The Old Tobacco Shop

"Fweddie," said the Little Boy.

"It ain't neither!" cried Mr. Littleback. "There ain't no such name. It's Freddie! Come on, now, say Freddie!"

"Fweddie," said the Little Boy.

"No, no!" cried Toby. "Try it again, now. Say Freddie!"

"Toby," said Aunt Amanda, "shut up. Freddie, I haven't any little boy, and I don't get out very much, and I'd like you to come and see me sometimes. Would you like to do that?"

Freddie stared at her, and said, "Yes'm."

"I hope you will, often. Be sure you do. I suppose you don't like gingerbread? Toby."

The little hunchback went out briskly through a back door and returned with a slice of gingerbread. "Baked today," said his aunt. "But what time is it? Quarter to six. Too near suppertime. You mustn't eat it now, Freddie. Toby, wrap it up."

Toby went into the shop and returned with a paper sack, and putting the gingerbread into it gave it to Freddie.

"Now," said Aunt Amanda, "take it home with you and eat it after supper. Will you come to see me?"

"Yes'm," said Freddie as if he meant it. You couldn't get gingerbread at home between meals every day in the week.

"That's a good boy. Now run away home."

"Please, sir," said Freddie, holding out the money in his hand, "my farver wants half a pound of Cage-Roach Mitchner."

"What? Oh!" said Toby. "I see. Half a pound of Stage-Coach Mixture. All right, young feller, come along into the shop."

"Good-bye, Freddie, and don't break the gingerbread before you get home," said Aunt Amanda, taking into her mouth a palmful of pins with a back toss of her head. Had she swallowed them? Freddie stared at her in alarm.

"Ain't you never comin' for the tobacco?" said Toby. "I can't keep all them customers in the shop waiting all day."

Freddie followed him into the shop.

"You'll have to wait your turn, young feller," said Toby. "I can't keep these customers waiting no longer. What'll you have, Mr. Applejohn?"

Freddie looked around for Mr. Applejohn, but so far as he could see there was no one in the shop but himself and Mr. Littleback. The hunchback went through the swinging gate and stood behind the counter, and looked over it (his head and shoulders just came over the top) at Mr. Applejohn.

"No," said Toby, "we're just out of it. Very sorry. But I have something just as good. No? Well, then, come around tomorrow; yes, sir; between ten and eleven. Now, then, Tom, it's your turn. You want what? No, sir, I won't sell no cigarettes to no boy, so you can clear out. You ought to be ashamed o' yourself, smoking cigarettes at your age. No use arguin', I won't do it. You can get right out o' here." The big wooden-looking head winked an eye at Freddie. "That's the way I treat 'em. Did you see how he skipped off in a hurry? You saw him go, didn't you?"

Freddie looked at the door. He hadn't seen anybody, but after all that talk there must have been somebody there; he couldn't be sure; probably he had been mistaken about it; grown-up people ought to know what they were talking about; perhaps he had seen somebody. He hesitated.

"I – I think so; I believe so; yes, sir."

"Don't you fool yourself, young man. You can't smoke cigarettes if you ever want to grow up. Look at me. Do you see this?" He turned his back and reached over his shoulder to his hump. "Cigarettes. That's what done it. Cigarettes. I smoked 'em along with my bottle of milk, regular, when I was a kid, and look at me now, not much bigger than Mr. Punch out there. Cigarettes. Maybe you might think it was the bottle o' milk done it, instead of the cigarettes, being as they was at the same time; but don't you never believe it. Cigarettes! You keep off of 'em. Now pipe-tobacco! That's a different thing. If I'd only stuck to a pipe, along with that bottle o' milk, look how high I'd 'a' been now! What kind o' tobacco did you say your farver wanted? Housewife's Favorite?"

"No, sir," said Freddie. "My farver he wants half a pound of Cage-Roach Mitchner."

"That's it," said Toby. "I don't see how I come to forget that name. Your father's a man o' good common sense. Nothing like Cage-Roach. Here it is." He turned to the shelf behind him and mounted a little ladder and took down a large tin. While he was scooping out the tobacco at the counter and weighing it on the scales and doing it up, he was singing to himself, and Freddie stared at him with rapt attention.

"Some day," said Mr. Littleback, without pausing in his work or looking at Freddie, "them eyes of yourn will pop right out of your head, if you ain't careful. Did you ever hear that song?"

"No, sir," said Freddie.

"Would you like to hear it?"

"Yes, sir," said Freddie.

"It's about two old codgers – friends of mine; they come in here regular. One of 'em's a good customer and pays spot cash; the other one never buys nothing; and I can't say which one of 'em I like worse. Anyway, here's how it goes:

"Oh-h-h! There was an old codger, and he had a wooden leg,
And he never bought tobacco when tobacco he could beg."

"Don't you never let yourself get into that habit, young man. Always buy your tobacco fair and square. I've known 'em – this feller and many another one – never have a grain o' tobacco left in their pouch – just used up the very last bit two minutes before, and always a-beggin' a pipeful, and right here in my own shop too, where I sell tobacco, mind you – I'd like 'em better if they sneaked in and stole it, I would, any day. But the other one! I don't know that I'd want to be him neither, if I had to choose between 'em, – however —

"Another old codger, as sly as a fox!
And he always had tobacco in his old tobacco box.

"Count on him for that! He never begs no tobacco, nor gives away none either. However, he ain't such a general nuisance as the other one, and he pays spot cash. I'll have to say that much for him. But in spite o' everything and all, I can't seem to make myself care for him, much. Anyway —

"Said the one old codger, Won't ye gimme a chew?
Said the other old codger, I'll be hanged if I do!

"They're a fine pair now, ain't they? One of 'em a nuisance and the other one a grouch. You'll see 'em here both in my shop one o' these days, when you're a-visitin' Aunt Amanda, and one of them times – you see the way I bounced that boy that wanted cigarettes, didn't you? Well, that's what I'm goin' to do to them two old codgers one of these days, you watch and see if I don't; yes, sir; both of 'em, as sure as I've got a hump on my back. But it's pretty good advice, after all, what the song says, —

"So save up your pennies and put away your rocks,
And you'll always have tobacco in your old tobacco box!

"Here's your Cage-Roach. Gimme your money. There's your change; five, ten, fifteen, seventeen. Now run along. Come back again; what did you say your name was?"

"Fweddie."

"You mean Freddie, don't you?"

"Yes, sir."

"Why don't you say what you mean? Well, Freddie, there's plenty of tobacco left in this shop, so you can come in whenever the old tobacco box at home runs out. And don't forget to come in to see Aunt Amanda. Plenty of goods left in the shop whenever – you see all that?" He pointed up towards the shelves. "I'll tell you something I ain't told to but mighty few people before. There's a jar of smoking tobacco up there that's just plain magic. Magic! You know what that means?"

Freddie started, and looked up at the shelves in alarm. He nodded.

"It's that one, on the middle shelf; the Chinaman's head. Do you see it?"

He pointed to a white porcelain jar, shaped like a human head. Freddie could see that it was the head of some foreign kind of man, with a little round blue cap on top, which was probably the lid.

"That tobacco in that Chinaman's head is magic, as sure as you're alive. I wouldn't smoke it if you'd give me all the plum puddings in this city next Christmas; no, sir; and I wouldn't allow nobody else to smoke it, neither: I just naturally wouldn't dare to. Do you know where that tobacco come from? A sailor off of one them ships down there in the harbor, that come all the way from China – yes, sir, China!– give it to me once for a quid of plug-cut; what you might call broke, he was, and it wasn't any use to him because he didn't smoke, but he did chew; and he told me all about it; he stole it from an old sorcerer in China, where he'd just come from. Don't you never touch it! I wouldn't want to be in your boots if you ever smoked that tobacco in that there Chinaman's head! You can steal anything else in this shop, and it wouldn't do much harm to anybody; but you keep your hands off of that Chinaman's tobacco, mind what I'm telling you!"

"Yes, sir," said Freddie. He had never thought about smoking before, in connection with himself, but now for the first time he began to wish that he knew how to smoke. It would be worth risking something to take a whiff or two of the magic tobacco in that Chinaman's head, just to see what would happen.

"Do you think you'd better go home now?" said Mr. Littleback.