Between nineteen and two

by Wolcott LeCléar Beard

BETWEEN NINETEEN AND TWO

By Wolcott LeCléar Beard

THE trouble began late one afternoon.

Seldon was blue. In fact, he was on the verge of despair and self-destruction and all the rest of it; for She had snubbed him again, or he thought she had, which came to the same thing. She was Polly Van Benschoten. I had known her always—used to superintend her mud pies. She had an income of her own, and a kind-hearted, sharp-tongued mamma; and these two facts frightened Seldon more even than Polly did, which is saying a great deal. He couldn't stand the strain, he said. He never intended to see her again.

"Bet you do within the week," drawled Greg. "Give you five to three; now come."

Seldon only shook his head and looked miserable.

"He doesn't dare take the bet," I said, hoping to rouse him. "In exactly four days there'll be a dance. He's invited, and he knows she'll be there."

"Suppose I'm going?" demanded Seldon. "Well, I'm not. I'd look well, wouldn't I, hanging around just to see that ass Chalmers talking to her fit to break his neck, and I never getting a chance the whole evening to slip in a word edgeways. That's what happened last time."

"Get her down here, then, and break your own neck talking to her," suggested Sam. "You needn't ask Chalmers. That'll put an extra zero in the wheel."

Seldon looked around the shabby room and made a despairing gesture.

"That's not a bad idea, just the same," said Jimmy, in reply to Seldon's gesture. "We can brace up the looks of the room here by clubbing our stuff. Then we'll get a lot of people down here who can do things—singing and monologues and the like; we know plenty—and then ask a lot of others to hear 'em. We can kill off a lot of people that way; dinners and things—those dances, for instance, that Seldon's growling about."

"But they wouldn't mix for sour apples, the people who'd do the things and the ones we'd ask down to hear 'em. And they'd have to mix," objected Seldon, dejectedly, yet with hope.

"Mix? They'd mix all right," said Jimmy. "They'd be such curiosities to each other, don't you see?"

"The audience would just revel in the giddy bohemianism of it all," remarked Baynes. "They'd talk about it for a month."

"Give 'em a feed, too," put in Sam. "More bohemianism. Real beer."

"Feed! I should say so!" exclaimed Greg, horrified.

"Paid your rent yet?" asked Baynes.

This was a very silly question. As it happened, we had not paid our rent for a couple of months or so; but we had frequently been farther behind than that, and there was never any trouble, for we had been a long time in the old Tenth street building. Baynes knew all this perfectly well, and with some heat we told him so.

"But the agent's away," said Baynes, "and the old sub-agent's ill. There's a new sub-agent in charge, and he doesn't know you fellows."

"Oh, well," I commenced, "Seldon and I both have some money coming in directly, so that'll be——"

"What the devil's that?" interrupted Seldon.

There was no need to listen. From the echoing corridor that led to our rooms there rose the growl of an angry man and the agonized yell of a dog.

"Ah, say, don't—don't!" cried the shrill voice of a boy. "Can't youse leave 'im alone? I'll get 'im out—I am gettin' 'im out. We was posin' fer Mr. Wallace, an' we's jus' got t'rough. "

Here the man said something we could not catch.

"1 know it's de wrong side er de buildin'. We was lookin' fer anudder job. Leave 'im be. We'll go out. Leave 'im be, I say, er I'll push yer face in wid dis!"

The dog yelped again. There was a scream of anger from the boy, and a little scuffling. We all ran out into the passage. At the head of the west stairway, curled into a convulsive heap, lay a worthless yellow cur. His nose was in the air and his open jaws trembled, but only a faint whimper came from them. Over the body of the dog stood a small and dirty boy, struggling in the grasp of a man we had never seen before. In his hand the boy held a dust-pan, which I recognized as the property of the servant who every morning failed to clean our rooms.

"What 'd you kick that dog for?" inquired Sam, going up to the man.

"What's that to you?" demanded the man.

By way of answer Sam grasped the man's collar with one hand and his trousers with the other. "Catch hold," he said to Greg, who stood nearest.

"Do you know who I am?" shouted the man.

Sam did not know. He did not care a profanely small amount. He expressed this in a very few words, for Sam's vocabulary is not large.

"My name's Siegel," said the man, "and I'll make it hot for you if——"

"All right," answered Sam. "Ready, Greg? Come on, Siegel."

Greg was ready. Between them he and Sam conveyed Siegel down the stairs in such a manner that only the tips of his toes touched them. Down both flights of stairs they led him, then around the passage to the front door, from which they ejected him with some emphasis and a warning not to return.

We were coming back, feeling on rather good terms with ourselves, when we met Baynes. He was laughing so hard that he had to lean against the wall. It annoyed us.

"Do you know who that man was you just threw out?" he managed to gasp. "That was Siegel."

"Sure we knew it," replied Sam. "He told us."

"He told us his name was Siegel," said Greg. "Who is he?"

"Who is he?" shrieked Baynes. "He's the new sub-agent I was telling you about."

We were all rather sobered by this.

"Well, we kicked him out all right," observed Sam, philosophically. "Maybe it'll do him good." Then he led the way back to our studio.

The dog lay on the floor, with a folded rug under him. Close beside him knelt the boy, his dirty face streaked with white, where tears, of which he was evidently ashamed, had with difficulty ploughed their way. The fellows stood sympathetically about, but to them the boy paid no attention. His eyes were on the little moaning cur.

"Take a look at the dog, will you?" said Seldon. "I'm afraid he's badly hurt."

I knelt down and examined it as gently as I could. There was little knowledge needed to tell how badly the kicks had injured the poor little brute.

"Say, youse don't t'ink he's go'n' ter croak, do youse?" asked the boy, as I looked up.

I did think so, and there was no use denying it. "I'm afraid he will," I said. Then the boy looked so distressed that I added: "But we'll hope he comes out all right."

As if in answer to my speech, the dog whined again and tried to struggle to his feet, then fell back, shivered, and was dead.

"Never mind, Terry," said Seldon, kindly. "We know what hard luck it is, but you've just got to brace up and take it. There's no other way."

"Dat's right," acquiesced Terry, dismally. "But he was dead fine, dat mut. I got 'im w'en he wasn't no bigger'n me fist, an' I was awful stuck on 'im."

He tried bravely to keep back his sobs, but more tears would come, and were rapidly making fresh streaks down his cheeks. For a moment he stood looking down at the little yellow body, then turned his back toward us, and, walking to the window, leaned on the sill, looking out into the street. It seemed kinder not to take any notice of him just then, so we ostentatiously continued our conversation.

"When'll we have this shindig we were talking about?" asked Jimmy. "It ought to be soon. What'll it cost?"

Whereupon they got pencil and paper and began making an estimate of expenses and a list of what would be required. When we came to the eatables, Terry, still standing by the window, showed signs of interest. The other fellows noticed this, and nudged each other to call attention to it.

"We can get Slattery and Mary to serve the stuff," said Seldon, "but we ought to have more help than that. Good scheme to have a boy in buttons. Terry, how'd you like the job?"

Terry turned from the window. "A job here, to wait on youse?" he asked.

"Yes; to get into tight clothes with buttons all over them, and to open the door and so on. How'd you like it?" asked Seldon, laughing.

"Great!" said Terry.

After that he evidently considered himself a retainer of ours; and though Seldon had been joking, neither he nor any of the rest of us had strength of mind sufficient to tell the boy that we were not in earnest. And besides, the idea was not such a bad one. Terry would cost very little, and might be made useful in a great variety of ways. He had no relatives that he knew of, so there need be no trouble on that score.

The very next morning, therefore, Seldon took Terry, together with all the money I had, as well as his own, and purchased a lot of things, chiefly a ready-made suit of dark-green cloth, resplendent with many rows of nickel-plated buttons. Then we stood Terry up in a big, flat bath-tub, and while one of us played a hose on him, the others scrubbed him with brooms until he was pink and sore, but very clean. After a solemn warning that, if he did not remain approximately in that condition, the dose would be repeated, Terry was permitted to array himself.

With his livery, Terry at once assumed charge of us all, and in a matter-of-fact way which left no room for an argument. His greatest responsibility, however, was our variety show, as he would call it. And we were fully committed to this show now, for Seldon had met Polly on the street, had told her of our plan, and she had approved.

Therefore, we hunted up our friends who could do stunts, to quote Terry again, and got these friends to promise to do them, and to meet a large number of other people who could not do them, but who would be glad to see them done. We also invested a large part of our credit—Terry's livery had taken about all our ready money—in a quantity of note-paper of a most superior variety, and sat down to write the invitations.

We had been at it for some time when Greg threw down his pen and announced that he was exhausted. The others instantly became affected in the same way, and nothing but beer, they said, could restore them. So Terry was sent out to get it, taking with him a tin pail concealed in a hat-box, which really gave quite a patrician air to the whole proceeding. He returned, and, extracting the pail from the box, began, with a deftness evidently born of experience, to pour the beer into glasses. But we saw that he had something on his mind.

"Say," he observed, after a little, "I just seen dat mug what youse trun out. He asked me what was I doin' here."

"Did you tell him?" I asked.

"Naw, sir," said Terry, and went on pouring out the beer.

"It won't take him long to find out, though, what Terry's doing and who's employing him," said Greg.

"He knows it now," answered Terry. "He had a poiper, and he wanted me ter give it ter youse."

"Where is the paper?" I asked, rather anxiously. "Didn't you take it?"

"Naw, sir," said Terry, again. "I said youse didn't want nahtin' er his."

This was quite true; yet the uncertainty as to what this paper might be troubled us considerably. We sent Terry to find out, and he shortly returned with the paper in his hand. We knew it by sight only too well; it was a three-days' notice for us to quit our room, No. 19, for non-payment of rent.

We were quite accustomed to these notices, it is true; but formerly they had been matters of no great importance, merely reminders of rather a humorous nature that the agent wanted some money; and he always got it, sooner or later. But this, coming from Siegel, was another matter, and we all looked rather grave as Seldon tacked it to the wall where the others that we had received at different times were collected. Still, there was nothing for us to do but wait until our money came, so we finished writing the invitations and sent Terry out with them.

It was quite astonishing how many people accepted those invitations of ours. How the studio was to hold them all we had no idea. Though we measured the available floor space again and again, and each time narrowed the territory allotted to each guest, there was a limit beyond which, without the aid of a hydraulic press, we could not go. Yet we were confident that we could manage it somehow, and so went ahead and had the rooms cleaned.

This was a matter involving considerable labor, but when at last it was done, with all the things of ours and the other fellows arranged about the room, it really looked very well; and we knew that the overwhelming bohemianism of the affair would excuse anything that might otherwise be thought amiss. Then that disgusting business of the three-days' notice came up again.

Our door was locked, for a wonder, and we were all busily sorting out wooden grocers' plates, upon which the supper was to be served—more bohemianism, combined with economy. Someone, without knocking, tried to open the door. Terry hurried to his post, and we heard him expostulating with somebody outside, saying that the gentlemen were busy with models and couldn't see no one. Then an unattractive young man forced his way into the room, and after depositing in Seldon's hand a document of a truly ominous appearance, he departed.

One after another we took the paper and read it. It was a summons to go somewhere and show cause why something or other should not happen. To all of us except Baynes, who looked concerned, the paper was quite unintelligible, but that it emanated from Siegel, and for that reason was probably malignant in its nature, was evident enough. Seldon tacked it on the wall with the rest. There was no other answer that we could give just then.

At last our arrangements were practically complete, and the affair itself was to take place on the following day. Even the chairs for the audience had been placed, and Terry was watching with a distrustful eye the man who was tuning the piano, when there came a knock at the door. It was not the single knock that always heralded the advent of an initiate, but an imperious summons, many times repeated before Terry, with all his bristles standing, could get to the door and open it. We heard him demand with very scant civility to know what was wanted; then he was brushed aside, and Siegel entered with a companion, whom he announced as a deputy marshal or something of the kind.

The scene which followed was quite what we might have expected had we stopped to think that the summons, or whatever it was, called upon us to go to court the day before. How in the end we managed to get a concession of twenty-four hours in which to move our goods, I do not know, but imagine that the marshal granted it to us largely because it was fiercely opposed by Siegel. At all events, we did obtain this much grace, and Siegel and the marshal went away, leaving us alone.

We tried to put the best face we could upon the matter, but the best was very bad indeed. The boys sat down in the chairs we had provided for our expected guests and looked at each other in blank despair. Except Seldon, that is. He just hid his face in his hands and groaned. Perhaps it was rather harder on him than it was on the rest of us, but it was bad enough for us all.

"Well," said Jimmy at last, "we've got to do something. Recall the invitations, I suppose."

"There's no time now. Besides, you lost the list, and we can't make a new one," said I.

Jimmy denied having lost the list, and at any other time there would probably have been words about it, but now we were too discouraged to quarrel.

"But we've got to do something," he repeated. "How about our studio?"

"These rooms are too small, and ours are about one-third the size," said Baynes.

No one else had any suggestions to offer. Dinner time passed unnoticed and in silence, save when Seldon remarked that this affair was sure to get about; that we would be made a laughing-stock, and that he, for one, intended to leave the city and to stay away; and Sam told him not to be more of a fool than he could help.

"Well, we're in a bad hole, but there's no use starving over it," said Greg, at last. "Let's all go somewhere and have dinner together. Perhaps we can think of some plan then."

"We haven't got the price among us, and we won't have until those checks come," objected Baynes.

"Might pawn our dress clothes," suggested Seldon, bitterly. "It's the only use we can put them to that I can think of."

"Order dinner from the kitchen and eat here," said Sam. "You won't have to pay then until the end of the month, and we'll all be flush before that."

At this suggestion, Terry, who had been listening, brightened up visibly, and at a nod from me ran down stairs to order the dinner. He evidently considered himself the author of our misfortunes, and it weighed upon him. He was gone a long time, but that was nothing unusual for Terry. At last he strolled back into the room and carefully closed the door behind him.

"Say, dere's anudder room on de bottom floor what's lots bigger'n dis," he remarked. "It'd be fine fer dat variety show, and it hasn't got nobody in it. It's room 2. Slattery says he'll send der grub right up."

Sure enough, Slattery, the janitor, followed close on Terry's heels, balancing two big trays on his hands, while the chambermaid brought another. We listlessly pushed some of the chairs aside, pulled a table out into the room and laid the big drawing-board over it, upon which, with a sigh of relief, the janitor deposited the trays and helped us arrange the dishes.

"Here's them keys," he said, as soon as his hands were clear. "I didn't know ye'd taken room 2 till just now. 'Tis a far betther room fer the intertainment ye'r' givin', but ye've none so much time to move. Ye'll be wantin' me to help?"

For a very long minute no one spoke. At last I managed to pull myself together a little. "We haven't got much time," I gasped. "We'll have to begin right after dinner, and we'll hurry and get through. Come then."

"I'll be here, sorr," said Slattery, and vanished.

When he had gone we looked at each other in blank amazement. It was Terry who spoke first.

"Say," he observed, "we ain't got no nails to hang t'ings on de wall wid. Wouldn't I go out an' get some before de hardware store shuts up?" Then, without waiting for permission, he departed, leaving us to discuss the turn affairs had taken.

There was little use in our discussion, however. Of course, there was but one thing to do, and that was to thankfully accept the room thus miraculously offered; but how the miracle had come about we had not the least idea. Gradually we recovered ourselves and attacked the dinner, resolving to wait until Terry came back, so that we might ask him. When at last he did return, burdened with bundles of ironmongery, he made everything plain at once.

"We had ter go somewheres," he explained, "an' dat room was de best one dere was, so I tol' Slattery we'd take it, an' ter bring de key up ter youse, an' he done it."

It was delightfully simple.

Jimmy flapped his arms and crowed. "They can't put you out before to-morrow night. This is the only room you've been evicted from," said Baynes.

"Dey can't put youse out den," said Terry, swaggering up to the table in order to change the dishes. "Siegel, he won't know nahtin' about it, 'nless you tell him—not before yer boodle comes, annyhow."

"That's so. There's no reason why Siegel should find out for some time, unless Slattery should happen to mention it to him."

"Slattery won't mention nahtin'," said Terry, positively.

We asked Terry his reasons for this positive statement, but he only inquired in return as to whether he should "begin to yank some er de stuff outer de room or would he chase Slattery up stairs first?" We told him to request Slattery to come to us, and he did so.

Our labors carried us far into that night, and we were at work again hours before we ordinarily had our breakfasts. By noon everything was finished, and we could lie about and rest, serene in the knowledge that both our work and Siegel were done, for the time being.

Yet there was a strain of uneasiness that ran through this knowledge. It lasted through the afternoon and into the evening, when we were dressed and waiting for the first guests to appear. We had each a carefully suppressed apprehension as to how and when Siegel would break out next. At last the door-bell rang, and Seldon went to see that Terry was at his post In a moment he returned, running, and holding two envelopes in his hand.

"I just looked into the office as I came by, and these were in the box," he called. "I believe they're our checks."

And they were.

Throwing on our hats and coats, we tore down to the corner and got Johnny to cash the checks for us; then we went to Slattery. We paid all the rent that we owed, and also a month in advance for the new room, and made him give us receipts.

Many of the guests had arrived when at last we returned. The rooms really looked very well, and my soul was at peace as we went into them, with the lights and the well-dressed people and the buzz of conversation and laughter. Seldon and I circulated our good news among the other fellows, and then Seldon took his station by the door, for She had not yet arrived. When She did come Seldon was off duty for a moment, so I met her first and introduced old Mr. Wallace to her as he followed her in. He took possession of her instantly, and Seldon could only follow disconsolately behind.

The affair was really going off remarkably well. Fitzhugh, the basso of some opera company or other, sang his great song about a ghost which made itself desperately unpleasant to some person who was not specified, and gave a coon song as an encore. There were a couple of good dancers, more singing, and Drake—the brother of the Drake that married Amy—got off his monologue, and did it very well. Then the actors mixed with the audience and were introduced between the numbers. Everything was very bohemian, indeed, and quite wicked in a thoroughly innocuous way.

Terry, standing by the door, beamed with joy, as well he might, for he was singled out by Polly, after she got away from old Wallace, and she had gone and asked him all sorts of questions, talking to him for a long time. I saw her, though I was too far away to hear what she said. Then, as she passed me, she gave my hand a little squeeze.

"1 think it's perfectly splendid what you did for that boy," she said. "I hope he was hurt when you kicked him out of the door—the man, I mean, not the boy. Where's Mr. Seldon?"

Seldon had been in hot pursuit, but, owing to the crowd, had only succeeded in getting as far as the door. A man who had begun to sing interrupted himself for a moment, disturbed by a voice that was raised in anger outside. It was the same voice that we had heard before. Seldon went out and closed the door behind him; then opened it again and, sticking his head inside, beckoned wildly for me. I was already making toward him as rapidly and inconspicuously as I could, and Sam was working in the same direction.

"Keep still for a minute, can't you, and listen to me," I heard Seldon say; then we opened the door and dodged out into the passage, where the tables, holding the refreshments, had already been placed. Siegel was leaning against one of them, and it was in danger of upsetting.

"Get away from that table," growled Sam.

"Well," said I, at the same moment, "what is it you want? Make it short—and don't raise your voice as you did just now."

Siegel was angry, but with an effort he controlled himself. Greg and Baynes slid unobtrusively out of the door.

"What do I want?" asked Siegel, with a labored effort at a sarcastic manner, "I want——"

Here I interrupted him. "By the way, Seldon," I said, "Polly was just asking for you—wanted to see you."

I spoke only in order to interrupt Siegel, and said the first thing that came into my head. I thought it would make him angry, and it did, but it also caused Seldon to vanish before I could get the words out of my mouth. Then I turned to Siegel again.

"Well?" I asked.

Siegel roared. "What I want is just——"

"Speak low!" snapped Greg, so shortly that Siegel involuntarily obeyed.

"1 want you to get yourselves and your stuff and that gang out the room," he said. "If you ain't out in fifteen minutes I'll have you thrown into the street, see? You'll start now, and I'm going in there to see that it's done."

"In there? Nit," observed Terry.

"Are you aware that these gentlemen had twenty-four hours—" commenced Baynes, in his most soothing manner.

"They had it to get out of the building in," said Siegel.

"Or to pay their rent," Baynes continued, blandly. "They have paid it. Then it occurred to them that they'd rather have this room, so they took it, paying a month's rent in advance. There are the receipts, signed by an authorized person, as you know. You can send the lease up in the morning. Go away now."

But Siegel was very angry. He declared, in a voice unnecessarily loud, that he would not go away. He took the receipts that I held out, glanced at the signatures, and then tore them into pieces, which he threw on the floor. Sam wriggled his shoulders as if he were about to wrestle, and I heard the lining of his dress-coat crack.

"Go on back," he said to us, in a tone of entreaty. "Go on; do! The people inside won't know what's become of you. They'll think that something's wrong."

But I appealed once more to Siegel. "You've seen the receipts," I said. "You can come again, if you like, in the morning, but you'd much better go quietly now."

"Er else you'll get fired out again," supplemented Terry.

Siegel was beyond prudence now. He announced his intention of bodily ejecting our guests, and was so ill-advised as to take a step toward the door.

"Well, you had your choice, you know," said Sam.

The song was nearly finished when we all, except Sam and Terry, returned to the room. Outside a series of bumps sounded, exactly as if a heavy body were being propelled rapidly, though in a somewhat spasmodic manner, along the passage; and the voice of Siegel, which at first was loud, grew rapidly fainter in the distance. We heard the front door slam, and a moment later Sam returned. His face was flushed, but it wore a cheerful smile.

Seldon was quite unconscious of all this. He was sitting beside Polly, who was looking intently at the stage, and he was looking at her with an idiotic expression of utter bliss that told its own story.

The song was finished, and there was a rattle of applause, but Seldon's face was still turned toward Polly, and it wore the same expression still. Therefore I knew, and anyone who glanced at him might have learned, that all was joy within him, and why.