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Updated: June 1, 2025
"If I get you," I said, "you're looking for something along the line of 'Noblesse Oblige. What?" "Cut the comedy," he retorted. "I'm telling you, the old class is there. You can't keep a fast horse in a poor man's stable." "Blood will tell, eh?" "Take it from me," said Sheener. It will be perceived that Evans had in Sheener not only a disciple; he had an advocate and a defender.
Let them send for him. This ain't no place for him." "You'll have your trouble for your pains," I told him. "The old soak is a plain liar; that's all." Sheener laughed at me. "That's all right, bo," he told me. "I know. This guy's the real cheese. You'll see." I asked him to let me know if he heard anything, and he said he would.
Evans kept his job; and Sheener I once caught him in the act, to his vast embarrassment did the janitor's work when Evans was unfit for duty. Also Sheener loaned him money, small sums that mounted into an interesting total; and furthermore I know that on one occasion Sheener fought for him.
But when he was pressed for details, the man though he might be weaving and blinking with liquor put a seal upon his lips. He said there were certain families in one of the Midland Counties of England who would welcome him home if he chose to go; but he never named them, and he never chose to go, and we put him down for a liar by the book. All of us except Sheener.
He took it meekly enough, but not Sheener. Sheener came to me with fire in his eye. "Sa-a-ay," he demanded, "what's coming off here, anyhow? What do you think you're trying to pull?" I asked him what he was talking about, and he said: "Evans says you've given him the hook." "That's right," I admitted. "He's through." "He is not," Sheener told me flatly. "You can't fire that guy." "Why not?"
I always told you the class was there. He says to me: 'I can't let my boy see me in this state, you know. Have to straighten up a bit. I'll need new clothes." "I noticed his new suit." "Sure," Sheener agreed. "I bought it for him." "Out of his savings?" "He ain't been saving much lately." "Sheener," I asked, "how much does he owe you? For money loaned and spent for him."
I thought you'd kick off, sure." The old man considered for a little, his lips twitching and shaking. "I say, you know," he murmured at last. "Can't have that. Potter's Field, and all that sort of business. Won't do. Sheener, when I do take the jump, you write home for me. Pass the good word. You'll hear from them." Sheener said: "Sure I will. Who'll I write to, Bum?"
This may have been through a native credulity which failed to manifest itself in his other dealings with the world. I think it more probable that Evans and his pretensions appealed to the love of romance native to Sheener. I think he enjoyed believing, as we enjoy lending ourselves to the illusion of the theatre.
I was somewhat impatient with Sheener's insistence, but I was also interested in this developing situation. "Who's going to do his work, anyhow?" I demanded. For the first time in our acquaintance I saw Sheener look confused. "That's all right too," he told me. "It don't take any skin off your back, long as it's done." In the end I surrendered.
Old Evans brushed at his coat anxiously; his fingers picked and twisted; and Sheener sat down on the bed beside him and began to soothe and comfort the man as though he were a child. The son was to arrive by way of Montreal, and at eleven o'clock we left Sheener's room for the station.
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