Michael O'Halloran
by
Gene Stratton-Porter
Part 3 out of 9
"I will see you when you return."
She stood bewildered, watching him go down the hall and enter his library.
That and his sleeping room were the only places in the house sacred to
him. No one entered, no one, not even the incorrigible children, touched
anything there. She slowly went to the car, trying to rally to Leslie's
greeting, struggling to fix her mind on anything pointed out to her as
something she might enjoy.
At last she said: "I don't know what is the matter with me Leslie. James
is planning something, I haven't an idea what; but his grim, reproachful
face is slowly driving me wild. I'm getting so I can't sleep. You saw him
come home as I left. He talked positively crazy, as if he had the crack of
doom in his hands and were prepared to crack it. He said he 'would see me
when I came back.' Indeed he will--to his sorrow! He will be as he used to
be, or we will separate. The idea, with scarcely a cent to his name, of
him undertaking to dictate to me, _to me!_ Do you blame me Leslie? You
heard him the other day! You know how he insulted me!"
Leslie leaned forward, laying a firm hand in a grip on Mrs. Minturn's arm.
"Since you ask me," she said, "I will answer. If you find life with Mr.
Minturn insufferable, an agony to both of you, I _would_ separate, and
_speedily_. If it has come to the place where you can't see each other or
speak without falling into unpleasantness, then I'd keep apart."
"That is exactly the case!" cried Mrs. Minturn. "Oh Leslie, I am so glad
you agree with me!"
"But I haven't finished," said Leslie, "you interrupted me in the middle.
If you are absolutely sure you can't go on peaceably, I would stop; but if
I once had loved a man enough to give my life and my happiness into his
keeping, to make him the father of my children, I would not separate from
him, until I had exhausted every resource, to see if I couldn't in some
possible way end with credit."
"If you had been through what I have," said Mrs. Minturn, "you wouldn't
endure it any longer."
"Perhaps," said Leslie. "But you see dear Mrs. Minturn, I am handicapped
by not knowing _what_ you have been through. To your world you appear to
be a woman of great wealth, who does exactly as she pleases and pays her
own bills. You seem to have unlimited money, power, position, leisure for
anything you fancy. I'll wager you don't know the names of half the
servants in your house; a skillful housekeeper takes the responsibility
off your hands. You never are seen in public with your children; competent
nurses care for them. You don't appear with your husband any more; yet he
is a man of fine brain, unimpeachable character, who handles big affairs
for other men, and father says he believes his bank account would surprise
you. He has been in business for years; surely all he makes doesn't go to
other men."
"You know I never thought of that!" cried Mrs. Minturn. "He had nothing to
begin on and I've always kept our establishment; he's never paid for more
than his clothing. Do you suppose that he has made money?"
"I know that he has!" said Leslie. "Not so fast as he might! Not so much
as he could, for he is incorruptible; but money, yes! He is a powerful
man, not only in the city, but all over the state. Some of these days
you're going to wake up to find him a Senator, or Governor. You seem to be
the only person who doesn't know it, or who doesn't care if you do. But
when it comes about, as it will, you'll be so proud of him! Dear Mrs.
Minturn, please, please go slowly! Don't, oh don't let anything happen
that will make a big regret for both."
"Leslie, where did you get all this?" asked Mrs. Minturn in tones of
mingled interest and surprise.
"From my father!" answered Leslie. "And from Douglas Bruce. Douglas'
office is across the hall from Mr. Minturn's; they meet daily, and from
the first they have been friends. Mr. Minturn took Douglas to his clubs,
introduced him and helped him into business, so often they work together.
Why only yesterday Douglas came to me filled with delight. Mr. Minturn
secured an appointment for him to make an investigation for the city which
will be a great help to Douglas. It will bring him in contact with
prominent men, give him big work and a sample of how mercenary I am--it
will bring him big pay and he knows how to use the money in a big way.
Douglas knows Mr. Minturn so well, and respects him so highly, yet no one
can know him as you do----"
"That is quite true! I live with him! I know the real man!" cried Mrs.
Minturn.
"How mean of you!" laughed Leslie, "to distort my reasoning like that! I
don't ask you to think up all the little things that have massed into one
big grievance against him; I mean stop that for to-day, out here in the
country where everything is so lovely, and go back where I am."
"He surely has an advocate! Leslie, when did you start making an especial
study of Mr. Minturn?"
"When Douglas Bruce began speaking to me so frequently of him!" answered
Leslie. "Then I commenced to watch him and to listen to what people were
saying about him, and to ask Daddy."
"It's very funny that every one seems so well informed and so enthusiastic
just at the time when I feel that life is unendurable with him," said Mrs.
Minturn. "I can't understand it!"
"Mrs. Minturn, try, oh do try to get my viewpoint before you do anything
irreparable," begged Leslie. "Away up here in the woods let's think it
out! Let's discuss James Minturn in every phase of his nature and see if
the big manly part doesn't far outweigh the little irritations. Let's see
if you can't possibly go to the meeting he wants when we return with a
balance struck in his favour. A divorced woman is always--well, it's
disagreeable. Alone you'd feel stranded. Attempt marrying again, where
would you find a man with half the points that count for good, to replace
him? In after years when your children realize the man he is, how are you
going to explain to them why you couldn't live with him?"
"From your rush of words, it is evident you have your arguments at hand,"
said Mrs. Minturn. "You've been thinking more about my affairs than I ever
did. You bring up points I never have thought of; you make me see things
that would not have occurred to me; yet as you put them, they have awful
force. You haven't exactly said it, but what you mean is that you believe
_me_ in the wrong; so do all my friends. All of you sympathize with Mr.
Minturn! All of you think him a big man worthy of every consideration and
me deserving none."
"You're putting that too strong," retorted Leslie. "You are right about
Mr. Minturn; but I won't admit that I find you 'worthy of no consideration
at all,' or I wouldn't be imploring you to give yourself a chance at
happiness."
"'Give myself a chance at happiness!'"
"Dear Mrs. Minturn, yes!" said Leslie. "All your life, so far, you have
lived absolutely for yourself; for your personal pleasure. Has happiness
resulted?"
"Happiness?" cried Mrs. Minturn in amazement. "You little fool! With my
husband practically a madman, my children incorrigible, my nerves on edge
until I can't sleep, because one thought comes over and over."
"Well you achieved it in society!" said Leslie. "It's the result of doing
exactly what you _wanted to!_ You can't say James Minturn was to blame for
what you had the money and the desire to do. You can't think your babies
would have preferred their mother to the nurses and governesses they have
had----"
"If you say another word about that I'll jump from the car and break my
neck," threatened Mrs. Minturn. "No one sympathizes with me!"
"That is untrue," said Leslie. "I care, or I wouldn't be doing what I am
now. And as for sympathy, I haven't a doubt but every woman of your
especial set will weep tears of condolence with you, if you'll tell them
what you have me. There is Mrs. Clinton and Mrs. Farley, and a dozen women
among your dearest friends who have divorced their husbands, and are free
lances or remarried; you can have friends enough to suit you in any
event."
"Fools! Shallow-pated fools!" cried Mrs. Minturn. "They never read
anything! Their idea of any art would convulse you! They don't know a note
of real music!"
"But they are your best friends," interposed Leslie. "What then is their
attraction?"
"I am sure I don't know!" said Mrs. Minturn. "I suppose it's unlimited
means to follow any fad or fancy, to live extravagantly as they choose, to
dress faultlessly as they have taste, freedom to go as they please! Oh
they do have a good time!"
"Are you sure that they didn't go through the same 'good time' you are
having right now, before they lost the men they loved and married, and
then became mothers who later deliberately orphaned their own children?"
"Leslie, for God's sake where did you learn it?" cried Mrs. Minturn. "How
can you hit like that? You make me feel like a--like a----! Oh Lord!"
"Don't let's talk any more, Mrs. Minturn," suggested Leslie. "You know
what all refined, home-loving people think. You know society and what it
has to offer. You're making yourself unhappy, while I am helping you, but
if some one doesn't stop you, you may lose the love of a good man, the
respect of the people worth while, and later of your own children! See,
here is the swamp and this is as close as we can go with the car."
"Is this where you found the flowers for your basket?"
"Yes," said Leslie.
"No snakes, no quicksands?"
"Snakes don't like this kind of moss," answered Leslie; "this is an old
lake bed grown up with tamaracks and the bog of a thousand years."
"Looks as if ten thousand might come closer!"
"Where you ever in such a place?" asked Leslie.
"Never!" said Mrs. Minturn.
"Well to do this to perfection," said Leslie, "we should go far enough for
you to see the home life of our rarest wild flowers and to get the music
full effect. We must look for a high place to spread this waterproof sheet
I have brought along, then nestle down and keep still. The birds will see
us going in, but if we make ourselves inconspicuous, they will soon forget
us. Have you the score?"
"Yes," answered Mrs. Minturn. "Go ahead!"
Leslie had not expected Mrs. Minturn's calm tones and placid acceptance of
the swamp. The girl sent one searching look the woman's way, then came
enlightenment. This was a stunt. Mrs. Minturn had been doing stunts in the
hope of new sensations all her life. What others could do, she could, if
she chose; in this instance she chose to penetrate a tamarack swamp at six
o'clock in the morning, to listen to the notes of a bird.
"I'll select the highest places and go as nearly where we were as I can,"
said Leslie. "If you step in my tracks you'll be all right."
"Why, you're not afraid, are you?" asked Mrs. Minturn.
"Not in the least," said Leslie. "Are you?"
"No!" said Mrs. Minturn. "One strikes almost everything motoring through
the country, in the mountains or at sea, and travelling. This looks
interesting. How deep could one sink anyway?"
"Deeply enough to satisfy you," laughed Leslie. "Come quietly now!"
Grasping the score she carried, Mrs. Minturn unconcernedly plunged after
Leslie. Purposely the girl went slowly, stooping beneath branches,
skirting too wet places, slipping over the high hummocks, turning to
indicate by gesture a moss bed, a flower, or glancing upward to try to
catch a glimpse of some entrancing musician.
Once Leslie turned to look back and saw Mrs. Minturn on her knees
separating the silvery green moss heads and thrusting her hand deeply to
learn the length of the roots. She noticed the lady's absorbed face, and
the wet patches spreading around her knees. Leslie fancied she could see
Mrs. Minturn entering the next gathering of her friends, smiling faintly
and crying: "Dear people, I've had a perfectly new experience!" She could
hear every tone of Mrs. Minturn's voice saying: "Ferns as luxuriant as
anything in Florida! Moss beds several feet deep. A hundred birds singing,
and all before sunrise, my dears!" When Mrs. Minturn arose Leslie went
forward slowly until she reached the moccasin flowers, but remembering,
she did not stop. The woman did. She stooped and Leslie winced as she
snapped one to examine it critically. She held it up in the gray light,
turning it.
"Did you ever see--little Elizabeth?" she asked.
"Yes," said Leslie.
"Do you think----?" She stopped abruptly.
"That one is too deep," said Leslie. "The colour he saw was on a freshly
opened one like that."
She pointed to a paler moccasin of exquisite pink with red lavender
veining. Mrs. Minturn assented.
"He can't forget anything," she said, "or let any one else. He always will
keep harping."
"We were peculiarly unfortunate that day," said Leslie. "He really had no
intention of saying anything, if he hadn't been forced."
"Oh he doesn't require forcing," said Mrs. Minturn. "He's always at the
overflow point about her."
"Perhaps he was very fond of her," suggested Leslie.
"He was perfectly foolish about her," said Mrs. Minturn impatiently. "I
lost a nurse or two through his interference. When I got such a treasure
as Lucette I just told her to take complete charge, make him attend his
own affairs, and not try being a nursery maid. It really isn't done these
days!"
Leslie closed her lips, moving forward until she reached the space where
the ragged boys and the fringed girls floated their white banners, where
lacy yellow and lavender blooms caressed each other, there on the highest
place she could select, across a moss-covered log, she spread the
waterproof sheet, and seating herself, motioned Mrs. Minturn to do the
same. She reached for the music and opening it ran over the score. Her
finger paused on the notes she had whistled, while with eager face she sat
waiting.
Mrs. Minturn dropped into an attitude of tense listening. The sun began
dissipating the gray mists and heightening the exquisite tints on all
sides. Every green imaginable was there from palest silver to the deepest,
darkest shades; all dew wet, rankly growing, gold tinted and showing
clearer each minute. Gradually Mrs. Minturn relaxed, made herself
comfortable as possible, then turned to the orchids of the open space. The
colour flushed and faded on her tired face, she nervously rolled the
moccasin stem in her fingers, or looked long at the delicate flower. She
was thinking so intently that Leslie saw she was neither seeing the swamp,
nor hearing the birds.
It was then that a little gray singer straying through the tamaracks sent
a wireless to his mate in the bushes of borderland, in which he wished to
convey to her all there was in his heart about the wonders of spring, the
joy of mating, the love of her, and their nest. He waited a second, then
tucking his tail, swelled his throat, and made sure he had done his best.
At the first measure, Leslie thrust the sheet before Mrs. Minturn,
pointing to the place. Instantly the woman scanned the score, then leaned
forward listening. As the bird flew, Leslie faced Mrs. Minturn with
questioning eyes. She cried softly: "He did it! Perfectly! If I hadn't
heard I never would have believed."
"There is another that can do this from Verdi's _Traviata_." Leslie
whistled the notes. "We may hear him also."
Again they waited. Leslie realized that Mrs. Minturn was not listening,
and would have to be recalled if the bird sang. Leslie sat silent. The
same bird sang, and others, but to the girl had come the intuition that
Mrs. Minturn was having her hour in the garden, so wisely she remained
silent. After an interminable time she arose, making her way forward as
far as she could penetrate and still see the figure of the woman, then
hunting an old stump, climbed upon it and did some thinking herself.
At last she returned to the motionless figure. Mrs. Minturn was leaning
against the tamarack's scraggy trunk, her head resting on a branch,
lightly sleeping. A rivulet staining her cheeks from each eye showed where
slow tears had slipped from under her closed lids. Leslie's heart ached
with pity. She thought she never had seen any one seem so sad, so alone,
so punished for sins of inheritance and rearing. She sat beside Mrs.
Minturn, waiting until she awakened.
"Why I must have fallen asleep!" she cried.
"For a minute," said Leslie.
"But I feel as if I had rested soundly a whole night," said Mrs. Minturn.
"I'm so refreshed. And there goes that bird again. Verdi to take his
notes! Who ever would have thought of it? Leslie, did you bring any lunch?
I'm famished."
"We must go back to the car," said Leslie.
They spread the waterproof sheet on the ground where it would be bordered
with daintily traced partridge berry, and white-lined plantain leaves, and
sitting on it ate their lunch. Leslie did what she could to interest Mrs.
Minturn and cheer her, but at last that lady said: "Thank you dear, you
are very good to me; but you can't entertain me to-day. Some other time
we'll come back and bring the scores you suggest, and see what we can
really hear from these birds. But to-day, I've got the battle of my life
to fight. Something is coming; I should be in a measure prepared, and as I
don't know what to expect, it takes all the brains I have to figure things
out."
"You don't know, Mrs. Minturn?" asked Leslie.
"No," she said wearily. "I know James hates the life I lead; he thinks my
time wasted. I know he's a disappointed man, because he thought when he
married me he could cut me out of everything worth while in the world, and
set me to waiting on him, and nursing his children. Every single thing I
have done since, or wanted or had, has been a disappointment to him. I
know now he never would have married me, if he hadn't figured he was going
to make me over; shape me and my life to suit his whims, and throw away my
money to please his fancies. He's been utterly discontented since
Elizabeth was born. Why Leslie, we haven't lived together since then. He
said if I were going to persist in bringing 'orphans' into the world,
babies I wouldn't mother myself, or wouldn't allow him to father, there
would be no more children. I laughed at him, because I didn't think he
meant it; but he did, so that ended even a semblance of content. Half the
time I don't know where he is, or what he is doing; he seldom knows where
I am; if we appear together it is accidental; I thought I had my mind made
up to leave him, and soon; but what you say, coupled with doubts I had
myself, have set me to thinking, till I don't know. I hate a scandal. You
know how careful I always have been. All my closest friends have jeered me
for a prude; there isn't a flaw he can find, there has been none!"
"Certainly not," said Leslie. "Every one knows that."
"Leslie, you don't know, do you?" asked Mrs. Minturn. "He didn't say
anything to Bruce, did he?"
"You want an honest answer?" questioned Leslie.
"Of course I do!" cried Mrs. Minturn.
"Douglas did tell me in connection with Mr. Minturn joining the
Brotherhood and taking a gamin from the streets into his office, that he
said he was scarcely allowed to see his own sons, not to exercise the
slightest control, so he was going to try his theories on a Little
Brother. But Douglas wouldn't mention it, only to me, and of course I
wouldn't repeat it to any one. Mr. Minturn seemed to feel that Douglas
thought it peculiar for a man having sons, to take so much pains with a
newsboy; they're great friends, so he said that much to Bruce."
"'He said that much----'" scoffed Mrs. Minturn.
"Well, even so, that is very little compared with what you've said about
him to me," retorted Leslie. "You shouldn't complain on that score."
"I suppose, in your eyes, I shouldn't complain about anything," said Mrs.
Minturn.
"A world of things, Mrs. Minturn, but not the ones you do," said Leslie.
"Oh!" cried Mrs. Minturn.
"I think your grievance is that you were born in, and reared for,
society," said Leslie, "and in your extremity it has failed you. I believe
I can give you more help to-day than any woman of your age and intimate
association."
"That's true Leslie, quite true!" exclaimed Mrs. Minturn eagerly. "And I
need help! Oh I do!"
"You poor soul, you!" comforted Leslie. "Turn where you belong! Turn to
your own blood!"
"My mother would jeer me for a weakling," said Mrs. Minturn. "She has
urged me to divorce James, ever since Elizabeth was born."
"I didn't mean your mother," said Leslie. "I meant closer relatives, I
meant your husband and sons."
"My husband would probably tell me he had lost all respect for me, while
my sons would very likely pull my hair and kick my shins if I knelt to
them for sympathy," said Mrs. Minturn. "They are perfect little animals."
"Oh Mrs. Minturn!" cried Leslie amazed. "Then you simply must take them in
charge and save them; they are so fine looking, while you're their mother,
you are!"
"It means giving up life as I have known it always, just about
everything!" said Mrs. Minturn.
"Look at yourself now!" said Leslie. "I should think you would be glad to
give up your present state."
"Leslie, do you think it wrong to gather those orchids?"
"I think it unpardonable sin to _exterminate_ them," answered Leslie. "If
you have any reason for wanting a few, and merely gather the flowers,
leaving the roots to spread and bloom another year, I should say take
them."
"Will you wait in the car until I go back?" she asked.
"But I wish to be alone," said Mrs. Minturn.
"You're not afraid? You won't become lost?"
"I am not afraid, and I will not lose myself," said Mrs. Minturn. "Must I
hurry?"
"Take all the time you want," said Leslie.
It was mid-afternoon when she returned, her hands filled with a dripping
moss ball in which she had embedded the stems of a mass of feathery pink-
fringed orchids. Her face was flushed with tears, but her eyes were
bright, her step quick and alert.
"Leslie, what do you think I am going to do?" she cried. Then without
awaiting a reply: "I'm going to ask James to go with me to take these to
Elizabeth, to beg him to forgive my neglect of her; to pledge the rest of
my life to him and the boys."
Leslie caught Mrs. Minturn in her arms. "Oh you darling!" she exulted. "Oh
you brave, wonderful girl!"
"After all, it's no more than fair," Mrs. Minturn said. "I have had
everything my way since we were married. And I did love James. He's the
only man I have ever really wanted. Leslie, he will forgive me and start
over, won't he?"
"He'll be at your feet!" cried Leslie.
"Fortunately, I have decided to be at his," said Mrs. Minturn. "I've
reached the place where I will even wipe James Jr.'s nose and dress
Malcolm, and fix James' studs if it will help me to sleep, and have only a
tinge of what you seem to be running over with. Leslie, you are the most
joyous soul!"
"You see, I never had to think about myself," said Leslie. "Daddy always
thought for me, so there was nothing left for me to spend my time and
thought on but him. It was a beautiful arrangement."
"Leslie, this is your car, but won't you dear, drive fast!" begged Mrs.
Minturn.
"Of course Nellie!" exclaimed the girl.
"Leslie, will you stand by me, and show me the way, all you can?" asked
Mrs. Minturn anxiously. "I'll lose every friend I have got; my house must
be torn down and built up from the basement on a new system, as to
management; and I haven't an idea _how_ to do it. Oh, I hope James can
help me."
"You may be sure James will know and can help you," comforted Leslie.
"You'll be leaving for the seashore in a few days; install a complete new
retinue, and begin all fresh. Half the servants you keep, really
interested in their work, would make you far more comfortable than you are
now."
"Yes, I think that too!" agreed Mrs. Minturn eagerly. "Some way I feel as
if I were turning against Lucette. I never want to see her again, after I
tell her to go; not that I know what I shall do without her. The boys will
probably burn down the house, and where I'll find a woman who will
tolerate them, I don't know."
"Employ a man until you get control," suggested Leslie. "They are both old
enough; hire a man, and explain all you want to him. They'd be afraid of a
man."
"Afraid!" cried Mrs. Minturn. "They are afraid of Lucette! I can't
understand it. I wonder if James----"
"Poor James!" laughed Leslie. "Honestly Nellie, don't impose too much of
your--your work on him. Undertake it yourself. Show him what a woman you
are."
"Great Heavens, Leslie, you don't know what you are saying!" cried Mrs.
Minturn. "My only hope lies in deceiving him. If I showed him the woman I
am, as I saw myself back there in that swamp an hour ago, he'd take one
look, and strangle me for the public good."
"How ridiculous!" exclaimed Leslie. "Why must a woman always rush from one
extreme to the other? Choose a middle course and keep it."
"That's what I am telling you I must do," said Mrs. Minturn. "Leslie, it
is wonderful how I feel. I'm almost flying. Do you honestly think it is
possible that there is going to be something new, something interesting,
something really worth while in the world for me?"
"I know it," said Leslie. "Such interest, such novelty, such joy as you
never have experienced!"
With that hope in her heart, her eyes filled with excitement, Nellie
Minturn rang her bell, ran past her footman and hurried up the stairs. She
laid her flowers on a table, summoned her maid, then began throwing off
her hat and outer clothing.
"Do you know if Mr. Minturn is here?"
"Yes. He----" began the maid.
"Never mind what 'he.' Get out the prettiest, simplest dress I own, and
the most becoming," she ordered. "Be quick! Can't you see I'm in a hurry?"
"Mrs. Minturn, I think you will thank me for telling you there is an awful
row in the library," said the maid.
"'An awful row?'" Mrs. Minturn paused.
"Yes. I think they are killing Lucette," explained the maid. "She's
shrieked bloody murder two or three times."
"Who? What do you mean?" demanded Mrs. Minturn.
She slipped on the bathrobe she had picked up, and stood holding it
together, gazing at the maid.
"Mr. Minturn came with two men. One was a park policeman we know. They
went into the library and sent for Lucette. There she goes again!"
"Is there any way I could see, could hear, what is going on, without being
seen?"
"There's a door to the den from the back hall, and that leads to the
library," suggested the maid.
"Show me! Help me!" begged Mrs. Minturn.
As they passed the table the orchids hanging over the edge caught on the
trailing robe and started to fall. Mrs. Minturn paused to push them back,
then studied the flowers an instant, and catching up the bunch carried it
along. She closed the den door after her without a sound, and creeping
beside the wall, hid behind the door curtain and peeped into the library.
There were two men who evidently were a detective and a policeman. She saw
Lucette backed against the wall, her hands clenched, her eyes wild with
fear. She saw her husband's back, and on the table beside him a little
box, open, its wrappings near, its contents terrifying to the woman.
"To sum up then," said Mr. Minturn in tones she never before had heard: "I
can put on oath this man, who will be forced to tell what he witnessed or
be impeached by others who saw it at the same time, and _are ready to
testify to what he said;_ I can produce the boy who came to tell me the
part he took in it; I have the affidavit and have just come from the woman
who interfered and followed you here in an effort to save Elizabeth; I
have this piece of work in my hands, done by one of the greatest
scientists and two of the best surgeons living. Although you shrink from
it, I take pleasure in showing it to you. This ragged seam is an impress
of the crack you made in a tiny skull lying in a vault out at Forest
Hill."
He paused, holding a plaster cast before the woman.
"It's a little bit of a thing," he said deliberately. "She was a tiny
creature to have been done to death at your hands. I hope you will see
that small pink face as I see it, and feel the soft hair in your fingers,
and--after all, I can't go on with that. But I am telling you, and showing
you exactly what you are facing, because you must go from this house with
these men; your things will be sent. You must leave this city and this
country on the boat they take you to, and where you go you will be
watched; if ever you dare take service handling a _child_ again, I shall
have you promptly arrested and forced to answer for the cold-blooded
murder of my little daughter. Live you must, I suppose, but not longer by
the torture of children. Go, before I strangle you as you deserve!"
How Mrs. Minturn came to be standing beside her husband, she never
afterward knew; only that she was, pulling down his arm to stare at the
white cast. Then she looked up at him and said simply: "But Lucette didn't
murder her; it was I. I was her mother. I knew she was beaten. I knew she
was abused! I didn't stop my pleasure to interfere, lest I should lose a
minute by having to see to her myself! A woman did come to me, and a boy!
I knew they were telling the truth! I didn't know it was so bad, but I
knew it must have been dreadful, to bring them. I had my chance to save
her. I went to her as the woman told me to, and because she was quiet, I
didn't even turn her over. I didn't run a finger across her little head. I
didn't call a surgeon. I preferred an hour of pleasure to taking the risk
of being disturbed. I am quite as guilty as Lucette! Have them take me
with her."
James Minturn stepped back, gazing at his wife. Then he motioned the men
toward the door, so with the woman they left the room.
"Lucette just had her sentence," he said, "now for yours! Words are
useless! I am leaving your house with my sons. They _are_ my sons, and
with the proof I hold, you will not claim them. If you do, you will not
get them. I am taking them to the kind of a house I deem suitable for
them, and to such care as I can provide. I shall keep them in my presence
constantly as possible until I see just what harm has been done, and how
to remedy what can be changed. I shall provide such teachers as I see fit
for them, and devote the remainder of my life to them. All I ask of you is
to spare them the disgrace of forcing me to _prove_ my right to them, or
ever having them realize just _what_ happened to their sister, and _your_
part in it."
She held the flowers toward him.
"I brought these----" she began, then paused. "You wouldn't believe me, if
I should tell you. You are right! Perfectly justified! Of course I shall
not bring this before the public. Go!"
At the door he looked back. She had dropped into a chair beside the table,
holding the cast in one hand, the fringed orchids in the other.
CHAPTER VII
_Peaches' Preference in Blessings_
"_God ain't made a sweeter girl
'An Lily, at keeps my heart a-whirl.
If I was to tell an awful whopper,
I'd get took by the cross old copper._"
Thus chanted Mickey at his door, his hands behind him. Peaches stretched
both hers toward him as usual; but he stood still, swinging in front of
him a beautiful doll, for a little sick girl. A baby doll in a long snowy
dress and a lace cap; it held outstretched arms, but was not heavy enough
to tire small wavering hands. Peaches lunged forward until only Mickey's
agility saved her from falling. He tossed the doll on the bed, and caught
the child, the lump in his throat so big his voice was strained as he
cried: "Why you silly thing!"
With her safe he again proffered it. Peaches shut her eyes and buried her
face on his breast.
"Oh don't let me see it! Take it away!"
"Why Lily! I thought you'd be crazy about it," marvelled Mickey. "Honest I
did! The prettiest lady sent it to you. Let me tell you!"
"Giving them up is worser 'an never having them. Take it away!" wailed
Peaches.
"Well Lily!" said Mickey. "I never was stuck up about my looks, but I
didn't s'pose I looked so like a granny that you'd think _that_ of me.
Don't I seem man enough to take care of a little flowersy-girl 'thout
selling her doll? There's where I got your granny skinned a mile. I don't
booze, and I never will. Mother hammered that into me. Now look what a
pretty it is! You'll just love it! I wouldn't take it! I'd lay out anybody
who would. Come on now! Negotiate it! Get your flippers on it!"
He was holding the child gently and stroking her tumbled hair. When he put
her from him to see her face, Mickey was filled with envy because he had
been forced to admit the gift was not from him. He shut his lips tight,
but his face was grim as he studied Peaches' flushed cheeks and wet eyes,
and noted the shaking eagerness for the doll she was afraid to look at. He
reached over and put it into her arms, then piled the pillows so she could
see better, talking the while to comfort her.
"Course it is yours! Course nobody is going to take it! Course you shall
_always_ have it, and maybe a grown-up lady doll by Christmas. Who knows?"
In utter content Peaches sank against the pillows, watching Mickey, while
she gripped the baby.
"Thank you, Mickey-lovest," she said. "Oh thank you for this Precious
Child!"
"You got to thank a lady about twice my height, with dark hair, pink
cheeks, and beautiful dresses. She's got a big rest house, a lover man,
and an automobile I wish you could see, Lily," he said.
"If I was on the rags in the corner, I'd have this child--wouldn't I?"
scoffed Peaches, still clutching the doll, but her gaze on Mickey. "What
happened was, 'at she _liked you_ for something, and _give_ you the baby,
so you brought it to me. Thank you Mickey, for this Precious Child!"
Peaches lifted her lips. Mickey met them more obsessed than before. Then
she turned away, clasping the doll. Mickey could see that the tears were
slipping from under the child's closed lids, but her lips were on the doll
face, so he knew she was happy. He stole out to bring in his purchases for
supper, and begin his evening work. He gave Peaches a drink, her daily
rub, cleaned the room without making dust as the nurse had shown him, and
brought water. He shook his fist at the faucet.
"Now hereafter, nix on the butting in!" he said belligerently. "Mebby I
couldn't have got _that_ doll, but I could have got one she'd have _liked_
just as well, and earned it extra, in one day. There's one feature of the
Big Brother business that I was a little too fast on. He's the finest man
that ever wanted me, while his rooms are done shameful. I could put a
glitter on them so he could see himself with the things he has to work
with, and he said any time I wanted it, the job was mine. It wouldn't be
cheating him any if I took it, and did better work than he's getting, and
my steady papers are sure in the morning; that would be sure in the
afternoon, and if I cut ice with a buzz saw, I might get through in time
to pick up something else before coming home, and being sure beats
_hoping_ a mile, yes ten miles! Mebby I'll investigate that business a
little further, 'cause hereafter I provide for my own family. See? Lily
was grand about it. Gee! she's smart to think it out that way all in a
minute. But by and by she's going to have a lot of time to think. Then
she'll be remembering about the lady I got to tell her of 'stead of _me_,
as she _should!_ Guess I'll run my own family! I'll take another look at
cleaning that office. There ain't any lap-dog business in a job, and being
paid for it, if you do it well."
Mickey turned the faucet and marched up the stairs with head high and
shoulders square. His face was grave while he worked, but Peaches was so
happy she did not notice. When he came with her supper she kissed the
doll, then insisted on Mickey kissing it also. Such was the state of his
subjugation he commenced with "Aw!" and ended by doing as he was told. He
even helped lay the doll beside Peaches exactly as her fancy dictated, and
covered it with her sheet, putting its hands outside. Peaches was
enchanted. She insisted on offering it a drink of her milk first, and was
so tremulously careful lest she spill a drop that Mickey had to guide her
hand. He promised to wash the doll's dress if she did have an accident, or
when it became soiled, and bowed his head meekly to the crowning
concession by sitting on the edge of the bed, after he had finished his
evening work, and holding the doll where she could see it, exactly as
instructed, while he told her about his wonderful adventure.
"Began yesterday," explained Mickey. "You know I told you there was going
to be a surprise. Well this is it. When the lady gave me the ribbons for
you, she told me to come back to-night, and get it. Course I _could_ a-got
it myself. I _would_ a-got it for Christmas----"
"Oh Mickey-lovest, does Christmas come here?"
"Surest thing you know!" said Mickey. "A fat stocking full of every single
thing the Nurse Lady tell Santa Claus a little--a little flowersy-girl
that ain't so strong yet, may have, and a big lady doll and a picture
book."
"But I never had no stockings," said Peaches.
"Well you'll have by _that_ time," promised Mickey.
"Oh Mickey, I'm so glad I want to say a prayin's 'at you found _me_,
'stead of some other kid!" exulted Peaches.
"Yes Miss, and that's one thing I forgot!" said Mickey. "We'll _begin_ to-
night. You ain't a properly raised lady unless you say your prayers. I
know the one _She_ taught me. To-night will be a good time, 'cause you'll
be so thankful for your pretty ribbons and your baby, that you'll just
love to say a real thankful prayer." "Mickey, I ain't goin' to say
prayin's! I just _said_ I was," explained Peaches. "I never said none for
granny, 'cause she only told me to when she was drunk."
"No and you never had a box of ribbons to make you look so sweet, or a
baby to stay with you while I'm gone. If you ain't thankful enough for
them to say your prayers, you shouldn't have them, nor any more, nor
Christmas, nor anything, but just--_just like you was_."
Peaches blinked, gasped, digested the statements, then yielded wholly.
"I guess I'll say them. Mickey when shall I?"
"To-night 'fore you go to sleep," said Mickey.
"Now tell me about the baby," urged Peaches.
"Sure! I _was!_ I _could_ a-got it myself, like I was telling you; but the
ones in the stores have such funny clothes. They look so silly. I knew I
couldn't wash them and of course they'd get dirty like everything does,
and we couldn't _have_ them dirty, so I thought it over, and I said to
Mickey-boy, 'if the Joy Lady is so anxious to get the baby, and sew its
clothes herself, why I'll just let her,' so I did _let_ her, but it took
some time to make them, so I had to wait to bring it 'til tonight. I was
to go to her house after it, and when I got there she was coming home in
her car from a long drive, and gee, Lily, I wish you could have seen her!
She's the prettiest lady, and the most joyous lady I ever saw."
"Prettier than the Nurse Lady?" asked Peaches.
"Well different," explained Mickey. "Nurse Lady is all gold like the end
of Sunrise Alley at four o'clock in the morning. This lady has dark hair
and eyes. Both of them are as pretty as women are made, but they are not
the same. Nurse Lady is when the sun comes up, and warms and comforts the
world; but the doll-lady is like all the stars twinkling in the moonlight
on the park lake, and music playing, and everybody dancing. The doll-lady
is joy, just the Joy Lady. Gee, Lily, you should have seen her face when
the car stopped, while I was coming down the steps."
"Was she so glad to see you?" asked Peaches.
"'Twasn't me!" said Mickey. "'Twas on her face _before_ she saw me. She
was just gleaming, and shining, and spilling over joy! She isn't the kind
that would dance on the street, nor where it ain't nice to dance; but she
was dancing inside just the same. She pulled me right into that big fine
car, so I sat on the seat with her, and we went sailing, and skating, and
flying along and all the boys guying me, but I didn't care! I like to ride
in her car! I never rode in a car like that before. She went a-whizzing
right to the office of the big man, where maybe I'll work; I guess I'll go
see him tomorrow, I got a hankering for knowing what I'm going to _do_,
and _where_ I'm going to be paid for it. Well she went spinning there, and
she said 'you wait a minute,' then she ran in and pretty soon out she came
with him. His name is Mr. Douglas Bruce, and I guess it would be a little
closer what _She'd_ think right if I'd use it. And hers he calls her by,
is Leslie. Ain't that pretty? When he says 'Leslie' sounds as if he kissed
the name as it came through. Honest it does!"
"I bet he says it just like you say 'Lily!'"
"I wonder now!" grinned Mickey. "Well he came out and what she had told
him, set him crazy too. They just talked a streak, but he shook hands with
me, and she said, 'You tell the driver where to go Mickey,' and I said,
'Go where, Miss?' and she said, 'To take you home,' and I said, 'You don't
need!' and she said, 'I'd like to!' and I saw she didn't care _what_ she
did, so I just sent him to the end of the car line and saved my nickel,
and then I come on here, and both of them----"
"What?" asked Peaches eagerly.
Mickey changed the "wanted to come to see you" that had been on his lips.
If he told Peaches that, and she asked for them to come, and they came,
and then thought he was not taking care of her right, and took her away
from him--then what?
"Said good-bye the nicest," he substituted. "And I'm going to see if she
wants any more letters carried as soon as my papers are gone in the
morning, and if she does, I'm going to take them, and if one is to him,
I'm going to ask him more about the job he offered me, and if we can
agree, I'm going to take it. Then I can buy you what you want myself,
because I'll know every day exactly what I'll have, and when the rent is
counted out, and for the papers, all the rest will be for eating, and what
you need, and to save for your new back."
"My, I wisht I had it now!" cried Peaches. "I wisht I could a-rode in that
car too! Wasn't it perfeckly grand Mickey?"
"Grand as any king," said Mickey.
"What is a king?" asked Peaches.
"One of the big bosses across the ocean," explained Mickey. "You'll learn
them when you get farther with your lessons. They own most all the money,
and the finest houses, and _all the people_. Just _own_ them. Own them
so's they can tell good friends to go to it, and _kill_ each other, even
_relations_."
"And do they _do_ it?" marvelled Peaches.
"Sure they do it!" cried Mickey. "Why they are doing it _right now!_ I
could bring a paper and read you things that would make you so sick you
couldn't sit up!"
"What kind of things, Mickey?"
"About kings making all the fathers kill each other, and burn down each
other's houses, and blow up the cities, and eat all the food themselves,
and leave the mothers with no home, and no groceries, and no stove, and no
beds, and the bullets flying, and the cities burning, and no place to go,
and the children starving and dying--Gee, I ain't ever going to tell you
any more, Lily! It's too awful! You'd feel better not to know. Honest you
would! Wish I hadn't told you anything about it at all. Where's your
slate? We got to do lessons 'fore it gets so dark and we are so sleepy we
can't see."
Peaches proudly handed him the slate. In wavering lines and tremulous
curves ran her first day's work alone, over erasures, and with relinings,
in hills and deep depressions, which it is possible Mickey read because he
knew what it had to be, he proudly translated, "Mickey-lovest." Then the
lines of the night before, then "cow" and "milk." And then Mickey whooped
because he faintly recognized an effort to draw a picture of the cow and
the milk bottle.
"Grand Lily!" he cried. "Gee, you're the smartest kid I ever knew! You'll
know all I do 'fore long, and then you'll need your back, so's you can get
ready to go to a Young Ladies' Sem'nary."
"What's that?" interestedly asked Peaches.
"A school. Where other _nice_ girls go, and where you learn all that I
don't know to teach you," said Mickey.
"I won't go!" said Peaches.
"Oh yes you will, Miss," said Mickey. "'Cause you're my family, so you'll
do as I say."
"Will you go with me?" asked Peaches.
"Sure! I'll take you there in a big au----Oh, I don't know as I will
either. We'll have to save our money, if we _both_ go. We'll go on a
_street_ car, and walk up a grand av'noo among trees, and I'll take you
in, and see if your room is right, and everything, and all the girls will
like you 'cause you're so smart, and your hair's so pretty, and then I'll
go to a boys' school close by, and learn how to make poetry pieces that
beat any in the papers. Every time I make a new one I'll come and ask, 'Is
Miss Lily--Miss Lily Peaches----' Gee kid, _what's your name?_"
Mickey stared at Peaches, while she stared back at him.
"I don't know," she said. "Do you care, Mickey?"
"What was your granny's?" asked Mickey.
"I don't know," answered Peaches.
"Was she your mother's mother?" persisted Mickey.
"Yes," replied Peaches.
"Did you ever see your father?" Mickey went on.
"I don't know nothing about fathers," she said.
Mickey heaved a deep sigh.
"Well! _That's_ over!" he said. "_I_ know something about fathers. I know
a lot. I know that you are no worse off, not knowing _who_ your father was
than to know he was so _mean_ that you are _glad_ he's dead. Your way
leaves you _hoping_ that he was just awful nice, and got killed, or was
taken sick or something; my way, there ain't no doubts in your mind. You
are plumb sure he wasn't decent. Don't you bother none about fathers!"
"My I'm glad, Mickey!" cried Peaches joyously.
"So am I," said Mickey emphatically. "We don't want any fathers coming
here to butt in on us, just as we get your back Carreled and you ready to
start to school."
"Can I go without a _name_ Mickey?" asked Peaches.
"Course not!" said Mickey. "You have to put your name on a roll the first
thing, then you must be interdooced to the Head Lady and all the girls."
"What'll I do Mickey?" anxiously inquired Peaches.
"Well, for smart as you are in some spots, you're awful dumb in others,"
commented Mickey. "What'll you do, saphead? Gee! Ain't you _mine?_ Ain't
you my _family?_ Ain't _my name_ good enough for you? Your name will be
Miss Lily Peaches O'Halloran. That's a name good enough for a Queen Lady!"
"What's a Queen?" inquired Peaches.
"Wife of those kings we were just talking about."
"Sure!" said Peaches. "None of them have a nicer name than that! Mickey,
is my bow straight?"
"Naw it ain't!" said Mickey. "Take the baby 'til I fix it! It's about
slipped off! There! That's better."
"Mickey, let me see it!" suggested Peaches.
Mickey brought the mirror. She looked so long he grew tired and started to
put it back, but she clung to it.
"Just lay it on the bed," she said.
"Naw I don't, Miss Chicken--O'Halloran!" he said. "Mirrors cost money, and
if you pull the sheet in the night, and slide ours off, and it breaks, we
got seven years of bad luck coming, and we are nix on changing the luck we
have right now. It's good enough for us. Think of them Belgium kids where
the kings are making the fathers fight. This goes where it belongs, then
you take your drink, and let me beat your pillow, and you fix your baby,
and then we'll say our prayers, and go to sleep."
Mickey replaced the mirror and carried out the program he had outlined.
When he came to the prayer he ordered Peaches to shut her eyes, fold her
hands and repeat after him:
"'Now I lay me down to sleep'"----
Peaches' eyes opened.
"Oh, is it a poetry prayer, Mickey?" she asked.
"Yes. Kind of a one. Say it," answered Mickey.
Peaches obeyed, repeating the words lingeringly and in her sweetest tones.
Mickey thrilled to his task.
"'I pray the Lord my soul to keep'"----he proceeded.
"What's my soul, Mickey?" she asked.
"The very nicest thing inside of you," explained Mickey. "Go on!"
"Like my heart?" questioned Peaches.
"Yes. Only nicer," said Mickey. "Shut your eyes and go on!"
Peaches obeyed.
"'If I should die before I wake'"----continued Mickey.
Peaches' eyes flashed open; she drew back in horror.
"I won't!" she cried. "I won't _say_ that. That's what happened to granny,
an' I saw. She was the awfullest, an' then--the men came. I _won't!_"
Mickey opened his eyes, looking at Peaches, his lips in a set line, his
brow wrinkled in thought.
"Well I don't know what they went and put _that_ in for," he said
indignantly. "Scaring little kids into fits! It's all right when you don't
_know_ what it means, but when kids has been through what we have, it's
different. I wouldn't say it either. You wait a minute. I can beat that
myself. Let me think. Now I got it! Shut your eyes and go on:
"If I should come to live with Thee----"
"Well I ain't goin'!" said Peaches flatly. "I'm goin' to stay right here
with you. I'd a lot rather than anywhere. King's house or anywhere!"
"I never saw such a kid!" wailed Mickey. "I think that's pretty. I like it
heaps. Come on Peaches! Be good! Listen! The next line goes: 'Open loving
arms to shelter me.' Like the big white Jesus at the Cathedral door. Come
on now!"
"I _won't!_ I'm goin' to live right here, and I don't want no big white
Jesus' arms; I want _yours_. 'F I go anywhere, you got to lift me
yourself, and let me take my Precious Child along."
"Lily, you're the worst kid I ever saw," said Mickey. "No you ain't
either! I know a lot worse than you. You just don't understand. I guess
you better pray something you _do_ understand. Let me think again. Now try
this: Keep me through the starry night----"
"Sure! I just love that," crooned Peaches.
"Wake me safe with sunrise bright," prompted Mickey, and the child
smilingly repeated the words. "Now comes some 'Blesses,'" said Mickey. "I
don't know just how to manage them. You haven't a father to bless, and
your mother got what was coming to her long ago; blessing her now wouldn't
help any if it wasn't pleasant; same with your granny, only more recent.
I'll tell you! Now I know! 'Bless the Sunshine Lady for all the things to
make me comfortable, and bless the Moonshine Lady for the ribbons and the
doll.'"
"Aw!" cried Peaches, staring up at him in rebellion.
"Now you go on, Miss Chicken," ordered Mickey, losing patience, "and then
you end with 'Amen,' which means, 'So be it,' or 'Make it happen that
way,' or something like that. Go to it now!"
Peaches shut her eyes, refolded her hands and lifted her chin. After a
long pause Mickey was on the point of breaking, she said sweetly: "Bless
Mickey-lovest, an' bless him, an' bless him million times; an' bless him
for the bed, an' the window, an' bless him for finding the Nurse Lady, an'
bringing the ribbons, an' the doll, an' bless him for the slate, an' the
teachin's, an' bless him for everything I just love, an' love. Amen--
hard!"
When Peaches opened her eyes she found Mickey watching her, a commingling
of surprise and delight on his face. Then he bent over and laid his cheek
against hers.
"You fool little kid," he whispered tenderly. "You precious fool little
flowersy-kid! You make a fellow love you 'til he nearly busts inside. Kiss
me good-night, Lily."
He slipped the ribbon from her hair, straightened the sheets, arranged as
the nurse had taught him, laid the doll as Peaches desired, and then
screened by the foot of the bed, undressed and stretched himself on the
floor. The same moon that peeped in the window to smile her broadest at
Peaches and her Precious Child, and touched Mickey's face to wondrous
beauty, at that hour also sent shining bars of light across the veranda
where Leslie sat and told Douglas Bruce about the trip to the swamp.
"I never knew I could be so happy over anything in all this world that
didn't include you and Daddy. But of course this does in a way; you, at
least. Much as you think of, and are with, Mr. Minturn, you can't help
being glad that joy has come to him at last. Why don't you say something,
Douglas?"
"I have been effervescing ever since you came to the office after me, and
I find now that the froth is off, I'm getting to the solid facts in the
case, and, well I don't want to say a word to spoil your joyous day, but
I'm worried, 'Bringer of Song.'"
"Worried?" cried Leslie. "Why? You don't think he wouldn't be pleased? You
don't think he might not be--responsive, do you?"
"Think of the past years of neglect, insult and humiliation!" suggested
Douglas.
"Think of the future years of loving care, reparation and joy!" commented
Leslie.
"Please God they outweigh!" said Douglas. "Of course they will! It must be
a few things I've seen lately that keep puzzling me."
"What have you seen, Douglas?" questioned Leslie.
"Deals in real estate," he answered. "Consultations with detectives and
policemen, scientists and surgeons."
"But what could that have to do with Nellie Minturn?"
"Nothing, I hope," said Douglas, "but there has been a grimness about
Minturn lately, a going ahead with jaws set that looks ugly for what
opposes him, and you tell me they have been in opposition ever since they
married. I can't put him from my thoughts as I saw him last."
"And I can't her," said Leslie. "She was a lovely picture as she came
across the silver moss carpet, you know that gray green, Douglas, her face
flushed, her eyes wet, her arms full of those perfectly beautiful,
lavender-pink fringed orchids. She's a handsome woman, dearest, and she
never looked quite so well to me as when she came picking her way beneath
the dark tamarack boughs. She was going to ask him to go with her to take
her flowers to Elizabeth, and over that little white casket she intended--
Why Douglas, he couldn't, he simply couldn't!"
"Suppose he had something previously worked out that cut her off!"
"Oh Douglas! What makes you think such a thing?"
"What Minturn said to me this morning with such bitterness on his face and
in his voice as I never before encountered in man," Douglas answered.
"He said----?" prompted Leslie.
"This is my _last_ day as a _laughing-stock_ for my fellowmen! To-morrow I
shall hold up my head!"
"Why didn't you tell me that _before?_"
"Didn't realize until just now that you and she hadn't _seen_ him--that
you were acting on presumption.
"I'm going to call her!" cried Leslie.
"I wouldn't!" advised Douglas.
"Why not?"
"After as far as she went to-day, if she had anything she wanted you to
know, wouldn't she feel free to call you?"
"You are right," conceded Leslie. "Even after to-day, for me to call would
be an intrusion. Let's not talk of it further! Don't you wish we could
take a peep at Mickey carrying the doll to the little sick girl?"
"I surely do!" answered Douglas. "What do you think of him, Leslie?"
"Great! Simply great!" cried the girl. "Douglas you should have heard him
educate me on the doll question."
"How?" he asked interestedly.
"From the first glimpse I had of him, the thought came to me, 'That's
Douglas' Little Brother'" she explained. "When you telephoned and said you
were sending him to me, just one idea possessed me: to get what you
wanted. Almost without thought at all I tried the first thing he
mentioned, which happened to be a little sick neighbour girl he told me
about. All girls like a doll, and I had one dressed for a birthday gift
for a namesake of mine, and time plenty to fix her another. I brought it
to Mickey and thought he'd be delighted."
"Was he rude?" inquired Douglas anxiously.
"Not in the least!" she answered. "Only casual! Merely made me see how
thoughtless and unkind and positively vulgar my idea of pleasing a poor
child was."
"Leslie, you shock me!" exclaimed Douglas.
"I mean every word of it," said the girl. "Now listen to me! It _is_
thoughtless to offer a gift headlong, without considering a second, is it
not?"
"Merely impulsive," replied Douglas.
"Identically the same thing!" declared Leslie. "Listen I said! Without a
thought about suitability, I offered an extremely poor child the gift I
had prepared for a very rich one. Mickey made me see in ten words that it
would be no kindness to fill his little friend's head with thoughts that
would sadden her heart with envy, make her feel all she lacked more keenly
than ever; give her a gift that would breed dissatisfaction instead of
joy; if that isn't vulgarity, what is? Mickey's Lily has no business with
a doll so gorgeous the very sight of it brings longing, instead of
comfort. It was unkind to offer a gift so big and heavy it would tire and
worry her."
"There _are_ some ideas there on giving!"
"Aren't there though!" said Leslie. "Mickey took about three minutes to
show me that Lily was _satisfied_ as she was, so no one would thank me for
awakening discontent in her heart. He measured off her size and proved to
me that a small doll, that would not tire her to handle, would be
suitable, and so dressed that its clothes could be washed and would be
plain as her own. Even further! Once my brain began working I saw that a
lady doll with shoes and stockings to suggest outdoors and walking, was
not a kind gift to make a bedridden child. Douglas, after Mickey started
me I arose by myself to the point of seeing that a little cuddly baby
doll, helpless as she, one that she could nestle, and play with lying in
bed would be the proper gift for Lily. Think of a 'newsy' making me see
_that!_ Isn't he wonderful?"
"You should have heard him making me see things!" said Douglas. "Yours are
faint and feeble to the ones he taught me. Refused me at every point, and
marched away leaving me in utter rout! Outside wanting you for my wife,
more than anything else on earth, I wanted Mickey for my Little Brother."
"You have him!" comforted the girl. "The Lord arranged that. You remember
He said, 'All men are brothers,' and wasn't it Tolstoy who wrote: 'If
people would only understand that they are not the sons of some fatherland
or other, nor of governments, but are sons of God?' You and Mickey will
get your brotherhood arranged to suit both of you some of these days."
"Exactly!" conceded Douglas. "But I wanted Mickey at hand now! I wanted
him to come and go with me. To be educated with what I consider
education."
"It will come yet," prophesied Leslie. "Your ideas are splendid! I see how
fine they are! The trouble is this: you had a plan mapped out at which
Mickey was to jump. Mickey happened to have preconceived ideas on the
subject, so he didn't jump. You wanted to be the king on the throne and
stretch out a royal hand," laughed Leslie. "You wanted to lift Mickey to
your level, and with the inherent fineness in him, have him feel eternal
love and gratitude toward you?"
"That sounds different, but it is the real truth."
"And Mickey doesn't care to be brother to kings, he doesn't perceive the
throne even; he wants you to understand at the start that you will _take_,
as well as _give_. Refusing pay for tidying your office was his first
inning. That 'Me to you!' was great. I can see the accompanying gesture.
It was the same one he used in demolishing my doll. Something vital and
inborn. Something loneliness, work, the crowd, and raw life have taught
Mickey, that we don't know. Learn all you can from him. I've had one good
lesson, I'm receptive and ready for the next. Let's call the car and drive
an hour."
"That will be pleasant," agreed Douglas.
"Anywhere in the suburbs to avoid the crowds," was Leslie's order to her
driver.
Slowly, under traffic regulations, the car ran through the pleasant spring
night; the occupants talking without caring where they were so long as
they were together, in motion, and it was May. They were passing
residences where city and country met. The dwellings of people city bound,
country determined. Homes where men gave so many hours to earning money,
then sped away to train vines, prune trees, dig in warm earth and make
things grow. Such men now crossed green lawns and talked fertilizers, new
annuals, tree surgery, and carried gifts of fragrant, blooming things to
their friends. Here the verandas were wide and children ran from them to
grassy playgrounds; on them women read or sat with embroidery hoops or
visited in small groups.
"Let's move," said Leslie. "Let's coax Daddy to sell our place and come
here. One wouldn't ever need go summering, it's cool and pleasant always.
I'd love it! There's a new house and a lawn under old trees, to shelter
playing children; isn't it charming?"
"Quite! But that small specimen seems refractory."
Leslie leaned forward to see past him. In an open door stood a man clearly
silhouetted against the light. Down the steps sped a screaming boy about
nine. After him ran another five or six years older. When the child saw he
would be overtaken, he headed straight for the street; as the pursuer's
hand brushed him, he threw himself kicking and clawing. The elder boy
hesitated, looking for an opening to find a hold. The car was half a block
away when Leslie turned a white face to Douglas and gasped inarticulately.
He understood something was wrong so signalled the driver to stop.
"Turn and pass those children again!" ordered Leslie.
As the car went by slowly the second time, the child still fought, the boy
stepped back, while James Minturn with grim face, bent under the light and
by force took into his arms the twisting, fighting boy.
"Heaven help him!" cried Douglas. "Not a sign of happy reconciliation
there!"
Leslie tried to choke down her sobs.
"Oh Nellie Minturn! Poor woman!" she wailed.
"So _that's_ what he was doing!" marvelled Douglas. "A house he has built
to suit himself; training his sons personally, with the assistance of his
Little Brother. That boy was William. I see him in Minturn's office every
day."
"Oh I think he might have given her a chance!" protested Leslie. "Remember
how she was reared! Think what a struggle it was for her even to
contemplate trying to be different."
"Evidently she was too late!" said Douglas. "He must have been gone before
you returned from the swamp."
"I'm going back there and tell him a few things! I think he might have
waited. Douglas, I'm afraid he did wait! She said he told her he wanted to
talk with her when she came back--and oh Douglas, she said he had a small
box and he threatend to 'freeze her soul with its contents!' Douglas,
_what_ could he have had?"
"'Freeze her soul!' Let me think!" said Douglas. "I met Professor Tickner
and Dr. Wills coming from his offices a few days ago, while he's just back
from a trip that he didn't tell me he was taking----
"You mean Tickner, the scientist; Wills, the surgeon?"
"Yes," answered Douglas.
"But those children! Aren't they perfectly healthy?"
"They look it! Lord, Leslie!" cried Douglas, "I have it! He _has_ made
good his threat. He has frozen her soul! What you want to do is to go to
her, Leslie!"
"Douglas, tell me!" she demanded.
"I can't!" said Douglas. "I may be mistaken. I think I am not, but there
is always a chance! Drive to the Minturn residence," he ordered.
They found a closed dark pile of stone.
"Go past that place where the children were again!" said Leslie.
The upper story was quiet. Outlined by veranda lights the massive form of
James Minturn paced back and forth under the big trees, his hands clasped
behind him, his head bowed, and he walked alone.
"Douglas, I'm going to speak to him. I'm going to tell him!" declared
Leslie.
"But you're now conceding that _she_ saw him!" Douglas pointed out. "Then
what have you to tell him that she would not? If she couldn't move him
with what she said, and while you don't know his side, what could you say
to him?"
"Nothing," she conceded.
"Precisely my opinion," said Douglas. "Remember Leslie I am a little ahead
of you in this. You know _her_ side. I know all you have told me of her,
also I know what he has told me; while putting what I have seen, and heard
at the office, and him here with the boys, in a house she would consider
too plebeian for words----"
"No Douglas. No! She is changed!" cried Leslie. "Completely changed, I
tell you! She said she would wipe Malcolm's nose and fix James' studs----"
"Mere figures of speech!" remarked Douglas.
"They meant she was ready to work with her own hands for happiness," said
Leslie indignantly.
"I think she's too late!" said Douglas. "I am afraid she is one of the
unhappiest women in the world to-night!"
"Douglas, it wrings my heart!" cried Leslie.
"Mine also, but what can we do?" he answered. "For ten years, she has
persisted in having her way, you tell me; what could she have expected?"
"That he would have some heart," protested Leslie. "That he would forgive
when he was asked, as all of us are commanded to."
"Does it occur to you that he might have confronted her with something
that prevented her from asking?" suggested Douglas. "She may never have
reached her flowers and her proposed concessions."
"What makes you think so?" queried Leslie.
"What I see and surmise, and a thing I know."
"What can I do?" asked Leslie.
"Nothing!" Douglas said with finality. "If either of them wants you, they
know where to find you. But you're tired now. Let's give the order for
home."
"Shan't sleep a wink to-night!" prophesied Leslie.
"I was afraid of that!" exclaimed Douglas. "There may be a message there
for you that will be a comfort."
"So there may be! Let's hurry!" urged the girl.
There was. They found a brief, pencilled note.
DEAR LESLIE:
_After to-day, it was due you to send a word. You tried so hard dear, and
you gave me real joy for an hour. Then James carried out his threat. He
did all to me he intended, and more than he can ever know. I have agreed
to him taking full possession of the boys, and going into a home such as
he thinks suitable. They will be far better off, and since they scarcely
know me, they can't miss me. Before you receive this, I shall have left
the city. I can't state just now where I am going or what I shall do. You
can realize a little of my condition. If ever you are tired of home life
and faintly tempted to neglect it for society, use me for your horrible
example. Good-bye,_
NELLIE MINTURN.
Leslie read this aloud.
"It's a relief to know that much," she said with a deep breath. "I can't
imagine myself ever being 'faintly tempted," but if I am, surely she is
right about the 'horrible example.' Douglas, whatever did James Minturn
have in that box?"
"I could tell you what I surmise, but so long as I don't _know_ I'd better
not," he answered.
"As our mutual friend Mickey would say, 'Nix on the Swell Dames,' for me!"
said Leslie determinedly.
"Thank God with all my heart!" cried Douglas Bruce.
CHAPTER VIII
_Big Brother_
"I've no time to talk," said Douglas Bruce, as Mickey appeared the
following day; "my work seems too much for one man. Can you help me?"
"Sure!" said Mickey, wadding his cap into his back pocket. Then he rolled
his sleeves a turn higher, lifted his chin a trifle and stepped forward.
"Say what!"
It caught Douglas so suddenly there was no time for concealment. He
laughed heartily.
"That's good!" he cried. Mickey grinned in comradeship. "First, these
letters to the box in the hall."
"Next?" Mickey queried as he came through the door.
"This package to the room of the Clerk in the City Hall, and bring back a
receipt bearing his signature."
Mickey saluted, laid the note inside the cover of a book, put it in the
middle of the package, and a second later his gay whistle receded down the
hall.
"'Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not
depart from it,'" Douglas quoted. "Mickey has been trained until he would
make a good trainer himself."
In one-half the time the trip had taken the messenger boys Douglas was
accustomed to employing, Mickey was back like the Gulf in the Forum,
demanding "more."
"See what you can do for these rooms, until the next errand is ready,"
suggested Douglas.
Mickey began gathering up the morning papers, straightening the rugs,
curtains and arranging the furniture.
"Hand this check to the janitor," said Douglas. "And Mickey, kindly ask
him if two dollars was what I agreed to pay him for my extras this week."
"Sure!" said Mickey.
Douglas would have preferred "Yes sir," but "Sure!" was a permanent
ejaculation decorating the tip of Mickey's tongue. The man watching
closely did not fail to catch the flash of interest and the lifting of the
boy figure as he paused for instructions. When he returned Douglas said
casually: "While I am at it, I'll pay off my messenger service. Take this
check to the address and bring a receipt for the amount."
Mickey's comment came swiftly: "Gee! that boy would be sore, if he lost
his job!"
"Messenger Service Agency," Douglas said, busy at his desk. "No boy would
lose his job."
"Oh!" exclaimed Mickey comprehendingly. His face lighted at the
information. Next he carried a requisition for books to another city
official and telephoned a cafe to deliver a pitcher of lemonade and some
small cakes, and handed the boy a dime.
"Why didn't you send me and save your silver?"
"I did not think," answered Bruce. "Some one gets the tip, you might as
well have had it."
"I didn't mean me _have_ it, I meant you _save_ it."
"Mickey," said Douglas, "you know perfectly I can't take your time unless
you accept from me what I am accustomed to paying other boys."
"Letting others bleed you, you mean," said Mickey indignantly. "Why I'd a-
been glad to brought the juice for five! You never ought to paid more."
"Should have paid more," corrected Douglas.
"'Should have paid more,'" repeated Mickey. "Thanks!"
"Now try this," said Douglas, filling two glasses.
"'Tain't usual!" said Mickey. "You drink that yourself or save it for
friends that may drop in."
"Very well!" said Douglas. "Of course you might have it instead of the boy
who comes after the pitcher, but if you don't like it----"
"All right if that's the way!" agreed Mickey.
He retired to a window seat, enjoyed the cool drink and nibbled the cake,
his eyes deeply thoughtful. When offered a second glass Mickey did not
hesitate.
"Nope!" he said conclusively. "A fellow's head and heels work better when
his stomach is running light. I can earn more not to load up with a lot of
stuff. I eat at home when my work is finished. She showed me that."
"She showed you a good many things, didn't She?"
"Sure!" said Mickey. "She was my mother, so we had to look out for
ourselves. When you got nothing but yourself between you and the wolf, you
learn to fly, and keep your think-tank in running order. She knew just
what was coming to me, so She _showed_ me, and _every single thing She
said has come, and then some!_"
"I see!" said Douglas. "A wise mother!"
"Sure!" agreed Mickey. "But I guess it wouldn't have done either of us
much good if I hadn't remembered and kept straight on doing what she
taught me."
"You are right, it wouldn't," conceded Douglas.
"That's where I'm going to climb above some of the other fellows,"
announced Mickey confidently. "Either they didn't have mothers to teach
them or else they did, and forget, or think the teaching wasn't worth
anything. Now me, I _know_ She was right! She always _proved_ it! She had
been up against it longer than I had and She knew, so I am going to go
right along doing as She said. I'll beat them, and carry double at that!"
"How double, Mickey?" inquired Douglas.
"I didn't mean to say that," he explained. "That was a slip. There's a--
there's something----something I'm trying to do that costs more than it
does to live. I'm bound to do it, so I got to run light and keep my lamps
polished for chances. What next, sir?"
"Call 9-40-X, and order my car here," said Douglas.
He bent over his papers to hide his face when from an adjoining room
drifted Mickey's voice in clear enunciation and suave intonation: "Mr.
Douglas Bruce desires his car to be sent immediately to the Iroquois
Building."
His mental comment was: "The little scamp has drifted to street lingo when
he lacked his mother to restrain him. He can speak a fairly clean grade of
English now if he chooses."
"Next?" briskly inquired Mickey.
"Now look here," said Douglas. "This isn't a horse race. I earn my living
with my brains, not my heels. I must have time to think things out; when
your next job arrives I'll tell you. If you are tired, take a nap on that
couch in there." "Asleep at the switch!" marvelled Mickey.
He went to the adjoining room but did not sleep. He quietly polished and
straightened furniture, lingered before bookcases and was at Douglas'
elbow as he turned to call him. Then they closed the offices and went to
the car, each carrying a load of ledgers.
"You do an awful business!" commented Mickey. "Your car?"
"Yes," answered Douglas.
"You're doing grand, for young as you are."
"I haven't done it all myself, Mickey," explained Douglas. "I happened to
select a father who was of an acquisitive turn of mind. He left me enough
that I can have a comfortable living in a small way, from him."
"Gee! It's lucky you got the Joy Lady then!" exclaimed Mickey. "Maybe you
wouldn't ever work if you didn't have her to scratch for!"
"I always have worked and tried to make something of myself," said
Douglas.
"Yes, I guess you have," conceded Mickey. "I think it shows when a man
does. It just shows a lot on you."
"Thank you, Mickey! Same to you!"
"Aw, nix on me!" said Mickey. "I ain't nothing on looks! I ain't ever
looked at myself enough that if I was sent to find Michael O'Halloran I
mightn't bring in some other fellow."
"But you're enough acquainted with yourself that you wouldn't bring in a
dirty boy with a mouth full of swearing and beer," suggested Douglas.
"Well not this evening!" cried Mickey. "On a gamble that ain't my
picture!"
"If it were, you wouldn't be here!" said Douglas.
"No, nor much of any place else 'cept the gutters, alleys, and the police
court," affirmed Mickey. "That ain't my style! I'd like to be--well--about
like you."
"You are perfectly welcome to all I have and am," said Douglas. "If you
fail to take advantage of the offer, it will be your own fault."
"Yes, I guess it will," reflected Mickey. "You gave me the chance. I am to
blame if I don't cop on to it, and get in the game. I like you fine! Your
work is more interesting than odd jobs on the street, and you pay like a
plute. You're being worked though. You pay too much. If I work for you it
would save you money to let me manage that; I could get you help and
things a lot cheaper, then you could spend what you save on the Joy Lady,
making her more joyous."
"You are calling Miss Winton the Joy Lady?"
"Yes," said Mickey. "Doesn't she just look it?"
"She surely does," agreed Douglas. "It's a good title. I know only two
that are better. She sows happiness everywhere. What about your Lily girl
and her doll?"
"Doll doesn't go. That's a Precious Child!"
"I see! Lily is a little girl you like, Mickey?"
"Lily is the littlest girl you ever saw," answered Mickey, "with a bad
back so that she hasn't ever walked; and she's so sweet--she's the only
thing I've got to love, so I love her 'til it hurts. Her back is one thing
I'm saving for. I'm going to have it Carreled as soon as I get money, and
she grows strong enough to stand it."
"'Carreled?'" queried Douglas wonderingly.
"You know the man who put different legs on a dog?" said Mickey. "I often
read about him in papers I sell. I think he can fix her back. But not yet.
A Sunshine Nurse I know says nobody can help her back 'til she grows a lot
stronger and fatter. She has to have milk and be rubbed with oil, and not
be jerked for a while before it's any use to begin on her back."
"And has she the milk and the oil and the kindness?"
"You just bet she has," said Mickey. "Her family tends to that. And she
has got a bed, and a window, and her Precious Child, and a slate, and
books."
"That's all right then," said Douglas. "Any time you see she needs
anything Mickey, I'd be glad if you would tell me or Miss Winton. She
loves to do kind things to little sick children to make them happier."
"So do I," said Mickey. "And Lily is _my_ job. But that isn't robbing Miss
Joy Lady. She can love herself to death if she wants to on hundreds of
little, sick, cold, miserable children, in every cellar and garret and
tenement of the east end of Multiopolis. The only kind thing God did for
them out there was to give them the first chance at sunrise. Multiopolis
hasn't ever followed His example by giving them anything."
"You mean Miss Winton can find some other child to love and care for?"
asked Douglas.
"Sure!" said Mickey emphatically. "It's hands off Lily. Her family is
taking care of her, so she's got all she needs right now."
"That's good!" said Bruce. "Here we unload."
They entered a building and exchanged the books they carried for others
which Douglas selected with care, then returning to the office, locked
them in a safe.
"Now I am driving to the golf grounds for an hour's play," said Douglas.
"Will you go and caddy for me?"
"I never did. I don't know how," answered Mickey.
"You can learn, can't you?" suggested Douglas.
"Sure!" said Mickey. "I've seen boys carrying golf clubs that hadn't
enough sense to break stone right. I can learn, but my learning might
spoil your day's sport."
"It would be no big price to pay for an intelligent caddy," replied
Douglas.
"Mr. Bruce, what price is an intelligent caddy worth?"
"Our Scotch Club pays fifty cents a game and each man employs his own boy
if he chooses. The club used to furnish boys, but since the Big Brother
movement began, so many of the men have boys in their offices they are
accustomed to, and want to give a run over the hills after the day's work,
that the rule has been changed. I can employ you, if you want to serve
me."
"I'd go to the _country_ in the car with you, every day you play, and
carry your clubs?" asked Mickey wonderingly.
"Yes," answered Douglas.
"Over real hills, where there's trees, grass, cows and water?" questioned
Mickey.
"Yes," repeated Douglas.
"What time would we get back?" he asked.
"Depends on how late I play, and whether I have dinner at the club house,
say seven as a rule, maybe ten or later at times."
"Nothing doing!" said Mickey promptly. "I got to be home at six by the
clock every day, even if we were engaged in 'hurling back the enemy.'
See?"
"But Mickey! That spoils everything!" cried Douglas. "Of course you could
work for me the remainder of the day if you wanted to, and I could keep my
old clubhouse caddy, but I want _you_. You want the ride in the country,
you want the walk, you _need_ the change and recreation. You are not a
real boy if you don't want that!"
"I'm so real, I'm two boys if _wanting_ it counts, but it doesn't!" said
Mickey. "You see I got a _job_ for evening. I'm promised. I'd rather do
what you want than anything I ever saw or heard of, except just this. I've
given my word, and I'm depended on. I couldn't give up this work, and I
wouldn't, if I could. Even golf ain't in it with this job that I'm on."
"What is your work Mickey?"
"Oh I ain't ever exactly certain," said Mickey. "Sometimes it is one
thing, sometimes it is another, but always it's something, and it's work
for a party I couldn't disappoint, not noways, not for all the golf in the
world."
"You are sure?" persisted Douglas.
"Dead sure with no changing," said Mickey.
"All right then. I'm sorry!" exclaimed Douglas.
"So am I," said Mickey. "But not about the job!"
Douglas laughed. "Well come along this evening and look on. I'll be back
before six and I'll run you where we did last night, if that is close your
home."
"Thanks," said Mickey. "I'd love to, but you needn't bother about taking
me home. I can make it if I start at six. Shall I take the things back to
the cafe?" "Let them go until morning," said Douglas.
"What becomes of the little cakes?"
"Their fate is undecided. Have you any suggestions?"
"I should worry!" he exclaimed. "They'd fit my pocket. I could hike past
the hospital and ask the Sunshine Lady; if she said so, I could take them
to Lily. Bet she never tasted any like them. If it's between her and the
cafe selling them over, s'pose she takes the cake?"
Mickey's face was one big insinuating, suggestive smile. Douglas' was
another.
"Suppose she does," he agreed.
"I must wrap them," said Mickey. "Have to be careful about Lily. If she's
fed dirty, wrong stuff, it will make fever so her back will get worse
instead of better."
"Will a clean envelope do?" suggested Douglas.
"That would cost you two cents," said Mickey. "Haven't you something
cheaper?"
"What about a sheet of paper?" hazarded Douglas.
"Fine!" said Mickey, "and only half as expensive."
So they wrapped the little cakes and closed the office. Then Douglas said:
"Now this ends work for the day. Next comes playtime."
"Then before we begin to play we ought to finish business," said Mickey.
"I have been thinking over what you said the other day, and while I was
right about some of it, I was mistaken about part. I ain't changing
anything I said about Minturn men and his sort, and millyingaire men and
their sort; but you ain't that kind of a man----"
"Thank you, Mickey," said Douglas.
"No you ain't that _kind_ of a man," continued Mickey. "And you are just
the kind of a man I'd _like_ to be; so if the door ain't shut, guess I'll
stick around afternoons."
"Not all day?" inquired Douglas.
"Well you see I am in the paper business and that takes all morning,"
explained Mickey. "I can always finish my first batch by noon, lots of
times by ten; from that on to six I could work for you."
"Don't you think you could earn more with me, and in the winter at least,
be more comfortable?" asked Douglas.
"Winter!" cried Mickey, his face whitening.
"Yes," said Douglas. "The newsboys always look frightfully cold in
winter."
"Winter!" It was a piteous cry.
"What is it, Mickey?" questioned Bruce kindly.
"You know I _forgot_ it," he said. "I was so took up with what I was
doing, and thinking right now, that I forgot a time ever was coming when
it gets blue cold, and little kids freeze. Gee! I almost wish I hadn't
thought of it. I guess I better sell my paper business, and come with you
all day. I _know_ I could earn more. I just sort of _hate_ to give up the
papers. I been at them so long. I've had such a good time. 'I like to sell
papers!' That's the way I always start my cry, and I do. I just love to. I
sell to about the same bunch every morning, and most of my men know me,
and they always say a word, and I like the rush and excitement and the
things that happen, and the looking for chances on the side----"
"There's messenger work in my business."
"I see! I like that! I like your work all right," said Mickey. "Gimme a
few days to sell my route to the best advantage I can, and I'll come all
day. I'll come for about a half what you are paying now."
"But you admit you need money urgently."
"Well not so urgently as to skin a friend to get it--not even with the
winter I hadn't thought of coming. Gee--I don't know just what I am going
to do about that."
"For yourself, Mickey?" inquired Douglas.
"Well in a way, yes," hesitated Mickey. "There are things to _think_
about! Gee I got to hump myself while the sun shines! If you say so, then
I'll get out of the paper business as soon as I can; and I'll begin work
for you steady at noon to-morrow. I've seen you pay out over seven to-day.
I'll come for six. Is it a bargain?"
"No," said Douglas, "it isn't! The janitor bill was for a week of half-
done work. The messenger bill was for two days, no caddying at all. If you
come you will come for not less than eight and what you earn extra over
that. I don't agree to better service for less pay. If you will have
things between us on a commercial basis, so will I."
"Oh the Big Brother business would be all right--with you," conceded
Mickey, "but I don't just like the way it's managed, mostly. God didn't
make us brothers no more than he did all men, so we better not butt in and
try to fix things over for Him. Looks to me like we might cut the brother
business and just be _friends_. I could be an awful good _friend_ to you,
honest I could!"
"And I to you Mickey," said Douglas Bruce, holding out his hand. "Have it
as you will. Friends, then! Look for you at noon to-morrow. Now we play.
Hop in and we'll run to my rooms and get my clubs."
"Shall I sit up with your man?" asked Mickey.
"My friends sit beside me," said Douglas. Mickey spoke softly: "Yes, but
if I watched him sharp, maybe I could get the hang of driving for you.
Think what a lump that would save. When I'm going, I'd love to drive, just
for the fun of it."
"And I wouldn't allow you to drive for less than I pay him," said Douglas.
"I don't see why!" exclaimed Mickey.
"When you grow older and know me better, you will."
While the car was running its smoothest, while the country Mickey had not
seen save on rare newsboy excursions, flashed past, while the wonder of
the club house, the links, and the work he would have loved to do
developed, he shivered and cried in his tormented little soul: "Gee, how
will I ever keep Lily warm?" Douglas noticed his abstraction and wondered.
He had expected more appreciation of what Mickey was seeing and doing; he
was coming to the realization that he would find out what was in the boy's
heart in his own time and way. On the home run, when Douglas reached his
rooms, he told the driver to take Mickey to the end of the car line; the
boy shyly interposed to ask if he might go to the "Star of Hope Hospital,"
so Douglas changed the order.
Mickey's passport held good at the hospital. The Sunshine Nurse inspected
the cakes and approved them. She was so particular she even took a tiny
nibble of one and said: "Sugar, flour, egg and shortening--all right
Mickey, those can't hurt her. And how is she to-day?"
"Fine!" cried Mickey. "She is getting a lot stronger already. She can sit
up longer and help herself better, and she's got ribbons, the prettiest
you ever laid eyes on, that a lady gave me for her hair, and they make her
pink and nicer; and she's got a baby doll in long clean white dresses to
snuggle down and stay with her all day; and she's got a slate, and a book,
and she knows 'cow' and 'milk' and my name, and to-day she is learning
'bread.' To-morrow I am going to teach her 'baby,' and she can say her
prayer too nice for anything, once we got it fixed so she'd say it at
all."
"What did you teach her, Mickey?"
"'Now I lay me,' only Lily wouldn't say it the way She taught me. You see
Lily was all alone with her granny when she winked out and it scared her
most stiff, so when I got to that 'If I should die before I wake,' line,
she just went into fits, and remembering what I'd seen myself, I didn't
blame her; so I changed it for her 'til she liked it."
"Tell me about it, Mickey?" said the nurse.
"Well you see she has a window, so she can see the stars and the sun. She
knows them, so I just shifted the old sad, scary lines to:
"_Guard me through the starry night,
Wake me safe with sunshine bright!_"
"But Mickey, that's lovely!" cried the nurse. "Wait till I write it down!
I'll teach it to my little people. Half of them come here knowing that
prayer and when they are ill, they begin to think about it. Some of them
are old enough to worry over it. Why you're a poet, Mickey!"
"Sure!" conceded Mickey. "That's what I'm going to be when I get through
school. I'm going to write a poetry piece about Lily for the first sheet
of the _Herald_ that'll be so good they'll pay me to write one every day,
but all of them will be about her."
"Mickey, is there enough of such a little girl to furnish one every day?"
asked the nurse.
"Surest thing you know!" cried Mickey enthusiastically. "Why there are the
hundred gold rings on her head, one for each; and her eyes, tender and
teasy, and sad and glad, one for each; and the colour of them different a
dozen times a day, and her little white face, and her lips, and her smile,
and when she's good, and when she's bad; why Miss, there's enough of Lily
for a book big as Mr. Bruce's biggest law book."
"Well Mickey!" cried the girl laughing. "There's no question but you will
write the poetry, only I can't reconcile it with the kind of a hustler you
are. I thought poets were languid, dreamy, up-in-the-clouds kind of
people."
"So they are," explained Mickey. "_That_ comes later. First I got to
hustle to get Lily's back Carreled and us through school, and ready to
_write_ the poetry; then it will take so much dreaming to think out what
is nicest about her, and how to say it best, that it would make any fellow
languid--you can see how that would be!"
"Yes, I see!" conceded the nurse. "Mickey, by Carreling her back, do you
mean Dr. Carrel?"
"Sure!" cried Mickey. "You see I read a lot about him in the papers I
sell. He's the biggest man in the _world! He's bigger than emperors and
kings!_ They--why the biggest thing they can _do_ is to kill all their
strongest, bravest men. He's so much bigger than kings, that he can take
men they shoot to pieces and put them together again. Killing men ain't
much! Anybody can do killing! Look at him making folks live! _Gee, he's
big!_"
"And you think he can make Lily's back better?"
"Why I _know_ he can!" said Mickey earnestly. "That wouldn't be a patching
to what he _has_ done! Soon as you say she is strong enough, I'm going to
write to him and tell him all about her, and when I get the money saved,
he'll come and fix her. Sure he will!"
"If you could get to him and tell him yourself, I really believe he
would," marvelled the nurse. "But you see it's like this, Mickey: when men
are as great as he is, just thousands of people want everything of them,
and write letters by the hundreds, and if all of them were read there
would be time for nothing else, so a secretary opens the mail and decides
what is important, and that way the big people don't always know about the
ones they would answer if they were doing it. He's been here in this very
hospital; I've seen him operate once. Next time a perfectly wonderful case
comes in, that is in his peculiar line, no doubt he will be notified and
come again. Then if I could get word to you, and you could get Lily here,
possibly--just possibly he would listen to you and look at her--of course
I can't say surely he would--but I think he would!"
"Why of course he would!" triumphed Mickey. "Of course he would! He'd be
tickled to pieces! He'd just love to! Any man would! Why a white little
flowersy-girl who can't walk----!"
"If you could reach him, I really think he would," said the nurse
positively.
"Well just you gimme a hint that he's here, and see if I don't get to
him," said Mickey.
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