“What’s this? what’s this?” demanded one of the policemen in a brisk, business-like tone, swinging his locust, and looking sharply about him, as if in quest of some desperado upon whom to vent his wrath.
“It looks as if there was some trouble here.”
“It’s all done with now,” replied the man that had finished it, and then, recognizing the officer, he extended his hand.
“How are ye, Billy?”
“Hello, Pat, is that you?”
“So it is, me, Patsey McConough, that happened down this way on the lookout for a wee boy, when I saw two men beating one, and I jist restored the aquilibrium, as ye may say. But what have ye there?” asked Patsey, peering through the gloom at the figure of a boy in the grip of the other policeman.
“A chap that we jerked for picking pockets; we’ve been shadowing him for a long time.”
The Irishman seemed to suspect the identity of the boy, and, going forward, he took him by the hand, and asked him how it all came about.
Tom told the story as it is known to the reader, when Patsey turned to the policeman.
“There’s some mistake here, Billy; that boy never took that watch—I’ll bet my life on that. I know him, and the story he tells is the true one, and no mistake.”
It didn’t take the policeman long to agree with Patsey, and a satisfactory arrangement was made, by which the faithful guardian kept the gold timepiece, and the boy was allowed to go free.
“I didn’t feel aisy,” said Patsey, as he walked off in company with his young friend, “when I left ye in that place, and I hadn’t been gone long whin I made up me mind to go back and fix it, whither the boss was mad or no. Whin I arrived the throuble was over, and ye had started out. I had to guess which way ye wint, but I seemed to hit it, and I was able to do ye a little hilp.”
“That you did, indeed,” replied the grateful boy. “I would have gone to jail but for you.”
“Ye same to be a wide-awake boy, and ye kape yer sinses about ye at all times. Ye are looking for a place to stay?”
“Yes.”
“There isn’t much of the night left, but I’ll find ye what ye want.”
A couple of blocks farther, Patsey conducted him into just the house the boy would have picked out for himself, had he been given a week in which to hunt.
Patsey accompanied Tom to his room, where he gave him some earnest advice.
“This is a moighty avil village, is New York, and ye had better get out of the same while ye have the money to do it. It isn’t a good thing for a lad to carry a pistol, but I wish ye to kaap the one I lint ye as long as ye are in danger, which is loikely to be all yer life.”
“My money is nearly all gone,” replied Tom, “and unless I get at something pretty soon, I shall have to beg. I would go out of the city tomorrow if I only had Jim.”
“Perhaps it is as well that ye wait where ye are for a few days for him, spinding yer laisure in looking for a job. I’m a coochman in the employ of an old rapscallion of a lawyer, who’s stingy enough to pick the sugar out of the teeth of the flies he cotches in his sugar-bowl. I darsn’t bring ye there, but if the worst comes and ye haven’t anything to ate, I’ll fix it some way.”
The plan was that Tom should stay in this house, visiting the other morning and evening in quest of information of Jim, while the sunlight would be spent in hunting for work.
It would be useless to dwell on the particulars of the several days which followed. Morning and night Tom went over to the other saloon and inquired after his missing friend. Each time the bartender replied he had not seen him, and it was his belief that the boy had “skipped the town,” as he expressed it. The little bundle containing all of Jim’s possessions was given to Tom, who took it away with him, leaving word where his friend could find him.
Dull, leaden despair filled his heart; and, as he paid his board-bill each evening, he saw with feelings which can scarcely be pictured, the steady decrease of his pile, until it was close to the vanishing point.
Five days had passed since he entered the new hotel, during which not a word was heard of Jim, nor had he seen anything of his friend Patsey McConough.
It seemed to the boy that he had tramped New York from one end to the other in his search for work, and in not a single instance had he received the slightest encouragement. Two vocations, it may be said, were open to him from the beginning; they were to sell newspapers or to black shoes. To one of Tom’s education and former life, it was the most bitter humiliation to contemplate adopting either of these employments. But the night came when he felt he must do it or beg.
He naturally preferred the newspaper line to that of polishing shoes, and he resolve to make his venture early the following morning.
Tom was unusually strong and active for one of his years, and he expected to have trouble from the envy of the other boys.
When he purchased his fifty Heralds, long before daylight, there seemed to be an army of newsboys ahead of him, and he was looked upon and muttered about in the most threatening manner.
He had scarcely reached the sidewalk when he was set upon by a couple of vigorous gamins, with the evident intent of discouraging him in the new business.
The others gathered around to see the fun.
They saw it.
The fiery urchins, though both were as large as, and no doubt older than, Tom, were literally “nowhere” in the fight.
He conquered them in less than a minute without receiving a scratch, and then, turning to the crowd, remarked that if there was any one or two or a dozen there that wanted to tackle him, all they had to do was to come forward. No one came, and Tom sauntered off to sell his newspapers.
It was exceedingly distasteful; but he was spurred on by necessity, and he went at it with the impetuosity of a veteran.
His success was below his expectations.
There seems to be a right way of doing everything, no matter how insignificant, which can only be learned by practice. Despite his natural quickness, Tom failed in more than one respect.
He hadn’t the right change in several instances, and the men wouldn’t wait while he darted into a store for it, but bought of some other boy who thrust himself forward. No matter where he turned, it seemed to the young hero that some more wide-awake newsboy was ahead of him, leaving only the aftermath for him to gather.
He boarded several of the crowded street-cars, and was kicked off one of them because he accidentally trod on a gouty old gentleman’s toes, he being the president of the road.
However, all this, and much more indeed, is the sad accompaniment of the poor little gamins who fight each other in their strife as to who shall have the preference in leaving the morning sheet smoking hot at our doors while we are wrapped in slumber.
After carefully balancing accounts that evening, Tom found he was exactly seven cents ahead.
On the next day he fell nine cents behind, but on the third there was exciting war news, and he not only rushed off his usual supply, and the same number repeated, but he obtained in many instances fancy prices, and cleared several dollars.
This was encouraging, but the day was marked by the greatest mortification of his life.
He had rushed in his impetuous manner into a streetcar, when some one called his name, and he turned about and saw Sam Harper and his sister, both of whom had been his classmates at the Briggsville school, and Tom was accustomed to look upon Nellie as a little above ordinary mortals.
Sam shook hands with Tom, and made some jocose remark about his new business; but Nellie sneered, and looked out the car window.
A high-spirited lad who has experienced anything like this needs not to be told that it cuts like a two-edged sword.
CHAPTER XII.
For two weeks Tom Gordon prosecuted his vocation as a newsboy in the city of New York, by which time he had gained enough experience to earn his daily bread, but nothing beyond that. Such being the case, he felt that he was not making a success of his calling, as there
was no reserve fund upon which to draw for clothing or other necessities.
The greater portion of a month wore by, during which he never gained the slightest knowledge of the fate of Jim Travers.
Tom went to the morgue, and applied to the police, and, in fact, used every means at his command to learn something. He occasionally encountered his friend Patsey, who rendered all the assistance he could, but it availed nothing.
When the fortnight was up, Tom received an unexpected offer, that the Irishman, through some acquaintance, secured for him. It was the opportunity to sell newspapers and periodicals on the Hudson River Railroad. He was to leave New York in the morning, “working the train” on the way up to Albany, and come down again in the afternoon.
This was such a big advance on what he had been doing, that he joyfully accepted the offer, even though he held not the slightest intention of following it as a continuous occupation. It would do very well until he could obtain something more suitable.
The lad found at the end of the first week that he was much better off than he anticipated. The privilege was conceded to him of charging double the price for the papers which was asked on the streets or at the news-stands, and his percentage of profits was very large.
Tom held his position for a couple of months to the satisfaction of his employer, and he had accumulated quite a sum, which was deposited in a savings-bank that wasn’t likely to “suspend” for the benefit of the officers.
Spring had opened, the Hudson was clear of ice, and his business became quite agreeable.
It happened that he encountered, on several occasions, some of his former friends of Briggsville, who could not conceal their surprise at seeing him engaged in selling newspapers.
Tom could not always keep back the flush that stole over his handsome face at such times. But he began to believe there was a nobility in honest labor like his, of which he had no right to feel ashamed.
There were any number of young fellows who envied him his position, and who were ready to use all sorts of artifices to have him “bounced.” Slanderous reports were carried to his employers, who took measures to investigate them, reaching the conclusion that Tom was without a superior in the way of integrity, politeness, and faithfulness.
The tiny gold chain and locket obtained from the drowning girl in so singular a manner, he preserved with a religious devotion. It was deposited in the savings-bank, beyond all danger of loss, and he would have starved to death before consenting to part with it.
The sweet face within the locket was as vividly fixed in his memory as if the original were a sister of his, and he never passed through the train without looking around, in the hope of seeing the little girl herself.
The only sister which Tom had ever had died in infancy, and there was something which linked the memory of the two in the tenderest and most sacred manner.
There were true modesty and manhood in the noble fellow, when he overheard a visitor in his employer’s office relate the incident of the rescue, without suspecting that the hero stood before him, and never dropped the slightest intimation that he knew anything about it.
One bright spring morning Tom was passing through the smoking-car, when a young man, very flashily dressed, whistled to him, and asked for a copy of a sporting paper.
Tom had but a single copy left. This he tossed over into the lap of the applicant in that careless, off-hand style which characterizes the veteran newsboy.
The purchaser passed over a quarter in coin, and as Tom pulled out a handful of silver from his pocket, from which to select the change, the flashy young man said,—
“Never mind, sonny; I’ll make you a present of that.”
“But you have given me five times the price of the paper,” said Tom, thinking there was an error.
“That’s all right. When I see a fellow of your style I like to encourage him.”
Tom thanked him and passed on.
The incident would not be worth recording but for the fact that it was repeated the next day, when the same young man bought a Herald, and compelled the lad to accept a bright silver quarter in payment, without allowing him to give any change.
Six times on successive days was this done, and then the liberal purchaser disappeared from the train.
Aside from the repetition of his favors, it was rather curious that on each occasion he should have placed a silver quarter in the palm of Tom.
Each coin was of the same date as that year, and was so bright and shiny that Tom believed they must have come directly from the mint. They looked so handsome, indeed, that he determined to keep them as pocket-pieces, instead of giving them out in change.
There is nothing like actual experience to sharpen a fellow’s wits; and, on the first day the munificent stranger vanished, a dim suspicion entered the head of Tom that some mischief was brewing.
That night in New York he examined the coins more minutely than heretofore. Half an hour later he walked down to the wharf and threw them into the river.
The whole six were counterfeit. It wasn’t safe for any one to carry such property about him.
Tom was strongly convinced, further, that a job was being “put up” on him, and he was mightily relieved when thoroughly rid of them.
That same evening one of his employers sent for him, and told him that he had received reliable information that he, Thomas Gordon, was working off counterfeit money on the road.
The boy denied it, of course, but he did not choose to tell all he knew, for he saw that his own situation was a dangerous one; but he demanded that the proof should be produced.
There was an officer present, who thereupon searched the lad for the “queer,” but he acknowledged there wasn’t a penny on him which was not sound.
Tom was kept at the office while another officer went to his lodging-house and ransacked his room. The result was nil. This rather stumped the detective, who was acting on the charge of some one else, and he started off, remarking that the business wasn’t done yet, and the best thing the boy could do was to confess.
“I must first have something to confess,” replied Tom, who was excusable for some honest indignation.
“Where is the man who said I was in that business?”
“You’ll meet him in the court-room,” was the significant reply of the detective.
“That’s just where I’d like to meet him, and you too, but you’re afraid to try it.”
“Come, come, young man, you’d better keep a civil tongue in your head, or I’ll jug you as it is. I’ve enough against you.”
“Why don’t you do it, then?” was Tom’s defiant question; “I’ve learned enough during the last few minutes to understand my rights, and if you think I don’t, now’s the time to test it.”
The officer went out muttering all sorts of things; and Tom, turning to his employer, his breast heaving with indignation, said,—
“They have been plotting against me ever since I’ve been on the road. They went with all kinds of stories to you, and now they’ve been trying to make it appear that I am in the counterfeit business.”
“But there must have been something tangible, or that detective would not have come here with the charge.”
“There was something;” and thereupon Tom told the story of the six shining quarters.
His employer was angered, for he saw through it all; and from the description of the donor, he recognized a worthless scamp who had been discharged for stealing some time before Tom went on the route. The detective was sent for, and the case laid before him. That night Mr. Dick Horton, who made the charge, was arrested, and in his rooms were found such proofs against him as a counterfeiter that, a few months later, he went to Sing Sing for ten years.
For a time succeeding this incident Tom was left undisturbed in the pursuit of his business, the occurrence becoming pretty generally known and causing much sympathy for him.
It was about a month subsequent that Tom missed his afternoon train down the river, and took another, whic
h left later, not reaching New York till late at night.
As there was nothing for him to do, the train being in the hands of another newsboy, he sat down in the smoking-car, which was only moderately filled. Directly in front was a man who, he judged from his dress, was a Texan drover, or some returning Californian He was leaning back in the corner of his seat, with his mouth open and his eyes shut, in a way to suggest that he was asleep.
Seated next him was an individual who looked very much like the Italian who had shoved his head into the door of Tom’s room some months before. This foreigner was watching the Californian—if such he was—as a cat watches a mouse.
“I believe he means to rob him,” was Tom’s conclusion, who, without being suspected by the scoundrel, was taking mental notes of the whole proceeding.
The supposition was confirmed within five minutes, when the Italian, leaning over toward the other, in an apparently careless manner, began cautiously inserting his hand into his watch-pocket.
The instant Tom saw this, he bent forward and shook the Californian’s shoulder so vigorously that he started up, and demanded in a gruff voice what was the matter. The Italian, of course, had withdrawn his hand like a flash, and was leaning the other way, with his eyes half-closed, like one sinking into a doze.
“I saw that man there,” said Tom, pointing to the Italian, “with his hand in your pocket, about to steal your watch, and I thought I’d best let you know.”
“Is that so?” demanded the stranger, a giant in stature, as he laid his immense hand on the shoulder of the other, who started up as if just aroused from sleep, and protested in broken English that he was not aware of being seated with the gentleman at all.
His vehement declarations seemed to raise a doubt in the mind of the Californian, who began an examination of his pockets. He found everything right, and so declared.
“He was just beginning operations,” said Tom in explanation, “when I woke you.”
“Bein’ as he ain’t took nothin’, I won’t knock the head off him,” said the Californian, as he announced himself to be; “but he ain’t any business to look so much like a sneaking dog, so I’ll punch him on general principles.”
The Edward S. Ellis Megapack Page 156
