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

“Sh-sh-sh!” whispered the prompter again. “He’s in jail.”

“I mean the assistant postmaster is also with us. And there are our other institutions, the⁠—”

“There’s going to be a prizefight tonight,” cried a young lieutenant who had taken too much wine, at the foot of the table. “Dandy Sullivan against Joe Corker.”

This interruption was too much for the commissioner, who was quite unable to resume the thread of his remarks for several moments. The guests in the meantime moved uneasily in their seats, for most of them were anxious to be off to see the fight.

“Those who carp against us at home,” continued the speaker, trying in vain to find some graceful way of coming to a close, “those who dishonor the flag are the men who pretend to be filled with humanity and to desire the welfare of mankind. They pretend to object to bloodshed. They are mere sentimentalists. They are not practical men. They do not understand our destiny, nor the Constitution, nor progress, nor civilization, nor glory, nor honor, nor the dear old flag, God bless her. They are sentimentalists. They have no sense of humor.”

Here the audience applauded loudly, although the speaker had not intended to have them applaud just there. It occurred to him that he might just as well stop at this point, and he sat down, not altogether satisfied, however, with his peroration and vexed to think that he had forgotten Sam altogether. The party broke up without delay, and Sam walked off with Cleary, who had been present, to see the prizefight.

“The commissioner isn’t much of a talker, is he?” said Cleary. “That was a bad break about the postmaster. I hear they’ve arrested Captain Jones for embezzlement too.”

“Good heavens!” cried Sam, “what an outrage!” And he told Cleary of his narrow escape from complicity in the matter, and how the military operations had prevented him from calling on the contractors. “Civilians don’t understand these things,” he added. “They oughtn’t to send them out here. They don’t understand things.”

“No. They haven’t been brought up on tabasco sauce. What can you expect of them?”

They soon arrived at the Alhambra Theater at which the fight was to take place, and found it in progress. A large crowd was collected, consisting of soldiers and natives in equal proportions. The last round was just finishing, and Joe Corker was in the act of knocking his opponent out. The audience was shouting with glee and excitement, the cheers being mixed with hisses and cries of “Fake, fake!”

“I know Corker,” said Cleary. “Come, I’ll introduce you.”

They pushed forward through the crowd, and were soon in a room behind the stage, where Corker was being rubbed and washed down by his assistants. Sam looked at the great man and felt rather small and insignificant. Here’s a kind of civilian who is not inferior to army men, he thought. Perhaps he is even superior. He would not have said this aloud, but he thought it.

“How de do, Joe?” said Cleary, shaking hands. “That was a great fight. You knocked him out clean. Here’s my friend, Colonel Jinks, the hero of San Diego and the pacifier of the Moritos.”

Corker nodded condescendingly.

“We enjoyed the fight very much,” said Sam, not altogether at his ease. “It reminded me of my own experience at East Point.”

“It was a good fight,” said Corker, “and a damned fair one too. I’d like to punch the heads of those fellers who cried ‘fake.’ It was as fair as fair could be, and Dandy and me was as evenly matched as two peas. I always believe in takin’ a feller of your size, and I did.”

“That wasn’t the way at East Point,” said Cleary. “They didn’t take fellows of their size there.”

“That’s against our rules anyway,” said Corker.

“It must be a civilian rule,” said Sam, beginning to feel his superiority again. “The military rule as we were taught it at East Point was to take a smaller man if you could, and you see, the army does just the same thing. We tackled Castalia and then the Cubapines, and they weren’t of our size. We don’t fight the powerful countries.”

“That’s queer,” said Corker, drinking a lemonade.

“It’s perfectly right,” said Sam. “When a man’s in the right, and of course we always are, if he fights a man of his size or one bigger than he is, he gives the wrong a chance of winning, and that is clearly immoral. If he takes a weaker man he makes the truth sure of success. And it’s just the same way with nations.”

Corker did not seem to be much interested by this disquisition, and Cleary dragged his friend away after they had respectfully bade the pugilist good night. A crowd of soldiers was waiting outside to see Corker get into his carriage. They paid no attention whatever to Sam and Cleary.

“When it comes to real glory a prizefighter beats a colonel all hollow,” said Cleary, and they parted for the night.

Sam was retained on the general staff and assigned to the important post of censor of the press. His duties were most engrossing, for not only were the proofs of all the local newspapers submitted to him, but also all other printed matter. One day a large number of handbills were confiscated at a printer’s and brought in for his inspection. He was very busy and asked his native private secretary to look them over for him. In a half-hour he came to him with a translation of the document.

“What does it say?” cried Sam. “I have no time to read it through.”

“It says that governments are made to preserve liberty, and that they get their only authority from the free will of the people who are ruled by them,” answered the clerk.

“That’s clearly seditious,” said Sam. “There must be some plot at the bottom of it. Have the whole edition burned and have the printer locked up.”

A few days later a newspaper was