John Hickey: Coachman
“This is to certify that the bearer, John Hickey, five years in my employ, is as honest a man as ever strode a horse.“(Signed),McDowell, General.”
“This is to certify that the bearer, John Hickey, five years in my employ, is as honest a man as ever strode a horse.
“(Signed),McDowell, General.”
The bearer, John Hickey, stood tall, straight and uncovered before me, while I read the above recommendation. There were several others, but I never looked at them. I knew something of “McDowell, General,” in California, and I was persuaded that a man who served him for five years possessed something more than “honesty” in the outfit of his virtues.
But he had, in my opinion, received a still better recommendation at the very moment of his coming into our lives, on that bright summer morning. I had been sitting on the front porch with a dog on each side of me—that being my usual allowance. Both these dogs—Maida and Sancho—yearned with a great yearning to exterminate the whole race of organ-grinders. They also had a profound dislike for that rather large body of men and women who move back and forth on the earth’s surface carrying bundles. Therein lay their only fault; otherwise, they were good, honest, self-respecting dogs. And it must be admitted that this peculiarity of theirs helped to keep things lively about the place and our blood in quick circulation. Therefore,when John Hickey entered the gates, carrying an unusually large valise, there was a roar and a rush before I could form one word of command or entreaty. The blazing eyes and white, uncovered fangs of the dogs told so plainly of their fell intention of reducing him and his valise to a condition resembling desiccated codfish, that anyone might have been frightened. But before they reached him I heard a calm voice, and an unmistakable Irish one, saying: “Well, well! What is it now? What is it?”
Lightning could not have stopped them quicker. Their heads lowered, their tails sagged down in a shamed sort of a way. They stretched their heads out and sniffed him a moment. Then, with a wild yelp of joy, Sancho, with slavering jaws, bounded at his breast, striking staggering blows by way of welcome, while Maida, the fierce, was standing erect on hind legs at his side, kissing his protesting hands, and digging with both great paws in his side. At last they subsided a little. He stood, showing the traces of their rapturous welcome, while they sat at his feet, and looking into his face, told him, with shining, loving eyes and excited beating of their tails, that he was the very fellow they had been searching forever since the seal of their puppyhood’s blindness had fallen from their foolish, blue eyes.
During the lull the man produced his little packet of recommendations and passed them to me. My husband, returning at that moment, engaged him in aconversation consisting mainly of questions and answers, and that gave me a chance to look at “the bearer, John Hickey.” The only Irish thing about him was his voice. He was tall, square of shoulder, flat of back, clear-skinned and ruddy, with good features, keen, light-blue eyes, and brown hair, which he wore in an odd way, parted down the back of his head, and brushed forward and upward toward his ears, which gave him a peculiarly cocky and alert air. There was something in the carriage of his head, the turning out of his feet, the hang of his arms and the position of his hands, when he stood at “attention,” that said, as plain as words could say, “Soldier, yes; ‘ex,’ if you like, but soldier all the same.” I thought that then; I knew it by night.
I was just going to put a question to him when the sunlight played him a trick and betrayed his poor, little secret to me. In vain, then, the upright pose, the cocky air, and jaunty manner! It must have been some hours since he had shaved—he wore no hair upon his face, and as he stood there the sun shone full upon him, revealing on cheek, and chin, and upper lip, the glittering frost of age, and he stood revealed, an old man.
I felt touched by the bold bluff he was making against Time, and I wished to give him a trial. Therefore, I looked steadily at my lord and master, and, using that great, unwritten language understood and used by every husband and wife on the top of theearth, I signified my desire for him to engage John Hickey, and he, being a man of intelligence and a husband in good standing, replied by the same means: “All right! but I’m afraid he is a bit elderly. Still, if you wish it!” And he told John to come with him and he would show him his quarters and settle about wages, etc. The words were scarcely out of his lips before the dogs were up and leading the way, with waving tails and many backward turnings of their heads. I think I have said the day was very hot, and as the two men stepped from the lawn to the carriage-drive, my husband, finding his hat oppressive, removed it and held it in his hand. Thus it happened that he walked with bared head at John Hickey’s side, while he escorted him to his new home. It was a trivial thing to notice, yet there came a time when it was sharply recalled to me.
The new man had not to take the horses out that first day at all, and in about an hour after his installment he sent a messenger to me, asking if I had a large flag, and if I had one would I not send it down to him, the coachman, who promised to take good care of it?
We had a large flag—yes. But what on earth did the man want with it then? There were four good, solid weeks between us and the glorious Fourth of July. What could he mean? Ah, well! let him have it. So the flag, a really fine one, as it happened, to his great joy was sent down to him.
Shortly after that I saw him with a lot of rope and some tools, tinkering, under the active supervision of both dogs, at the old flagstaff standing on the hill which rises sharply at the back of the stable. Later in the afternoon, chancing to glance from the window, there, sure enough, was the brave, old flag, floating free from the top of the staff. And very pretty it looked, too, against the blue sky and above the fresh, green foliage of the young summer-time. Ah, I thought, that’s it, is it? But I had not got it all, even yet, for just before dinner I heard an explosion of some sort of firearm! My heart gave a jump, and I exclaimed: “Good mercy! Has the poor man met with an accident?”
I ran to the window. Out on the hill, by the flagstaff, stood John, while through a cloud of smoke the flag came fluttering down just as the red sun sank from view. I understood at last! My soldier-coachman was saluting the flag, and firing for a sunset gun a rusty old blunderbuss that was likely to kick him through the greenhouse every time he touched it.
I confess I sat down and laughed hysterically. He had intended to greet the rising sun in the same manner, but as sickness in the family required quiet at that hour, he contented himself with simply running up his flag at exactly the proper moment. And when my husband, either from secret sympathy with “Old John’s” feelings, or from a fear for the safety of the greenhouse, gave him a good musket and enough ammunition for amodest sort of battle, John Hickey, coachman, was proud and happy.
And so he entered upon his life with us. We spoke of hiring? In our dull way we for some time believed that we had engaged or accepted him, not at all understanding, till much later, that he had accepted us, and that the house was his, the place was his, the fruits thereof, and that the family were his—his household gods—whom he loved devotedly, and served faithfully all the rest of his life.
We were quick to discover that in “Old John” we had an excellent servant and an eccentric man, while the slow years piled up proof upon proof of his loyalty. He won my heart at once by quickly learning the individual characters of our horses. One in particular, my favorite saddle-horse, I was a bit anxious about, since he was getting the reputation of being ugly. He (Creole by name) was a big, spirited Kentucky horse, with an exquisitely tender mouth, requiring a very light as well as steady hand. Two or three great fellows, with sledge-hammer fists, had tried to ride him on his bridle, instead of on his back, and he had, as the result, lifted them not too gently over the top of his handsome head, and they raised the cry of ugliness, when he had simply acted in self-defense, as would any other Kentucky gentleman.
But when “Old John” returned from exercising Creole for the first time, he remarked: “Ah, he’s a fine fellow; he’s got a mouth as tender as a baby’s, and aheart as bold as a lion’s. I will be glad to see you on him, ma’am.”
John loved the horses as much as people love their children. When he came to us the horses were most all in their prime, but as the years crept by they aged and weakened together, and I was always amused, albeit touched as well, to see “Old John’s” fervent efforts to prove to the world that they still preserved all the nerve, vitality and fire of youth. And when the time came when the carriage-horses ought really to have been replaced, “Old John” was a sorrowful man and an anxious one; and at our faintest suggestion of a change, with frowning brow and trembling lips, the old man would march stiffly off to the stable, where he would assure its occupants that “they were mighty fine horses, and people ought to know it by this time.”
Like most people of affectionate disposition, he was very fond of keeping anniversaries. All high-days, holidays, and birthdays were precious boons to him, but they came to be occasions of more or less anxiety to the family, owing to his utter inability to express his joy without the help of an explosion. It would seem that the comparatively harmless running up of flags, backed by explosions of varying degrees of heaviness, would be a sufficient outlet for any man’s joy. But John Hickey had still a “card up his sleeve,” so to speak, for the climax of his love and enthusiasm, the actual perfect flowering of his joy could only be attained by the aid of blazing tar. A great bonfire of wood was notto be despised, but tar was the material worthy of his attention, and when he had diligently sought for and found the most dangerous possible places, and had put in each a kettle of flaming tar, and could gallop wildly back and forth from one kettle to another, trying to prevent a general conflagration, he was the most perfectly happy man I ever saw.
Not more than ten minutes after his discovery that my birthday fell on Saint Patrick’s Day he was at the house, asking if the ladies wouldn’t let him have some “grane material.” That seemed a very vague order—“grane material”—leaving such a wide margin for speculation as to what kind of “grane material” he meant. But the only information he would give was that he just wanted “grane material, dress goods or the like.”
Thereupon my mother gave him a deep flounce of all green silk, taken from a retired stage-dress of mine. This he ripped, and pressed, and sewed at, till, lo! on Saint Patrick’s morning there fluttered from the flagstaff a brilliant, green silk flag, and I was informed it was there in my honor, not Saint Patrick’s. In the years that followed I was very rarely at home on my birthday, but no matter how far away I might be, early on Saint Patrick’s morning the green silk flag ran swiftly up the staff. “But mark this now,” as he himself would say, never even in my honor, never once did that green flag fly above the “Stars and Stripes.” Honest, old Irish-American that he was, the flag he hadserved with arms in his hands was the first flag in the world for him, and had to take the place of honor every time.
So thoroughly did he identify himself with the family that when anything particular was going on, he, without invitation, yet equally without the faintest idea of presuming, always took his share. On one occasion “Old John” learned that I was expecting a visit from my husband’s mother, and hearing me speak of the freshness of her looks, the brightness of her mind, and her extreme activity as something remarkable in one of her advanced years, his interest was at once aroused. Knowing his ways as well as I did know them at that time, I suppose I should have bridled his fine, Irish enthusiasm; but, truth to tell, I was so busy with my own joyous preparations for her welcome coming that I gave no thought to the possible doings of my eccentric coachman. Mamma H—— had heard much of him, and was amused by his stately salute to her from the box. As we entered the gate we met welcome No. 1, in the form of a great flag flying from a staff in front of the house, a thing which had never happened before, and never happened after that visit. Then “Old John” drove down to the stable, while we ascended the stairs, to be met at the top, where we had the least breath to bear it, with welcome No. 2, in the shape of an explosion so heavy that it shook the color out of the cheeks and the breath out of the body of the welcomed lady. Seeing her, after two or three desperate gasps, recoverthe breath which had been literally shaken out of her, we looked at one another, and all exclaimed together: “John Hickey!” Then she understood, and falling into a chair, she spread out her hands on its arms, laid her head back, and laughed—laughed till the tears came. When she could speak again, she remarked: “What a nice, kind old man, to take so much trouble on my account—but he is a bit noisy, isn’t he, dear?”
In his preparations for this visit “Old John” not only shaved himself so closely that he must have removed several layers of cuticle along with his beard, but I had a suspicion that he had shaved the cobblestones about the stables as well, so shining clean they were, and so hopeless was it to search for a blade of grass between them. Everything was in precise order down there, and I guessed at once that he wished, himself, to show our guest about his domain. At that time he had received an injury—was very lame, and secretly suffered greatly. I say secretly, yet we knew all about it, but it was such a shame and mortification to him to have his condition noticed or spoken of that we all mercifully pretended ignorance at that period of his troubles. When, therefore, we went forth for a morning stroll, and were showing Mamma H—— about the place, I was not surprised to see him hovering about, watching for a chance to capture the guest, and the way he did it was very neat. There was a tiny gutter down there; it must have been fully six inches broad, and as we approached, “Old John,” tall and straight (what sufferingthat forced straightness cost him Heaven only knows), stepped quickly forward, and with impressive politeness helped the lady across—the gutter being perfectly dry at the time. But observe, this action placed him instantly in the position of escort and guide. We all recognized the fact, and took up second fiddles and played to “Old John’s” first.
Perhaps I am sentimental, but to me it was rather touching to see how quickly these two old people recognized each other—one a lady born, the other brought up to servitude, but each touched with the fine mystery of old age. With all her gentle dignity, he knew she took a real interest in him, and he gave her a passionate gratitude for her evident comprehension of the pains and penalties time exacted of him. On her part, she saw at a glance the honesty, the courage of the man, and his great, kind heart, and knew him to be as innocent as a little child of intentional presumption—knew that his forwardness was the result of his loving desire to do something to give pleasure to the family. And so it came to pass that they paced about here, there, and yonder—he showing her the horses, the framed pedigrees of my little dogs, two or three wonderful lithographs of myself (all framed at his own expense), and finally presented her with a receipt for a certain liniment for a shoulder-strain in horses, and, having completed the round, he brought her back to us with great pride and dignity.
I never knew a man who loved flowers with such tendernessas did this queer, old coachman. His garden, principally laid out in lard-pails, tomato-cans, and an occasional soap-box, filled my heart with envy by its astounding mass of beautiful bloom. Even the gardeners used to grunt unwilling admission of his wonderful luck. ’Twas all fish that came to John’s net. Sunflowers or daisies, lilies or morning-glories, pinks or japonicas—everything he could beg, buy or pick up—he so craved, so longed for flowers. As a chicken will rush for a crust of bread, so would “Old John” rush when sick or dying plants were cast from the greenhouse. He always gathered them up and carried them out of sight, to make his examinations in private and decide upon the course of treatment necessary. A bit later he could be seen, happy and perspiring, filling yet another lard-pail with leaf-mould, etc., a big dog on each side watching with restless, inquiring eyes each movement, and sniffing with infinite curiosity at every article used, while John worked on and conversed affably with them all the time about the nature of the plant and his hopes for its future. One of his great successes was the wonderful restoration to life and opulent beauty of a pair of castaway begonias, almost leafless, entirely yellow, and sick unto death. They were thrown out bodily, and when “Old John” picked them up he was greeted with a roar of laughter from the gardener. The old man was nettled, but he only remarked: “Suppose ye wait a bit now, and by-and-by I’ll be laughin’ with ye—perhaps.”
A long time after, as he helped me dismount one day, he asked me “wouldn’t I go down to his room a minute, he wanted to show me something.”
And there, in riotous health and beauty, stood two rarely fine begonias, presenting a mass of foliage and a prodigality of bloom only to be found in “Old John’s” garden. I was frankly envious, to his great pride. One plant was loaded with great, coral-like clusters. The other dripped clear, white, waxen blossoms from trembling pink stems, and wore such an air of united purity and abundance, that, almost without thought, I exclaimed: “That flower should be dedicated to the Virgin Mary!” John gave me a startled glance, and said, “Why-y-y, why, madam! you’re a Protestant!”
“Well?” I asked, “and because I am a Protestant am I to be denied the privilege of loving and honoring the immaculate mother of our Lord?”
Now, I had long known that there was something wrong between my poor, old chap and his Church—the servants declaring that he was no Catholic, or even that he was an unbeliever. “Old John Hickey?” Why, Catholicism was born in him! It was in the blood of his veins, in the marrow of his bones. No matter how harshly he might speak of his Church, nor how long he might neglect his duties, almost unknown to himself, down in the bottom of his heart the old faith lived, warm and strong, and it only needed an emergency to make him turn to the Mother Church as trustingly as a babe would turn to its mother.
I found that “Old John,” in his fancied quarrel with the Church, had suffered cruelly. He had neglected his duties, and had then been unhappy because of that neglect. He was very bitter and deeply wounded, and that day he exclaimed sadly: “It’s hard, madam—it’s hard that a man should be made to lose his soul!”
“Never say that again, John!” I cried. “There is just one man created who can lose your soul for you, and that man is John Hickey.”
He looked at me a moment, then putting one forefinger on my arm he asked, solemnly: “Madam Clara, are you talking as a Catholic or as a Protestant, now?”
Laugh I had to, though I saw it hurt the poor, bewildered one before me and belied the tears in my own eyes. But I made answer quickly: “I’m speaking neither as Catholic nor Protestant, but simply as a woman, who, like yourself, has a soul, and does not want to lose it! Don’t look so unhappy! Your Church is beautiful, great and powerful, but there is One who is greater, more beautiful and more powerful. In all the ages there has been but One who left the unspeakable joy of Heaven to come to earth to suffer and toil, to love and lose, to hope and despair, and finally to give up His perfect life to an ignominious death, because His boundless love saw no other way to save us from the horror of eternal death! He paid too great a price for souls to cast them easily away. There is but one Saviour for us all, be we what we may! There is but one God whose smile makes Heaven. Wetravel by different paths—oh, yes! We wear different liveries, some showing the gorgeous vestments of the stately Catholic, some the solemn drab of the Quaker, others black robes. But the paths all lead to the one place, and the great questions are, do we love the One we seek, and have we loved and helped those we traveled with? John, make Christ your Church, and the mightiest cannot harm you!” and, catching up the scant fold of my riding-habit, I turned and fled from the only sermon I ever preached in my life, while from behind me came certain familiar sentences, such as, “Yis, yis! Ye’re fine horses, that ye are, but it’s too soon for water yit, y’r know, because,” etc., etc., but all spoken in so husky a voice it might have been a stranger’s.
Anxious, economical old body, from the early fall he began to watch over the welfare of our house. We, sleeping in it, knew no sooner of a loosened shutter than did “Old John,” who immediately began a still-hunt for the offender. But his drollest habit, I think, was the making of a slow, close search over all the grounds, and even out into the road, after every storm, seeking for possible slates torn from the roof. On one of my homecomings from a long season he met me with a small bill for mending the roof, and he anxiously explained that he did it, he knew, without orders, but if he hadn’t, it would have got worse and made a leak and would have ruined thousands of dollars’ worth of beautiful frocks up there! Please bear in mind that the figures mentioned are “Old John’s,” not mine.
I assured him it was all right. I thought his face would clear, but no, not yet. He carefully produced a large, flat package from under his table, and when the package was gravely opened, there lay a collection of broken slates. John had saved them all as his witnesses, and he would take up the best of them and explain: “If it had broken this way, instead of that way, it might have been replaced, but as it was, do you think now, ma’am, that I could have done any different?” The second assurance satisfied him, and his face resumed its usual contented look.
So we all moved our wonted ways until that lovely spring day, when a pale-faced messenger ran up to the house to say, “Oh, madam! Old John has had a fall, and he’s hurt bad!”
I thrust my feet into a pair of bed-room slippers, being myself ill at the time, flung a loose gown about me, and, with my mother, hurried with all possible speed down to the stable. He was stretched out—not sitting—in a horribly unnatural position on a chair. His face was ghastly, his eyes dim, his pulse almost unfindable. I gave him a stimulant, praying inwardly that I might not be doing wrong. I learned from the others that he had washed the pony phaeton, and was pushing it backward to its place when he had slipped and fallen heavily, face forward, on those cruel cobblestones.
I was convinced he was seriously injured, and leaving my mother attending to his wants and directingthe men how to get him to his room, I hurried back to the house, wishing at every step that my husband would come, and hastily telephoned for the doctor. When the doctor and Mr. H—— were both on the spot and I could retire to the background, I was surprised at my feeling of profound depression. “Old John” had had two falls far and away worse than this one, but that look on his face, it was neither age nor pain—though both were there—that so impressed me. It was a look of hopeless finality, and accepting it as a warning, I hastened to inquire if John would see a priest, and lo! as I had thought, the old faith was warm within him, since he answered readily that he’d see the priest, if we would be so kind.
But here the doctor interfered, saying he should prefer the patient to be kept quiet, and to my eager protest made answer: “He is really safe for the night; the morning will tell whether he is fatally injured or not, and I promise I will give you ample notice.”
And so I opened my ears to reason, and shut them hard and close against that still, small voice that cried, “Send! send!” and kept repeating the two words I had seen written upon that stricken, old face: “The end! the end!” In a conflict between reason and instinct I have always found instinct to be right, but, alas! I yielded to reason that time.
Down in “Old John’s” room all had been arranged for the night. The gardener was to sit up for the next three hours, then my husband would come downand watch the rest of the night. To the patient this was an arrangement of such outrageous impropriety and so exciting that it had seemingly to be abandoned. The lamp was shaded carefully, an open watch lay on the table by the medicine-bottle, glass and spoon, and all were neighbored by a pitcher of lemonade.
Lying on the floor at the foot of the bed was the great dog John had reared from puppyhood, and in the corner, in the seat of the old rocking-chair, three calmly-confident cats lay sleeping. It was all so quiet that when the sick man spoke even his weak tones could be heard plainly.
“Mr. H——, will you be thanking the ladies for their goodness to me, and if you please, sir, could me room be made proper-like before either of them might be looking in to-morrow?”
The promise was given. Then, after a moment, he said: “If you please, sir, would yer be asking the man to keep the door ajar a bit through the night, that the dog might have his freedom? Yer see he’s used to it, sir.”
This promise also was given, and John lay quiet for some minutes. Suddenly his face became troubled, and once more he opened his weary eyes, and looking up at his long-time employer, he anxiously asked: “Sir, has anyone had the sense to bring down the flag?”
And said employer, knowing nothing whatever about it, but anxious only to quiet the patient’s mind, answered, “Yes, the flag is down,” though at that moment it was hanging limp at the staff.
“John, would you like a drink of water?” asked my husband, finally.
“Yes, if you’ll be so kind, sir.” (Pause.)
“Do you wish for anything else, John?”
“For nothing in the world, sir.” (Another pause.)
Then after a faint movement or two: “Sir, perhaps you’ll be kind enough to help me raise my right hand?”
The heavy, nearly helpless hand was raised and laid gently across his breast. He gave a sigh of seeming contentment and closed his eyes.
“Is that all, John?”
“That’s all, sir.”
“Good-night, then, John!”
“Good-night, sir!” he tenderly replied.
And my husband turned and walked quietly out of the room, to make his report to me, who, anxious and foreboding, was awaiting him. At the lifting of “Old John’s” hand I burst into tears. Ah! I thought, he needed no man’s help to lift that brawny right hand of his when he swore allegiance to the Constitution of the United States, or later when he took the solemn oath that made him a soldier under that beloved flag, beneath whose folds he now lay, old and broken! And even as the thought passed through my mind, a handful of pebbles came dashing against the window. We both sprang forward, and looking down we saw the terrified face of the gardener, gleaming white in the moonlight!
In his fright he babbled Scandinavian to us, butfinally dragged from his unwilling throat one English word, “Come! come!”
My husband rushed with him down to the sick-room, and at the moment of their entrance found everything so precisely as he had left it that he felt angry at the man’s stupid fright. But before he could speak, three shadowy, gray forms slipped from the room, and the dog rose slowly, giving him a sullen, threatening look, then turned, and resting his heavy jaws on the foot of the bed, he lifted his great voice in one long, dismal howl, and dropped to his place again upon the floor, where he lay half growling, half groaning. Fearing that such a noise would disturb the sick man, my husband hurried to the bedside, and, laying his hand upon “Old John’s” head, he stood dumfounded, for from the body he touched life had flown!
It seemed incredible, for he had never moved. His hand lay on his breast just as it had been placed there. His face wore the same look of contentment that had come to it when he had said he wished “for nothing in the world, sir,” and later, when he had added, “Good-night, sir!” having, at the same time, bidden “good-night” to life and the world.
So, surrounded by the tender care of the family he adored—in his bed—under the same roof that sheltered the horses he had loved—beneath the great flag he reverenced—with his dog at his feet—quiet, peaceful, dignified, such was the passing of John Hickey, coachman.
We covered him with flowers. Nothing was too good to be offered in this last gift to the man who had walked so far with us along life’s highway. I had already ordered mass to be said for him. And then I paid him my last visit. I went alone, and talked to him, as foolish women will talk to their dead, and told him how and why I missed sending for the priest, and while I looked at him, I noticed for the first time what a fine head he had, the clearness of his profile, and above all, the calm dignity of his expression. Slowly, like music, there rolled through my memory certain words of Holy Writ: “He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill; that He may set him with princes, even with the princes of his people.”
And I knelt at the coffin’s side and prayed for this good and faithful servant and friend. A little later I stood on the porch, and through blinding tears saw my husband a second time walk with bared head by “Old John’s” side—a second time escorting him to a home.
So he passed out of my life, but never will he pass from my memory. Though he left us without “warning,” and asked for no “recommendation,” we cannot complain, since he “bettered” himself in following the summons of the Great Master.