Ernest Hemingway - Complete Short Stories Of Ernest Hemingway, The

3 d Soldier —He was all right.

2 d Roman Soldier —You guys don’t know what I’m talking about. I’m not saying whether he was good or not. What I mean is, when the time comes. When they first start nailing him, there isn’t none of them wouldn’t stop it if they could.

1 st Soldier —Didn’t you follow it, George?

Wine-seller —No, I didn’t take any interest in it, Lootenant.

1 st Soldier —I was surprised how he acted.

3 d Soldier —The part I don’t like is the nailing them on. You know, that must get to you pretty bad.

2 d Soldier —It isn’t that that’s so bad, as when they first lift ’em up. [ He makes a lifting gesture with his two palms together .] When the weight starts to pull on ’em. That’s when it gets ’em.

3 d Roman Soldier —It take some of them pretty bad.

1 st Soldier —Ain’t I seen ’em? I seen plenty of them. I tell you, he was pretty good in there today.

[ The second Roman soldier smiles at the Hebrew wine-seller .]

2 d Soldier —You’re a regular Christer, big boy.

1 st Soldier —Sure, go on and kid him. But listen while I tell you something. He was pretty good in there today.

2 d Soldier —What about some more wine?

[ The wine-seller looks up expectantly. The third Roman soldier is sitting with his head down. He does not look well .]

3 d Soldier —I don’t want any more.

2 d Soldier —Just for two, George.

[ The wine-seller puts out a pitcher of wine, a size smaller than the last one .

He leans forward on the wooden counter .]

1 st Roman Soldier —You see his girl?

2 d Soldier —Wasn’t I standing right by her?

1 st Soldier —She’s a nice-looker.

2 d Soldier —I knew her before he did. [ He winks at the wine-seller .]

1 st Soldier —I used to see her around the town.

2 d Soldier —She used to have a lot of stuff. He never brought her no good luck.

1 st Soldier —Oh, he ain’t lucky. But he looked pretty good to me in there today.

2 d Soldier —What become of his gang?

1 st Soldier —Oh, they faded out. Just the women stuck by him.

2 d Roman Soldier —They were a pretty yellow crowd. When they seen him go up there they didn’t want any of it.

1 st Soldier —The women stuck all right.

2 d Soldier —Sure, they stuck all right.

1 st Roman Soldier —You see me slip the old spear into him?

2 d Roman Soldier —You’ll get into trouble doing that some day.

1 st Soldier —It was the least I could do for him. I’ll tell you he looked pretty good to me in there today.

Hebrew Wine-seller —Gentlemen, you know I got to close.

1 st Roman Soldier —We’ll have one more round.

2 d Roman Soldier —What’s the use? This stuff don’t get you anywhere. Come on, let’s go.

1 st Soldier —Just another round.

3 d Roman Soldier —[ Getting up from the barrel .] No, come on. Let’s go. I feel like hell tonight.

1 st Soldier —Just one more.

2 d Soldier —No, come on. We’re going to go. Good-night, George. Put it on the bill.

Wine-seller —Good-night, gentlemen. [ He looks a little worried .] You couldn’t let me have a little something on account, Lootenant?

2 d Roman Soldier —What the hell, George! Wednesday’s payday.

Wine-seller —It’s all right, Lootenant. Good-night, gentlemen.

[ The three Roman soldiers go out the door into the street .]

[ Outside in the street .]

2 d Roman Soldier —George is a kike just like all the rest of them.

1 st Roman Soldier —Oh, George is a nice fella.

2 d Soldier —Everybody’s a nice fella to you tonight.

3 d Roman Soldier —Come on, let’s go up to the barracks. I feel like hell tonight.

2 d Soldier —You been out here too long.

3d Roman Soldier—No, it ain’t just that. I feel like hell.

2d Soldier—You been out here too long. That’s all.

CURTAIN

Banal Story

SO HE ATE AN ORANGE, SLOWLY SPITTING out the seeds. Outside, the snow was turning to rain. Inside, the electric stove seemed to give no heat and rising from his writing-table, he sat down upon the stove. How good it felt! Here, at last, was life.

He reached for another orange. Far away in Paris, Mascart had knocked Danny Frush cuckoo in the second round. Far off in Mesopotamia, twenty-one feet of snow had fallen. Across the world in distant Australia, the English cricketers were sharpening up their wickets. There was Romance.

Patrons of the arts and letters have discovered The Forum , he read. It is the guide, philosopher, and friend of the thinking minority. Prize short-stories—will their authors write our best-sellers of tomorrow?

You will enjoy these warm, homespun, American tales, bits of real life on the open ranch, in crowded tenement or comfortable home, and all with a healthy undercurrent of humor.

I must read them, he thought.

He read on. Our children’s children—what of them? Who of them? New means must be discovered to find room for us under the sun. Shall this be done by war or can it be done by peaceful methods?

Or will we all have to move to Canada?

Our deepest convictions—will Science upset them? Our civilization—is it inferior to older orders of things?

And meanwhile, in the far-off dripping jungles of Yucatan, sounded the chopping of the axes of the gum-choppers.

Do we want big men—or do we want them cultured? Take Joyce. Take President Coolidge. What star must our college students aim at? There is Jack Britton. There is Doctor Henry Van Dyke. Can we reconcile the two? Take the case of Young Stribling.

And what of our daughters who must make their own Soundings? Nancy Hawthorne is obliged to make her own Soundings in the sea of life. Bravely and sensibly she faces the problems which come to every girl of eighteen.

It was a splendid booklet.

Are you a girl of eighteen? Take the case of Joan of Arc. Take the case of Bernard Shaw. Take the case of Betsy Ross.

Think of these things in 1925—Was there a risqué page in Puritan history? Were there two sides to Pocahontas? Did she have a fourth dimension?

Are modem paintings—and poetry—Art? Yes and No. Take Picasso.

Have tramps codes of conduct? Send your mind adventuring.

There is Romance everywhere. Forum writers talk to the point, are possessed of humor and wit. But they do not try to be smart and are never long-winded.

Live the full life of the mind, exhilarated by new ideas, intoxicated by the Romance of the unusual. He laid down the booklet.

And meanwhile, stretched flat on a bed in a darkened room in his house in Triana, Manuel Garcia Maera lay with a tube in each lung, drowning with the pneumonia. All the papers in Andalucia devoted special supplements to his death, which had been expected for some days. Men and boys bought full-length colored pictures of him to remember him by, and lost the picture they had of him in their memories by looking at the lithographs. Bull-fighters were very relieved he was dead, because he did always in the bull-ring the things they could only do sometimes. They all marched in the rain behind his coffin and there were one hundred and forty-seven bull-fighters followed him out to the cemetery, where they buried him in the tomb next to Joselito. After the funeral every one sat in the cafés out of the rain, and many colored pictures of Maera were sold to men who rolled them up and put them away in their pockets.