Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 124, No. 3 — page 33: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

RAW MATERIAL. patch of drift net, had gone on, doggedly, sometimes brutally on until he had built a cannery, a second, a third. They were here now, the- three ‘canneries, Lillian Hendricks was the millionaire heiress of a fish man, Heavo Hendricks. A vague regret swept over the girl. She sort of wished that she had remained at home, on Cypress Island of Puget Sound, that she hadn’t traveled, accumulated so- phistication, seeking novelty, loosing con- tent. Most of all she wished that her aunt had remained ‘in the East, hadn’t come on to find and point out the glaring, unan- swerable crudities in Tumtum Teller. Her aunt was right. Tumtum was kind, - fair to everybody, was a2 perfect steam en- gine for work, but, oh, so unpolished and untamed. Yes, her aunt was right. Lillian couldn’t, just couldn’t, thmk of Tumtum ever doing anything noble, or imposing. A flush of shame swept over her. Toam- tum Teller was exactly what her own father, Heavo Hendricks had made him. And, like her father, Heavo Hendricks, Tumtum was beloved, but never would be esteemed. Like her father was Tumtum Teller. And ' why not? Since the day that Tumtum had been large enough to pull a dory, he had worked with and for Hleave Hendricks. As Hendricks accumfilated fish-trap loca- tions, built canneries, and tugs, and scows, he loaded Tumtum with new responsibili- ties. Heavo Hendricks swore by Tumtum Teller. ‘“ He's righter than a new rope, Tamtum is,” had been the old fish man’s favorite veetaphor “ Righter than a new rope, six- teen threads to the strand, weighs according. to his length, no short ends tucked in under that will fetch away first time you bend him to a lead. “Yeah. And Tumtum is made fast to this shebang with a double, tar splice. . Tumtum was here when the Hendricks com- pany slimmed its first salmon; I have my say, he'll be here when the engineer turns Steam for the last quittin’.” | Bat, really—there her aunt had touched her shrewdly—Lillian coulda’t think of Tumtum doing anything more elevated than outswear a tug-boat skipper, or maul recalcitrant caneery hands mto subjection. 407 She couldn’t think of Tumtum cast in a role noble or dignified. Not since she had traveled, and under the tutelage of her aunt she had observed the ways of gentlemen she couldn’t. | Lillian had spent six months in Japan, had accumulated a smattering of the lan- guage. She had been three months at Papette, three months at Honolulu, she had spent a winter at Palm Beach, another at Coronado, everywhere meeting men who seemed to move like parts of a well-oiled machine. These men of the world had polish, gen- tility, a tutored suavity. ‘finished product: That was it, the finished product. Tumtum Teller had worth of a rugged sort, but he was the raw material. Tumtum Teller, hurt, humiliated, survey- ing the squat buildings of the Hendricks Salmon Cannery, Kuskokwim, Alaska, de- cided that his sobriquet, ‘“Tumtum,” must have been conferred by old Heavo while in a facetious mood. ‘“ Tumtum ” is a word of the Chinook Indian tongue, a trade lan- guage understood and spoken from the California line to Point Barrow. The word means “courage,” “honesty,” “a clean, stanch heart.” | - His name was a joke. He was a joke. Aleut cannery hands, embarking in their kisks and umiaks, were calling back pro- fane farewells to Japs, Chinese, white men as they puddled along the sloppy dock mounted the gangplank of the liner, their — duffle bags upon their backs. Shortly the lmer would weigh, for Seattle, the last beat out. - Tumtum glanced up at the ship’s high side. The Walrus and Lillian were stand- ing at the rail, looking down at him. The Walrus was talking about hin. He knew it. In her speech, he knew there would be no breath of compliment. Tumtum’s face flushed. he muttered an impolite word. Very well. This would end his labors with the Hendricks Cannery Company. He had sixteen hundred dollars coming, his wages for the season’s work. A thousand dollars he must pay on the Puget Sound trap focation that he had bought on con- tract. Must pay the thousand or loose ail They were the | COLMUC mE Under his breath | OOOLK (CO