JERGEN'S REINCARNATION

Hastings Standard, Volume VIII, Issue 4206, 16 April 1904, Page 1 (Supplement)

JERGEN'S REINCARNATION

(By George Horton.) Miss Violet Smith saw the cashier of Robinson :u:d Company's little cauntr? bank the day before he departed for Canada taking so great a portion of the -fund® with lrnn that, wii!i other irregularities, ha caused the concern to close its doors. He walked into the place ahead of her and then, as she stood. r it tre counter —tru-re was no iron grating he turned about and faced her, inquiring : "What can 1 do for you, madam As he c-tood there with, his hat- in 'his hand she noticed that he v. ; is young and fat—verv fast. His obesity, because of his youth, was" not of the sort that results in abdominal protrusion, but- was rather distributed evenly over 'his entire body. His cheeks were puffed out as though he were inflating them with wird. his legs were as large around as bags of wneat, and so fleshy on the contiguous surfaces that they gave him the appearance of being "knock-kneed." He was broad, too —very, very broad. "I'd like to get a small cheque cashed, please." said 'Miss Smith, as she took a rustling bit of paper from her pocket-book and straightened it out. As he came around behind the <• «-.nr«-r -V. occurred to 'her that it was a pity lis was so fat, for he had a pleasant wav"and encaging manners. His eyes Were of ail e*s .-s-.se brown, his complexion was fair and delicate enough for that of a babv, and his teeth, when he revealed them in smiling, were even and beautifully white. It was impossible to imagine, however, how he would lcok without his puifed-u-p cheeks, that- "li'.s head to resemble in shape a pumpkin, or a man with a violent toot-hach-j on botu sides of the jaw.

Miss Smith smiled as she left the bank, tucking the bills into her purse. Alas! Women never fall in love at first sight with fat men. There ti. ver was a fat hero of romance. Corpulence suggests—often unfairly—eagerness for the trencher, much laughter, and that jovial, care-free attitude which is the very antipode of love. Fat men are tortured by the tender passion, of course, but it is hard to think of them as seriously affected, as suffering othtr than Falstaffinn pangs. The absconding of the cashier was a sensation in the little town, the intensity and magnitude of which can hardly be appreciated by the dwellers in great cities, where such events are of mo-re frequent occurrence. They had no great business concerns ; the groceries. tils two hardware stores, the feed st'ire were modest concerns of age and sta•bi'ity. -Robinson and Company's Bank, founded by Silas Robinson, dated from the year 1857. The farmers who had deposited therein their three or four thousand dollars fe!t as secure about the money as though itwere invested in land. To- many of these the surpetiision of the bank meant only the relinquishment of the dream of renting outth-> farm and moving into town. T'o a few other?, including an old maid and a widow or two, it meaot 'hard work in their declining years, instead of ease and an imposing monument. in the village churchyard. Miss Violet Smith was exasperated at the defalcation -of the cashier, for personal reasons. She was an heiress in a small way, but the loss of her five hundred dollars deposited in the bank would occasion the changing of certain agreeable plans. When she thought of the old maid and the widow or two, her indignation was strong and tears of sympathy for the victims arose to her eyes. "The fat villain!" she exclaimed, as ehe thought of the cashier. And even then she could'not-help smiling, for there is something comical and contradictory in the very thought of a villain who is fat. Mr Jergens' first sensation, after he had got comfortably seated in the smoker of the outgoing train, was one of unalloyed satisfaction. He was fixed now, for life. He wasn't a millionaire, nor yet a rich man ; but he had made- a comfortable haul. He should be able to live for several years at his ease and get into some business of which he would be the owner. As he lay back in the seat the big bulging pocket-book pressed •genially against his heart, and he tapped it affectionately with his hand. His conscience did not trouble him at all. As for the farmers, why, they had their farms. A man possessing sixty or one hundred acres of land, and who knows how to work them, has no need of a bank deposit. The widows and the old maids, none of them had got together enough to be of any real use to them. What could any one do with a few hundred dollars? He had simply gathered together all these useless driblets into a sum of sufficient size to be of real advantage to a human being, and had constituted himself that being. And now it' was that be began to worry about his obesity. A man of his size was marked, -was easily described. Thank Heaven, he had given himself suffi-

: cient time to get away, but wherever he went, every one wko him would at last suspect him ot beuigi tne defaulting cashier. Ha would bvi as. conspicuous as the statue of Liberty in 2\ew Yopk Harbor. He determined, therefore, to take ship and sail away immediately to some remote part of the earth. Accordingly, despite the fact that his ticket .was bought for Toronto, he took boat at 'Buffalo with the idea of making connections that would bring, him out at Halifax. Fortune favored him(He had departed on Saturday afternoon, and. the trouble would not be discovered till Monday morning. 'He arrived at (Halifax in the evening and got away on a big sailing vessel; bj-und for Australia and laden with a miscel- : laneous cargo of non-perishable goods. He had not been on the ship two days before , he discovered that not a soul on board: knew . of the disaster to the Newark bank. He j ■heaved a sigh, of relief. j " 'Tis a big; world," he muttered, as he j stood leaning against the rail, looking con- ; tentedly at the green waves that galloped by j in endless procession. " 'Tis a trig world, j and a man is an idiot who fails to make the j most of it. A*nd "we've only one life to live." j And, like feptain Kidd, he sailed and he | sailed. j

But it's a lonsj way from Halifax to Australia, and the sea is an uncertain element. | Somewhere, it- matters not at all where, a < great storm arose, and the ship that was ■ bearing SMr Ernest W. Jergens and his for- > tunes was wreebed and all on board were , obliged to take to the boats, three in number. One of these promptly swamped, and all its occupants- were drowned. The other floated away, appearing now and then as it ■ crested a wave, each time smaller, till it finally disappeared.. Jergens never knew what did become of it. in his own boat . were the captain, four sailors and a boy, beside® himself. They were weeks afloat, dur- . ing which time all perished witii the exception of Jergens r ,w;b©se reserve supply of fat tept him aJiive.. The reader must imagine <he sufferings of our hero and his companions luring this terrible time. It is no part of . hi» narrative to describe them. Not a sail *<lß seen from first "to last, but finally, one norning Jergens had the inexpressible joy o behold land, .and two hours later he ran lis prow into a bit of beach the shape of a new moon, but half a mile in length. About .he first thing he saw,, as tie staggered upon .he land, almost fainting from hunger, was i. large clam, washed ashore by an incoming Tare. The shell was broken, revealing the ihrobbing meat. He fell upon his knees, iterally tore the bivalve apart with his ingers, and devoured it. '.ftien he ran, up ind down the beach,, as eagerly as a marsii len looking foe food, in search of more :lams. His jpy was great to discover that i ■hey came steaming in continuously. He j gorged himself on clams, after which he dug i. well in the sand, some distance back from he sea, and was pleased to find that it filled Tith tolerably fresh water. His island proved to be a mere giant rock >r projecting top of a submarine mountain. Juite a number of trees grew on it—a small, ) jnarled species of oak, and these furnished ! ■nough material for the beacon fire which he | letermined to light at night and for a i x>lumn of smoke by day. He was taken ofi i ;y a passing steamer at the end of the , ourth week oil the island, during which, j ime he had subsisted largely on the clams ; ,nd an occasional bird which he managed to : all by creeping up on the flock and throwing i iieary gtick into it as it arose from the ;round. It was intensely hot upon the is- \ and during the day, and the only shade that i Fergens could find was afforded by a turn- j >led mass of rocks. He spent much of his : ;ime, however, upon, a blistering knoll of j (and, chasing after a species of crab that ran , tideways on long legs with incredible swiftie6B and div6d into a hole. The sand was white and glittered in the sun till it made lis eyes ache, the sea shone, lite a lake of jlass, and the scurrying crabs were as white d in catahing one of these nimble creatures is bits of ivory. Whenever Jergens succerdt afforded a welcome variety in his bill-of-'are. Moreover, in the hurry of leaving the sinking, ship a box of Cranz's assorted deicacies had been put into the boat by misake for a box of crackers, and Jergens found .he pickles and chili sauce quite useful in 'endering the clams less monotonous. He lid. not, however, leave his diet upon the sland with any feeling of regret. The men who came after him in a boat rom the ship standing oiit there to sea were frenchmen, and the cashier was unable to •onverse with them at all; but as soon as id got on board the captain addressed him in olerable English.^

"My name is 'Stackpole," said Jergens; "Jonas Stackpole," remembering with considerable difficulty the name by which he had been known on the wrecked steamer. He was conscious of a great fear, the moment he met the captain's eye, that he would be recognised as the absconding cashier ; an unreasonable and groundless fear, as the reader will agree, founded on his own consciousness of guilt. When he went into the captain's cabin and caught sight of himself in a full-length mirror he laughed aloud. He was transformed, he was another man. Jergens, the fat Jergens, had disappeared, m his place stood another man —a sallow man whose face was covered with a scraggy beard, and who was thin—yes,_ actually thin, almost to the point- of emaciation. "I will trim my beard," he mused, "and I can got back to the United States, or anywhere I choose. No one will recognise me now." His joy over losing his fat was the greater inasmuch as it had been a heavy affliction to him from his boyhood, when he was known among his playmates as "Jumbo." "Well, it's gone now," he muttered grimly, "and I'll not let it come hack, if I live on pickles and clams all the rest of my life." . .

The food on the Trench ship, a tramp steamer laden with wheat, tasted to huii somewhat as ambrosia must have tasted to the gods or manna to the Israelites, and he ate ravenously for the first few days, to get his strength back. He weighed himself on the steamer's scales the first day that- he was taken on board, and lon ml that from two hundred and eighty pounds he had gone down to one hundred and twenty. At the end of a week he weighed himself again and found that he had run back up to one hundred and thirty. He made a- little calculation and his face blanched with fear. "Ten pounds "week \ln twenty s 111 gain two hundred pounds. I must stop tins thing right here." And he did. He die-ted so rigidly and persistently that he managed to remain a tall, slender man with a thin face. However he might- enjoy life, the pleasures of the table were certainly denied -him; and this was a hardship, for he had left- the island some forty thousand dollars richer—the money of the wrecked schooner, taken from the body of the dead captain. He returned to America and at the end of two years gained such confidence in his changed appearance that he shaved off his beard, which grew but unevenly and was not becoming. He began even to feel that he Jonas Stackpole, was not the same man as' Ernest Jergens. He felt that -his character was different. The consciousness of his thin ascetic face caused him to look more seriously upon life, to judge his neighbors more severely, to talk less and to_ laugh much le*s. indeed, of laughter he lived m wholesome fear, because he had ever m mmd the ancient saw, "Laugh and grow fat.

He joined the church and attended eervices regularly, and 'whereas he had been mildly interested before in. horse racing and always attended vaudeville, he now began to frequent art exhibitions and grand opera. He grew more severe in judgments too, and the droll humor of his corpulent days changed to an incisive wit. Can it be a matter of wonder that this change took place in Jergens when we refle-ct that the very hat a man wears has an influence upon his character?

He met Miss Violet 'Smith again, in the Berkshires. ; She was spending a couple of months there enjoying the «>cf summer ■weather, and he was there at the invitation ; of a friend of a year's standing, who offered . him the advantages of the Country Club and its fine golf course. Mr 'Stackpole, as he was now known, and Miss Smith were thrown together by Fate, which consigned them to the same boarding-house. -Lney met evenings in the parlor, and, with the other boarder?, played games; they went over the golf course together, and, finally, their friendship advanced so far that they took long trolley rides over the mountains and to the many small towns of historic interest roundabout. Mr IStaxdipole recognised I Miss Smith the moment he set eyes on her, I and the fact that she was not conscious of ever having seen Jiim before served as final

of the ease and security lie felt. even, when he went with her to the kcal bank to get a cheque cashed, she related to him the Newark incident, and asked h:m with laughter: J "Did you ever hear of such a thing as a fat villain, before, Mr Stackpole?" Ernest W. Jergens, the fat, the dishonest, the coarse-fibred, tit..' absconding, .had dematerializod,. was gone forever, was translated , to another planet, and nothing now remained of him on earth gave a d windling memory of ill repute. Yet something of the Jergens nature remained, despite the influence of the aesthetic countenance in the mirror, for Mr Stackpole remembered Miss Smith's reputation of heiress in a small way, and the tiiought strengthened his impression that she. was an attractive girl. He mads early inquiries before allowing his intimacy witn her. to advance too far, and learned that, by the; death, of aft. uncle, sh® had become an heiress indeed. He now regarded iher as pjsitively beautiful, and began to lay systematic siege to her affections. His judgment confirming his choice,, be actually fell in love with her, a fact thai grcatliy abetted ■his suit, for nothing, appeals to a good woman's. heart mope. than, evident sincerity. And it was no difficult matter for any man to fall in love with. Violet Smith, with her frank, charming ways, her girlish enthusiasm, her slender, graceful figure, her red-dish-brown hair, brown eyes- and long black eyelashes, her pretty, tip-tilted nose, heir cheeks like ripe 'Maryland peaches. Mr Stackpole did not win. the lady at all easily, for she was in no hasfe to relinquish her freedom, but from the very first she felt him to be a dangerous suitor. His manners were engaging, and his smile,, .though sad, was positively beautiful. Then,, too, there was about him-an air of mystery,, perceirad by her keen feminine intuition,, which, added an element of. romance to his other assete. He was interested in art,, too, and could read poetry beautifully. "The man must be aAI- soul," she fondly; "why, <hs eats almost nothing at

all." Which was quite true, bo far as the eating was concerned, and it was also true that Mr Stackpole was a constant patron of weighing machines, and wheii he found himself gaining he ate still leas for a. day or two. One afternoon in August Mies Smith agreed to let'Mr Stackpole call her "Violet," ajid she promised to become his in name as well as fact some time before Christmas. 'He felt a. keen thrill of delight whan, in addressing- him a little later, she faltered out the w'ord, "Jo —Jonas," and brushed prettily at her awkwardness. The day after they went up 'Mount Tom together by trolley. In his new-found happiness as possessor of this attractive heiress he was almost boyish in his 1 en joyment of th® day. He became enthusiastic over the magnificent view, one of the finest in the world : of shining, streams, hamlet® embowered in orchards, square fields green and ploughed, and thrifty white farmhouses. They took, luncheon in the cafe and Stackpole celebrated the happy event by eating double his ordinary allowance. ; After luncheon they ascended to the telei scope-room and Mr Stackpole spent considerj able tinae .gazing through. one of in<j struments, while his fiancee, who was not j interested in them, wandered about tha ' room. As he was thus employed iMiss Smith ■ gave a cry of astonishmest, and then broke . into laughter. "Oh,..come here, Jonas!" she shrieked, and ; seizing him by the arm she pulled him across i the room to a full-length, mirror fixed in the : wall. It was convex and made thin people : look immensely fat. I Miss Smith gazed at the reflection in the , mirror and the reflection gazed at her and its face turned pale. There, with his liat in his hand, 6tood Ernest W. Jergens, the broad Mr Jergens, with the puffy cheek*, exactly in the attitude in which he had stood that day in the bank. 1 Miss "Smith screamed and sank half fainting upon a chair. Mr Stackpole knew what was the matter, .but his first thought was to brazen it out. Bending over the girl, he murmured:

"My darilng, what is the matter? Ar» you ill? Tell what I can dp .for you?" She looked up at him and full recognition blazed from her eyes, complete confession kneeled in his.

"Go away, Jergens," she whispered, with white lips. "Go away, quick ! Quick !" "I will at least —get—you —a glass—of— water," he faltered. He went , and never came back.