I Married Adventure Page 4

  Experiment followed on experiment, and it is certain that more stock was wasted than was sold over the counter in those first few months of Martin’s awakened thirst for knowledge. Instead of being annoyed by these raids on his valuable photographic stock, Mr. Johnson encouraged them by building a darkroom in the back of the store and supplying Martin with all the books to be had on the subject. These Martin promptly took to school with him, further distracting his mind from his studies and exasperating his teachers.

  Unless there was an element of novelty in an undertaking, Martin was not interested. On one occasion, however, his efforts to dodge a rather tiring as well as boring chore did not work out so well. On washdays, Martin was expected to get up earlier than usual, often before daylight, and to carry enough water from the well to fill the boiler and tubs, a task that he heartily disliked. Using every bit of his considerable powers of persuasion, he eventually coaxed his father to buy a hand-powered washing machine, which then was being extensively advertised as a labor-saving device. When it arrived, Martin found to his disgust that not only was he obliged to carry just as much water as before, but to furnish the hand power as well.

  Mr. Johnson continued to cherish the dream that some day his son would take over the prosperous little jewelry business. To this end he exerted every effort to teach Martin to buy and sell rings and watchfobs, to repair watches and clocks, and to polish silver—but without success. Martin’s horizon was far beyond the plate-glass window of his father’s store.

  One morning, just before Christmas, Martin was leaving for school when his father said, “Martin, I want you to come straight over to the store this afternoon. There’s a lot of new Christmas stuff to unpack.”

  Martin, now knowing what awaited him, dawdled on the way, engaging in a halfhearted snowball fight that carried him finally and reluctantly to the door of his father’s store. In the back room, he took off his coat, cap, muffler, and mittens, blew on his cold, wet fingers, reached for the unwieldy nail-puller, and went to work on the big boxes.

  The first one was filled with cuckoo clocks trimmed with wooden lace. He tried but failed to visualize the places they came from. Interlaken! Lausanne! Montreux! What strange names. He tried tentatively to pronounce them but gave it up at once. The letters and numerals on the box and in the old Swiss newspapers used for packing had a distinctively and intriguingly foreign look. It was that way with the French and Italian newspapers, too. All used the Roman alphabet, just as they did in Kansas, and yet there was something fascinatingly different about the letters.

  Another box of Christmas novelties was from Nuremburg, Germany. The newspapers in these boxes were printed in letters that had the look of Sunday-school texts. Next was a box of glass from far-off Venice, in which he found a newspaper printed with odd-shaped letters wholly new to him.

  He went with it to his father and interrupted the sale of a wedding ring, but John Johnson didn’t know whether the printing was Russian, Greek, or Turkish; it might be all or any of them.

  Martin always saved the boxes from the Eastman Company until the very last. Often he would wait until after supper to open them, and that gave him time without interruption to inspect each camera down to the last screw. Iris, shutter, and lens—all were subjected to a careful scrutiny and became a part of his store of knowledge as well as part of the stock on the orderly shelves.

  The snapshots sent by the Eastman Company as specimens fascinated Martin quite as much as the cameras themselves. Usually there was a liberal sprinkling of scenes of foreign lands. Maybe, he conjectured, these are from those same places where the newspapers came from. After that, Martin might be seen at almost any time taking pictures of the town hall, the bank, the corner drugstore, and the new hotel. Underexposed, over-developed, poorly printed, light-struck, and badly composed, they were, Martin decided, pretty bad. And for that matter, he concluded in justice to himself, as he compared his photography with that from across the world, Independence might be a pretty big town, bigger than Lincoln Center, but its buildings, civic and otherwise, weren’t much to brag about.

  It was about this time—he was just thirteen—that Martin read of the circus in Kansas City. Pictures of some of the animals and performers appeared in the Independence papers, and since he had never seen a circus, the whole thing proved too much for him. Packing a small but strong wooden box with camera, tripod, plates, and films, and emptying his iron bank of its seventy-eight cents, he dropped from the window of his bedroom at two in the morning and made his way down to the Santa Fe freight yards. Here he climbed into the open door of an empty boxcar and promptly fell asleep. He awoke several hours later to find himself in Topeka. He arrived in Kansas City that night to find the circus had left town. Martin had then to content himself with taking pictures of the colored circus posters; and he had likewise to think about getting home. Too many cream puffs and peanuts made him violently ill. His father, notified by a kindly brakeman, found him curled up in a corner of the Santa Fe freight yards and took him home.

  Chapter 2

  “I’m going to travel and make money doing it,” Martin announced to his parents some three weeks after vacation had started.

  “That’s fine, Martin, that’s fine,” his father answered characteristically. Then, a little anxiously, “How are you going to do it, son?”

  “Take pictures.” Martin was confident. “A penny apiece. County fairs. Volume business.”

  John Johnson’s thoughts wandered to his jewelry store, one of the finest in the state, and to his fast-fading hopes that one day his son would take it over. Then, a little dubiously, he eyed the equipment on which Martin had worked hard and secretly for the past three weeks. It consisted of a rickety buckboard and the piebald pony Socks; an old camera and tripod together with developing fluids and trays bought from Hannah Scott on the installment plan; an ambitious number of plates out of the Eastman stock in the store; and an old tent. This last was lined with black cloth. How much labor had gone into it Mr. Johnson could only guess.

  “That’s my darkroom,” his son explained proudly.

  Martin was fifteen, going on sixteen. John Johnson sighed and, as the strange contraption rattled off down the road, thought of his own youth.

  “Anyhow,” he smilingly said aloud to Martin’s mother, “one thing we don’t have to worry about in Kansas these days is Indians.”

  The first letter from Martin was postmarked Neodesha, Kansas. After two or three weeks a letter from Fredonia informed them that he was well except for spots in front of his eyes—was it his stomach and what should he do about it?—and that he was going on to Altoona. The next letter was to the effect that a spell of rain had almost ruined his equipment, but that he was going on to Chanute, where he would open a gallery. Somebody had told him that no photographer was there at the moment. “And,” he asked, “don’t you think this is a good idea?”

  Arriving in Chanute, Martin found Mr. Williams, who owned the opera house, about the only person who would rent him a room and take a chance on collecting the rent later. This turned out to be a storeroom, cluttered and dusty, but it had a fine skylight and, almost equally important, a washbasin with running water. Martin took the room on the spot. Elatedly, he cleared a place for work, carried his equipment up the long stairs, hand-lettered some announcements, and, after pasturing Socks with a genial farmer on the edge of town, settled down to wait for business. This was in the middle of August, and hot as only a Kansas August knows how to be. Martin remarked some years later that in all our years together in Africa he never suffered from the heat as he did in that practically airtight cubicle over Williams’ Opera House in Chanute.

  His patrons, mostly of the grade-school age, came in just sufficient numbers to let him hope he was establishing a business; he even dreamed of becoming as important to Chanute as Hannah Scott was to Independence. The fear of missing a customer, however, kept him a virtual prisoner in his oven-like cell.
The old tent with its black cloth lining still served as his darkroom, and night usually found him developing the plates that had been exposed during the day. Some “prop” cushions were kicked together in a corner and that was where he slept, though often with wistful visions of his comfortable bed and clean, cool sheets at home.

  Business picked up, and it seemed to Martin that he was doing very nicely indeed. He was even saving money. But a new problem arose when his materials ran out and he had to pay cash for more. This was a very different matter, he found, from drawing on his father’s stock at will, and on Hannah Scott’s on credit. His money was almost gone. He made several valiant efforts at producing cabinet pictures and charging ten cents apiece, but here his equipment failed him utterly. And then—whether it was the heat or nature tardily rebelling at his too-steady diet of watermelon, peanuts, and cream puffs—his stomach went back on him. Reluctantly he began to wonder whether it wouldn’t be a good idea to go home—yes, and maybe even go back to high school again.

  The last penny picture Martin took in Chanute was of a hot, cross little boy who came with his sister, equally hot and cross, and there was an argument over a white, starched, embroidered collar.

  * * *

  —

  Martin had dreaded the return home. Grimy, almost ragged, and hollow to his heels with hunger, he could think of no way to justify himself. Naturally, he knew of his father’s hope to have him learn the jewelry business and eventually to take over the store, and he also knew that because of his failure to buckle down, his father had had to hire some help.

  Martin sighed when he remembered all these things. What was the matter with him anyhow? Why couldn’t he do the thing that was expected of him, the right thing? It seemed to him that surely his parents would reproach him this time—gently, of course—and point out that from now on he had better consult them about his plans. What he found, however, was a sympathetic sort of casualness that left no room at all for embarrassment over the outcome of his initial trek. There were no questions or reproaches anywhere, either spoken or implied.

  And, of course, there had been that other notion of his, now vanished, in which he had pictured himself returning grandly bearing gifts. All he had been able to manage was a little gingham parasol for Freda. It was bright pink, and the wooden handle smelled of shellac.

  “It cost thirty cents,” he said. “I could have bought one for twenty-five cents, but while I was about it I thought I might as well get a good one.”

  His father eyed Martin’s lean, lank figure, but commented only on the fact that he sure was growing to be a tall fellow; must have added at least an inch since he left. His mother, saying nothing, hurried a plate of ham and eggs before him. Freda pulled a chair close and looked at him in pure, unmixed admiration because he had gone away, traveled far, and come safely back with a parasol.

  * * *

  —

  The next few months showed a concentration of effort which, by all odds, should have succeeded in anchoring Martin to Independence for life; at least such was his worthy intention. Promptly after school every day he would appear for work at his father’s jewelry store.

  The girls at school began to take note of Martin, a rather better-than-average-looking youth, and even consulted his mother about giving a surprise party for him on his birthday. It seemed to Mrs. Johnson that this was a very nice idea indeed, and she entered wholeheartedly into the pleasant conspiracy. There was much secret cake-baking and chicken-frying, and all went well until the very evening of the party, when, just as he was entering the strangely quiet house, one of the girls giggled. Martin gave one startled look, wheeled about, leaped the fence, and was off in the direction of the river.

  Here, tied to an overhanging limb, was a raft which he and some of the gang had rigged up. A houseboat, they called it, though the structure was little more than an oversized box nailed none too securely to the center crosspieces. It was raining by the time Martin got there, so he crawled into the little shelter, fastened the door securely against any of the crowd that might follow him, curled up on the old blanket with which the place was furnished, ate some stale cookies, and went to sleep.

  The rain became a downpour, and Martin’s impressions of what happened next were somewhat mixed, but he found himself bumping around in the once-snug box, and found further that if he didn’t get out in a hurry he’d probably drown. Finally, kicking his way free, he swam to shore and from there saw what was left of his houseboat carried in odd bits and pieces down the swollen river. He also saw the end of his half-formed plans to spend the next summer on that raft, taking pictures while he drifted down the river, perhaps clear to the Mississippi.

  Martin was rarely seen without his camera. He took pictures of his class individually and as a group, and nearly everyone in school had yielded indulgently at one time or another to posing for an informal snapshot. Neither party nor picnic was considered a success without Martin’s pictorial record of the occasion, and with an eye to business he garnered a few dollars here and there selling the prints. Picnics were his special delight. He liked the challenge of light and shade under the trees down by the river, and groupings and composition claimed his earnest attention.

  One bright, warm Saturday that fall, with camera and tripod lashed to the handlebars of his bicycle, Martin led a party to a spot several miles out of town beside a clear stream. There were shoebox lunches of fried chicken, deviled eggs, and cake. This, Martin decided, was a nice life indeed.

  Propped lazily against the trunk of a tree, he sank his teeth into a big piece of chocolate cake and thought about girls. He was both pleased and embarrassed when they showed a preference for him. He liked the big brown eyes of one, but her hair was coarse and reminded him of another girl with a long, dark braid who had once sat in front of him at school. The little blonde was all right—pretty enough, he guessed—but she giggled too much and agreed with everything he said. The girl with the red hair was cute in her way, had pretty hands, and was graceful, but he suspected her of a bad temper. Martin couldn’t help thinking it was too bad one couldn’t make a composite, using the good points of maybe half a dozen of them.

  The trend of the day was on the sentimental side, and Martin, in the mood—objectively, at least—took some pictures of a sweetly tender nature. One couple, cheek to cheek, peeped coyly at the camera over a low-hung bough. Another stood in embrace before a weeping-willow tree. A young lady sat on a tree stump while a young man, intently ardent, knelt at her feet. Undeniable was the influence of those colored slides used in “nickel shows” to illustrate the popular songs of the day.

  On developing the plates, Martin was gratified to find a distinct improvement in his skill as a photographer, and after making a few prints he carefully filed the negatives. Several months later found him working in the little darkroom which he had rigged up at home, and whatever he was doing required the most careful and exacting performance. It had its amusing side, too, for his mother, at the door with his nightcap of bread, jam, and milk, heard a sudden shout of laughter.

  At morning recess the next day, the schoolyard was static with huddles of shrieking students; there were more huddles in the halls and cloakrooms. At the approach of a teacher, each huddle sobered instantly and dissolved. Late that forenoon, Martin was called too the office of the principal.

  “Martin,” that gentleman said sternly, “it has come to my attention that you have been distributing photographs around the school—photographs that are indecent!”

  “Indecent, sir?”

  “So I have been told. Indecent and ridiculing the faculty. What have you to say for yourself?”

  “Well, I made some photographs, but—”

  “Let me see them, please.”

  Martin pulled from his pocket what appeared at first glance to be ordinary snapshots, but the principal, eyeing them closely, saw the very proper instructor of algebra cheek to cheek with the come
ly new Latin teacher. He saw every gentleman member of the faculty paired off with a lady member in what, without quibble, was an attitude of love. And, lastly, he saw himself on one knee in an attitude or ardor before the lady teacher of English 4-B.

  “I only thought they were—well, sort of funny,” Martin ventured lamely.

  “Funny! Indecent, that’s what they are, and I demand that you collect every print you gave out and bring them here to me!”

  This Martin did during the noon hour, taking them at once to the principal’s office. There was an ominous silence as they were torn in bits. Then the principal spoke.

  “Martin Johnson, by this performance you have disgraced not only yourself but the entire school, and it is clear that we can no longer tolerate your presence here. You are expelled, sir.”

  Martin felt suddenly hollow inside. His mouth was dry.

  “I meant no harm, sir. It was all in fun. If you’ll give me another chance, I’ll—for my father’s sake, I mean—I’ll do anything.”