CHAPTER X
"I'm sorry, old fellow."
"Sorry for what, Mr. Landor?"
"To have driven your little friends away. They evidently had some goodnews to tell you."
"Oh! that's all right," said Jack cheerily, "it will keep, you know, andthey were in a hurry--they said they could only stop a moment." Jack waspuzzling his young brain over their abrupt departure, but his loyalty toall three friends made him wish to hide from Landor the fact that he wasapparently the cause. "I'm so sorry they _were_ in a hurry," hecontinued, "for I'm always wishing you knew one another--you'd get onlike a house afire."
"Should we, Jack? I don't know. Recent events don't seem to prove it, dothey?" laughing good-naturedly.
"Oh! that doesn't count. You just wait until some day when they havemore time--I don't know when that'll be, though, for they're regularhustlers. What do you suppose?" confidentially. "They call their flat'The Hustle'--isn't that great?"
"I should say so--it sounds enterprising."
"They named it after the private car they used to live in--they've toldme all about it. Gee! wouldn't I like to get aboard of her once! Shemust have been a beauty!"
"What became of the car? Did you ever happen to hear, Jack?"
"It's out west somewhere--some railroad's got it, I think, but I'm notsure. They never spoke of it but once--I could see it went kind of hardtalking about it, though Miss Hester laughed and joked about its beingthey who did the hustling now, instead of the car. It must be fine to berich and travel all around," exclaimed the boy, "but I'd hate to havehad it and then have to give it all up the way they have. Say, Mr.Landor, shall I tell you something?" He clasped the arms of thereclining chair with his thin hands and drew himself up to a sittingposture.
Landor nodded and drew his seat closer. He encouraged the boy in hisconfidences.
"I slumped the other night--clean went all to pieces. I'm fourteen, youknow, but if I'd been four I couldn't have acted more kiddish. Motherwas out and I'd been thinking how I wanted to go to college andcouldn't, because mother can't afford it, and how I wanted to travelaround and couldn't, and how I even wanted to walk and couldn't--not fora long time yet--and I just lay here and thought there wasn't much sensein getting any better anyway--I'd just have to go back and be nothingbetter than an office boy where I was before I got hurt and--"
"And you succeeded in working yourself up into a fine frenzy ofdiscontent, didn't you, Jack? I understand, my boy. We all have ourrebellious moments."
"I was crying like a baby when Miss Julie came in."
"Poor old Jack," patting his hand sympathetically.
"Poor nothing!" exclaimed the boy in a tone of infinite disgust, "itmakes me hot all over to think about it and that wasn't the worst! I_kept on_ crying." Jack's honest nature was abasing itself before hisfriend. "I kept on crying till she shamed me out of it."
Landor did not speak, feeling silence at that moment would betterharmonize with the boy's mood. Jack and he understood each other, andthe boy feeling his sympathetic interest drew a long breath and went onagain.
"She made me tell her all about it and I felt so cut up and blue that Isaid a lot of things I didn't mean and I told her it was easy enough forher to be brave--she didn't know what it was to lie still and perhaps becrippled all your life--the doctor can't tell. _Think of my telling herthat!_" The boy shuddered. "I believe if I'd struck her, Mr. Landor, Icouldn't have hurt her more, for there's her father, you see, a milliontimes worse off than I am, and I'd forgotten all about him."
Landor pushed back his chair and as if he found action of some kindnecessary paced the room quietly while the boy talked on.
"Her face got so white and her eyes got so dark that it frightened me,but do you know what she did? I was lying on the couch and she came overand knelt down beside me and talked to me a long time about her father."Jack's voice was awed and Landor's hands went deeper down into hispockets--a way he had when he was moved.
"She called him 'Daddy' and you could see just the way she said it thatshe worshiped him, and she told me that when you loved a person verymuch it was harder to see him stricken down than if you were ill andhelpless yourself. I hadn't thought of that, but it must be so, mustn'tit, Mr. Landor?"
"Yes, Jack, it must be so." No cloud had ever darkened Kenneth Landor'spleasure-loving, pleasure-giving life.
"Then she told me that she wasn't brave really. That many a night shecried herself to sleep because she was heart-broken about her father anddiscouraged about their work and tired. I think she just told me that soI wouldn't feel as if I were a coward because I cried too. I'd stoppedby that time, I can tell you! And then she said she wanted me to helpher and her sister be bright and jolly by being bright and jolly, too.That made me laugh--to think I could help them! We both laughed and Ifelt better. After that she talked a long time about trouble and how itcame to some people very young and how it was a sort of test--did youever think of that, Mr. Landor?" gazing earnestly into the man's face.
"No, Jack, there are many things I have never thought of!"
"You would if you knew them, you couldn't help it. She wasn't a bitpreachy--I hate that--but she said the way we took things showed thekind of characters we had and when we got discouraged we must justremember we were soldiers--Christ's soldiers--that's what she said." Theboy's voice sank to a whisper. "And that no soldier amounted to shuckstill he was knocked about and disciplined and taught to obey hissuperiors."
"That is the truth, my boy." In his heart Landor was marveling at whathe heard.
"And do you know what, Mr. Landor? I'm going to march in the rankstoo--a double-quick step to try to catch up with them and if ever I docatch up and can march alongside of them, won't I be proud, just!"Julie's little sermon had sunk deep into his receptive mind and kindledhis imagination to deeds of valor like some knight of old. He leanedback on his cushions exhausted by this unusual talk, his frail body inpitiful contrast to the strength of the spirit that had awakened withinhim and glowed in his face with a transfiguring light.
Landor came over to his chair and took his hand in a grip that hurt. "Iam going to enter the ranks too, old fellow," said he, carrying out theillusion partly to please the boy's fancy and partly because he hadnever before been so in earnest in his life.
"You!" said the boy, to whom Landor was a hero, "you don't have tofight--why you can kill buffaloes and Indians and everything!"
Landor smiled. "Perhaps I have more dangerous foes nearer at hand, Jack.Who knows? Well, I must be going. Shall I lift you onto the couchfirst?"
Jack always enjoyed the feeling of Landor's strong arms about him andgave the man a grateful look as he was laid gently down. The couch wasin reality Jack's bed and the change to the reclining chair had beenbrought about by Landor, who sent the chair to him in the early days oftheir acquaintance, but laughingly denied any previous knowledge of itwhen Jack endeavored to thank him.
"You seem to have a lot of paper about," commented Landor, picking upsome sheets from the floor. "What are you up to these days?"
Jack blushed.
"Out with it, old fellow; you look guilty."
"I'm--I'm trying to write out the stories I make about the people I seeout of my window. You know I like to imagine things about them. _She_said if I'd write them down the way I tell them they'd entertain herfather very much, but I've gotten sort of disgusted--it seems such awfulrot when it's down on paper."
Landor ran his eye over the sheets Jack indicated.
"They are not rot, Jack, they are pretty good. I am not much of aliterary chap, but I know when a thing is interesting. When you havetaken this way of introducing the neighborhood to Mr. Dale why don't yousend him a weekly bulletin--a regularly gotten up paper with all theneighborhood news? When there isn't news you can invent it, you know,"smiling; "that is allowable in the newspaper trade."
"Say, that's great!" cried Jack. "I'll call it the--'In the Ranks' andmake a great big heading for my first column 'News from the Front' (thatmean
s front window) and I know, that'll please Mr. Dale, for mother toldme he was a distinguished officer in the Civil War and Miss Julie saysthey were brought up on military principles." Jack snatched paper andpencil eager to begin.
"Keep on with your stories first, Jack. Why, we shall be setting up aprinting-press here next," and with this delightfully suggestive remarkLandor departed.
He did not go on to the club, as was his wont at that hour, but lighteda cigar and walked out of the little court and down through Crana Streetto the river, where on the bridge he paused and gazed across to the citywith a rapt, preoccupied air. Then, as if the noise of the ever-whirringelectric cars disturbed him, he retraced his steps and took a road inthe opposite direction which brought him into the quiet and seclusion ofthe park. The air was keen and crisp and blew in his face in gustywhiffs as he strode on, while all about him in their winter nakednessthe trees cast spectral shadows. Usually, from long training andassociation with western plains and mountain trails, he took note ofeverything as he passed, but to-night he gazed far on ahead, engrossedin thought. To his annoyance, twice his cigar went out--which was initself significant. Finally he threw it away and lighted a littlebull-dog pipe, his solace and companion in many a solitary stroll.
So those were the Dale girls, he was thinking, of whom Dr. Ware had saidso much but of whom, all unconsciously, Jack had revealed more thanyears of intercourse with them might tell. He thought of Julie as he hadseen her, quiet and fair-haired, with that gracious little plea that heshould not let them drive him away, to prevent which they had themselvesmade a hasty exit from the room. And then there was another Julie asJack had pictured her, turning her heart out for a boy that he might becomforted! He thought of her with reverence. A profound solemnitypossessed him, giving him a strangely subdued sensation as of a manemerging from a sanctuary. What was he to whom life was an idle pastime,that he should draw the same breath with her!
Then from out this solemn train of thought danced another picture--twobaffling eyes mocking him. Who was she, this will-o'-the-wisp, that sheshould hold him at arm's length in that imperious fashion! He stoppedand half closed his lids as if the better to conjure up a vision of her,then shook himself and went on--were not those eyes enough and thatlight ironical voice in his ears? Why had she snubbed him so--him, whowas surely unoffending? And she was a soldier too, marching in theranks. That pretty, piquant, fascinating sprite had shouldered herknapsack and was fighting a battle royal. Dr. Ware had told him so longago, but somehow he only now began to realize it since Jack hadexpressed it in Julie's simple way. Jove! the very simplicity of it wasimpressive! Thoughts like these carried Landor out into the country andbrought him back to the club two hours later in an unusually quiet frameof mind. The men with whom he habitually fraternized found him dull andunresponsive and to his inexpressible relief they left him to finish theevening alone.