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By O. Henry (1862 – 1910)

The pseudonym O.Henry (originally William Sydney Porter) has become a symbol to represent a recognizable species of short story writing. Within a decade or so O. Henry produced nearly three hundred stories that captured the fancy and touched the hearts of countless newspaper and magazine readers of his time. (He also wrote many skits and humorous verses). Most O. Henry’s stories were translated into foreign languages, not only European but some oriental too. Many of then in radio, television and cinema adaptations have been and still are equally popular with millions of people.

O. Henry’s stories above all else are very American in language, attitudes and spirit. O. Henry possesses one of the largest vocabularies among his contemporaries. Sometimes he uses it ostentatiously but more frequently than not he uses it effectively. The humorous devices he employs also traditionally American. These are exaggeration, incongruous comparisons, malapropisms, misquotations and inflated circumlocutions.

Much of what O. Henry wrote bears the stamp of individuality. Whatever its devices, O. Henry’s humour is very different from that of Mark Twain or any other American writer of his time.

But for all that it can’t be overlooked that many of his stories are to some degree marred by sentimentality, far-fetched coincidence or triviality of conception as well as by a certain amount of conventional literary clichés. Some of O. Henry’s stories fall below the accepted lasting standards of first rate literature, for they were written for monetary reasons rather hastily and carelessly to achieve cheap effect and to stir the curiosity and sympathy of Sunday supplement readers.

O. Henry intentionally avoids sharp social problems. He is fond of describing amusing incidents from the life of common people. In his stories we find inhabitants of big cities and ranches, highway outlaws as well as self-made business tycoons come into wealth and power through freak of chance.

On the whole O. Henry’s literary production is bourgeois in spirit for on the one hand he shows the defects of capitalist society, while on the other he strives to cheer up his readers furnishing happy endings to most of his stories.

The story Mammon and the Archer is a kind of parody on American society where the dollar reigns supreme.

Anthony Rockwall is a wealthy retired manufacturer and proprietor of Rockwall’s Eureka Soap, evidently a self-made man. He is very fond and proud of his only son Richard, a college graduate. Old Mr. Rockwall is quite sure that money is omnipotent and tries to do his best to convince his young son of the truth of his worldly wisdom.

…“There are some things that money can’t accomplish,” remarked young Rockwall, rather gloomily.

“Now, don’t say that,” said old Anthony, shocked. “I bet my money on money every time.² I’ve been through the encyclopaedia down to Y looking for something you can’t buy with it: and I expect to have to take up the appendix³ next week. I’m for money against the field.⁴ Tell me something money won’t buy.”

“For one thing,” answered Richard, rankling a little, “it won’t buy one into the exclusive circles of society.”

“Oho! Won’t it?” thundered the champion of the root of evil.⁵ “You tell me where your exclusive circles would be if the first Astor* hadn’t the money to pay for his steerage passage over?”

Richard sighed.

* Astor = John Jacob Astor (1763-1848) – a rich American fur merchant

“And that’s what I was coming to,” said the old man, less boisterously. “That’s why I asked you to come in. there’s something going wrong with you, boy. I’ve been noticing it for two weeks.⁶ Out with it. […] If it’s your liver, there’s the Rambler* down in the bay, coaled, and ready to steam down to the Bahamas** in two days.”

“Not a bad guess, dad: you haven’t missed it far.”

“Ah,” said Anthony keenly, “what’s her name?”

Richard began to walk up and down the library floor. There was enough comradeship and sympathy in this crude old father of his to draw his confidence.

“Why don’t you ask her?” demanded old Anthony. “She’ll jump at you. You’ve got the money and the looks, and you’re a decent boy. Your hands are clean. You’ve got no Eureka soap on ‘em.⁸ […]

“I haven’t had a chance,” said Richard.

“Make one,” said Anthony. “Take her for a walk in the park, or a straw ride***, or walk home with her from the church. Chance! Pshaw!”

“You don’t know the social mill, dad. She’s part of the stream that turns it.⁹ Every hour and minute of her is arranged for days in advance. I must have that girl, dad, or this town is a blackjack**** swamp forever more. And I can’t write it – I can’t do that.”

“Tut!” said the old man. “Do you mean to tell me that with all the money you’ve got you can’t get an hour or two of a girl’s time for yourself?”

“I’ve put it off too late. She’s going to sail for Europe at noonday after to-morrow¹⁰ for a two years’ stay. I’m to see her alone to-morrow evening for a few minutes. She’s at Larchmont now at her aunt’s. I can’t go there. But I’m allowed to meet her with a cab at the Grand Central Station to- morrow evening at the 8.30 train. We drive down Broadway to Wallack’s at a gallop, where her mother and a box party***** will be waiting for us in the lobby. Do you think she would listen to a declaration from me during that six or eight minutes under those circumstances?¹¹ No. And

* Rambler – the name of Mr. Rockwall’s yacht

** the Bahamas – islands lying north-east of Cuba, famous for their favourable climate and fashionable health resorts

*** a straw ride = a hay ride (Am.) – a pleasure ride usually at night by a group of people in a wagon, sleigh or open truck partly filled with straw or hay

**** blackjack – a common often somewhat scrubby oak of the South-eastern and Southern US

***** a box party – the number of people who will occupy the same box at the theatre

what chance would I have in the theatre or afterward? None. No, dad, this is one tangle that your money can’t unravel. We can’t buy one minute of time with cash: if we could, rich people would live longer. There’s no hope of getting a talk with Miss Lantry before she sails.”

“All right, Richard, my boy,” said old Anthony, cheerfully. “You may run along down to your club now. I’m glad it ain’t your liver.” […]

That night came Aunt Ellen, gentle, sentimental, wrinkled, sighing, oppressed by wealth in to Brother Anthony at his evening paper, and began discourse on the subject of lovers’ woes.¹²

“He told me all about it,” said brother Anthony, yawning. “I told him my bank account was at his service. And then he began to knock money.¹³ Said money couldn’t help. Said the rules of society couldn’t be backed for a yard by a team of ten-millionairs.” ¹⁴

“Oh, Anthony,” sighed Aunt Ellen, “I wish you would not think so much of money. Wealth is nothing where a true affection is concerned. Love is all powerful. If he had spoken earlier! She could not have refused our Richard. But now I fear it is too late. He will have no opportunity to address her. All your gold cannot bring happiness to your son.”

At eight o’clock the next evening Aunt Ellen took a quaint old gold ring from a moth-eaten case and gave it to Richard.

“Wear it to-night, nephew,” she begged. “Your mother gave it to me. Good luck in love she said it brought.¹⁵ She asked me to give it to you when you had found the one you loved.”

Young Rockwall took the ring reverently and tried it on his smallest finger. It slipped as far as the second joint and stopped. He took it off and stuffed it into his vest pocket, after the manner of man. And then he phoned for his cab.

At the station he captured Miss Lantry out of the gabbing mob at eight thirty-two.

“We mustn’t keep mamma and the others waiting,” said she.

“To Wallack’s Theatre as fast as you can drive!” said Richard, loyally. […]

At Thirty-four Street young Richard quickly thrust up the trap¹⁶ and ordered the cabman to stop.

“I’ve dropped a ring,” he apologized, as he climbed out. “It was my mother’s and I’d hate to lose it. I won’t detain you a minute – I saw where it fell.”

In less than a minute he was back in the cab with the ring.

But within that minute a crosstown car had stopped directly in front of the cab. The cabman tried to pass to the left, but a heavy express wagon cut him off. He tried the right and had to back away from a furniture van that had no business to be there. He tried to back out, but dropped his reins and swore dutifully. He was blockaded in a tangled mess of vehicles and horses.

One of those street blockades had occurred that sometimes tie up commerce and movement quite suddenly in the big city.

“Why don’t you drive on?” said Miss Lantry, impatiently, “We’ll be late.”

Richard stood up in the cab and looked around. He saw a congested flood of wagons, trucks, cabs, vans and street cars filling the vast space where Broadway, Sixth Avenue, and Thirty-fourth street cross one another. […] And still from all the cross streets they were hurrying and rattling toward the converging point at full speed, and hurling themselves into straggling mass, locking wheels and adding their drivers’ imprecations to the clamor. The entire traffic of Manhattan* seemed to have jammed itself around them. The oldest New Yorker among thousands of spectators that lined the sidewalks had not witnessed a street blockade of the proportions of this one.

“I’m very sorry,” said Richard, as he resumed his seat, “but it looks as if we are stuck.¹⁷ They won’t get this jumble loosened up in an hour. It was my fault. If I hadn’t dropped the ring we - .”

“Let me see the ring,” said Miss Lantry. “Now that it can’t be helped, I don’t care. I think theatres are stupid, anyway.”

At 11 o’clock that night somebody tapped lightly on Anthony Rockwall’s door.

“Come in,” shouted Anthony, who was in a red dressing-gown, reading a book of piratical adventures.

Somebody was Aunt Ellen, looking like a gray-haired angel that had been left on earth by mistake.

“They’re engaged, Anthony,” said she, softly. “She has promised to marry our Richard. On their way to the theatre there was a street blockade, and it was two hours before their cab could get out of it.

* Manhatten is the name of an island which forms the heart of New York. The island is 13 miles long, 2 miles wide and lies at the mouth of the Hudson River. Manhatten is full of parallel rows of buildings, those running from north to south are called avenues while those running from east to west are called streets. The avenues and streets have only numbers instead of names.

And oh, Brother Anthony, don’t ever boast of the power of money again. A little emblem of true love – a ring that symbolized unending and unmercenary affection – was the cause of our Richard’s finding his happiness. He dropped it in the street, and got out to recover it. And before they could continue the blockade occurred. He spoke to his love and won her there while the cab was hemmed in. Money is dross* compared with true love, Anthony.”

“All right,” said old Anthony. “I’m glad the boy has got what he wanted. I told him I wouldn’t spare my expense in the matter if – “

“But, brother Anthony, what good could your money have done?”

“Sister,” said Anthony Rockwall. “I’ve got my pirate in a devil of a scrape. […] I wish you would let me go on with this chapter.”

The story should end here. I wish it would as heartily as you who read it wish it did. But we must go to the bottom of the well of truth.

The next day a person with red hands and a blue polkadot necktie who called himself Kelly, called at Anthony Rockwall’s house, and was at once received in the library.

“Well,” said Anthony, reaching for his check-book, “it was a good bilin’ of soap.¹⁸ Let’s see – you had 85,000 in cash.”

“I paid $300 more of my own,” said Kelly. “I had to go a little above the estimate.¹⁹ I got the express wagons and cabs mostly for $5: but the trucks and two-horse teams mostly raised me to $10. The motorman wanted $10, and some of the loaded teams $20. The cops struck me hardest – $50.²⁰ I paid two, and the rest $20 and $25. but didn’t it work beautiful, Mr Rockwall? … And never a rehearsal, either! The boys were on time to the fraction of a second. It was two hours before a snake could get below Greeley’s statue**.”

“Thirteen hundred – there you are, Kelly.” Said Anthony, tearing off a check. “Your thousand, and the $300 you were out.” ²¹ […]

Anthony called Kelly when he was at the door.

“You didn’t notice,” said he, anywhere in the tie-up, a kind of a fat boy without any clothes on shooting arrows around with a bow, did you?”

“Why, no,” said Kelly, mystified. I didn’t. If he was like you say, maybe the cops pinched*** him before I got there.”

* dross – filth; (fig.) anything that is considered to be worthless (e.g. earthly joys contrasted with spiritual values)

** ’Greeley’s statue – a monument to Horace Greeley (1811-1872), an American politician

*** pinched (sl.) – arrested

“I thought the little rascal wouldn’t be on hand,”* chuckled Anthony. “Good-bye, Kelly.”

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