"Your modesty does you credit," replied Quimbleton, "but you forgetthat owing to my relation with Miss Chuff I shall happily be precludedfrom the necessity of entering public life for this purpose."
"And what, pray," said Mrs. Bleak with distinct asperity, "is to becomeof me and the children if Mr. Bleak is elected to this preposterousoffice?"
"I was coming to that," said Quimbleton eagerly. "It would be arranged,of course, that the Perpetual Souse would be granted a liberal salaryfor his family expenses; you and your delightful children would bemaintained at the public expense in a suitable bungalow nearby, with aprivate family entrance into the official cellars. Your rank, ofcourse, would be that of Perpetual Spouse."
"My good Quimbleton," said Bleak, somewhat bitterly, "this is afascinating vision indeed, but how can it be accomplished? How wouldyou ever get such a scheme accepted by Bishop Chuff, who will neverforgive you for kidnaping his daughter? You are building bar-rooms inSpain, my dear chap; you are blowing mere soap-bubbles."
"And why not?" cried his friend. "Bishop Chuff has called me a soap-boxorator. At any rate, a man who stands upon a soap-box is nearer heavenby several inches than the man who stands upon the ground."
Theodolinda's face sparkled with the impact of an idea.
"Come," she said, "it's not impossible after all. I have a thought.We'll offer Father an armistice and talk things over with him. Hedoesn't know what straits we're in, and maybe we can bring him toterms. He was very badly scared by those gooseberry bombs, and maybe wecan bluff him into a concession."
"If we had had any luck," said Quimbleton, "we would have blown himinto a concussion. But anyway, that's a bonny scheme. We'll grant him atruce. Bleak, you're a newspaper man, just get hold of the United Pressand let them know the armistice is signed."
Bleak smiled wanly at the thrust.
"All right," he said. "Let's go. But what's your idea, Miss Chuff? Wemust have something to base negotiations on."
"Wait and see," she cried gayly. "We'll talk it over as we go along."
Mrs. Bleak aroused her children, who had fallen asleep, and climbedback into the wheelbarrow.
"I don't know that I approve of that scheme of making Dunraven thePerpetual Souse," she remarked. "I can imagine what my poor motherwould say about it if she were living. She came of fine old Kentuckystock, and it would humiliate her deeply to know to what a level we hadbeen reduced."
"My dear Mrs. Bleak," said Quimbleton, as he hoisted his betrothed intothe saddle and the pilgrims began to move, "I know of a great deal ofgood old Kentucky stock that has had a far worse fate than that inthese tragic years."