Tull Wexford's Letter
by King of the Jube Jubes
i loped into town
for to have a go round
and there saw my jane
with that huckleb'ry
clown
i drove them down
kissed her lily crown
now i'm san quentin
bound
for another go round
The
Ides of April, 1858
Not
far from Nachos, two miles east and three and a half north, in a cemetery lined
with lime trees and cicada shrub green like kale, lie the remains of the great
General James A. Walingsford who, seconded to the Confederates, died in the war
at Getterferd. I visited there many, many years ago when I was a young man
unaccustomed to myself. Now, lying here in melancholy, comfortable but
indisposed, I write you this letter with the story of his famous daughter as it
was told to me so long ago in a chance encounter with a stranger at his
graveside. Ah, my old friend, you would not so readily wish for glory at the
hands of fey or elf if you knew what I know, I say with some greater
understanding than you have achieved of military matters, as I am sure you will
grant me
The stranger related thus to me. "I
had come to see my uncle Lansford, the grandson of a respected Confederate
officer, recipient of the America Cross for bravery and daring at Getterferd.
He had requested my visit on 'some important business,' as he put it to me in a
telegram, without specifying its nature. As I hoped for some recognition in his
will and knowing him to be infirm and likely on his deathbed, I forthwith
booked passage on a coach and sped to his side.
"He no sooner saw me but fell to
weeping and, reaching his hand toward me, indicated that I come to embrace him.
He whispered to me to reach under the bed and fetch forth a box. The room being
dark in the extreme, I had difficulty seeing at all. Must and mold assaulted my
nostrils and dust made me sneeze. I extracted the container and passed it to
him. He asked, almost inaudibly, for me to open it and this procedure I managed
with a key from his neck. Inside lay a letter and another key. These he passed
to me with trembling hands and every indication of perturbation, nay, fear, for
he cast his eyes continuously back and forth about the room as if expecting an
interruption. Then he fell asleep with such suddenness that for a moment I
guessed he had given up his spirits altogether.
"He had a daughter, a lithesome
thing who spent many hours on field and in wood. I had not seen her since I
wore knee-highs in boyhood. Even then I adored her. Now, petite as she was at
sixteen and given to fun and frolicsome behavior, she again charmed all my
senses. I sat down with a glass of tea and read the letter. In it I saw to my
immediate horror an announcement of love and a request for a rendezvous with
Jane from someone with the salubrious surname of Suggs to be made in a cemetery
no great distance from the spot that my poor uncle now inhabits. The letter was
signed, 'I, Suggs, am affectionately yours, for all time, for all occasions,
for every moment.' I noted the time and date of the anticipated tryst and
determined that I would be there that night to intercept them and prevent their
congruence. I do not recall what madness compelled me to engage so
precipitously in another's business, but I now guess, lying here as I pen this
sad confession to you, that my own foolish youthfulness did so.
"On the appointed evening, never
thinking to carry a weapon, I arrived at the cemetery and placed myself in the
shrubbery. Precisely at midnight, as per the letter, a figure dressed all in
white and shimmering in the moonlight approached on lightsome foot. A moment later, out of the woods to her left
with terrible suddenness leapt a swarthy personage of terrible visage dressed
all in black. He held a great stick and rapidly made his way toward whom I
could only surmise was my cousin Jane. He came, he stood before her, and lo, he
raised his stick in anger and brought it down with ferocious power upon her
head. At the last moment she threw up her arm in defense and it took upon
itself the savageness of a blow that otherwise would surely have ended her life
on earth.
"The murderer raised his weapon for
the second time to finish what he had begun. With a terrible roar that diverted
him from his intention, I rose and crossed the distance between us in less time
than it takes a duck to pluck up a caper. I had in rising grasped a large stone
from the ground. Now, in a trice, I flung the miscreant bodily to the ground, (being
myself of no mean size and strength). He stabbed upwards yat me with his cudgel
and would yet have prevented my success. But, in an instant I brought my stone
down on his skull with such great force that he, thanks be to our creator,
breathed no more and would not till the moment when a better judge than I will
bring him before the all-seeing in eternity.
"Ah, the vistigicies of human kind.
Oh, the misfortunes of love. Fright and melancholy deprived me of my senses
then. When I awoke I found myself in an infirmary in the house of the very
woman I knew I loved and the man who had summoned me there with such lucky
coincidence. To make short a long story, I recovered, Jane became my bride, we
kept all hush-hush, the police failed to discover the perpetrator of the crime
(he, however, being well-known to them), we removed back here to Bradsford,
North Dakota, and we two lived happily together there till death and old age took
my lovely one from me."
More will follow my good old friend. Just
now a sudden faintness overwhelms me. I shall rest and regain what fortitude
our Savior will grant me. I long for your
company and shall certainly ride out to see you when I am once again able. Sincerely,
and with trust in your discretion, I am as always, yours,
Tull
Wexford,
Macolm
County, N.D.
