by Leroy Scott
CHAPTER V
GUEST TURNS HOST
The first object David's eyes fell upon when they opened the nextmorning was Tom, sitting beside the bed, a look of waiting eagerness onhis pinched face. The instant he saw David was awake he sprang up, andDavid perceived the boy had on one pair of the boxing-gloves.
"Can you use de mitts?" Tom asked excitedly.
"A little. I used to, that is," David answered, smiling at the oddfigure the cow-lick, the eager face, the baggy coat and the bigboxing-gloves combined to make of the boy.
"Come on, den!--git up! Let's have a go."
David slipped out of bed, and while he was dressing Tom entertained himwith an account of the Corbett-Britt fight, kinematograph pictures ofwhich he had seen at one of the Bowery theatres. Tom danced about thenarrow space between the bed and the wall, taking the part of one man,then of the other, giving blows and receiving blows, feinting, ducking,rushing and being rushed against imaginary ropes, and gasping out bitsof description: "Corbett breaks in an' lands like dis--Jimmie hands backdis poke--Corbett goes groggy--dey clinch--bing! bang! biff!--Den Jimmiegits in dis peach--Corbett kerplunks--one, two, t'ree, four, five, six,seven, eight, nine, ten--an' Corbett's a has-been!"
By this time David was half-dressed, and had drawn on the other pair ofgloves. They gravely shook hands and drew apart. "Be careful, and don'tmake me a has-been," David cautioned.
"Oh, mudder! Fetch me a step-ladder!" besought Tom, looking upward atDavid's head. He spat from one side of his mouth, drew his head downbetween his shoulders, rushed in, and began directing a fury of blows atDavid's stomach, which was near the level of his fists; and it took allDavid's long-rusted, but one-time considerable, skill to ward off therapid fists. He made no attempt to get in a blow himself, and this soondrew on him Tom's wrath.
"I ain't no baby!" the boy yelled in disgust. "Punch me!"
David proceeded to land a few light touches about the slender body.
"A-a-h, punch me!" Tom gasped. "Harder!"
David obeyed, and landed a chest blow that sent Tom to his back. Daviddropped to his knees beside him, alarmed, for the boy's face was whiteand dazed. But Tom rose to an elbow and pushed David away. His lipsmoved silently, then with sound: "Seven, eight, nine, ten." At "ten" hesprang to his feet and rushed at David again.
But David threw up his hands. "That's enough for to-day. And finishfights are against the New York law."
Tom grumblingly drew off the gloves. After their breakfast of bread andcoffee David asked him what he was going to do that day.
"Look for odd jobs."
"Where will you stay to-night?"
"Dunno."
"How did you like the floor?"
"Bully!"
"Well, suppose you come back and try it again to-night. Be here at six.Will you?"
"Will I!" gasped the boy. "You can just bet your gran'mudder'ssuspenders dat I will!"
When David returned at six, after another day of hopeless search, hefound Tom sitting in the doorway of the tenement. The boy's face lightedup with his lop-sided smile; David felt a quick glow at having someoneto give him a welcoming look--even though that someone were only aragged, stunted boy in an old slouch hat that from time to time slippeddown and eclipsed the sharp face.
They had dinner, and after it they set forth on a walk. David left theguidance to Tom, and the boy led the way down the Bowery, where, to thehellish music of elevated trains, and by the garish light that streamedfrom restaurants, pawnshops, music-halls and saloons, moved theall-night procession of thieves and thugs, cheap sports and cheapconfidence men, gutter-rags of men and women, girls whose bold, rovingeyes sought markets for their charms--all those whom we of shelteredmorals are wont to consider the devil's irretrievable share, withoutthinking much, or caring much, as to why they should be his. Tom'stongue maintained a constant commentary on everything they passed; totalk was clearly one of his delights. What he said was interesting, andwas given a grotesque vivacity by his snappy diction of the streets;but David shivered again and again at the knowledge he had where heshould have had ignorance.
The boy was erudite in the wickedness of this part of the city. Thatinnocent-looking second-hand store, which was run by the fat old womanin the doorway, was in reality a "fence;" that laundry was an opium den;in the back of that brilliantly-lighted club-room, whose windows werelabelled "The Three Friends' Association," there was a gambling joint;that saloon was the hang-out of a gang of men and women thieves; in thatmusic hall, through whose open door they glimpsed a dancer in a redknee-skirt doing the high kick, the girls got their brief admirers drunkand picked their pockets;--and so on, and on, missing nothing that heshould not have known.
At Chatham Square they turned into the Jewish quarter and shoulderedhomeward through narrow streets that from wall to wall were adistracting entanglement of playing children, baby carriages, familieson door-steps, promenading lovers, hurrying men, arguing groups,flambeau-lighted pushcarts whose bent and bearded proprietors offeredthe chaotic crowd every commodity from cucumbers to clothes. The latterpart of their walk took them by St. Christopher's, through the glowingcolours of the Morton memorial window; and the Mission came in for a fewof Tom's sentences. It was a great place to steal women's pocketbooks."A lot o' swell ladies from Fift' Avenoo comes down dere to monkey widde kids--hell knows what for. Dere easy fruit. I pinched two or t'reefat leathers dere meself."
David marvelled at the boy's intimacy with wickedness, yet he understoodit. Evil was the one thing Tom had had a chance to become acquaintedwith; it had for him the familiar face that virtue has for childrenraised amid happier circumstances. The conditions of its childhood,whether good or bad, are the normal conditions of life to the child. Soto Tom wickedness was normal; he talked of stealing, of gambling, ofwomen, with the natural vivacity that another boy might have talked ofhis marbles.
David saw, as definitely as the calendar sees to-morrow, the future ofthis boy if there were no influence counter to the influence that wasnow sweeping him toward his fate. He saw arrest (Tom had boasted that hehad been arrested once)--prison--a hardening of the boy's nature--a lifeof crime. He heard little of the rest of the boy's chatter, andpresently he came to a decision--a very unpretentious decision, for hewas poorer than poverty, and what confidence he once had in his personalinfluence had slipped away. But the little he could do for the boy, thathe would do.
"How would you like to stay with me for awhile, Tom?" he asked when theywere back in his room. "I can't offer you anything but the floor for abed--and perhaps not that after a few weeks."
"D'you mean I can stay wid you?" Tom cried, springing up, his eyesa-gleam. "Say, dat'll be great! We'll divide on de price! An' we'll havea little go wid de mitts ev'ry day!"
"Very well. But I want to place one condition on your staying. You're tobe strictly honest with me, and you're not to steal. You understand?"
The boy made a grimace. "All right--since you ask me. But say, you'requeer!"
The next morning David bought Tom a red cotton sweater and advanced hima quarter with which to buy a stock of papers. Two weeks passed, everyday very much like the one before it. David found no work, and Tom madebut little. During the two weeks the rent fell due, and most of David'slibrary went to a second-hand book dealer and the proceeds went to thelandlady. Then, two or three at a time, the rest of the books werecarried to the second-hand store.
At length there came a morning when there was not a cent, and when, toperfect the day's despair, David woke with a burning soreness throughouthis body--the consequence of having been caught the day before in a coldrain and having walked for several hours in his wet clothes. He crawledout of bed, but soon crept in again. His muscles could make no searchfor work that day.
Tom proposed a doctor. David dismissed the suggestion; doctors requiredmoney. But, money or no money, Tom saw there had to be one thing--food.He sat gazing for several minutes at the boxing-gloves, their lastnegotiable possession, which his favour had thus far kept out
of thepawnshop; then with a set face he put them under his arm and walked outof the room. He returned with fifty cents.
That night Tom came home discouraged. He had hunted work all day, but noone wanted him. "Dey all wanted to hire a good suit o' clo'es," heexplained to David. But the next morning he seemed confident. "I t'oughtof a place where I t'ink I can git a job," he said, as he started awayafter having prepared for David a breakfast that David's feverish lipscould not touch.
His confidence was well founded, for that evening he entered the roomwith an armload of bundles. "Look at dis, will you!" he cried, droppingthe parcels on the bed. "Bread, an' butter, an' eggs, an'steak--ev'ryt'ing. You got to git well, now! You're goin' to git fat!"
David in his surprise sat up in bed. "Why, where did you get all thosethings?"
"Didn't I say I'd git a job? Well, I did! In a big hardware store. I'merrand boy--ev'ryt'ing! De boss say, 'Tom do dis; Tom do dat.' I do 'emall, quick! De next minute I say to de boss, 'anyt'ing else?' He pays mesix a week, I'm so quick."
"But you've only worked a day. You haven't been paid already?"
"Sure. I hands de boss a piece o' talk: me mudder's sick, an' I needsready coin bad. So he pays me a dollar ev'ry day."
David made a mental note that later there must be a few more remarks onthe subject of lying; but this was not the time to reprove Tom's fib. Hetook the boy's hand in his hot, weak grasp. "You're mighty good to me,Tom," he said, huskily.
Tom's face slipped to one side and twitched. His blinking eyes avoidedDavid's gaze. "Oh, dat's nuttin'," he gruffly returned. "Nobody goesback on his pal."
At the end of the first week of David's illness Kate Morgan returnedhome, having given up her position, and thenceforward she prepared mostof his meals, chatted much with him, and lent him ten-cent novels. Oneresult of their chats was that Kate became strengthened in herconviction that David had been a thief of great skill and daring.Contradiction availed him nothing. "Your last haul was a big one--youtold me so yourself," she would say. "And only the top-notchers haveyour kind of talk and manners."
One day she returned to the matter of her former prophecy. "You've hadenough of this," she said. "When you get out of bed, and get yourstrength back, you'll be at the old game again. You see!"
During this time Tom left for work regularly at half-past seven, andreturned regularly at half-past six; and each evening he insisted onturning his dollar in to David, to be spent under David's direction. Onenight, as Tom was giving frightful punishment to an imaginary opponentwith the boxing gloves--he had redeemed them with part of his secondday's pay--several coins slipped from his pocket and went ringing uponthe floor. When Tom rose from picking them up David's thin face wasgazing at him in sorrowful accusation. The boy paled before the look. Hewas silent for a moment. Then he asked mechanically, almost withoutbreath: "What's de matter?"
"Haven't you been stealing from your employers?" David asked, in a lowvoice.
The boy's colour came back. "No I ain't. Honest."
"Then where did you get that money?"
"Why--why, Kate Morgan give it to me. She t'ought I might want to buy afew extry t'ings."
David was unconvinced, but from principle he gave Tom the benefit of thedoubt. He had the instinctive masculine repugnance to accepting moneyfrom a woman; so a moment later, when Kate came in, he said to her: "Iwant to thank for you for loaning that money to Tom. I understand andappreciate--but I don't need the money. You must take it back."
"What money?" she asked blankly.
She turned about on Tom, who was sitting at the foot of the bed whereDavid could not see him. The boy's face was very white, and he washardly breathing. He looked appealingly at her.
Kate's face darkened. "Tom," she said sharply, "I told you not to tellthat!"
When she had gone, David called Tom to him and took his hand. "I begyour pardon, Tom," he said.
Tom made no answer at all.
All these days, when David was not chatting with Kate, or reading aboutthe love of the fair mill-girl and the mill-owner's son, he was wanlystaring into his future. He longed for the day when he could beginsearch again--and that day was also his great fear. Often he laythinking for hours of Helen Chambers. He thought of the lovers she musthave; of her marriage that might not be far off; of the noble place shewould have in life--honoured, admired, a doer of good. He would nevermeet her, never speak to her--never see her, save perhaps as he had beendoing, from places of shadow.
Well ... he prayed that she might be happy!
