Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 September 1891 — Always Placid. [ARTICLE]

Always Placid.

The receiving clerks behind the Jesks at the telegraph offices are cool, placid fellows. They take your message of life and death with perfect Indifference, mechanically count the words, and look a bit bored as they reply: “It will be sixty-five cents, please.” I had my eye on a certain chap for several weeks, says a correspondent of the Free Press, before I humbled his pride. He insulted me. He insulted me by softly whispering to himself as he counted the words in the following message: “Grandmother died last night very suddenly. How many of you can attend funeral?” When I handed in that message I expected him to exhibit a little emotion. While he could not have been personally acquainted with my grandmother, he must have suspected that she was a nice old lady, and that her sudden death had greatly overcome me. Why didn’t he look, up with a bit of sympathy in his eye and say: “Too bad! I know just how you feel, and I’m sorry for you.” But no. He whistled and counted, made a scratch or two with his pen, and remarked: “Three words over—seventy cents.” And as he made change, he told one of the boys behind the counter that he be if he wasn’t going to the dog fight that night. Then he picked up my dead grandmother dispatch and banged it on a hook, shoved me over some change, and turned away to resume the perusal of a sporting paper. The next week I went in with a dispatch announcing that my grandmother’s will had been opened and that I came in for $25,000. That map must have seen by my face that I was highly elated. Hang him, he never had the fifth of that sum, and his salary had just been cut down $lO per mpnth, but when he had read the dispatch he calmly announced: “Forty cents, and you forgot to date it.” And then he began talking to one of his fellow clerks about a slugging match, and how he won $3 by betting on the right man. I don’t say he ought to have swung his hat and cheered over my good fortune, but why couldn’t he have extended his hand and said: “Eh, old boy? In luck, ain’t you? Well, I’m glad on it. Send around the cigars and we’ll smoke to your good health.” I made up my mind when I went out that I would upset that man’s equanimity or lose a leg. I’d tumble him off that pedestal of placidity if it cost a thousand dollars. I’d upset, unbalance, and unhinge him or die trying. I gave him two weeks to repent. It isn’t right to rush a telegraph man out of the world on a day’s notice. I went back one evening, and I felt a bit sorry for him as he glanced up and then let his eyes return to his Police Gazette., I <knew that his wife and child were in Ohio on a visit, and I stepped to the desk and wrote: Detroit, June «, 1885. J. H. Smith, Columbus, O.: Please telegraph us full particulars of the accident by which Mrs. George Taylor and daughter of this city were Instantly killed this afternoon. 8. P. I felt a bit sorry as I handed it in, not knowing but the man might faint dead away as he read the terrible news. Still, I had vowed revenge, and I would not forego it. He received the dispatch, whistled softly as was his wont, clattered the point of his pen along the words as he counted, and then he drawled out: “A dollar and twenty cents, and where shall I send the answer?” • “Did you read that dispatch?” I asked, after looking at him for half a minute. “Yes.” “Do you know the parties?” “Yes, sir.” “Isn’t your iiame George Taylor?” “Yes, sir.” “Aren’t the parties your wife and daughter?” • “No, sir. They returned home this morning. Here’s your change!”