After Twenty Years

The policeman walked his beat slowly, twirling his club. It was nearly ten o'clock at night, and a cold wind with a taste of rain had cleared the streets of almost everyone.

He tried doors as he passed, checking they were locked. He glanced into dark shop windows. He was a big man with a bit of a swagger, and he looked like what he was: a guardian of the peace.

Most of the shops in that part of the city had closed hours ago. But halfway along one block, in the dark doorway of a hardware store, a man was leaning with an unlit cigar in his mouth.

As the policeman came near, the man spoke up quickly.

A promise in a doorway

"It's all right, officer," he said. "I'm just waiting for a friend. It's an appointment made twenty years ago. Sounds a bit funny to you, doesn't it? Let me explain, if you'd like to be sure it's all straight."

He struck a match and lit his cigar. The light showed a pale face with a square jaw, sharp eyes and a little white scar near his right eyebrow. His scarf pin was a large diamond, oddly set.

"Twenty years ago tonight," the man went on, "there was a restaurant on this very spot, called Big Joe Brady's."

"It was here until five years ago," said the policeman. "Then it was torn down."

The man nodded. Twenty years ago, he said, he had eaten dinner here with Jimmy Wells, his closest friend and the finest fellow in the world. They had grown up in New York together, like two brothers. He was eighteen, Jimmy was twenty. The next morning he was leaving to make his fortune in the West.

Jimmy would not leave New York for anything. He thought it was the only place on earth. So the two of them agreed that night: exactly twenty years later, at this very hour, whatever had happened to them and however far they had to come, they would meet here again.

Waiting in the wind

"That's an interesting story," said the policeman. "A long time between meetings. Have you heard from your friend since?"

For a while they had written, the man said. Then, after a year or two, they lost track of each other. The West was a big place, and he had kept moving. But he knew Jimmy would come if he was alive. Jimmy was the most loyal, dependable old fellow in the world. He himself had travelled a thousand miles to stand in this doorway tonight, and it would be worth it if his old partner turned up.

He pulled out a handsome watch, its lid set with small diamonds.

"Three minutes to ten," he said. "It was exactly ten when we said goodbye at the restaurant door."

"You did pretty well out West, didn't you?" asked the policeman.

"You bet! I hope Jimmy has done half as well. He was a slow, steady sort, good old fellow. I've had to compete with some of the sharpest people around to make my pile. A man gets stuck in a groove in New York. It takes the West to put a razor's edge on him."

The policeman twirled his club and took a step or two.

"I'll be on my way," he said. "Hope your friend comes round all right. Will you leave if he isn't here on time?"

"I should say not! I'll give him half an hour at least. If Jimmy's alive on earth, he'll be here by then. Good night, officer."

"Good night, sir," said the policeman, and walked on along his beat, trying doors.

A tall man in a long coat

A fine, cold drizzle began to fall. The wind blew harder. The few people still out hurried past with their collars turned up.

The man from the West waited in the doorway and smoked.

After about twenty minutes, a tall man in a long overcoat, his collar pulled up to his ears, hurried across the street and came straight up to him.

"Is that you, Bob?" he asked, uncertainly.

"Is that you, Jimmy Wells?" cried the man in the doorway.

"Bless my heart!" said the newcomer, grasping both his hands. "It's Bob, sure as fate. I was certain I'd find you here if you were still alive. Twenty years is a long time. The old restaurant's gone, Bob. I wish it had lasted, so we could have had another dinner there."

Arm in arm, they set off along the street. The man from the West began to talk about his success, his money and his adventures. The other listened, sunk into his overcoat.

At the corner stood a drugstore, bright with electric lights. As they came into the glare, both men turned at the same moment to look at each other's face.

The note

The man from the West stopped short and pulled his arm away.

"You're not Jimmy Wells," he snapped. "Twenty years is a long time, but not long enough to change the shape of a man's nose."

"It sometimes changes a good man into a bad one," said the tall man. "You've been under arrest for ten minutes, Silky Bob. Chicago thinks you may have stopped over in New York, and they sent us a message saying they want a word with you. Going quietly? That's sensible. Now, before we go to the station, here's a note I was asked to give you. You can read it here by the window. It's from Patrolman Wells."

The man from the West unfolded the little piece of paper. His hand was steady when he began to read. By the time he had finished, it was trembling a little.

The note was short.

Bob, it said. I was at the place on time. When you struck the match to light your cigar, I saw it was the face of the man wanted in Chicago. Somehow I couldn't do it myself, so I went round and got a plain-clothes man to do the job. Jimmy.

About this story

O. Henry was the pen name of William Sydney Porter (1862–1910), an American writer famous for his warm, witty stories of ordinary city people and their surprise endings. "After Twenty Years" was collected in The Four Million in 1906. This version is a shortened, simplified retelling.