The Reformation of James Reddy Page #2

"The Reformation of James Reddy" is a short story by Bret Harte that explores themes of redemption and transformation in a Western setting. The narrative follows the character of James Reddy, a man with a dubious reputation who undergoes a significant change in his behavior and perspective. Through a series of events and encounters with other characters, Reddy grapples with his past mistakes and seeks to redefine himself. Harte's storytelling combines humor and social commentary, highlighting the complexities of human nature and the possibility of change against a backdrop of frontier life.

• Short story

								

had not shown before. I do not know whether this was merely an effort
at concealment, or an awakened recognition of her duty; but, after the
fashion of her sex,--and perhaps in contrast to his,--she was kinder
that evening to the average man on account of HIM. He did not, however,
notice it; nor did her absence interfere with his now healthy appetite;
he finished his meal, and only when he rose to take his hat from the
peg above him did he glance around the room. Their eyes met again. As
he passed out, although it was dark, he put on his hat a little more
smartly.

The air was clear and cold, but the outlines of the landscape had
vanished. His companions, with the instinct of tired animals, were
already making their way in knots of two or three, or in silent file,
across the intervening space between the building and their dormitory.
A few had already lit their pipes and were walking leisurely, but the
majority were hurrying from the chill sea-breeze to the warmth and
comfort of the long, well-lit room, lined with blanketed berths, and set
with plain wooden chairs and tables. The young man lingered for a moment
on the wooden platform outside the dining-shed,--partly to evade this
only social gathering of his fellows as they retired for the night, and
partly attracted by a strange fascination to the faint distant glow,
beyond the point of land, which indicated the lights of San Francisco.

There was a slight rustle behind him! It was the young girl who, with a
white woolen scarf thrown over her head and shoulders, had just left the
room. She started when she saw him, and for an instant hesitated.

"You are going home, Miss Woodridge?" he said pleasantly.

"Yes," she returned, in a faint, embarrassed voice. "I thought I'd run
on ahead of ma!"

"Will you allow me to accompany you?"

"It's only a step," she protested, indicating the light in the window of
the superintendent's house, the most remote of the group of buildings,
yet scarcely a quarter of a mile distant.

"But it's quite dark," he persisted smilingly.

She stepped from the platform to the ground; he instantly followed and
ranged himself at a little distance from her side. She protested still
feebly against his "troubling himself," but in another moment they were
walking on quietly together. Nevertheless, a few paces from the platform
they came upon the upheaved clods of the fresh furrows, and their
progress over them was slow and difficult.

"Shall I help you? Will you take my arm?" he said politely.

"No, thank you, Mr. Reddy."

So! she knew his name! He tried to look into her eyes, but the woolen
scarf hid her head. After all, there was nothing strange in her
knowing him; she probably had the names of the men before her in the
dining-room, or on the books. After a pause he said:--

"You quite startled me. One becomes such a mere working machine here
that one quite forgets one's own name,--especially with the prefix of
'Mr.'"

"And if it don't happen to be one's real name either," said the girl,
with an odd, timid audacity.

He looked up quickly--more attracted by her manner than her words; more
amused than angry.

"But Reddy happens to be my real name."

"Oh!"

"What made you think it was not?"

The clods over which they were clambering were so uneven that sometimes
the young girl was mounting one at the same moment that Reddy was
descending from another. Her reply, half muffled in her shawl, was
delivered over his head. "Oh, because pa says most of the men here don't
give their real names--they don't care to be known afterward. Ashamed of
their work, I reckon."

His face flushed a moment, even in the darkness. He WAS ashamed of his
work, and perhaps a little of the pitiful sport he was beginning. But
oddly enough, the aggressive criticism only whetted his purpose. The
girl was evidently quite able to take care of herself; why should he be
over-chivalrous?

"It isn't very pleasant to be doing the work of a horse, an ox, or a
machine, if you can do other things," he said half seriously.

"But you never used to do anything at all, did you?" she asked.

He hesitated. Here was a chance to give her an affecting history of
his former exalted fortune and position, and perhaps even to stir her
evidently romantic nature with some suggestion of his sacrifices to one
of her own sex. Women liked that sort of thing. It aroused at once
their emulation and their condemnation of each other. He seized the
opportunity, but--for some reason, he knew not why--awkwardly and
clumsily, with a simulated pathos that was lachrymose, a self-assertion
that was boastful, and a dramatic manner that was unreal. Suddenly the
girl stopped him.

"Yes, I know all THAT; pa told me. Told me you'd been given away by some
woman."

His face again flushed--this time with anger. The utter failure of his
story to excite her interest, and her perfect possession of herself and
the situation,--so unlike her conduct a few moments before,--made him
savagely silent, and he clambered on sullenly at her side. Presently she
stopped, balancing herself with a dexterity he could not imitate on one
of the larger upheaved clods, and said:--

"I was thinking that, as you can't do much with those hands of yours,
digging and shoveling, and not much with your feet either, over ploughed
ground, you might do some inside work, that would pay you better, too.
You might help in the dining room, setting table and washing up, helping
ma and me--though I don't do much except overseeing. I could show you
what to do at first, and you'd learn quick enough. If you say 'yes,'
I'll speak to pa to-night. He'll do whatever I say."

The rage and shame that filled his breast choked even the bitter laugh
that first rose to his lips. If he could have turned on his heel and
left her with marked indignation, he would have done so, but they were
scarcely half way across the field; his stumbling retreat would have
only appeared ridiculous, and he was by no means sure that she would not
have looked upon it as merely a confession of his inability to keep
up with her. And yet there was something peculiarly fascinating and
tantalizing in the situation. She did not see the sardonic glitter in
his eye as he said brutally:--

"Ha! and that would give me the exquisite pleasure of being near you."

She seemed a little confused, even under her enwrappings, and in
stepping down her foot slipped. Reddy instantly scrambled up to her
and caught her as she was pitching forward into the furrow. Yet in the
struggle to keep his own foothold he was aware that she was assisting
him, and although he had passed his arm around her waist, as if for her
better security, it was only through HER firm grasp of his wrists that
he regained his own footing. The "cloud" had fallen back from her head
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