Squaring the Circle

by O. Henry

　　

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At the hazard of wearying you this tale of vehe-ment emotions must be prefaced by a discourse ongeometry. Nature moves in circles; Art in straight lines.The natural is rounded; the artificial is made upof angles. A man lost in the snow wanders, in spiteof himself, in perfect circles; the city man's feet,denaturalized by rectangular streets and floors, carryhim ever away from himself. The round eyes of childhood typify innocence;the narrowed line of the flirt's optic proves the in-vasion of art. The horizontal mouth is the mark ofdetermined cunning; who has not read Nature's mostspontaneous lyric in lips rounded for the candid kiss? Beauty is Nature in perfection; circularity is itschief attribute. Behold the full moon, the enchant-ing golf ball, the domes of splendid temples, thehuckleberry pie, the wedding ring, the circus ring,the ring for the waiter, and the "round" of drinks. On the other hand, straight lines show that Na-ture has been deflected. Imagine Venus's girdletransformed into a "straight front"! When we begin to move in straight lines and turnsharp corners our natures begin to change. Theconsequence is that Nature, being more adaptive thanArt, tries to conform to its sterner regulations. Theresult is often a rather curious product -- for in-stance: A prize chrysanthemum, wood alcohol whis-key, a Republican Missouri, cauliflower au gratin,and a New Yorker, Nature is lost quickest in a big city. The causeis geometrical, not moral. The straight lines of itsstreets and architecture, the rectangularity of itslaws and social customs, the undeviating pavements,the hard, severe, depressing, uncompromising rulesof all its ways -- even of its recreation and sports --coldly exhibit a sneering defiance of the curved lineof Nature. Wherefore, it may be said that the big city hasdemonstrated the problem of squaring the circle.And it may be added that this mathematical intro-duction precedes an account of the fate of a Kentuckyfeud that was imported to the city that has a habitof making its importations conform to its angles. The feud began in the Cumberland Mountains be-tween the Folwell and the Harkness families. Thefirst victim of the homespun vendetta was a 'possumdog belonging to Bill Harkness. The Harknessfamily evened up this dire loss by laying out thechief of the Folwell clan. The Folwells were promptat repartee. They oiled up their squirrel rifles andmade it feasible for Bill Harkness to follow his dogto a land where the 'possums come down when treedwithout the stroke of an ax. The feud flourished for forty years. Harknesseswere shot at the plough, through their lamp-lit cabinwindows, coming from camp-meeting, asleep, in duello,sober and otherwise, singly and in family groups,prepared and unprepared. Folwells had thebranches of their family tree lopped off in similarways, as the traditions of their country prescribedand authorized. By and by the pruning left but a single memberof each family. And then Cal Harkness, probablyreasoning that further pursuance of the controversywould give a too decided personal flavor to the feud,suddenly disappeared from the relieved Cumberlands,baulking the avenging hand of Sam, the ultimate op-posing Folwell. A year afterward Sam Folwell learned that hishereditary, unsuppressed enemy was living in NewYork City. Sam turned over the big iron wash-potin the yard, scraped off some of the soot, which hemixed with lard and shined his boots with the com-pound. He put on his store clothes of butternutdyed black, a white shirt and collar, and packed acarpet-sack with Spartan lingerie. He took hissquirrel rifle from its hooks, but put it back againwith a sigh. However ethical and plausible the habitmight be in the Cumberlands, perhaps New Yorkwould not swallow his pose of hunting squirrels amongthe skyscrapers along Broadway. An ancient butreliable Colt's revolver that he resurrected from abureau drawer seemed to proclaim itself the pink ofweapons for metropolitan adventure and vengeance.This and a hunting-knife in a leather sheath, Sampacked in the carpet-sack. As he started, Muleback,for the lowland railroad station the last Folwellturned in his saddle and looked grimly at the littlecluster of white-pine slabs in the clump of cedars thatmarked the Folwell burying-ground. Sam Folwell arrived in New York in the night.Still moving and living in the free circles of nature,he did not perceive the formidable, pitiless, restless,fierce angles of the great city waiting in the darkto close about the rotundity of his heart and brainand mould him to the form of its millions of re-shapedvictims. A cabby picked him out of the whirl, asSam himself had often picked a nut from a bed ofwind-tossed autumn leaves, and whisked him awayto a hotel commensurate to his boots and carpet-sack. On the next morning the last of the Folwells madehis sortie into the city that sheltered the last Hark-ness. The Colt was thrust beneath his coat and se-cured by a narrow leather belt; the hunting-knifehung between his shoulder-blades, with the haft aninch below his coat collar. He knew this much --that Cal Harkness drove an express wagon some-where in that town, and that he, Sam Folwell, hadcome to kill him. And as he stepped upon the side-walk the red came into his eye and the feud-hate intohis heart. The clamor of the central avenues drew him thith-erward. He had half expected to see Cal comingdown the street in his shirt-sleeves, with a jug anda whip in his hand, just as he would have seen himin Frankfort or Laurel City. But an hour went byand Cal did not appear. Perhaps he was waiting inambush, to shoot him from a door or a window. Samkept a sharp eye on doors and windows for a while. About noon the city tired of playing with its mouseand suddenly squeezed him with its straight lines. Sam Folwell stood where two great, rectangulararteries of the city cross. He looked four ways, andsaw the world burled from its orbit and reducedby spirit level and tape to an edged and corneredplane. All life moved on tracks, in grooves, accord-ing to system, within boundaries, by rote. The rootof life was the cube root; the measure of existencewas square measure. People streamed by in straightrows; the horrible din and crash stupefied him. Sam leaned against the sharp corner of a stonebuilding. Those faces passed him by thousands, andnone of them were turned toward him. A sudden fool-ish fear that he had died and was a spirit, and thatthey could not see him, seized him. And then the citysmote him with loneliness. A fat man dropped out of the stream and stooda few feet distant, waiting for his car. Sam creptto his side and shouted above the tumult into hisear: "The Rankinses' hogs weighed more'n ourn awhole passel, but the mast in thar neighborhood wasa fine chance better than what it was down -- " The fat man moved away unostentatiously, andbought roasted chestnuts to cover his alarm. Sam felt the need of a drop of mountain dew.Across the street men passed in and out throughswinging doors. Brief glimpses could be had of aglistening bar and its bedeckings. The feudist crossedand essayed to enter. Again had Art eliminated thefamiliar circle. Sam's hand found no door-knob -it slid, in vain, over a rectangular brass plate andpolished oak with nothing even so large as a pin'shead upon which his fingers might close.Abashed, reddened, heartbroken, he walked awayfrom the bootless door and sat upon a step. A locustclub tickled him in the ribs. "Take a walk for yourself," said the policeman.You've been loafing around here long enough." At the next corner a shrill whistle sounded in Sam'sear. He wheeled around and saw a black-browed vil-lain scowling at him over peanuts heaped on a steam-ing machine. He started across the street. An im-mense engine, running without mules, with the voice ofa bull and the smell of a smoky lamp, whizzed past,grazing his knee. A cab-driver bumped him with ahub and explained to him that kind words were in-vented to be used on other occasions. A motormanclanged his bell wildly and, for once in his life, cor-roborated a cab-driver. A large lady in a changeablesilk waist dug an elbow into his back, and a newsypensively pelted him with banana rinds, murmuring,"I hates to do it -- but if anybody seen me let itpass!" Cal Harkness, his day's work over and his expresswagon stabled, turned the sharp edge of the build-ing that, by the cheek of architects, is modelled upona safety razor. Out of the mass of hurrying peoplehis eye picked up, three yards away, the survivingbloody and implacable foe of his kith and kin. He stopped short and wavered for a moment, be-ing unarmed and sharply surprised. But the keenmountaineer's eye of Sam Folwell had picked him out. There was a sudden spring, a ripple in the streamof passersby and the sound of Sam's voice crying: "Howdy, Cal! I'm durned glad to see ye." And in the angles of Broadway, Fifth Avenue andTwenty-third Street the Cumberland feudists shookhands.

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