Mr. Nye’s Visit
Told by Lynne Sharkey (speaking as Sadie Vandevert)

I heard a horse and went to the front porch to see who was coming.  It was too early for the men to be back from the cattle.  I thought it would be someone coming to pick up their mail.

Maude was standing by the spring getting water for supper.  Her bucket was on the ground and she was looking up at a man in a shay.  He was a thin man about forty with a bald head.  He was wearing a black cloth jacket with lapels and was bending out of the carriage to talk to Maude.  Maude raised her arm and pointed to the house.

The man gave a little wave and said, “Hello.  Your little girl says this is Carlisle.”  He seemed like a nice enough man.  But we were miles from anywhere.  It was strange to see a man in a jacket he could wear to formal dinner way out here driving such a nice vehicle.

“Yes, it is Carlisle,” I said.  I gave the man a neighborly smile.  For miles around the place was known as our family’s ranch.  But officially, in some big book in Washington, it was known as Carlisle, at least the post office was.  Now this man had come from who knew where, to visit Carlisle.

“How do you do?  My name is Edgar Nye and I am on my way to Prineville to give a talk.  I am to spend the night with a Mr. Scoggins.  I have a letter of introduction to him.  Can you tell me where to find him?”

“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Nye,” I said.  “I am Sadie Vandevert and that’s my daughter, Maude.”  We’re inclined to trust people around here.  And to welcome strangers.  But this man could have some mischief in mind and I wanted to be careful.  “Scoggins sold the place to us three years ago,” I said.  “Are you a preacher?”

“Not at all.  I am a newspaperman, the editor of the Laramie Boomerang in Laramie, Wyoming.  Other papers printed some of the articles I wrote.  People thought they were funny.  Or instructive.  Or inspirational.  Or something.  Maybe a warning to anyone who has sold goods on credit.  In any case, the citizens of Prineville invited me to speak, as did the citizens of Keno and Silver Lake from whence I have come.”

 “My husband and our son will be home soon.  Then we’ll see what we can do to help you out.  While you wait, you can let your horse get a drink from the river and graze along the banks”

“Thank you very kindly.”

“Just don’t let her get into the rye.”

Once he’d seen to the horse the man came to the back door and knocked.  The door was open to the kitchen where I was working.

“Mrs. Vandevert, might I ask where the actual Carlisle post office is?”

“It’s right here in the front room.”

“You see, I was the postmaster of Laramie years ago and I am always interested in the progress of Mr. Franklin’s institution.  I know that Carlisle is a new post office and, assuming you are the postmistress of Carlisle, I am doubly glad to make your acquaintance.”

“I named it Carlisle after Mr. Cleveland’s Secretary of the Treasury and the former Speaker of the House.”

“I recall that Mr. Carlisle is from Kentucky.  And I thought I heard the sound of Kentucky in your voice, Mrs. Vandevert.  Are you acquainted with him?”

 “Not personally.  But I and my family in Jeffersontown are great admirers of the man.  I wish our post office were more of a credit it to him.  It’s just a corner of the parlor.”

“Well that’s exactly what I am interested in,” said Mr. Nye.  “I’ve seen the big city post offices in St. Louis and Denver.  The Laramie post office was no small thing either.  But when a man has a career in such a fine and historical establishment, then, if he is a man with a thinking mind, he is forever fascinated with the workings of the nation-wide organization, down to the last detail in the most far-flung location.”

“Well then, come on in and have a look around.  The post office is open for another hour yet.  Though the chance of your seeing a real live customer while you are here is pretty low.”

We went through the kitchen into the front room.  In the corner opposite the fireplace was a table with a range of cubbyholes above it.  Mr. Nye inspected the distributing table, the postal cards, and the two-cent stamps, and the canceling stamp.  I stamped a blank piece of paper for his inspection and he took it with him for a souvenir.  The man even shed a small tear that he brushed away.

“It warms the cockles of my heart to see such a well-kept post office, as modest as it may be.  I’m proud to know you, Mrs. Vandevert.  And proud to know that you and I have shared the responsibilities placed upon us by the same President of the United States.  I look upon our appointments as great triumphs of eternal truth over error and wrong.”  If he were trying to flatter me into letting my guard down he was badly mistaken.  But it didn’t look like he expected me to take him seriously.  Maybe he just liked to talk.  I told him I had never considered that I was sharing responsibilities with President Cleveland, or even the postmaster general.

“Well, Mrs. Vandevert, they appointed you and their predecessors appointed me.  I do not know when I have noticed any strides in the affairs of state which so thoroughly impressed me with their wisdom.” 

Bill and his son, Tom, stopped at the barn to unsaddle the horses and turn them loose to graze.  As they walked down the hill Mr. Nye and I stepped out to meet them.  I introduced the men to each other. 

“Mrs. Vandevert and I have been comparing the vicissitudes of post mastering in Oregon vs. Wyoming,” Mr. Nye told them. 

“Do you have people coming to pick up their mail and staying for hours, expecting conversation and drinking up all your coffee?” my husband asked.  Bill liked to talk but he didn’t care for just anyone showing up anytime and expecting to be entertained.  I’m sure he had reservations about Mr. Nye.  At least Mr. Nye was from far away and not likely to return.

“We had a bigger post office in Laramie.  If our customers failed to amuse us we excused ourselves to sort mail in the back room.  But some people in Wyoming get mad if they do not receive a registered letter every fifteen minutes of every day including Sundays.  I’m not surprised, though, that your customers want to visit you.  On the way here I stopped to see the post offices in Keno and Silver Lake.  They have been in place for years but they don’t hold a candle, or even a match, to Carlisle.”

“You’ve had a long journey over some pretty indifferent roads, Mr. Nye,” said Bill.  “Where have you stayed on your journey?”   

“I have stayed with friends or friends of friends.  In Keno I stayed with the postmaster.  He told me he named the town after his bird dog.  I allowed as how I’d named my newspaper, the Boomerang, after my mule.  Tonight I was planning to stay with a Mr. Scoggins but I understand he has vacated.”

“Sadie forwards his mail to Oregon City.  That barn you passed up the hill used to be his house.”

“Do you suppose it would be alright if I bedded down in your barn tonight?”

“Of course you can,” said Bill.  “I’ll bet Sadie can even find you some room at the supper table.  Where are you off to next on your journey?”

“Tomorrow night I am staying with the Sisemores in a place called Farewell Bend.  I believe they are expecting me.”

“Well, at least the Sisemores are still there.”

“I am in admiration of your river, Bill,” said Mr. Nye, turning to gaze at it.  “The one in Laramie is not much of a torrent.  The drought was so bad last year that the fish left town and went downriver to get a drink of water.”  Edgar didn’t look at Bill or me for a reaction.  I could see Bill curl up the corners of his mouth.  Mr. Nye would be an amusing dinner guest. 

The man just gazed longingly at the river.  “Even when there are fish in the river I am no good at catching them.  A friend of mine, though, chased one into a prairie dog hole and killed it.”  Young Bill looked at his parents, trying to decide whether this was funny or Mr. Nye was simply out of his mind.  We all laughed.

We didn’t have anything fancy to serve Mr. Nye so I put out the best leg of lamb I knew how to cook.  He ate heartily and said he enjoyed it.  He seemed very much at home in our rustic log house.  He said he’d grown up in a remote region of Maine and it was refreshing to be so far from civilization again.

“In most places nowadays you know that if you ride a day you can get the daily papers and read them under the electric light.”

“Prineville has a newspaper but it doesn’t have electric light yet,” said Bill.  “Even so, we consider ourselves pretty civilized out here.  Sadie was trained to be a school teacher and she is doing a great job with young Bill and Maude.  Our oldest daughter is back east at school.” 

“I’m sure it is a lot more civilized here than it used to be in Laramie.  I considered us civilized when we started hanging men by law instead of by moonlight.  We once had a posse pursue a criminal out of town and report that they had found him dead from an overdose of opium.  But the corpse had the most unusual marks around its neck.  It appeared to me the true cause of death was too much ropium.”

  Bill had never been to Wyoming but he did know a little about it. 

“Isn’t it true that women have the vote in Wyoming?” he asked.

“Yes it is,” said Edgar.

“I don’t know about the rest of Oregon,” said Bill with a wink, “but Sadie doesn’t really need to vote.  She’s the educated one and I vote the way she tells me to.”

“No you don’t,” I said, “but at least you listen.”

“And I’m always persuaded,” said Bill.  I wanted to ask Mr. Nye something more.

“How do the men in Wyoming feel about the women voting?  Do they think women who vote will want to take more charge of the world?”

“It is generally supposed that the female voter is a lunatic who looks like she rose hastily in the night at the alarm of fire and dressed herself partially in her own garments and partially in her husband’s.  This is a popular error.  There are millions of women, no doubt, who are better qualified to vote, and yet cannot, than millions of alleged men who do vote.  My wife voted eight years with my full knowledge and consent.  And today I cannot see but that she is as docile and as tractable as when she won my trusting heart.  Besides, there are so few women in Wyoming that the ladies only have a limited influence on the elections.”

“I bet there aren’t many women there because they don’t like the cold weather,” said young Tom.

“I believe it is the men they can’t stand.  But you are right about the cold weather.  The early autumn frosts make close connections with the late spring blizzards, so that there is only time for a hurried lunch between.”

It was a good thing we didn’t have any wine or spirits.  Mr. Nye would have kept us up all night.  He bedded down in the parlor.  We had plenty of blankets to spare because it was summer.  We let him sleep through breakfast.  He’d come all the way from Silver Lake the day before and he had plenty of time to get to Bend that afternoon. 

The following October he sent us a very nice letter and a book he wrote called A Guest at the Ludlow.  It was a book of amusing stories and essays.  I was afraid he might have written a story about his visit with us.  He exaggerates so much.  But he didn’t even mention Oregon.  We all studied the book over and over until we could quote each other long passages verbatim.