More Jonathan Papers | Page 2

over my shoulder, said, "But that wasn't
the top shelf, I suppose you will admit."

Sure enough! There was a shelf above. "Oh, yes; but I don't count that
shelf. We never use it, because nobody can reach it."
"How do you expect me to know which shelves you count and which
you don't?"
"Of course, anatomically--structurally--it is one, but functionally it isn't
there at all."
"I see," said Jonathan, so contentedly that I knew he was filing this
affair away for future use.
On another occasion I asked him to get something for me from the top
drawer of the old "high-boy" in the dining-room. He was gone a long
while, and at last, growing impatient, I followed. I found him standing
on an old wooden-seated chair, screw-driver in hand. A drawer on a
level with his head was open, and he had hanging over his arm a gaudy
collection of ancient table-covers and embroidered scarfs, mostly in
shades of magenta.
"She stuck, but I've got her open now. I don't see any pillow-cases,
though. It's all full of these things." He pumped his laden arm up and
down, and the table-covers wagged gayly.
I sank into the chair and laughed. "Oh! Have you been prying at that all
this time? Of course there's nothing in that drawer."
"There's where you're wrong. There's a great deal in it; I haven't taken
out half. If you want to see--"
"I don't want to see! There's nothing I want less! What I mean is--I
never put anything there."
"It's the top drawer." He was beginning to lay back the table-covers.
"But I can't reach it. And it's been stuck for ever so long."
"You said the top drawer."

"Yes, I suppose I did. Of course what I meant was the top one of the
ones I use."
"I see, my dear. When you say top shelf you don't mean top shelf, and
when you say top drawer you don't mean top drawer; in fact, when you
say top you don't mean top at all--you mean the height of your head.
Everything above that doesn't count."
Jonathan was so pleased with this formulation of my attitude that he
was not in the least irritated to have put out unnecessary work. And his
satisfaction was deepened by one more incident. I had sent him to the
bottom drawer of my bureau to get a shawl. He returned without it, and
I was puzzled. "Now, Jonathan, it's there, and it's the top thing."
"The real top," murmured Jonathan, "or just what you call top?"
"It's right in front," I went on; "and I don't see how even a man could
fail to find it."
He proceeded to enumerate the contents of the drawer in such strange
fashion that I began to wonder where he had been.
"I said my bureau."
"I went to your bureau."
"The bottom drawer."
"The bottom drawer. There was nothing but a lot of little boxes and--"
"Oh, I know what you did! You went to the secret drawer."
"Isn't that the bottom one?"
"Why, yes, in a way--of course it is; but it doesn't exactly count--it's not
one of the regular drawers--it hasn't any knobs, or anything--"
"But it's a perfectly good drawer."

"Yes. But nobody is supposed to know it's there; it looks like a
molding--"
"But I know it's there."
"Yes, of course."
"And you know I know it's there."
"Yes, yes; but I just don't think about that one in counting up. I see
what you mean, of course."
"And I see what you mean. You mean that your shawl is in the bottom
one of the regular drawers--with knobs--that can be alluded to in
general conversation. Now I think I can find it."
He did. And in addition he amused himself by working out phrases
about "when is a bottom drawer not a bottom drawer?" and "when is a
top shelf not a top shelf?"
It is to these incidents--which I regard as isolated and negligible, and he
regards as typical and significant--that he alludes on the occasions
when he is unable to find a red book on the sitting-room table. In vain
do I point out that when language is variable and fluid it is alive, and
that there may be two opinions about the structural top and the
functional top, whereas there can be but one as to the book being or not
being on the table. He maintains a quiet cheerfulness, as of one who is
conscious of being, if not invulnerable, at least well armed.
For a time he even tried to make believe that he was invulnerable as
well--to set up the thesis that if the book was really on the table he
could find it. But in this he suffered so many