The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1878-05-30
Waiting In q st. 10 (MO.) Barber
Shop.

AWAITED. 1 saw the barber lather
the face of the man in the chair. 1t
was five o'clock, and my train started
at SAT. Good; there was plenty of
time. WAITED. The man in the chair
went to sleep and the barber lathered
his face and washed it, and washed it
and lathered it. He laved it with warm
water and dried it with towels. He
critically examined the cheeks and in
vestigatcd the chin. He fingered the
mans bristly moustache and ran his
fingers meditatively through the sitter's
hair. Then he strapped a razor and
gazed out of the window with a far
away, dreamy look, and saw that his
soul was dwelling in the shadowy aisles
of the Long Ago, and l had not the
heart to call him back, although it was
fifteen minutes past five. and the sleep
ing mans face had not been touched
by the razor yet. Presently the barber
sighed, and turning to the patient.
rubbed his sleeping cheek with his fin
gers, and appeared to be on the point
Of asking him who he was, what he was
doing there, and what he wanted. But
then he looked down at his razor in an
absent kind of way as though it was
something he never saw before; a
CLEAN of living intelligence lightened
his face and he came back into the land
of activity and life; he turned the razor
over once or twice as though he wasn't
quite certain whether To shave the man
with the edge or the back, and then he
touched the cheek of the sleeper so
lightly that it never disturbed him.
Tenspus tugsts a thousand miles a
minute. I fidgeted and looked nerv-
ously at the clock. "Time," said the
barber, with his silent, deliberate hand.
sis for slaves He went over that
mans face as though he was shaving
the Queen of England. Bristle by
bristle he moved the stubble-field Of
that mans illimitable cheek. 1t was
twenty-five minutes after five and the
shaver was just making his first swath
on the mans chin.
said in tones suffused with waiting
anguish.
"When does that train 60 north on
the X. C. & C. B.P''
The barber nursed his way around .
pimple on the mans chin as carefully
as though it was the end of the jugular
vein sticking out, and stepped back to
admire his work. Presently he looked
up at the clock and then he looked at
me and then he said:
(which tramp
1 told him, ION the X. c., & St. J.,
& C. B.; passenger; going north
He turned the mans face over to the
other side, washed off the lather with a
sponge, laid on some more, washed it
of, dried the mans face, washed it,
lathered it, stropped the razor little,
made an offer at the man cheek, drew
back, looked &C the razor, glanced at
the clock, put down the razor and took
chew of tobacco, picked up the razor,
laid one hand on the mans head and
was on the point of beginning, when he
poised the razor in the air, nodded to
some one across the street. looked al
me and said:
Zone that goes to the Bluffs7'
said, No, the Hopkins Branch"
The barber began shaving the man.
Then he stopped, looked at the clock,
turned his head and looked out of the
window, then he glanced at me in q
fixed manner and said:
II don't know"
He resumed his study of that mans
face and went over it like an apatomist'