Discuss Jimmy's actions in O. Henry's "After Twenty Years".

There is a slight weakness in the ending of O. Henry's story. The reader is expected to admire Jimmy Wells for doing his duty in having "Silky" Bob arrested. This makes Jimmy seem like a "staunch" character (to borrow from Bob's description of him). However, he was not "staunch" enough to make the arrest himself. This may be a sign of compassion, but it is also a sign of fecklessness. What would his superiors think of him if they found out that he had been talking face to face with a man who was wanted by the law and didn't make the arrest himself? Could he explain that dereliction of duty to them as well as he explains it to Bob in his note?

After spending some minutes talking to Bob without being recognized, Jimmy takes pains to establish how long his old friend will be waiting there in the doorway.

"I'll be on my way. Hope your friend comes around all right. Going to call time on him sharp?"
"I should say not!" said the other. "I'll give him half an hour at least. If Jimmy is alive on earth he'll be here by that time. So long, officer."
"Good-night, sir," said the policeman, passing on along his beat, trying doors as he went.

Jimmy makes sure that Bob will be waiting there long enough for him to get to the station and enlist a plain clothes detective to make the arrest. It should be noted that both at the beginning and end of the encounter between the two old friends, O. Henry specifies that the uniformed cop is patrolling his own beat, which just happens to include the hardware store where Bob is standing. If this were not Jimmy's regular beat and Bob did not see him trying doors along the way as he approached and departed, then Bob might become suspicious. 

Bob is smart. Bob is on the lam. Bob is not an easy man to fool. If he had not seen Jimmy in the process of patrolling his beat, he might have asked himself some questions, such as: "Why did this uniformed cop suddenly appear out of nowhere at just the time that I have an appointment to meet Jimmy Wells?" "And why did the uniformed cop just walk off after talking to me for a few minutes?" "Where did he come from?" "Where was he going?" "And why???"

If Bob hadn't been suspicious while he was talking to the cop he didn't recognize as his old friend, he could easily have become suspicious after that cop walked away. He might have suspected that he was being set up. In fact, he might have suspected that Jimmy himself was the one who was setting him up. Because Jimmy is the only person in the whole wide world who knew that Bob would be at that precise location at ten o'clock on that particular date. Such things happen all the time--and they had probably happened to Bob before in his career. 

The reader's own possible suspicions are allayed by the apparent fact that the uniformed cop is obviously patrolling his beat. That is what enables O. Henry to deliver his biggest surprise at the end of his story. The cop who had been chatting with Bob at the beginning was actually Bob's old friend Jimmy Wells, now wearing a policeman's uniform. It takes a very good writer to introduce a character without really introducing him. 

The premise of "After Twenty Years" by O. Henry is a simple one: two young friends part ways, one stays in New York and one heads West, and agree to meet at a specific time and place twenty years later. What happens at that time and place is the crux of the story.

Bob has been out West, and he has obviously had some success. He is dressed well and has a diamond stickpin and watch. He is waiting on the corner where he and his friend Jimmy had agreed to meet, and a police officer approaches him. Concerned that the officer might think he was up to no good (which is quite ironic, given what we learn later), Bob lights a cigarette (by the light of which the officer can see the man's face more clearly) and tells him the story of why he is here. 

"Twenty years ago to-night," said the man, "I dined here at 'Big Joe' Brady's with Jimmy Wells, my best chum, and the finest chap in the world. He and I were raised here in New York, just like two brothers, together. I was eighteen and Jimmy was twenty. The next morning I was to start for the West to make my fortune. You couldn't have dragged Jimmy out of New York; he thought it was the only place on earth. Well, we agreed that night that we would meet here again exactly twenty years from that date and time, no matter what our conditions might be or from what distance we might have to come. We figured that in twenty years each of us ought to have our destiny worked out and our fortunes made, whatever they were going to be."

Bob is correct; each of them has found his destiny. Bob, as it turns out, has become an infamous Chicago gangster, and Jimmy has become an upstanding policeman. While Jimmy recognizes Bob, Bob does not see the officer well enough to recognize him as his old friend Jimmy. 

Now Jimmy has, it seems to me, three choices: does he arrest his childhood friend (who is now a wanted criminal), does he just walk away and pretend he never saw Bob, or does he acknowledge Bob but ignore the fact that Bob is a wanted criminal. None of the choices are good ones for Jimmy. 

Clearly the twenty years that have elapsed have, as Bob said, determined his destiny. He went West and chose a life of crime. Though he is still a loyal friend to Jimmy because he showed up here tonight and is even willing to wait an extra half hour for him, Bob is not a good man or a good citizen. His choices have made him rich, but they certainly have not made him a better man.

Those same twenty years have shaped Jimmy's destiny, as well. Jimmy chose to spend his life upholding the law and, ironically, protecting others from people just like his old friend Bob. This is still not an easy choice for Jimmy, for he is also a loyal friend. Even so, Bob unknowingly reveals what Jimmy must do when he describes him this way:

"But I know Jimmy will meet me here if he's alive, for he always was the truest, staunchest old chap in the world."

So now we realize that Jimmy has no choice; because he is a trustworthy and staunch (loyal, committed, and strong) police officer, he has to arrest Bob. He manages to do the right thing while still remaining a friend to Bob, sending someone else in to make the arrest. That is the best he could offer his old friend; he spares Bob the embarrassment and indignity of having to face his old friend in handcuffs.

If I had been Jimmy, I would hope that I would have been both compassionate and moral enough to do exactly the same thing. 

In "After Twenty Years" by O. Henry, how much has Jimmy changed over the years?

According to Bob, his friend Jimmy Wells was twenty years old when he last saw him twenty years ago. Now Jimmy would be forty. The years between twenty and forty are the most crucial years in a man's life. Whatever he has become by the age of forty is what he will remain. Jimmy would be a middle-aged policeman, probably a little overweight, probably married and having a home and children. He was barely out of his teens when he and Bob parted twenty years ago. Jimmy may have joined the police force shortly afterwards. Bob describes him at the age of twenty as a "plodding" type of person. The police force could have appealed to him because it provided security and respectability. He has gained a lot of practical experience on the job. We can see that in the adroit way he handles Bob, never letting him know that he in fact is Jimmy Wells and is keeping their appointment. O. Henry does not introduce Jimmy by name at the beginning of the story, but the author describes the manner and actions of a typical New York beat cop to let the reader see that this is a man who has become completely shaped into the role of an honest, responsible police officer who likes his routine job. The way Jimmy twirls his club represents years of walking his beat and passing the time by practicing his club-twirling.

THE POLICEMAN ON the beat moved up the avenue impressively. The impressiveness was habitual and not for show, for spectators were few....Trying doors as he went, twirling his club with many intricate and artful movements, turning now and then to cast his watchful eye adown the pacific thoroughfare, the officer, with his stalwart form and slight swagger, made a fine picture of a guardian of the peace. 

Jimmy has been shaped by what he does. This happens to most men with increasing age. Bob, too, has been shaped by what he does. Bob has been shaped into a stereotypical petty criminal who has been on the run for twenty years and is superficially successful but has missed out on all the things that Jimmy has acquired, including a home and a family, friends, security, comfort, roots, and a certain degree of authority. O. Henry's story is mainly intended to show the contrast between the two men after twenty years. Both of them made career choices twenty years ago, and both have become what they are as a result of their choices. Bob brags to the policeman, whom he doesn''t recognize, about having been successful. He doesn't expect Jimmy to have done as well. But who is the really successful man? 

In "After Twenty Years," what do Jimmy's actions reveal about his character?

In O. Henry's view, human character doesn't really change dramatically over the years but only becomes more and more sharply defined. Silky Bob describes Jimmy Wells to the police officer, whom he doesn't recognize as his old friend, as follows:

"But I know Jimmy will meet me here if he's alive, for he always was the truest, stanchest old chap in the world. He'll never forget....He was a kind of plodder, though, good fellow as he was."

In the end it doesn't seem surprising that Jimmy should have become a cop. As a "true" and "stanch" man, the job of upholding law and order would have appealed to him. As a "plodder," he would like the security and routine of poliice work, even though it was poorly paid. Over the years he has become molded more and more firmly into the role he chose, while in the meantime, Silky Bob, who is a restless, ambitious. flamboyant risk-taker, has become more and more firmly molded into the role of a flashy career criminal.

O. Henry characterizes Silky Bob by his appearance:

The man in the doorway struck a match and lit his cigar. The light showed a pale, square-jawed face with keen eyes, and a lititle white scar near his right eyebrow. His scarfpin was a large diamond, oddly set....The waiting man pulled out a handsome watch, the lids of it set with small diamonds.

This describes a successful man of O. Henry's day. He is smoking a cigar and flashing his diamonds. Men did not wear wristwatches in those days. Successful men carried big gold pocket watches in their vest pockets.

Jimmy Wells and Silky Bob were friends twenty years ago, but they have gone off on separate paths and their characters have evolved accordingly. This divergence in people's characters with the passage of time is the principal theme of O. Henry's story. The ways in which they would change were predetermined by their characters when they were young and relatively naive and immature.

Jimmy's action in having his old pal arrested comes as a surprise because O. Henry loved to give his stories surprise endings. In fact, a story with a surprise ending is often described as an "O. Henry story." But the reader does not feel misled. The ending seems to be completely appropriate, given the reader's impression of Jimmy's youthful character as a true, loyal, dependable and "stanch" man who, as Silky Bob says, was "a bit of a plodder" and who loved New York.

"You couldn't have dragged Jimmy out of New York; he thought it was the only place on earth."

Jimmy still had enough of a feeling of friendship for Bob that he couldn't bring himself to make the arrest in person. But he made a point of find out that Bob would be waiting there in the doorway for at least another half-hour. This enabled Jimmy to get another officer to make the arrest. The arresting officer hands Bob a note which includes the sentence:

"Somehow I couldn't do it myself, so I went around and got a plain clothes man to do the job."

Jimmy had developed too strong a sense of duty to overlook the fact that he recognized his old friend and knew he was the man who was wanted in Chicago.

O. Henry must have worried about the ending of this story, although the rest of it might have been easy enough to write. He decided not to have Jimmy arrest his old friend. Such a denouement would have led to a lot of protests and recriminations. It would have left the reader with an unfavorable impression of Jimmy. O. Henry shows good artistic taste in having Jimmy make the arrest by proxy.