"Thompson, Jim - Pop. 1280" - читать интересную книгу автора (Thompson Jim)

Smack down into thirty years' accumulation of night soil.
Naturally, I had him fished out almost as fast as he went in. So he wasn't really hurt none, just awful messed up. But I never saw one man so mad in all my borned days.
He hopped up and down and sideways, waving his fists and flinging his arms around, and yelling blue murder. I tried to toss some water over him to get the worst of the filth off. But the way he was hopping around and jumping every which way, I couldn't do much good. I'd throw the water at him in one place, and he'd be in another. And cuss! You never heard anything like it, and him a deacon in the church!
The county commissioners came running out,along with the other office holders, all of 'em pretty jittery to see the town's most important citizen like that. Mr. Dinwiddie recognized them somehow, although it's hard to see how he could with all that gunk in his eyes. And if he could have found a club, I swear he'd've clubbed 'em.
He cussed 'em up one side and down the other. He swore he'd file felony charges against them for criminal negligence. He yelled that he was going to file personal damage suits against them for wilfully perpetuating a public hazard.
About the only person he had a kind word for was me. He said that a man like me could run the county by himself, and that he was going to see that all the other officials were recalled, because they were just a needless expense and a menace to life and limbas well.
As things turned out, Mr. Dinwiddie never did get around to doing anything of the things he threatened to. But that sure settled the privy problem. It was gone and the pit was filled in within an hour; and if you ever feel like getting a punch in the nose, just tell the commissioners that there ought to be another courthouse privy.
Well, that's a sample of Ken Lacey's advice. Just one sample of how good it is . . .
Of course, some people might say it was no good at all, that it might have got Mr. Dinwiddie killed and me in a pack of trouble. They might say that the other advice Ken had given me was pure meanness, and meant to be hurtful rather than helpful.
But me, well, I'll always think good of people as long as I possibly can. Or at least I won't think bad about 'em until I absolutely have to. So I hadn't quite reached a decision about Ken as yet.
I figured I'd see how he acted today, what kind of advice he gave me before I made up my mind. If he stacked up even halfway good, I'd give him the benefit of the doubt. But if he didn't appear even that good . . .
Well, I'd know what to do about him.
I always know.

4
I bought a bite of lunch from the train news butch, just a few sandwiches and some pie and potato chips and peanuts and cookies and sody-pop. About two o'clock that afternoon, we got into Ken Lacey's town, the county seat where he was high sheriff.
It was a real big place--probably four, five thousand people. The main street was paved, along with the square around the courthouse, and everywhere you looked there were wire-wheeled buggies and fancy fringe-topped carriages, and I even seen two, three auty-mo-biles with eye-goggled dudes driving 'em and women in veils and linen dusters holding on for dear life. I mean, it was just like being in New York or one of them other big cities I've heard about. All that stuff to see, and the people so busy and used to excitement that they didn't pay no mind at all.
Just for example, I passed this one vacant lot where there was the god-dangest dogfight going on that I ever did see. Kind of a battle royal between two hounds and a bulldog and a kind of spotty-assed mongrel.
Why, even if there hadn't been a fight, that mongrel would have been enough to make a fella stop and stare. Because I'm telling you, he was really something! He had this high ass in the back, all spotted and speckled like a cow had farted bran on him. But his front legs were so short that his nose almost rubbed on the ground. And one of his eyes was blue and the other'n was yaller. A real bright yaller like a woman's hair.
I stood there gawking, wishing that I had someone from Pottsville with me as a witness, because naturally no one'd ever believe I'd really seen a dog like that. Then, I happened to look around, and hard as it was to tear myself away, I turned my back on that spectacle and went on toward the courthouse.
I just about had to, you know, unless I wanted people to think I was an old country boy. Because I was the only one that had stopped to look. There was so much going on in that city that no one would ever give a second glance to something like _that!_
Ken and a deputy named Buck, a fella I'd never met before, were sitting in the sheriff's office; slumped way down on their spines with their boots crossed out in front of 'em, and their Stetsons tilted over their eyes.
I coughed and scuffled my feet, and Ken looked up from under his hatbrim. Then he said, "Why, I'll be god-danged, if it ain't the high sheriff of Potts County!" And he rolled his chair over to me and held out his hand.
"Set down, set down, Nick," he said, and! sat down in one of the swivel chairs. "Buck, wake up and meet a friend of mine."
Buck was already awake, as it turned out, so he rolled over and shook hands like Ken had. Then, Ken kind of jerked his head at him, and Buck rolled over to the desk and got out a quart of white corn and a handful of stogies.
"This here Buck is the smartest deputy I got," Ken said, as we all had a drink and lit up. "Got a lot of initiative, Buck has. Don't have to tell him every god-danged thing he's supposed to do like you would some fellas."
Buck said all he'd ever done was tojust try to do his duty, and Ken said, no, sir, he was smart.
"Like old Nick here. That's why he's sheriff of the forty-seventh largest county in this state."
"Yeah?" Buck said. "I didn't know they was but forty-seven counties in the state."
"Pre-zackly!" Ken said, sort of frowning at him. "How is things in Pottsville these days, Nick? Still booming?"
"Well, no," I said. "I wouldn't hardly say that was booming. Pottsville ain't exactly no real metropolis like you got here."
"Is that a fack?" Ken said. "Guess my recollection ain't as good as it used to be.Just how big is Pottsville, anyways?"
"Well, sir," I said, "there's a road sign just outside of town that says 'Pop. 1280,' so I guess that's about it. Twelve hundred and eighty souls."
"Twelve hundred and eighty souls, huh? Is them souls supposed to have people to go with 'em?"
"Well, yeah," I said, "that's what I meant. It was just another way of saying twelve hundred and eighty people."
We all had a couple more drinks, and Buck tossed his stogie in a gaboon and cut himself a chaw; and Ken said I wasn't pre-zackly correct in saying that twelve hundred and eighty souls was the same as twelve hundred and eighty people.
"Ain't that right, Buck?" Ken said, giving him a nod.
"Kee-rect!" Buck said. "You're a thousand per cent right, Ken!"
"Natcherly! So just tell old Nick why I am."
"Shorely," Buck said, turning toward me. "Y'see it's this way, Nick. That twelve hundred and eighty would be countin' niggers--them Yankee lawmakers force us to count 'em--and niggers ain't got no souls. Right, Ken?"
"Kee-rect!" Ken said.
"Well, now, I don't know about that," I said. "I wouldn't come out flat and say you fellas was wrong, but I sure don't reckon I can agree with you neither. I mean, well, just how come you say that colored folks don't have souls?"
"Because they don't, that's why."
"But why don't they?" I said.
"Tell him, Buck. Make old Nick here see the light," Ken said.
"Why, shorely," Buck said. "Y'see, it's this way, Nick. Niggers ain't got no souls because they ain't really people."
"They ain't?" I said.
"Why, o' course not. Most everybody knows that."
"But if they ain't people, what are they?"
"Niggers, just niggers, that's all. That's why folks refer to 'em as niggers instead of people."