The Tompkins Laughorium

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLVII, Issue 19, 8 May 1912, Page 50

The Tompkins Laughorium

Bi

EDWARD BOLTWOOD.

©N an August afternoon. John Hcffren >at with :n«* in a dismal )"assenger-ear, which dangled at the tail of a freight-train cradling Millrah aci<»-*■' the x ' y »uung desert. Our only companion ua> a wrinkled Indian roman. She decline*! ■•omeisa'ion. and >t »nil\ presented, wiui a fine, Milt »nic effort, the -ainted visage of di', inMvia u. holy. •’Alongside this here coach, a morgue at midnight would be a steady roar of merriment!” groaned John. We tried in vain to talk, to sleep to quarrel, and at length w * were driven io smoke in moody .-ilrmv. The aged Indian kept her expressionless eyes fixed on the grimy floor. Suddenly, without an instant’s warning, or an apparent cause, she broke into a ringing j *al of mirthful and mighty laughter. I could not have been more amazed had a party of pallbearers suddenly performed the X irginiau reel. “Well. Mrs. Langtry, v hat's the joke, ma’am?” >.»id Uvffren. The squaw nursed her chin, and then, as abruptly a* she had laughed, she relapsed again into dreariest gloom. John Ileffren nodded wisely. ’But what was the joke?" I asked him. ■ \ou can search me." he replied. *A\hv does an Injun laugh'. That’s a lend one. Injuns is rigged cnusual for laughin’. Injuns is." He paused refle iiVeh and rolled a cigarette. ‘’And .that > a tact." he went on. ‘ And nob«'»dy knows it betier’n me. and Jigstep McHenry, and Professor ><*? rates Tompkins, a Scientific man. I never told you about- that time, did I? Well, pass th? marches.’’ Iletfrcn lit his cigarette and plunged into hL story. U JT "I hi- McHenry and me was winter ing hi the town ot Sralded Butte,” said John. "We was financially non compos, and had t*> stand off the W idder Briggs, our board-lady, fc-r grub ami room-rent, we spread our-ehes to be as pop’lar with her as a pink fashion-sheet. McHenry. he’d rode in a circus once, ami could tickle the w idder with moss-<-vvered clown .'dories and comic songs, and. vou-eqnently. we was livin’ higher’n a <oh pie of murderers under sentence. "One da\. over the be*'f-.?* tew. the bidder s "‘What do you think?’ she says. T There's goin’ to be muster els at the s hoolbouse. for the benefit * th * Judies' Aid ’(iety,’ she says. Now, w e knew how the w idder her Felt’ was big chief o' that Ladies’ Aid OuuiL so Jigstep McHenry gartv me a quiet wink.

•••Minsterels?’ lie says. ‘Well. Mrs. Briggs, if I van help to assist, just you holler. When it comes to minsterels, I’ve got ’em all trimmed, from Dockbtader to Kit-hard Mansfield.’ •’t Oh. that’ll be perfec’ly dear of you!" >aid the widder. ’Spoon up some more of that jell, Mr. M. Henry/ she said. "Then Jigstep and me had a private war-talk about the minsterels, am! McHenry. he’s >tire exultant. Wliy, I’ll bp the head pm o: thin performance, ileffren!’ he says. TH thereby solidify us with the wilder till the spring round-up. there a n’t a comedian in scalded But tv* that’s on the same reservation with me/ "But after we’d scouted' round, tilings begun to look some tliffTent, and Jigstep McHenry s-es he’d been qii le some too numerous. "It was this way. 'There was a secretary to the Ladies’ Aid, wh'eh her name was Anu Lily Mott, and -he was fearful jealous of the W’i Ider Briggs, and aimed to grab the president’s belt next election. > s o, when the min-tere! scheme loomed up. and Mrs. Briggs threw out her chest, public ’cause of her star comedian McHenry, this Ann Lily Mutt dug up a cousin, who lived in Deadwood, and had took first money, three amachoor nights a running*, at the Deadwood A audeville Opera-House Theayter. He’s a plumber by trade, the cousin, but he writes to Ann Lily how he’ll win over to Scalded Butte f r the ladies’ Aid show, and make any other miustervl on the platform look like a counterfeit two-bits. " You see. a cow-town in winter fevers v.p easy, and this manoeuvre tore Saided Butte wide apart. It warn’t so much Jigstep ag’in’ the plumber, as it was the Mr-. Briggs gang ag’in the Anu Lily Mott adherents, and what you’d call the social atwiosphere of the settlement would ’a’ fried eggs. i ‘ Well, here it was a fortnight afore the minsterels. " * McHenry,’ says T. if you disgrace the widder in this show, the next performance we give will be in the county jail, for owin’ a board-bill.’ Jigstep, he laid on our bed, learnin’ jokes out of a almanac, while I sat on the bureau, and Professor Socrates Tompkins roosted on a chair. ’**l ompkins? Oh. he was a new boarder—a narn. r built oi l trout, with a plume on his face. He allowed he was a scientific man. and the last science he li.id worked was at a phonograph hewgi_- in a Cheyenne restaurant. AL Henry,’ says I, ’two weeks from s evenin’ Ann Lily’s cousin wilt get. more laughs in a minute than you will from supper to sun-up, and we’ll be ditched.* " Jigstep is scared, and he’d a’ backed

out, only for being a pile mure s.aider uf Mix. Brigg-. “•liefire'll,’ lie says, ‘you’ll have to laugh for me, anyhow, and that'll kind of coax a giggle out of the others —kind of start ’eiii.' ‘“Me laugh,’ I says. ‘What gool'lll that do? They’ll suspicion me. I wisht to gracious,’ 1 says, ‘ that Sniggerin’ Miller was around to help you!’ “ ’ Who’s he?’ said Tompkins. “‘lie’s a friend of mine,’ said I. ‘He's got the coaxin’est laugh, for a crowd, in the Black Hill-.’ said 1. ‘Sniggerin’ Miller’s laugh, said I. 'would coax a grin out of the cold side of a tombstone.’ “At that the professor looks wiser'n blazes. "'-Mil I see,’ he says. ‘A contagions laugh, it must be. This Miler’s laugh hits a fundamental note,' says Tompkins. ’ ‘ Yes, it's funny enough,’ 1 said. “ Then the perfessor’s lingo gets too many for my intellee'. Near’s 1 can remember, he claims how everythin' in nature from a cathedral to a pill box, lias got a cliff”rent funderniental note of mtisie. and that if you can strike up that note —bingo, the thing will fly to smithereens. He said a tiddler could heave down the Cheyenne city had, if he fiddled the right note in front ci it, and that what Miller’s laugh does was to hit the funderniental note of your diaphragm, or somethin’, and cause you to cackle, joyous. “Well, me and Jigstep passes up that scientific stuff. “ What’s the use of such loony talk?’ said McHenry. ‘1 don't much guess we can fetch Sniggerin' Miller to the show, anyway.’ “ ’ No,’ said I. ‘ Seein’ how he's on a promenade through Mexico, with three sheriffs after him, I don’t much guess we can.’ ’’But the professor liounced out of his chair, sudden, and his whiskers bristled like cactus. “‘I never thought of it before!’ he shouted. ‘Boy-.’ said lie, 'l’ll help you ag’in’ the plumber. Why shouldn't a contagious laugh, same as Miller’s, be imitated?' said he. “’With what?’ I said. ‘•‘W'th science’ said -he. ‘ .-.Vienee be darned!' yelled MeTTenry, a heap disgusted. “ So little Socrates Tompkins got awful warm in the collar, and prance! about. “‘lt I only had the makins’ of a graphaphone.’ he jabbered. ‘ I’d show you ign’rant sheep some science that'd drive your wisdom-teeth out o' the top of your heads!’ “ With that he banged the door, and we could hear him in the next room. i;itnm4gin’ in his trunk and snortin' to hisself. “Well, sir. we didn't see Socrates Tompkins for ’most a week, bailin’ mealtimes. But, after a couple of days, the cussedest noises begun to emigrate out of his room that ever you laid your earn <o! Mrs. Briggs, her nerves were on end a’ready. ’count of A. 1.. Mott, and the minsterels, ar. I she told Tompkins how that racket would have to quit. B if Soc said he was work-in’ for her own good, so's to ruin the Ann Lily crowd, and advised of her to wait. Aecc.rdiii’ly, we waited, till one n*ght, sure enougn, here conies Tvnipkius down to the par-

lour with somethin’ under his arm. 110 plants it on the table. ‘•'What is it?’ said Mrs. Briggs. Tompkins's Universal Lsiughorilini,’ he said. It was a tin squeegee, about the size of your boot-leg. ‘ Guaranteed,' said Tompkins. ‘ to vibrate the laughin' muscle of tile young and obi. •Suitable for theayters, humorous lectures, and church sociables. Hide losr under a seat, and set the auj’enec in r. roar, when desired.' “ ‘ Wind her up,' I said. “ lhe professor wound up a spring contraption, and turned her lose. And by the jumpin' cattish! You can believe me or not. but that phonograph dingus certainly had a powerful queer laugh to her! £>he took right holt o’ you. somehow, down where you live, and sort o’ wobbled you. Yes. sir, the queerest, quietest. lau'Jl.'iii’ noise jdia made! Human too. ‘ Ha w-ruh-ha w! Haw-iuh-haw!’— somethin’ like that. " But digstep, lie didn't laugh back none, nor 1 didn’t, nor Mrs. Briggs, although the widow's face kind of puck-' ered some. lhe professor is east down for a minute, but he chirks up, speed'.-. ’■ ’ I know why she didn't get a laugh oat of you all,’ ji e said. ‘ Yen-all guessed what was expected of you. so you nat’rally held off, and leaned back agin’ the-breeehin’-strap’; and he begs the widiler’s pardon for that sim'lee. ‘The only fair test of the l-aughoritun.’ said Tompkins, is to try hv- on parties that ain’twarned of her, none whatever.’ “‘How in time can we manage to do that?' said McHenry. ' We can't go blnt•tin’ around promise'ous with the con traptioii now, or we’ll give away t.liei game afore the niglit of the minsterels,’ said Jigstep. ” All right there, sir when McHenry said that—tight there’s where me. John Heffren. makes one of the chief misplays of my whole misplayed e’reer. ’ Listen to me.’ said I. ‘ There’s a cabin full of Injuns, just over the divide. What's the matter with packing the Laughorlum over there?' said I. ‘ We can spring her unbeknownst among the aborigines, ami If -lie \ : -s a gurgle out of an Injun, it's a good bet that she’ll erupt milt- out of Seal led Butte like a Yellowstone geyser.’ “ Well, the fool deal went through that same evenin'. The four of us, wilder and all, we gum-shoe’d over the divide, sly as the Standard Oil Company, and we sneaks up to a window of the Injun shack, without niakin' a' sound. Tlreie sat the Injuns. .-,01011111 and rocky, the way they do. You'd ’a thought, a dozen deaf-and-duniu orphans was holdin’ the obs’quies of a wafted parent. “Then Tompkins cranked up the Laughoi ium. “I’m tellin’ you the truth, straight as we're settin' here in tins car. One of the bucks dove for the door, but afore he made it, he'd begun to titter! Then an other laughed, and another: and the squaw-, thev giggled, and the papooses crowed continuous. Gai'ty? Glee? Don’t talk! If Tonipkins hadn’t choked off the machine when he did, we'd ’a’ had a dozen merry maniacs trailin' <».s for life, so help me! As it was, oil Charlie Dogeollar, who was the head buck, offers Tompkins a buffalo-hide aud two squaws for the Laughorium, 'causa

him and his tribe has to putt their freight early the next inornin . •‘•This settles it!’ says'. McHenry in our bedroom; and he tears up the comic ahnanae. TH outhold the. plumber now’’ he says. 'With that laugh-can at work for me in the gall'ry, I’d staek up, fearless, ag’in’ Chauncey Depew, or anybody,’ he says. • ; . ‘■Honest, it did seem so to me, too. II J. “Come minsterel-night, and that.auj’enee fair bulged the schoolhouse. Mrs. Briggs has her dev'tees herded on the north side, ami Ann Lily Mott, has hers on the south, like Grant and Lee at Waterloo. You ean smell fight half-a-mile away. The plumber, he’s there, safe and sober: and when they slid the curtain, I could savvy, by the style he jerked a tambourine, that he was no si nidi of an impresario. ■ ‘Jigstep McHenry, he’s the other end-man. He aimed to get a snicker light at the start, by means of milkin' ftiees durin’ the overchoor. Howsomever, the first face he made crackled up his burned cork, so most of it dropped off his countenance: and he looked horrid and alarmin', like an ad for a complexion soap. But that calm’ty don t stampede me any at all. ’Cause why? ’Cause 1 knows that in a dark corner under the stairs is Professor Socrates Tompkins with the Laughorium. “After the overchoor, the next items was a warble by the postmaster, and another by the Crescent Grange Quartet; and Abie Holtz, the city marshal, does a dance, and runs a six-inch sliver in his foot, and wants to arrest the janitor. And then everybody sits back and draws a long Jireath. for now comes Ann Lily’s cousin, tellin’ jokes, and after him, McHenry. ' “The eousin done pretty good all through, I’ll say that for him. There Was one string of jokes about a girl in a -sleepin’-ear—but never mind. They’ warn’t from an ahnanae. and Scalded Butte p’intedly howled. It sure ’peared like a big whinin’ for Ann Lily and the plumber. But from where I sat, near to the platform, I got McHenry’s eye, and he was ca’ui and confident as four kings vyitlr an ace kicker. “Then followed a kind o’ waltz— a. minaret, they called it —on the eab'net organ; and then Jigstep, up he rises.

•••Good evenin’, ladies and what came with you,’ he says; and he pulled down his vest, that the widder had rigged comical, w it'll a ’lastic inside. “The auj’ence grinned, but all of a sudden: “•Jlaw-ruh-liiiw! Jlaw-mh haw!’ says the •i ''“‘Twnni’t. loud, umhjjstand. Just soft, ami kind o’ teasin’, like a woman. The folks fidgeted in their seats, and peeked along sideways, nervous, as if they mistrusted somebody was sick, somewhere*; and McHenry snapped his vest again.

" •.Haw-ruh-haw! ’ comes that scientific device. “At that, a fat stranger in a green bonnet cuddles up og’in’ my arm. “ Sakes alive!’ she whimpered. ‘ls this a undertakers’ convention, Mr. Heft’ren, or what?’ “Jigstep took a fresh holt, and let fly a rib-splittin’ yarn about a Turkish bath, but the Laughorium headed him off. Three men got up and went out,

pensive, ami a small kid on the front row bust* into an ag’ny of -grief. “By this time I sec plain that- science lead d«)«q»ed ns. That airj’eiue i* on the verge of bitter tear*. I remember the crowd in a Bedelia City saloon, the. night the toun voted prohibition, and 1 know what I’m talkin’ about. Another minute, ami som«d»ody would ’a’ reared up and offered to lead the brethren in prayer, I galloped out o’ that schoolhouse niuh r quirt and spur, and on the porch I found Professor Socrates Tompkins. “‘Hey!’ I said. ‘Extinguish that invention!’ I said. “Soc, he's white in the gills as a dead cottonwood, and breathin’ hard. “‘Hush!’ he says. *l‘ni 'fraid to go back to stop it. Ileffren. There’s four weepin* cow-punchers inside a seekin’ it with guns. But just listen! Ain’t it wonderful?' says Tompkins. “‘Wonderful?’ said 1. ‘lt’s plumb demolished of us! Do you call this laughter, that you’re evokin’, you * ientifle shrhni)?’ “ ‘No,’ says So?. *1 didn’t quite throw what I roped for. But I got a fundermental note. Ileffren you’re bound to own to that. It was the Injuns that fooled us. Their diaphragm* is diff’rent, end ' ‘ But me. I was hot. ‘“Gimme that a.\!’ k bvHvred. ‘l’ll diaphragm it!’ and I charged under the stairs for that Laughorium. sir, like a thunderbolt o’ war.’’ IV. John livffrcn looked at me. and then rubbed the car-window with his elbow. Our train was down. The melancholy Indian woman across the aisle was gathering her bundles. “It was a shame, .John,” 1 hinted, “io destroy such a remarkable machine.’’ “Well. J was too late.” said he. “By the time l*d smashed it to suit- me, the auj’ence was cheerin’ for Ann Lily Mott’s cousin, and Jigstep McHenry was hidin’ for his lil’p in the lean-to of the schoolhouse, under a pile of kindlin’wood.” Ileffren sighed profoundly, and seemed to change the subject. “Look a- yonder!” hp directed, pointing. “Sep tlt.it water-tank? That’s Scalded Butte. shake out. son. Wo get off here. We’ll bed down at the

Scalded Butte Hotel. It’s kept I>y McHenry and Iris wife the widder’Brigg* th it was.” I manifested surprise at the marriage. “It was the only way he had .to square himself with her,” explained John mournfully. “Well. I'll be glad.’’ said I. “to meet Mr. McHenry. Do you think he’ll tell me a minstere) joke or two, if I ask him?’’ “Before yon mention it. you’d batter leave your name with the coroner,’’ said Ileffren.