Captain Jinks, Hero by Ernest Howard Crosby (story read aloud txt) 📕

“Come, Mary, show your cousin his room. Here, give me your grip. Yes, you must let me carry it. Now get ready for supper as soon as you can. It’s all ready whenever you are.”

After supper they all sat round a wood fire, for it was a little chilly in the evening now. Mr. Jinks had his little girl in his lap, and they talked over family history and the events of the day. Sam asked who Mr. Reddy was whom he had met in the train.

“Oh! you mean old Reddy. Was he drunk? No? That’s odd.”

“He’d been away for the day drawing his pension,” said Sam.

“Of course,” said Mr. Jinks. “I might have known it. That is his one sober day in the month. He sobers up to go to town, but he’ll make up for lost time tonight. That twelve dollars will last just a week, and it all goes into the barroom till. He’s been that way ever since I was a boy, though they say he was a steady enough young fellow before he went to the war. It’s a curious coincidence, but there are two or three old rum-soaked war veterans like that hanging round every tavern in the country, and I’d like to know how much pension money goes that way. It’s a great system though, that pension system. I see something of it in Whoppington when I’m attending Congress. It distributes the money of the country and circulates it among the people. I like to see the amount increase every year. It’s a healthy sign. I’m trying to get some more for Reddy. It helps the county just that much. Swan, the hotel man, spends it here. I believe in protecting home industries and fostering our home market. I wish you could have heard my speech on the war-tax bill⁠—it covered that point. My, how this war is costing, though! A million dollars a day! But it’s well worth it. The more money we spend and the higher the taxes, the more circulation there is. You ought to see how things are booming at Whoppington. I’m sorry you couldn’t come to see me there, but I had to be here this week looking after election matters in my district. In Whoppington all the hotels are full of contractors and men looking for commissions in the army, and promoters and investors, all with an eye to the Cubapines. You can just see how the war has brought prosperity!”

“I should have liked to see Whoppington very much,” said Sam, “but I suppose I must wait till I come back. It must be very different from other cities. You must feel there as if you were at the center of things⁠—at the very mainspring of all our life, I mean.”

“You’ve hit the nail on the head,” said his uncle. “Whoppington holds up all the rest of the country. There is the Government that makes everything go. There’s no business there to speak of; no manufacturing, no agriculture in the country round⁠—nothing to distract your attention but the power of the Administration that lies behind all the rest. Just think what this country would be without Whoppington! Just imagine the capital city sinking into the ground and what would we all do? Even here at Slowburgh what would be left for us?”

“Wouldn’t we have breakfast tomorrow morning, papa?” asked the little girl in his lap.

“Er-er-well, perhaps we might have breakfast⁠—”

“Wouldn’t we have clothes, papa?”

“Perhaps we might have⁠—but no, we couldn’t either; it’s the tariff that gives us our clothes by keeping all foreign clothes out of the country, and then we shouldn’t have er-er⁠—”

“It would upset the post-office,” suggested Sam, coming to the rescue.

“Yes, to be sure, that is what I meant. It would cause a serious delay in the mails, that’s certain.”

“And then there would be no soldiers,” added Sam.

“Of course. How stupid of me to overlook that. How would you like to see no soldiers in the street?”

“I shouldn’t like it at all, papa.”

“Yes, my dear boy,” he proceeded, turning to Sam, “I would not want to have it repeated in my district, but I confess that I am always homesick for Whoppington when I am here. That’s the real world there. There’s the State Department where they manage all the foreign affairs of the world. What could we do without foreign affairs? And the Agricultural Department. How could we get in our crops without it? And the Labor Department. Every man who does a day’s work depends on the Labor Department for his living, we may say. And the⁠—”

“The War Department,” said Sam.

“Yes, the War Department. We depend on that for our wars. Perhaps at first that does not seem to be so useful, but⁠—”

“Oh! but, Uncle George, surely it is the most useful of all. What could we do without wars. Just fancy a country without wars!”

“I don’t know but you’re right, Sam.”

“And then the Treasury Department depends a good deal on the War Department,” said Sam, in triumph, “for without the War Department and the army it wouldn’t have any pensions to pay.”

“That’s so.”

“Papa,” said Mary Jinks, who had modestly taken no part in a conversation whose wisdom was clearly beyond her comprehension⁠—“papa, why didn’t everybody go to the war like Mr. Reddy, and then they’d all have pensions and nobody’d have to work.”

“It’s their own fault if they didn’t,” answered her father; “and if some people are overworked they have only their own selves to thank for it. I have no patience with the complaints of these socialists and anarchists that the poor are getting poorer and the number of unemployed increasing. In a country with pensions and war taxes and a tariff there’s no excuse for poverty at all.”

“Yes,” said Sam, “they could all enlist if they wanted to.”

The following day was spent in driving about the country. Mr. Jinks was obliged to visit the various centers in his Congressional district, and