The Open Boat and Other Stories
discomfort of the storm, and gave a meaning to the pace of the people
and the vehicles, scores of pedestrians and drivers, wretched with
cold faces, necks and feet, speeding for scores of unknown doors and
entrances, scattering to an infinite variety of shelters, to places
which the imagination made warm with the familiar colours of home.
There was an absolute expression of hot dinners in the pace of the
people. If one dared to speculate upon the destination of those who
came trooping, he lost himself in a maze of social calculation; he
might fling a handful of sand and attempt to follow the flight of each
particular grain. But as to the suggestion of hot dinners, he was in
firm lines of thought, for it was upon every hurrying face. It is a
matter of tradition; it is from the tales of childhood. It comes forth
with every storm.
However, in a certain part of a dark west-side street, there was a
collection of men to whom these things were as if they were not. In
this street was located a charitable house, where for five cents the
homeless of the city could get a bed at night, and in the morning
coffee and bread.
During the afternoon of the storm, the whirling snows acted as drivers,
as men with whips, and at half-past three the walk before the closed
doors of the house was covered with wanderers of the street, waiting.
For some distance on either side of the place they could be seen
lurking in the doorways and behind projecting parts of buildings,
gathering in close bunches in an effort to get warm. A covered wagon
drawn up near the curb sheltered a dozen of them. Under the stairs
that led to the elevated railway station, there were six or eight,
their hands stuffed deep in their pockets, their shoulders stooped,
jiggling their feet. Others always could be seen coming, a strange
procession, some slouching along with the characteristic hopeless gait
of professional strays, some coming with hesitating steps, wearing the
air of men to whom this sort of thing was new.
It was an afternoon of incredible length. The snow, blowing in twisting
clouds, sought out the men in their meagre hiding-places, and skilfully
beat in among them, drenching their persons with showers of fine
stinging flakes. They crowded together, muttering, and fumbling in
their pockets to get their red inflamed wrists covered by the cloth.
New-comers usually halted at one end of the groups and addressed a
question, perhaps much as a matter of form, "Is it open yet?"
Those who had been waiting inclined to take the questioner seriously
and became contemptuous. "No; do yeh think we'd be standin' here?"
The gathering swelled in numbers steadily and persistently. One could
always see them coming, trudging slowly through the storm.
Finally, the little snow plains in the street began to assume a leaden
hue from the shadows of evening. The buildings upreared gloomily save
where various windows became brilliant figures of light, that made
shimmers and splashes of yellow on the snow. A street lamp on the curb
struggled to illuminate, but it was reduced to impotent blindness by
the swift gusts of sleet crusting its panes.
In this half-darkness, the men began to come from their shelter places
and mass in front of the doors of charity. They were of all types, but
the nationalities were mostly American, German, and Irish. Many were
strong, healthy, clear-skinned fellows, with that stamp of countenance
which is not frequently seen upon seekers after charity. There were
men of undoubted patience, industry, and temperance, who, in time of
ill-fortune, do not habitually turn to rail at the state of society,
snarling at the arrogance of the rich, and bemoaning the cowardice of
the poor, but who at these times are apt to wear a sudden and singular
meekness, as if they saw the world's progress marching from them, and
were trying to perceive where they had failed, what they had lacked, to
be thus vanquished in the race. Then there were others of the shifting,
Bowery element, who were used to paying ten cents for a place to sleep,
but who now came here because it was cheaper.
But they were all mixed in one mass so thoroughly that one could not
have discerned the different elements, but for the fact that the
labouring men, for the most part, remained silent and impassive in the
blizzard, their eyes fixed on the windows of the house, statues of
patience.
The sidewalk soon became completely blocked by the bodies of the men.
They pressed close to one another like sheep in a winter's gale,
keeping one another warm by the heat of their bodies. The snow came
down upon this compressed group of men until, directly from above, it
might have appeared like a heap of snow-covered merchandise, if it
were not for the fact that the crowd swayed gently with a unanimous,
rhythmical motion. It was wonderful to see how the snow lay upon the
heads and shoulders of these men, in little ridges an inch thick
perhaps in places, the flakes steadily adding drop and drop, precisely
as they fall upon the unresisting grass of the fields. The feet of the
men were all wet and cold, and the wish to warm them accounted for the
slow, gentle, rhythmical motion. Occasionally some man whose ear or
nose tingled acutely from the cold winds would wriggle down until his
head was protected by the shoulders of his companions.
There was a continuous murmuring discussion as to the probability of
the doors being speedily opened. They persistently lifted their eyes
towards the windows. One could hear little combats of opinion.
"There's a light in th' winder!"
"Naw; it's a reflection f'm across th' way."
"Well, didn't I see 'em light it?"
"You did?"
"I did!"
"Well, then, that settles it!"
As the time approached when they expected to be allowed to enter, the
men crowded to the doors in an unspeakable crush, jamming and wedging
in a way that it seemed would crack bones. They surged heavily against
the building in a powerful wave of pushing shoulders. Once a rumour
flitted among all the tossing heads.
"They can't open th' door! Th' fellers er smack up agin 'em."
Then a dull roar of rage came from the men on the outskirts; but all
the time they strained and pushed until it appeared to be impossible
for those that they cried out against to do anything but be crushed
into pulp.
"Ah, git away f'm th' door!"
"Git outa that!"
"Throw 'em out!"
"Kill 'em!"
"Say, fellers, now, what th' 'ell? G've 'em a chance t' open th' door!"
"Yeh dam pigs, give 'em a chance t' open th' door!"
Men in the outskirts of the crowd occasionally yelled when a boot-heel
of one of trampling feet crushed on their freezing extremities.
"Git off me feet, yeh clumsy tarrier!"
"Say, don't stand on me feet! Walk on th' ground!"
A man near the doors suddenly shouted--"O-o-oh! Le' me out--le' me
out!" And another, a man of infinite valour, once twisted his head
so as to half face those who were pushing behind him. "Quit yer
shovin', yeh"--and he delivered a volley of the most powerful and
singular invective, straight into the faces of the men behind him. It
was as if he was hammering the noses of them with curses of triple
brass. His face, red with rage, could be seen upon it, an expression
of sublime disregard of consequences. But nobody cared to reply to
his imprecations; it was too cold. Many of them snickered, and all
continued to push.
In occasional pauses of the crowd's movement the men had opportunities
to make jokes; usually grim things, and no doubt very uncouth.
Nevertheless, they were notable--one does not expect to find the
quality of humour in a heap of old clothes under a snow-drift.
The winds seemed to grow fiercer as time wore on. Some of the gusts of
snow that came down on the close collection of heads, cut like knives
and needles, and the men huddled, and swore, not like dark assassins,
but in a sort of American fashion, grimly and desperately, it is true,
but yet with a wondrous under-effect, indefinable and mystic, as if
there was some kind of humour in this catastrophe, in this situation in
a night of snow-laden winds.
Once the window of the huge dry-goods shop across the street furnished
material for a few moments of forgetfulness. In the brilliantly-lighted
space appeared the figure of a man. He was rather stout and very well
clothed. His beard was fashioned charmingly after that of the Prince
of Wales. He stood in an attitude of magnificent reflection. He slowly
stroked his moustache with a certain grandeur of manner, and looked
down at the snow-encrusted mob. From below, there was denoted a supreme
complacence in him. It seemed that the sight operated inversely, and
enabled him to more clearly regard his own delightful environment.
One of the mob chanced to turn his head, and perceived the figure in
the window. "Hello, lookit 'is whiskers," he said genially.
Many of the men turned then, and a shout went up. They called to him
in all strange keys. They addressed him in every manner, from familiar
and cordial greetings, to carefully-worded advice concerning changes in
his personal appearance. The man presently fled, and the mob chuckled
ferociously, like ogres who had just devoured something.
They turned then to serious business. Often they addressed the stolid
front of the house.
"Oh, let us in fer Gawd's sake!"
"Let us in, or we'll all drop dead!"
"Say, what's th' use o' keepin' us poor Indians out in th' cold?"
And always some one was saying, "Keep off my feet."
The crushing of the crowd grew terrific toward the last. The men, in
keen pain from the blasts, began almost to fight. With the pitiless
whirl of snow upon them, the battle for shelter was going to the
strong. It became known that the basement door at the foot of a little
steep flight of stairs was the one to be opened, and they jostled and
heaved in this direction like labouring fiends. One could hear them
panting and groaning in their fierce exertion.
Usually some one in the front ranks was protesting to those in the
rear--"O-o-ow! Oh, say now, fellers, let up, will yeh? Do yeh wanta
kill somebody!"
A policeman arrived and went into the midst of them, scolding and
be-rating, occasionally threatening, but using no force but that of his
hands and shoulders against these men who were only struggling to get
in out of the storm. His decisive tones rang out sharply--"Stop that
pushin' back there! Come, boys, don't push! Stop that! Here you, quit
yer shovin'! Cheese that!"
When the door below was opened, a thick stream of men forced a way down
the stairs, which were of an extraordinary narrowness, and seemed only
wide enough for one at a time. Yet they somehow went down almost three
abreast. It was a difficult and painful operation. The crowd was like
a turbulent water forcing itself through one tiny outlet. The men in
the rear, excited by the success of the others, made frantic exertions,
for it seemed that this large band would more than fill the quarters,
and that many would be left upon the pavements. It would be disastrous
to be of the last, and accordingly men with the snow biting their
faces, writhed and twisted with their might. One expected that from the
tremendous pressure, the narrow passage to the basement door would be
so choked and clogged with human limbs and bodies that movement would
be impossible. Once indeed the crowd was forced to stop, and a cry
went along that a man had been injured at the foot of the stairs. But
presently the slow movement began again, and the policeman fought at
the top of the flight to ease the pressure of those that were going
down.
A reddish light from a window fell upon the faces of the men, when
they, in turn, arrived at the last three steps, and were about to