The Coming Subject

‘Howdy?’ came the greeting of my voluble friend, as he stopped me in the midst of my Saturday morning errands about town. ‘So you’re back at work! And still teaching English! Foolish! Very foolish! Science is the subject to-day. We need science. Or, if you must have language, why not Spanish? That is becoming more important every day. No more defunct branches for the wise student. Silent tongues do not call the live man.’

I opened my lips, preparatory to verbal expression in a live language.

‘Oh, yes,’ continued Sir Voluble, ‘the usual excuse. English is in general use. Then why over-emphasize? It disseminates itself. We English-born do not need you. As for the foreign element — they soon pick up a vocabulary sufficient for their needs, without you enthusiasts, who preside over English in the most impossible form for popular utility. If you taught science now, or Spanish! There is your coming subject!’

I made my departure during his intaking of breath, the name of the coming subject following me to the door of the shoe-shop a few yards away.

‘Well, did you find my shoe?’ I asked.

The alert black eyes sparkled their assent. The little waxed moustache twitched with suppressed enjoyment of the joke.

‘Ach,ya! I haf heem. He eez feexed.’

A grimy right hand flourished the shoe wildly before my face, and the glib tongue continued the narration to the nervous accompaniment of the left.

‘I say when you go las’ time — Damn heem! I fine heem! All day it could take me, but I fine heem! I chase heem all over store. He nowhere. I chase heem een pile, een corner, een drawer — allwheres I chase heem — he nowhere. Sometime I see shoe on peg where I leef heem when man come! Ach! I grab heem! ’ — This with dramatic demonstrations. — ‘I grab heem — I hole heem up — I look at heem! Ach! Mein Gott! You eez de shoe!’

I departed for the Chinese laundry. The Chinaman shuffled forward. His passive yellow face reflected no emotion as he wrapped the shirt in its white paper and hunted for the ball of string. The string was apparently missing. He padded to and fro in vain, and from the gentle murmur, I judged that he was slowly and safely troubled.

‘Dammee stringee gonee — dammee stringee gonee — dammee stringee gonee —’

He finally inserted a pin to do duty for the string, his motionless lips still emitting the fascinating refrain about the lost ball.

As I went up the steps to the street, a sprinkle or two announced a shower close at hand. I hurried along, but the shower caught up with me, and ran ahead of me through the streets. Those unnecessarily abroad hastened indoors or under awnings. I crossed the street, weight on heels on the dangerously slippery pavement; then stopped to witness a modern Italian drama, street scene, all characters on stage.

An apartment house was in process of construction. A number of the poorer branches of Æneas’s family-tree had been engaged in their ancestor’s classic occupation — building. They now stood waging verbal war with the Dutch in the person of their boss, a stolid little man, who, between pipe-puffs, continued his commands.

‘Go on mit dem bricks, I tell you. Hustle mit dem bricks.’

Some of the meeker sheep started to obey, but were restrained by the incensed gestures and staccato Italian of the stronger-minded. One bold spirit, pushed to the front and a dialogue ensued.

‘You hustle mit dem bricks.’ Puff. Puff.

‘It rain. Men say no work.’ Inclusive gestures.

‘I tell you hustle mit dem bricks or no money.’ A decisive gesture.

The hero shrugged his shoulders and confronted his supporters.

‘Damma boss! We no work. Rain! Get wet! Seek! Dead! To hell wiz ze money! ’

Poorer, but conqueror, he led his comrades to the unfinished basement and their abandoned coats. The boss puffed after them sullenly.

I laughed as I turned my home corner, nearly colliding with three girls, whose ideas were wont to form part of a dull conclusion to my teaching day. I should explain that they were not foreign-born. They barely nodded to me, but this remark came back to me.

‘New glad rags! An’ out in all this soup! Wha’ d’yer know about that!’

On my own doorstep I stood and pondered. Then, with absent-minded ease born of habit, I took out my notebook and wrote: ‘If you could teach science, now — or Spanish. There is your Coming Subject!’