Democratic Sentinel, Volume 1, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 December 1877 — JOE’S NEW-YEAR’S DINNER. [ARTICLE]

JOE’S NEW-YEAR’S DINNER.

To have seen Joe Sterling stubbing about the Htore of Messrs. Sampson & Sturges no one would have suspected him of being a hero—a little, short, beardless fellow, with a peaked face, and shoulders that stood out sharply—wearing never a plume, nor scarf, nor slashed velvet doublet, like the hero of romance and chivalry, neither epaulets and gold lace like the military hero, neither broadcloth and beaver like the gentleman hero of the moral drama, but attired with severe simplicity in a wellworn “pepper-and-salt” suit, that pinched about the shoulders, and was too short in the sleeves, his sallow complexion effectively set off by a sky-blue neck-tie—a tie which Filkins, a spruce fellow-clerk, who supported a dictionary, had stigmatized as “perennial”—his cuff-buttons not mates. Oh, but, Joe, blessed be the world on its New-Year’s days, if it had more like you I Who Joe was, where he came from in the morning, where he went at night, interested neither Sampson nor Sturges nor Filkins. The hitter had, one evening, invited him out to witness the presentation of that glory of the drama, “The Black Sheep,” to be followed by “ the side-splitting farce of ‘ The Onelegged Shoemaker ” but Joe had politely declined, murmuring something about duties that detained him at home. Thereupon, Filkins had lifted his eyebrows, and made no more advances. He had never found young men with “duties” congenial companions. By 10:30, New-Year’s morning, Joe had completed his marketing among the shops and stalls on Bread-and-But-ter square, and, with his basket swung on his arm, had begun trudging homeward. He kept a sharp watch, as was iiio *<ont, to left and to right, to see if there was anything he could do for anybody. When one is on the lookout for somethir g of that nature, something generally turns up, and it was hard on to 11 when Joe turned into that sloppy, decayed old street, which he had turned into regularly every night since he had been in Sturges’ empoiy. He was growing dreadfully tired of that street. It wasn’t a busy street. Nothing ever seemed to stir in it, except tired men and women going out and coming in from labor. Nothing ever went up on it; nothing ever came down. The old wooden tmildiDgs just gathered a few more lichens, and sank a little from twelvemonth to twelvemonth. It wasn’t a cheerful street. It sometimes seemed to Joe as if all the tired, and discouraged, and sick, and cross, in the city—all the people despairing enough to he wretched, and yet not despairing enough to give up a kind of automatic effort, had gathered themselves together there. Joe began whistling as soon as her entered its precincts, and whistled lustily, just as boys do who have their courage to keep up, until he came alongs do the decrepit wooden building that held his “homo.”

Up two flights, mid turning to the left he entered fi small room, the atmosphere of which was charged in about equal proportions with the odor of moldy wall-paper and of some kind of pungent liniment. A middle-aged, unhappylooking man, witli his feet and legs stretched out on two chairs, reclined before the window. His gay dressinggown was wrapped tightly around his body, and a gray shawl was swathed about his limbs and feet. This was Joe’s Uncle William. Uncle William had been in his day a dishing young man, but he had dashed just a little too far, and all at once, as sometimes happens in parallel cases, found himself used up, body and soul. Then, since nothing else remained to be done, he had repented, and found, to his astonishment, that the laws of nature wouldn’t work backward, even for repentant prodigals. The almshouse impended. Just then Joe, the size of whose heart, was out of all proportion with his pecuniary resources, had interposed. He had left a pleasant boardingplace for a detestable tenement, saddled himself with a burden which he was likely to carry for life, and gone to housekeeping. Uncle William, when securely established in his three chairs at Joe’s expense, hail given himself unreservedly to brooding over his troubles and lamenting his hard fate. His melancholy gaze was, this morning, fixed out of the window, and he failed to withdraw it when Joe entered. “Morning again, Uncle William,” said Joe, briskly. “It’s been a bit dull here, for New-Year’s morning; has it, Uncle William, slowly turning from the window, delivered himself of a sound that might have been either a grunt or a groan. “ And you haven’t found anything in- 1 foresting in the papers ?” continued Joe, looking down at the pile of periodicals. “ I laid in liberally for all the pictorials, hoping you would be entertained by them.”

Uncle William shook his head slowly and a trifle scornfully. “I couldn’t be entertained by pictures, Joe ; I’ve been reflecting. ” “ Then I wouldn’t reflect any more. It don’t agree with you. Aren’t you glad you’re going to have me for company, this alternoon? And a hot dinner, too ? Hot dinners are luxuries nowadays. See here, will you?” pulllng from oat his basket a round of beef. Uncle William eyed it gloomily. ■Beefsteak for a New-Year’s dinner !” muttered he. Beefsteak isn’t to be despised— not if it s tender and juicy as this,” replied Joe, making an incision in the beef with his pocket-knife, and watching the juice start out with an expression of keen gratification. “ Not in our ■present situation, I know it, Joe ; tnat s the sting of it. I don’t blame you, Joe ; but I can’t help thinking how it used to be with me ” Here Uncle William attempted moving- one of his limbs, hit his foot against a ohairbaok, and cried out with pain. Joe slapped his steak upon tho table, brought Uncle William his liniment and then pirouetted ofl' into his bed-room-three minutes, and he was back again, in a suit the patches whereof attested the fact that he did his own mending, as well as cooking. “ Now, we must have dinner in a jiffp, unde. Then I’m going to give the room a thorough cleaning up; and after Mint, jf Mm, Dotyd bring* up the

ing, I’ll sew up the holes in the stockings, while you read aloud.” “ You know I can’t read aloud, Joe; it nuts me out of breath,” snapped Uncle William. “No more you can’t. How forgetful in me! Well talk, then, and have a good time just the same.” Uncle William grunted derisively, and fingered his swollen and bandaged Joe shook down the ashes in his stove, turned on a pile of coal, brushed out the oven and tumbled in a half dozen or more potatoes. From suspicious-look ing depths beneath the table he drew forth a gridiron, which he began scraping vigorously, meanwhile talking briskly — whether to himself or Uncle William it would have been difficult to decide. “ It’s a miserable way to leave a gridiron, without cleaning; but what can a fellow do who has as many irons in the fire as I have?—breakfast to get and clear away, rooms to tidy up, dinner to be laid out, Mrs. Dowd’s water to be brought, Unde William’s feet and legs to be bound up, and may be a run to the druggist’s or the doctor’s. Haug it all! a fellow can’t be as nice about all these little particulars as he’d like to be. He must once in a while neglect his gridirons.” Joe soon had his steak sputtering on the iron, it’s grateful odor mingling with that of the coffee on the stove, and overpowering the perfume of Uncle William’s liniment. He then jerked the table a few inches from the wall, spread over it a stiffly-starched and highly-blued “best” tablecloth, set on the dishes spasmodically, and, just as the little mantel-clock rang out 12, he announced dinner, and offered to assist Uncle William to the table. The process of getting Uncle William to the table in good order was no mean one. First, the two chairs in which his limbs reposed were one after the other moved a slight distance; the large chair in which he sat followed them carefully; then the small chairs made another forward move, and by degrees the entire establishment was brought alongside the table. “It’s all piping hot, and I’ve had splendid luck with the gravy !” cried Joe, sitting down and helping Uncle William with a liberal hand. “Joe,” said Uncle William, peevishly, “ I ain’t up near enough.” Joe hopped up, and drew the three chairs gently, one after another, an inch or two nearer the table, then bobbed down in his place again. “ You’ll take two potatoes, I think, Uncle William, and—” “Joe,” interrupted Uncle William, “ won’t you just h’ist up those pillows at my back, and put the big one at the bottom and the little one at the top ?” “Dear me, uncle!” cried Joe, flying at the pillows. “How careless lam ! It seems to mo I never shall remember about those pillows. You see I’m thinking so much as to whether you’ll like the dinner or not the pillows slip my mind.” “ Joe,” said Uncle William, as soon as Joe was again seated, “I wish you’d just take that cushion out from under my left leg and slip it around under the right one. ” Joe dropped his gravy-ladle and whisked around to the cushion. “ Careful, now—careful, Joe,” said Uncle William, dividing his attention between Joe and the forkful he was making up. “Now, under the other one—not so high up—a little lower down — oh, dear! Can’t you get it right ? There, now ! And won’t you just wrap that corner of the shawl around them again?” Back came Joe, and, not in the least discouraged, began Ms dinner. Uncle William, as lie the second time passed his plate, groaned : “I can’t help thinking of the New-Year’s dinners I’ve eaten in years gone by—such dinners as you never dreamed of, Joe. Little did I anticipate I should ever come to this.” “But just think how much better this is than notMng! . We’re going to have biscuit and grapes for dessert; and you’ve the best tliiug yet to learn, uncle,” cried Joe, exultantly. “This isn’t our regular New-Year’s dinner. This is only an installment. We’re going to have another after I get cleaned up.” And Joe’s face fairly beamed. Uncle William, though still gloomy, appeared interested. “Just look here, will you?” Joe drew up from beneath the table a little oyster-keg. ‘ * These aren’t your common every-day sort of oysters. These are au extra, prime, extravagant kind—kind the big-bugs use. Pass me that saucer, please. I’ll turn you out two or three, just enough for a trial taste. There, ain’t they beauties? Have a little pepper and vinegar with them. Aren’t they delicious ? And those aren’t all.”

Uncle William solemnly swallowed the oysters, while Joe rapped the bung in his little keg and brought his marketbasket up from beneath the table. “See there, will you?” triumphantly | producing a handsome plum pudding. “And there, too !” with much rustling of tissue paper bringing forth and poising on his hand a frosted and flowered cake. “Then there will be grapes enough for the second meal. You didn’t expect all this, did you ? Say, now, did you ? You’ve been pleasantly surprised for once iu your life, haven’t you?” cried Joe, playfully pinchiDg Uncle William’s arm, eliciting only a sharp yelp. “ I’ve done with all expectations of anything good, Joe.” “How delighted you must be with these things, then. You’ll taste the pudding, and find out you’re going to , have one good thing, any way, won’t you ?’’ said the undaunted Joe, slashing into the pudding with his “sharp | knife,” then depositing a thick, ! fruity slice before Uncle Wiiliam. “ Here’s the cake. You’d like to j know how this looks on the inside. I would, any way. It seems almost a pity to cut it. That’s what it was made for, though. Isn’t that cherubim—l mean that cherub—a nobby little fellow? How the sugar-works crackle ! Have a bit6f this, uncle?” Uncle William nodded, and eyed the cake approvingly. “Oh! I know what I’ll do,” cried Joe, jumping up again; “I’ll carry a part of my share down to Mrs. Dowd. She’s always washing and washing, until it seems as if she’d wash the soul out of yet, with those five children to keep in bread and meat, she never has any treats.” Joe cut out a quarter of the pudding and the cake, and whisked out. In a few seconds he returned, singing jubilantly through the hall. “Don’t, Joe; it goes through my head,” said Uncle William. “So it does. I beg pardon. Have you been waiting to be moved away ? I stopped to empty Mrs. Dowd’s tubs for her.” Uncle William intimated his readiness to be moved, and the operation was successfully performed. Then Joe slipped oil' his cuffs, and went into the work. He cleared and washed, assorted and arranged, swept, dusted, rubbed and scrubbed. He had applied the lead, and was polishing up his stove, rattling the covers back and forth vigorously, his hair shaking down toward his nose, when unwonted voices were heard in the hall, the steps of two men, and the tap of a cane on the bare floor. “The ocoupaut °f this tenement,” said a voice, Joe qqw recognised as his landlord“is an eccentric yaqugman, whoi boards bjjnsplf and supports aq invalid uncle/’ '■ • -

“Rap, rap, rap,” went the cone on Joe’s door. Joe, unaccustomed to receiving company, was a trifle discomposed. He pushed the hair out of his eves with his wrist, and, still grasping the blacking brash, threw open the door. “Mr. Sampson, Mr. Sterling,” said Joe’s landlord. Joe bowed in a dazed sort of way, holding his glittering hands awsy from contact with his clothes, and swaying the brash in the air. “ Mr. Sampson is about purchasing this building and is inspecting the tenements,” explained the landlord. “ I think—it seems to me that I’ve met yon before, young man,” said Mr. Sampson. “ Yes, sir; I’m the Sterling tliat clerks it in yonr store,” said Joe, humbly. “Blessme, so you are! Sturges attends to the store mainly, and I don’t have much chance to know yon boys. So you live here do yon? You re-al-ly do?” “ Yes, sir. And this is my uncle, Mr. Knowles,” said Joe, nodding toward Uncle William, who was beginning to bristle at a fancied slight. Mr. Sampson bowed; giving Uncle William a glance that pretty accurately took the measure of that gentleman. “ And you live here, Sterling, and support your uncle, eh ?” said Sampson, bluntly, and to Uncle William’s offense. “Ido sir,” said Joe, proffering Ms only unoccupied chair, and motioning one of his callers to the lounge. “Our apartments can’t be called elegant, and all things hereabouts aren’t exactly to our tastes, but it does very well, and we’re quite comfortable.” “ But really— re-al-ly, thisisqMte extraordinary for the present day —for the present day. Qmte extraordinary! ” “ May I ask what salary we are paying you?” continued Sampson, looking about the room.

“Five hundred a year, sir.” “And I understand—excuse me, young man, but do I understand that you support yourself and uncle with your salary, exclusively ?” “ Oh, dear, no, sir !” said Joe, misunderstanding Sampson. “I shouldn’t be willing to spend all my salary. We put nearly two hundred in the bank last year.” “Mr. Sterling,” said Sampson, looking Joe sharply ii the face, “ do you wish me to understand that you and your uncle lived on three hundred dollars last year ?” “ Certainly, sir; and lived pretty well, too; didn’t we Uncle William?” “Pretty well,” said Uncle William, faintly. “You know, sir,” continued Joe, “it isn’t the necessaries of life that eat up the boys’ salaries so; it’s the extras they like, and some of which they must have, unless they live a little more quietly. ” “Better live more quietly, then,” muttered Sampson. “As for myself,” said Uncle William, “ I won’t deny that it comes hard on me. I don’t blame Joe, but it isn’t what I’ve been used to. I was once a man among men, even as you are, sir; free and easy in regard to money matters, and with no expectations of being brought down to this. I’m nearly helpless, sir; I’m agreat sufferer, and I’m—- “ Yes. I see—l see,” interrupted Sampson, impatiently. “I beg pardon, Mr. Sterling; I’m greatly interested. May I ask what are your expectations ?” “ They’re not great,” said Joe, abstractedly, rubbing the blacking-brush over his hand. “Mr. Sturges promised a rise in salary if I did well; and then I’ve thought that if I did well, perhaps —perhaps there’d be more rises. Clerks do progress, you know. ” “Yes; I know,” said Sampson, smiling. “ Then I’m hoping to some day obtain a pleasanter home, and better medical aid for Uncle William.” “I wish you success, young man. I thiuk I must speak with Sturges about this case—yes, I will speak with Sturges. I don’t care to look further at these rooms, landlord.” Sampson made a respectful bow to Uncle William, a most respectful one to Joe, aud ambled out. Joe resumed his stove-blacking, clattering the covers more merrily than ever. “Sturges,” said Sampson to his partner next morning, “ what kind of a fellow do you call young Sterling ?” “ Reliable 1” firmly replied Sturges. “And we paying him only 500?” “ I’m going to make it six this year.” “ Make it seven; and, if he bears that well, increase it by another hundred next year.” Sturges opened his eyes. Sampson gave him a little recital; and, before the end of the year, Joe was in such a Eosition that Uncle Willism began to ave a glimmering perception that, mediately, good did sometimes come to himself.

“ My dear,” said Sampson to his wife, on the 31st of the next December, “ there’s that yoimg Sterling, of whom I’ve told you so much—he seldom leaves his uncle, evenings, and appears to have few social pleasures. I think I’d better invite him to dinner to-morrow. In many respects lie’s an exceptional young man—for the present day—for the present dag, an exceptional young man.” So it happened that, on the next NewYear’s eve, Joe made Uncle William comfortable with cold turkey and plumpudding at his right hand, and liniment at his left; and, having carefully attired himself in a brand-new suit, skipped up town to Mr. Sampson’s. Notwithstanding his half-dozen eccentricities of manner, lie created an excellent impression, and thereafter rapidly grew into favor in high quarters. Five years from that time, Sampson had gone out of the business, and Joe had gone in. The firm had become “Sturges & Sterling;” Uncle William had so far recovered as to be able to take care of himself; Joe had improved in looks and manners, ceased to do his own cooking, and was making slow but sure progress in winning the affections of Miss Nell S impson.