Torchy, Private Sec.

  CHAPTER VIII

  SOME GUESSES ON RUBY

  Well, I'm shocked at Ruby, that's all. Also I'm beginnin' to suspicion Iain't such a human-nature dope artist as I thought, for I've made atleast three fruity forecasts on Ruby, and the returns are still comin'in.

  My first frame-up was natural enough. When this goose-necked youngfemale with the far-away look in her eyes appeared as No. 7 in ourbatt'ry of lady typists, and I heard Mr. Robert havin' a seance tryin'to dictate some of the mornin' correspondence to her, I swung round witha grin on my face and took a second look. She was fussed and scared.

  No wonder; for Mr. Robert has a shorthand system of his own that he usesin dictatin' letters. He'll reel off the name and address all right, andthen simply sketch in what he wants said, without takin' pains to throwin such details as "Replying to yours of even date," or "We are inreceipt of yours of the 20th inst." And the connectin' links he alwaysleaves to the stenog.

  Course that don't take much bean after they get used to his ways; butthis fairy in the puckered black velvet waist and the white linen cuffshadn't been on the Corrugated staff more 'n three days, and this was herfirst tryout on private officework. She'd been told to read over thelast letter fired at her, and she was doin' it like this:

  BAILY, BANKS & BAKER, Something-or-other Chestnut, Philadelphia. Look up the number, will you? Gentlemen--and so on. Ah--er--what's that note of theirs? Oh, yes! Shipments of ore will be resumed--

  Which was where Mr. Robert stops her. "Pardon me," says he, "but beforewe go any further just how much of that rubbish do you mean totranscribe?"

  "Why," says Ruby, starin' at him vacant, "I--I took down just what yousaid."

  "Mm-m-m!" says he sarcastic. "My error. And--er--that will be all."Then, when she's gone, he growls savage: "Delightful, eh? You noticedher, didn't you, Torchy?"

  "The mouth breather?" says I. "Sure! That's Ruby. Nobody home, and thefront door left open. One of Piddie's finds, I expect."

  "Ring for him, will you?" says Mr. Robert.

  Poor Piddie! He was almost as fussed as Ruby had been. He admits takin'her on, but insists that she brought a good letter from some Westernmill concern and was a wonder at takin' figures.

  "Keep her on them and out of here, then," says Mr. Robert. "And if youlove peace, Mr. Piddie, avoid sending her to the governor."

  Which was a good hunch too. What Old Hickory would have remarked if themletters had got to him it ain't best to imagine. Besides, that stare ofRuby's would have got on his nerves from the start; for it's theweirdest, emptiest, why-am-I-here look I ever saw outside a nut fact'ry.Kind of a hauntin' look too. I couldn't help watchin' for it every timeI passes through the front office, just to see if it had changed any.And it didn't--always the same!

  Then here one day when I has to cook up some tabulated stuff for theSemiannual me and Ruby had a three-hour session together, me readin' offlong strings of numbers, and her thumpin' 'em out on the keys. We gotalong fine too, and when I says as much at the finish she jars me almostspeechless by shootin' over a shy, grateful look and smilin' coy.

  From then on it was almost a case of friendly relations between me andRuby, conducted on the basis of about two smiles a day. Poor thing! Iexpect them was about the only friendly motions she went through durin'business hours; for she didn't seem to mix at all with the other ladytypists, and as for the young sports around the shop--well, to them Rubywas a standin' joke.

  And you could hardly blame 'em. Them back-number costumes of hers lookedodd enough mixed in with all the harem effects and wired-neck ruffs thatthe others wore down to work. But when it come to doin' her hair Rubywas in a class by herself. No spit curls or French rolls for her! Shesticks to the plain double braid, wound around her head smooth andslick, like the stuff they wrap Chianti bottles in, and with her longsoup-viaduct it gives her sort of a top-heavy look. Sort of dull,ginger-colored hair it is too. Besides that she's a tall,shingle-chested female, well along in the twenties, I should judge, andwith all the earmarks of bein' an old maid.

  So shock No. 2 is handed me when I discovers how the high-shoulderedyoung husk with the wide-set blue eyes, that I'd seen hangin' round theArcade on and off, was really waitin' for Ruby. Uh-huh! I stood andwatched 'em sidle up to each other and go driftin' out into Broadwayhand in hand. A swell pair they'd make for a Rube vaudeville act!Honest, with a few make-up touches, they could have walked right on andhad the gallery with 'em!

  Believe me, I couldn't miss a chance to josh Ruby some on that. I shovesit at her next day when I comes back early from lunch and finds herbrushin' her sandwich crumbs into the waste basket.

  "Now don't spring any musty first-cousin gag on me," says I; "for itdon't go with the fond, palm-pressin' act. Steady comp'ny, ain't he?"

  Which was where you'd expect her to turn pink in the ears and let loosea giggle. But not Ruby. She's a solemn, serious-minded party, Ruby is."Do you mean Mr. Lindholm?" says she.

  "Heavings!" says I. "Do you have relays of 'em? I'm referrin' to thestocky-built young Romeo that picked you up at the door last night."

  "Oh, yes," says she placid, "Nelson Lindholm. We had Sanskrit together."

  "Eh?" says I. "Sans-which? What kind of a disease is that?"

  "It's a language," explains Ruby. "We were in the same class. I thoughtit might help me in my foreign mission work. I'm sure I don't know whyNelson took it, though. He was studying electrical engineering."

  "Maybe it was catchin', at that," says I. "Where was all this?"

  "At the Co-ed," says Ruby. "But then I'd known Nelson before. He's fromNaukeesha too."

  "Come again," says I. "From what?"

  "Naukeesha," repeats Ruby, just as if it was some common name likePatchogue or Hoboken.

  "Is that an island somewhere," says I, "or just a mixed drink?"

  "Why," says she, "it's a town; in Wisconsin, you know."

  "Think of that!" says I. "How they do mess up the map! What's it like,this Naukeesha?"

  And for the first time Ruby shows some traces of life. "It's nice," saysshe, "real nice. Not at all like New York."

  "Ah come, not so rough!" says I. "What you got special against our burghere?"

  Ruby lapses back into her vacant stare and sort of shivers. "It's so bigand--and whirly!" says she. "I don't like things to be whirly. Then thepeople are so strange, and their faces so hard. If--if I should falldown in one of those crowds, I'm sure they would walk right over me,trample on me, without caring."

  "Pooh!" says I. "You'll work up a rush-hour nerve in a month or so. Ofcourse, havin' always lived in a place like Naukeesha----"

  "But I haven't," corrects Ruby. "I was born in Kansas."

  "As bad as that!" says I. "And your folks moved up there later, eh?"

  "No," says she. "They--they--I lost them there. A cyclone, you know."

  "You don't mean," says I, "that--that----"

  "Yes," says she, "Mother, Father, and my two brothers. We were alltogether when it struck; that is, I was just coming in from the kitchen.I'd been shutting the windows. I saw them all go--whirled off, just likethat. The chimney fell, big beams came down, then it was all smoky anddark. I must have been blown through a window. My face was cut a little.I never knew. Neighbors found me in a field by a stump. They found theothers too--laid them side by side in the wagon shed. Nothing else wasleft standing. It's dreadful, being in a cyclone--the roar, you know,and things coming at you in the dark, and that feeling of being liftedand whirled. I was only twelve; but I--I can't forget. And when I'm inbig, noisy places it all comes back. I suppose I'm silly."

  Was she? Say, what's your guess about that? And, take it from me, Ididn't wonder any more at that stary look of hers. She'd seen 'em allgo--four of 'em. Good-night! I talked easy and soothin' to Ruby afterthat.

  "Then I went up to live with Uncle Edward at Naukeesha," she trailsalong. "He's a minister there. It was he who suggested my going intoforeign mission work. I had to do something, you know, and I'd alwaysbeen such
a good scholar. I love books. So I studied hard, and was sentto the Co-ed. But the languages took so much time. Then I had to skipseveral terms and work to help pay my expenses. I worked duringvacations too, at anything. Now I'm waiting for a field. They send youout when there's a vacancy."

  "How about Nelson?" says I. "He's goin' to be a missionary too?"

  "He doesn't want me to go," says Ruby, shakin' her head. "That is why hecame on. He had charge of the electric light plant too, a good place.And here he gets only odd jobs. I tell him he's silly to stay. I can'tsee why he does."

  "Asked him, have you?" says I.

  "Why, no," says Ruby.

  "Shoot it at him to-night," says I.

  But she shakes her head, opens her notebook, and feeds in a copyin'sheet as the clock points to 1. I looks up just in time to catch acouple of them cheap bondroom sports nudgin' each other as they passesby. Thought I'd been joshin' the Standin' Joke, I expect. Well, that'sthe way I started in, I'll admit.

  It's only a day or so later I has the luck to run across Oakley Mills.Something had come up that needed to be passed on by Mr. Robert, and ashe was still out lunchin' I scouts over to his club, and finds himstowed away at a corner table with this chatty playwright party.

  He's quite a swell, Oakley is, you know; and I guess with one Broadwayhit in its second year, and a lot of road comp'nies out, he can affordto flit around under the white lights. Him and Mr. Robert has alwaysbeen more or less chummy, and every now and then they get together likethis for a talkfest. As Mr. Mills seems to be right in the middle ofsomething as I drifts in, Mr. Robert waves me to a chair and signals himto keep on, which he does.

  "It's a curious mess, that's all," says Oakley, spreadin' out hismanicured fingers and shruggin' his shoulders under his Donegal Norfolk."I'm not sure if the new piece will ever go on."

  "Another procrastinating producer?" asks Mr. Robert careless.

  "No, a finicky author this time," says Oakley. "You see, there is onepart, a character part, which I'm insisting must be cast right. Itseemed easy at first. But these women of our American stage! Notraining, no facility, no understanding! Not one of them can fill it,and we've tried nearly a dozen. If I could only find the original!"

  "Eh?" says Mr. Robert, who's been payin' more attention to manipulatin'the soda siphon than to Oakley's beefin'. "What original?"

  "The dumbest, woodenest, most conscientious young female person it hasever been my lot to meet," goes on Mr. Mills. "Talk about your raretypes! You should have known Faithful Fannie (my name for her, youknow). It was out in the Middle West last summer. I had two or threeweeks' work to do on the new piece, revising it to fit Amy Dean. Allstars of that magnitude demand it, you understand.

  "Well, I should have stayed right here until it was done, but someChicago friends wanted me to go with them up into the lake region,promised me an ideal place to work in--all that. So I went. I might havehad better sense. You know these bungalow colonies in the woods--wherethey live in fourteen-room log cabins, fitted with electric lights andEnglish butlers? Bah! It was bridge and tennis and dancing day andnight, with a new mob every week-end. Work? As well try it in the middleof the Newport Casino.

  "So I hunted up a little third-rate summer hotel a mile or so off, wherethe guests were few and the food wretched, and camped down with mymangled script and my typewriter. There I met Fannie the Unforgetful.She was the waitress I happened to draw out of a job lot. I suppose itwas her debut at that sort of thing. For the sake of hungry humanity Ihope it was. What she did not know about serving was simply amazing; buther capacity for absorbing suggestions and obeying orders was profound.'Could I have a warm plate?' I asked at the first meal. 'Oh, certainly,Sir,' says Fannie, and from then on every dish she brought me was pipinghot, even to the cold-meat platter and the ice cream saucer. It was thatway with every wish I was rash enough to express. Fannie never forgot,and she kept to the letter of the law.

  "Also she would stand patiently and watch me eat. That is, she would fixher eyes on me intently, never moving, and keep them there for a quarterof an hour at a time. A little embarrassing, you know, to be soconstantly observed. She had such big, stary eyes too, absolutelywithout any expression in them. To break the spell I would order thingsI didn't want, just to get her out of the way for a moment or so while Isnatched a few unwatched bites. You know how it is? There's green corn.Now I like to tackle that with both hands; but I don't care to beclosely inspected while I'm at it. I used to fancy that her gaze wassomewhat critical. 'Good heavens, Girl!' I said one day. 'Can't you looksomewhere else--at the ceiling, or out of the window?' She chose theceiling. It was a bit weird to have her stationed opposite me, her eyesrolled heavenward. Uncanny! It attracted the attention of the otherguests. But it was something of a relief. I could watch her then.

  "There was something fascinating about Faithful Fannie, though, as thereis about all unusually plain persons. Not that she was positivelyhomely. Her features were regular enough, I suppose. But she was such atall, slim, colorless, neutral creature! And awkward! You've seen ayoung turkey, all legs and neck, with its silly head bobbing above thetall grass? Well, something like that. And as I never read at my meals Ihad nothing else to do but study that sallow, unmoving face of hers withits steady, emotionless, upward gaze. Was she thinking? And what about!Who was she? Where had she come from?

  "A haunting face, Fannie's was; at least, for me. It became almost anobsession. I could see it as I sat down to my work. And the first thingI knew I was writing Fannie into my play. There was a maid's part init,--the conventional, table-dusting, note-carrying, tea-serving maid,with not half a dozen words to speak. But before I knew it thisinsignificant part had become so elaborated, I had sketched in Fannie'spersonality so vividly, that the whole action and theme of the piecewere revolving about her--hinged on her. I couldn't seem to stop,either. I wrote on and on and--well, by Jove! it ended in my turning outsomething entirely different from that which I had begun. The originalskeleton is still there, the characters are the same; but the valueshave exchanged places. This is a Fannie play through and through. Andit's good, the biggest thing I've done; but----" Once more Oakley shrugshis shoulders and ends with a deep sigh.

  "Rubbish!" says Mr. Robert. "You and your artistic temperament! What'sthe real trouble, anyway?"

  "As I've tried to make clear to your limited and wholly commercializedintelligence," comes back Mr. Mills, "I have created a character whichis too deep and too subtle for any available American actress to handle.If I could only find the original now, with her tractable genius fordoing exactly what she was told----"

  "Why not send out for her, then?" asks Mr. Robert.

  "As though I hadn't!" says Oakley. "Two weeks ago I located the hotelmanager in Florida and wired him a full description of the girl. All Igot from him was that he'd heard she was somewhere in New York."

  "How simple!" says Mr. Robert. "Here is my young friend Torchy, withwits even more brilliant than his hair. Ask him to find Fannie foryou."

  "A girl whose name I don't even know!" protests Oakley. "How in blazescould anyone trace a----"

  "I'll bet you the dinners," cuts in Mr. Robert, "that Torchy can do it."

  "Taken," says Mr. Mills, and turns to me brisk. "Now, young man, whatfurther details would you like?"

  "Don't happen to have a lock of her hair with you?" says I, grinnin'.

  "Alas, no!" says he. "She favored me with no such mark of her esteem."

  "Was it kind of ginger-colored," says I, "and done in a braid round herhead?"

  "Why--er--I believe it was," says he.

  "And didn't she have sort of droopy shoulders," I goes on, "and a trickof starin' vague, with her mouth part way open?"

  "Yes, yes!" says he eager. "But--but whom are you describing?"

  "Ruby Everschott," says I. "Come down to the Corrugated and take alook."

  Course it seemed like a 100 to 1 chance, but when I got the Wisconsinpart of his yarn, and tacked it onto the rest, it didn't seem likely on
eState could produce two such specimens. Inside of fifteen minutes thethree of us was strollin' casual through the front offices.

  "Glance down the line of lady typists," I whispers to Oakley.

  "By George!" says he gaspy. "The one at the far end?"

  "You win," says I.

  "And you also, my young wizard," says Oakley.

  "I'll have her sent into my private office," suggests Mr. Robert.

  And once more I was lookin' for some startled motions from Ruby when shediscovers Mr. Mills. But in she comes, as woodeny and stiff as ever,goes to her little table, and spreads out her notebook, without glancin'at any of us.

  "Pardon me, Miss Everschott," says Mr. Robert, "but--er--my friend Millshere fancies that he--er--ah--oh, hang it all! you say it, Oakley."

  At which Mr. Mills steps up smilin'. I should judge he was a fairlysmooth, high-polished gent as a rule; but after Ruby has turned thatstupid, stary look on him, without battin' an eyelash or liftin' aneyebrow, the smile fades out. She don't say a word or make a move: justcontinues to stare. As for Oakley, he shifts uneasy on his feet andflushes up under the eyes.

  "Well?" says he. "I trust you remember me?"

  Ruby shakes her head slow. "No, Sir," says she.

  "Eh?" says Oakley. "Weren't you a waitress at the Lakeside Hotel lastsummer?"

  "Certainly, Sir," says Ruby.

  "And didn't you bring me my meals three times a day for four mortalweeks?" he insists.

  "Did I?" says Ruby, starin' stupider than ever.

  "Great Scott, young woman!" breaks out Oakley. "Didn't you look at melong enough and steadily enough to remember? Don't you recall I wasdisagreeable enough to ask you not to watch me eat?"

  "Oh!" says Ruby, a flicker of almost human intelligence in her big eyes."The one who wanted hot plates!"

  "At last," says Oakley, "I am properly identified. Yes, I am thehot-plate person."

  "You had tea for breakfast too, didn't you?" asks Ruby.

  "Always," says he. "An eccentricity of mine."

  "And you put salt on your muskmelon, and wanted your eggs opened, anddidn't like tomato soup," adds Ruby, like she was repeatin' a lesson.

  "Guilty on all three counts," says Mr. Mills.

  "I tried to remember," says Ruby, sort of meek.

  "Tried!" gasps Oakley. "Why, you made an art of it. You never so muchas---- But tell me, was it those foolish little whims of mine you werethinking so hard about while you stood there gazing so intently at me?"

  Ruby nods; a shy, bashful little nod.

  Mr. Mills makes a low bow. "A thousand pardons, my dear young lady!"says he. "I stand convicted of utter selfishness. But perhaps I canatone."

  And with that he proceeds to put his proposition up to her. He tells herabout the play, the trouble he's had tryin' to fit one special part, andhow he's sure she could do it to a T. He asks her to give it a try.

  "Go on the stage!" says Ruby, her big eyes starin' at him like he'dasked her to jump off the Metropolitan Tower. "No, I don't think Icould. I'm going to be a foreign missionary, you know."

  "A--a what?" gasps Oakley. "Missionary! But see here--that can wait. Andin one season on the stage you could make----"

  Well, I must say Oakley argued it well and put it strong; but he'd haveproduced just as good results if he'd been out in the square askin' thebronze statue of Lafayette to hand him down a match. Ruby drops backinto her vague gazin' act and shakes her head. So at last he ends byaskin' her to think it over for a day, and Ruby goes back to her desk.

  "How absurd!" growls Oakley. "But I simply must have her. Why, we wouldpay her three hundred dollars a week."

  I catches my breath at that. "Excuse me if I seem to crash in," says I,"but was that a gust of superheated air, or did you mean it?"

  "I should be glad to submit a contract to Miss Everschott on thoseterms," says he.

  "Then leave it to me," says I; "that is, to me and Nelson."

  Did we win Ruby? Say, with our descriptions of what three hundred a weekmight mean in the way of Christmas presents to Uncle Ed, and donationsto the poor box, and a few personal frills on the side, we shot thatforeign missionary scheme so full of holes it looked like a last yearmosquito bar at the attic window.

  "But I'm sure I sha'n't like it at all," says Ruby as she signs hername.

  I didn't deny that. I knew she was in for a three weeks' drillin' by theroughest stage manager in the business. You know who. But he can deliverthe goods, can't he? He makes the green ones act. Look at what he didwith Ruby! Only it don't seem like actin' at all. She's just Ruby, inthe same puckered waist, her hair mopped around her head in the samesilly braid, and that same stary look in her big eyes. But it gets 'emstrong. Packed every night!

  I meets Nelson here only yesterday, and he was tellin' me. Comin' alongsome himself, Nelson is. He's opened an office and is biddin' for bigjobs.

  "I've just landed my first contract," says he.

  "Good!" says I. "What's it for?"

  "A fifty-foot, twenty-thousand-candle-power sign over the theater," sayshe, "with Ruby's name in it. She's signed up for another year, youknow."

  "Well, well!" says I. "Then it's all off with the heathen, eh?"

  And Nelson he drifts up the street wearin' a grin.