The Walking Doll ; OB, THE ASTERS AND DISASTERS OF SOCIETY. By R. H. NEWELL, AUTHOR OF "THE ORPHEUS C. KERR PAPERS," "AVERT GLIBtTN," "THE CLOVEN FOOT," "VERSATILITIES." ETC, ^ Q 4 PTew Yoj\k : FRANCIS B. FELT & COMPANY, 91 MERCER STREET. 1872. <\ Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by FRANCIS B. FELT & COMPANY, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. EDWARD. 0. JENKINS. rRINTER AND STEREOTYPER, NO. 20 N. WILLIAM STREET, N. Y. PREFACE. Tlie " Great American Novel " has been long expected by the Critics, who 1 ' in their foolishness, Passion and mulishness," have dictated that it shall possess and rival all the worst beanties of Dickens, Beade, "Wilkie Collins, Thackeray, and Miss Braddon. Well — here it is ! o. c. k. mS.127-1 I CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. All about a Watch-you-may-call-it 9 CHAPTER JI. The Watch a Duplex Lever 20 CHAPTER III. A Glimpse of the Skeleton 28 CHAPTER IV. The Mystery of the Walking Doll 34 CHAPTER V. Come Wheel, Come " Whoa " 40 CHAPTER VI. Rung and Rank 50 CHAPTER VII. The new Finn of Dapple & Co 61 CHAPTER VIII. Dollie's Confession 68 CHAPTER IX. The Circumambient Heir , 74 (5) 6 CONTENTS. CHAPTER X. Stepmother, Sire, and Son 82 CHAPTER XI. Tedium Lardnerous 90 CHAPTER XII. The Chivalry of Physic 100 CHAPTER XIII. An Appeal unto Caesar 107 CHAPTER XIV. In Two Rooms 114 CHAPTER XV. Great Demoralization of Jack Aster, Drayman 123 CHAPTER XVI. Sweetheart and Cousin 134 CHAPTER XVII. The Story of the Walking Doll 140 CHAPTER XVIII. A Convert from Rascality 146 CHAPTER XIX. One of the Three Comes in 156 CHAPTER XX. Mrs. Dedley can not Forget 165 CHAPTER XXI. Aster-risks on Ice 172 CHAPTER XXII. The Owner of the Watch 186 CONTENTS. 7 CHAPTER XXIII. Mother and Son 194 CHAPTER XXIV. Mr. Stalker is finally Dismissed 202 CHAPTER XXV. A few Canary seeds of Comfort 210 CHAPTER XXVI. A Man and Men 217 CHAPTER XXVII. Another of the Three Comes in 232 CHAPTER XXVIII. The Stepmother-Tongue 240 CHAPTER XXIX. Toyman and Drayman 249 CHAPTER XXX. In a Box at the Opera 256 CHAPTER XXXI. Mrs. Dedley asks for Instructions 267 CHAPTER XXXII. Sacrifice of the Walking Doll 273 CHAPTER XXXIH. Doctor Canary's Dream 281 CHAPTER XXXIV. Mad at Last 285 CHAPTER XXXV. The Stepbrothers ,288 8 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXXVI. " Good-bye, Gen'ral " 296 CHAPTER XXXVII. Returned to Iris Relatives 302 CHAPTER XXXVIII. The Curse of the Walking Doll 309 CHAPTER XXXIX. News in Lardner Place 321 CHAPTER XL. Danforth 327 CHAPTER XLI. The Half-brothers 338 CHAPTER XLII. The Last of the Three Comes in 345 CHAPTER XLIII. Don't you see how it was ? 355 CHAPTER XLIV. Love pays for all 374 CHAPTER XLV. And down comes the Curtain 385 THE WALKING BOLL. i. ALL ABOUT A WATCH-YOTJ-MAY-CALL-IT. CALL it half-past Two, post-meridian, when Chatham Square, New York, in the vicinity of that stroke of architectural humor formerly known by gilt letter legend, as the Department of Finance, was happily relieved of its horse-car monotony by the advent of a pageant. The latter consisted of a moire-antique horse of the severest Doric build, fluttering a whole girlhood of gay ribbons from his harness ; a long, low wagon, which might have been accredited to the Fashionable-Undertaker's school but for the extremely crimson liveliness of its panels ; and a freight of two Dramatic Impersonations, a theatri- cal ducal-chair in purple and silver, and a kind of boxed table, or pulpit, draped with gold -laced green. Seated in the ducal chair, with back to steed and face to boxed table, was an impressive middle-aged version of Hamlet, clad in the plumed mourning-hat, and cloaky mourning- tongs style of costume, in which popular actors generally solemnize the melancholy prince of Schleswig-Holstein. Behind him, and driving the ribboned horse at a slow, majestic pace, stood the other Dramatic Impersonation, who, though, attired in the livery-overcoat and laced cocked hat of an Italian cardinal's footman, was as pal- pable an Irishman as ever whacked hurroo. I* (9) 10 ALL ABOUT A WATCH- YOTJ-M AY-CALL-IT. Taken altogether, the- pageant was a sensation, even for a Square in which the four-wheeled canvas temple of Try Skinner's Instantaneous Paint Wash was a daily complication with the horse- cars, and Mr. Editor Gree- ley's celebrated original dressing of Romeo, a weekly hint that "Now Is The Time To Subscribe." Shabby old men paused on the sidewalks to gaze at it ; spruce young fellows stepped briskly toward it from the curb, to utter aloud such witticisms as women never understand at all, and always laugh at ; old ladies with baskets, and young ones with parasols, walked into Returned Veteran apple- stands, and affronted foreign Hot Roast Chestnut men, in attempting to look at it in one direction, and glide away from it in another ; gentlemen of poll-parrot aspect as to their noses, and Biblical flavor as to the names upon their sign-boards, swarmed forth from fifty haunts of second-hand attire, suspenders, and pawn-brokerage, \o stare at it with Hebrew intensity; while Youngest America (which freely ranges along the Square, from the Pious Little Boot -black of the Boston Tract for Boys, to the junior heir of the tailor-prince,) boldly fol- lowed close at the tail of the crimson car, vivaciously exchanging compliments in that occult language of un- intelligible sounds, which is also a popular medium for the ideas of firemen, Macbeth's stage-army, and any two colloquial hackmen who chance to get their wheels lock- ed in a jam. What time he of Denmark, in his ducal chair, con- templated, with studious abstraction, a human skull, which he poised in one hand, and thoughtfully tapped with a flute held in the other. What time he of the cocked hat stolidly held telegraphic communication, as it were, through the lines, with the Doric horse, and ma- ALL ABOUT A WATCH- YOU-H AY-CALL-IT. 11 jestically advised the latter of such turns as passing affairs seemed likely to take. Arriving, however, at the centre of a long cross-walk in the widest part of the Square, the animal was telegraphed to take no further steps in the matter at present ; and, of course, stopped proceedings : whereupon he of the cocked hat suddenly leaped from the wagon to the ground, briskly drew out a pin here and bolt there, and caused the sides and ends of the vehicle to flap down outwardly like so many leaves of a table. Thus the wagon was transformed into a trim platform, not unlike the ingenious combination of dis- guised candle-boxes, upon which the Duke of Mantua occasionally sits enthroned at a Bowery play-house, when the robustious drama of that side of the town gives the Orange Girl of Italy, as a final bridge between the last Sailor's Hornpipe and breakfast-time. Thus the scene was prepared for Hamlet, who, after rising slowly from his chair of state, placing the skull (which, by the by, was remarkable for its splendid teeth) upon the boxed table, and bowing profoundly to the gathering throng about the wheels, adjusted his flute to his lips and struck into what — the flute being a wind instrument — might be termed a blustering air. It was an air from Venice as affected by the Carnival, tempered by a zephyr of Yankee Doodle, and a slight breeze of Old Dog Tray ; not to speak of a casual gale of Captain Jinks, momen- tary gusts of Come Rest in this Bosom, and fragmentary north-easter whiffs of Rip, Snap, set 'em Up Again. It was, in short, just such an air as your fashionable young unmarried friend shall frantically scratch out of her grand Steinway for you on a summer night, and ask you to credit as Those Evening Bells. Thoroughly blown by this performance, Hamlet rested 12 ALL ABOUT A WATCH-YOU-MAT-C ALL-IT. again in his chair, under the sarcastic congratulations of the mob, the while his attendant in the cocked hat, who had remounted the wagon, opened a drawer in the table from which sundry small round boxes were handed by him to a place of display near the skull ; the while Ham- let's long black locks, foxy little eyes, sharp red nose, and grizzled cheeks and chin, attracted the particular at- tention of one of the shabby old men who had paused to note his progress from the nearer sidewalk. Not a very old man, either, when your second glance was corrected by the sudden energy which seemed almost to straighten the earlier deep stoop of his shoulders, and light a painful youth in the eyes behind his silver spec- tacles, as he glared with increasing attention at the mountebank. His light hair — quite flaxen — looked the lighter for its liberal admixture of gray, and his shaggy eyebrows to match gave an old and gnarly aspect to a countenance much seamed and drawn about the brow and mouth ; but, as his seedy figure involuntarily straight- ened while he stared, and he finally stepped quickly across the intervening cobble-stones, toward the object of his curiosity (if that was his emotion), there were an elas- ticity and alertness of demeanor and movement which suggested but forty-five years, at the most, to critical cal- culation. Not heeding his especial scrutinize!*, the mountebank presently arose from the chair once more, and laid aside the flute for the skull ; the cardinal's footman simultane- ously spreading across the front of his gaudy table a white banner, or poster, upon which was inscribed : " Dr. Canary, Odontolator to the Civilized Universe." The various exact imitations of ironical canary-bird notes elicited from the crowd by this revelation, did not ALL ABOUT A WATCH-YOTT-MAY-CALL-IT. 13 disturb the gravity of Dr. Canary, who, with his twink- ling eyes fixed upon the grinning relic of mortality in his left hand, began, in ringing treble tones, the follow- ing astonishing address : 1 ' Alas, poor Yorick ! Friends, I knew him well, Of all your diners-out the greatest swell. ' Twas his to set the table in a roar, Where graver wisdom had been deem'd a bore ; To make the laugh attend each sally, quite As good digestion waits on appetite, And cause good-humor's wholesome sauce to mend What in the viands else should health offend. Aye, there's the rub ! as you will understand From this sad mortal remnant in my hand. See how the Teeth, when all the rest is dust, Still keep unsullied their enamel'd crust. He whom this skull once served as inner head, Knew good digestion from good Teeth is bred, And in digestion's perfect work the mind's Inherent brightness greater brightness finds ; So, to elude dyspepsia, bane of wit, (And Teeth imperfect ever hasten it,) The Great Canary's potent aid he sought, And of Canary Dental Powder bought, Plung'd in his mouth the brush well sprinkled o'er, And made his molars white for ever more ! Thence did his eating bud into an art, That, through the stomach, strengthen'd mind and heart ; Thence did his sallies greater zest afford Than Yankee envoy's at St. James's board. Nor ever, from the dawn of morning light Until the very witching hour of night, Did he forget to whom the praise was due, — • The very man who now addresses you ! Behold the skull! And, live you slow or fast, To this complexion must you come at last : Your eyes, your nose, your lips and cheeks decay; 14 ALL ABOUT A WATCH-YOTJ-MAY-CALL-IT. But, by my Powder, save your Teeth you may, That, when your skull, like this, is held to view, Men, seeing Them, may feel respect for You !" As it is absolutely necessary for all poetry to be pub- lished in Boston before the discriminating American mind can see anything in it, this toothsome epic did not evoke all that popular enthusiasm which one of Mr. Long- fellow's "New England Tragedies," or a few readings of Emerson's mystical poem on The Wood -Louse, might have excited. Still, there was some emotion in the crowd, several critics loudly inquiring how much such " cackle" was worth per yard, and whether it would wash ; and Dr. Canary followed up his metrical hit by grandiloquently urging some victim of dental neglect to take a seat in the chair and have the virtues of the won- derful Powder illustrated in his case gratuitously. To pick out a particularly striking example, the mounte- bank now scanned the upturned faces around him with especial care, and was thus led to catch the intent gaze of the shabby man before mentioned. As he did so, a sudden frowning sharpness came into his look, then a sinister kind of grin, and he appealed directly to that person. "Why, how are you, sir?" cried he, nodding and smirking. " I have some recollection of you from old times, I'm sure. Just oblige an old friend, won't you, by stepping up here for a moment and giving me another look at a set of teeth that would be the fortune of many a young fellow — Of all the charms that nature can bequeath There's nothing fairer than unsullied teeth. What edge they give to youth's desires and bliss ! Refine its eating and make firm its kiss ; ALL ABOUT A WATCH-Y0U-MAY-C ALL-IT. 15 While graver Age, devoid of other charms, Oft by fair Teeth wins beauty to its arms ! So, step up here, old friend, and give me a chance at your osteoplastics. The public await you, and friend- ship calls." The unhappy shabby man grew so nervous at this; so bewildered and frightened, apparently ; that his only reply was an abject and very desperate attempt to run away. The crowd behind him being dense, and the first subject of collision a handsome, sturdy young fellow in sailor's dress, his flight ended where it began ; but the attempt caused a momentary rush and jam, and some one bawled a caution about watches and pocket- books. At the cry, the would-be fugitive, all pale and panting as he was, mechanically clapped a hand to one of his waistcoat pockets, and piteously whimpered that his watch was gone. " Of course, it's gone !" whispered a brisk, smooth- faced, sharp-eyed man at his elbow. u Didn't that sailor hustle you ?" In a moment, the poor, nervous creature had the sailor by an arm, and was frantically imploring him to restore the missing time-piece. a What are you talking about, good man !" exclaimed the young fellow, between a smile and a stare. " I know nothing about your watch. Are you crazy ?" " But you hustled him, you know," put in the sharp- eyed man, loudly enough for all around to hear ; u and his watch is gone. That's suspicious, I should say." " That's so ! Make him give back the watch !" chorussed a dozen time-servers, as the crowd opened with alacrity 16 ALL ABOUT A WATCH- YOU-MAY-C ALL-IT. to permit the hasty outward passage of one low-browed and small-eyed fellow who, as he passingly expressed it, could no longer refrain from calling a hofficer. " Friends !" cried the sailor, as they pressed upon him from all sides and temporarily forgot the great Oclonto- lator, " this is an outrageous mistake, I tell you " Here Dr. Canary made an abrupt attempt to blend the new excitement with his own topic, and turn it to ac- count. " From ill digestion," chaunted he — " From ill digestion, when the Teeth are poor, Comes ev'ry evil jails are built to cure. Crime from the stomach, not the heart, is bred, Or from some unsound molar in the head." " I tell you," reiterated the young sailor, angrily push- ing aside the rudest crowder, " that there is some out- rageous mistake here ! I'm one of Uncle Sam's boys just home from a cruise, and hav'n't the sign of a watch about me. Why, just look here," and he plunged a hand into a pocket of his^blue flannel unmentionables ; — u I'll show you all my traveling-rig. Here's my bandanna, you see, and I believe my knife's got afoul in it some way. — Why ! — by George ! — it isn't a knife : it's a — Watch /" " That's it ! That's my watch, you scamp !" screamed the shabby man, snatching it from him. The mischief being done, the police were just due, and a languid member of that haughty force now burst heavily through the ring about these side-show perform- ers, and placed a white cotton glove on the nearer shoulder of the detected thief. " Come along !" quoth this magnate, whose whiskers richly entitled him to a place in the Broadway Squad, and whose nature was inflamed because he ha&a't it — ALL ABOUT A WATCH TO U-M AY-CALL-IT. 17 " Come along, all this party, with me. And you play- actor fellows in that wagon, there ! move on, or I'll make yer.'' Pale as a ghost, and with the bandanna still in his hand, the sailor went speechlessly along under the im- pulse of the white cotton glove, as though no actuating soul of his own remained in him ; and the owner of the watch, closely attended by the brisk, sharp-eyed man, reluctantly followed after to prefer a charge. To do credit to the arrest, and prove that it met the approba- tion of all thinking men, some fifty leisurely gentlemen and youths, in rakish soft hats and faded blue military overcoats, also marched in a body as far as the Police Court ; but here the doors were slammed in their faces, and it was only left for them to exchange sarcasms under the name of " Johnny," and proceed, as an extemporized body-guard, in the train of a passing fashionable maiden who had the Grecian Bend. But one of all the swarm managed to get into court with the prisoner's party, and that was — Dr. Canary. Mr. Justice O'Blackstone may not have written it, see- ing that his chirography was not such as you could wish a dear friend to address to you, but it was generally understood, in high legal circles, that his career had, at least, suggested that graceful book of travel known as " Kambles in Yan Dieman's Land ; or, The Convict, The Fugitive before the Mast, the Naturalized Citizen, and the Member of the U. S. Judiciary." Before this subtle master of the Constitution the prisoner was unresistingly projected by the white cotton glove. "And what have yez to say for yourself ?" asked the Justice, after hearing the faltering accusation of the shabby man, who seemed miserably bewildered by the presence 18 ALL ABOUT A WATCH- YOU-MAY-CALL-IT. of the mountebank and the continued promptings of the sharp-eyed man. " I say," responded the young sailor, still very pale, but self-possessed and dreadfully in earnest, " that I am completely astounded at this thing ! I never put that watch into my pocket. ' I know they saw me take it from my pocket with the handkerchief; but I solemnly swear that I never put it there — never saw or touched it before ! I belong to the ironclad Chawuppa, which accounts for my being so little tanned. In an ironclad of her mon- itor-build, a man is more under water than in the sun, and more steamed than roasted. I'm an honest sailor who has fought for his flag, and if that old man will not withdraw his shameful charge against me I am ruined for life in more ways than one. For God's sake, sir, be careful how you forever dishonor the innocent ! I can't prove that I didn't take that watch ; but you did not see me take it, and I beg you not to be an instrument in what is part of a conspiracy against me and mine." " Sure, and it's a power of gab ye have, acushla," ob- served the Court ; " and f hat might yer name be ?" u I decline to give that. Call me John Doe." " Your Honor," said the sharp - eyed man, stepping forward near the prisoner, " I'm a detective officer, name of Stalker, and I think I know this man. Young fellow, isn't your name Aster ?" " Yes," returned the prisoner, staring with surprise and apparent discomfiture at the questioner, " I may as well own-up that far. My name is Aster." " I thought so," muttered the detective, with a barely perceptible wink ; and his manner was as much as to acid : " It's a name I know little good about." " It's committed, prisoner, ycz'll have to be " began ALL ABOUT A WATCH- YOU-M AY-CALL-IT. 19 Justice O'Blackstone ; but the prisoner, with amazing presumption, cut him short there : "As I hope for salvation, I did not take the watch ! If I had stolen it, do you think I would have pulled it from my pocket again in that way ? My dear old man, you don't seem to be willing in this thing, and I implore you to take back the charge. Perhaps you're a father. I tell you that I can see in this pickpocket trick upon me — and it's nothing else — a plan to set my father against me. To make him think me a thief ! Why, you, your- self, may some day be dragged into court " Here he was cut short, in his turn, by the man whom he addressed; for the latter started — almost fell — back, as though he had received a blow, and cried, in a sharp, tremulous voice — " I'll not charge you with anything ! Don't go on ! I'll not charge you with anything I" " But," observed the Justice, very red in the face, a it's tistified ye have already, Misther Dapple, that yere watch was taken from the pocket of this very spalpeen that's now so contimpchuss about the ividinces of yere own eyes." " Contemptuous !" repeated the prisoner, impatiently. " What contempt a man like me can afford to feel is reserved for vice and ignorance " " Thin, begorra, it's guilty ye are of contimpt of Coort !" roared the Justice, catching him by his own inadvertent confession, " and I'll commit ye for a pickpocket." The sailor drew himself up magnificently, and his curly, black liair, manly moustache, coal-black eyes, and warmly tinted complexion, seemed all to quiver and radi- ate with the noble anger of a fine soul at bay : " I am not a Pickpocket, I am a victim of Woman's HATE." 20 THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVEE. And the words had scarcely left his lips, when, with an agile spring he alighted upon the policeman nearest and knocked him down ; knocked down detective Stalker ; knocked down Dr. Canary and the officer at the door ; knocked open the latter, and was — Off. Off! your Honor, and Gentlemen of the Jury. Off! Reverend Henry Ward Beecher, and Members of the Citizens' Association. Off! Messieurs Legislative In- vestigating Committee, and incorruptible District At- torneys. And getting thus off around us — though gener- ally through political influence — every day. II. THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVEE. THE Bowery, as a business thoroughfare, compares with Broadway very much as Mr. Oliver Wendell Holmes' serious poetry compares with Tennyson's. There are, undoubtedly, a greater number of Capitals employed in it ; but a score of them do not amount to as much, usually, as the least significant single one in Broadway. There are more ground-floor noise and assumption about it ; but there is also more comparatively vacant upper- story. It may exceed its rival in its retail of Yankee Notions ; but where is its own wholesale of the Best European ? ISTo one will deny its possession of certain original lines (of horse-cars), which do not everywhere THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVEE. 21 occur in the Street of Mercantile Palaces ; but, for that very reason, the latter should have clearer passages. The Bowery, however, is a fine, wide, double-line of the democracies of carpet, candy, clothing, millinery, drugs, boots, shoes, hardware, and what not, picked-out here and there with those quaint, old-fashioned houses of a past time, which, like gray hairs in young locks, give a spicy dash of old age to the more youthful bricks forever going it in a highway. Wooden are most of those same old Landmarks ; and to one of them (standing, at the time of our story, not far from the late New Bowery Theatre), with a steep shingle roof, rich in moss, a two- story ed yellow front, rather rickety about its shutters and doors, and a grim mouth of a store, in which a com- munity of toy gentlemen, ladies, animals, villages, railway trains, etc., seemed on their way to such a gigantic swal- lowing as the ancient fabulous dragons inflicted upon commonwealths of a larger growth, the attention of the reader is herewith directed. Above said dragon's-mouth, by way of moustache, was a dingy sign-board, reading thus : GEOFFREY DAPPLE, INYENTOK OF MECHANICAL TOYS. and just within the gritty lips of the mouth, like an es- pecially dainty tid-bit, to be swallowed last, stood pretty Dollie Dapple, waiting for her father. All distinctive woman-character begins with a doll, and Miss Dapple had none of the strong-minded young- woman-as-clerk aspect in her suggested connection with a business in which dolls had it all their own wav. There 22 THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVEE. was n't the least hint of female clerkliness (which is gen- erally a rather embittered type of feminine loveliness) in her laughing brown eyes, plump red cheeks, and springy figure ; and the manner in which her plentiful brown curls fell into an arch veil for either eye, as she slightly stooped to peer up or down the street, was any- thing but business-like. If the spirit of the shop clung to her at all, it was in the shape of the twelve-inch young lady, very waxy about the head and shoulders, who swooned limply in her little right hand, and was in such a primitive stage of toilet as made bed, or a fashionable party, seem a more suitable place for her than the street. " I wonder what keeps him f ' asked Dollie of herself, noticing that twilight deepened, and the public lamps in the distance began twinkling. It is an invariable and sarcastic commentary upon the keenest human vigilance, that after one has spent hours of preternatural alertness in looking up and down a road, for the chance to meet some expected, and suppos- ably unexpecting, loved one half way, as it were, there is always the one rash second of exhausted nature's ab- straction, during which the loved one is sure to make miraculous speed from the horizon to your elbow, and be there to startle all intelligible English out of you at your next turn of the head. So it happened, that while Miss Dapple borrowed just half a minute from her anxious vigil to look at a new style of bonnet going by, her agile sire vanquished at least six good blocks of practicable Bowery perspective, and was beside her before she had decided whether the Trimming was Gathered or Fluted. Not only beside her, but actually brushing past into the store, without a word of greeting ! " Why I— ! Well, I declare !" was the best Dollie THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVER. 23 could say, as, with a prettily provoked air, she flirted in after the shabby man of the police court, and permitted the sashed door to spring shut so pettishly, that its alarm- bell at the top was excited to the verge of going off the handle. "What in the world has kept you so late, father ? Oh !" — with a sudden shock of fright— " what can be the matter P' It was rather shadowy in the Toy Store by that time ; but as Geoffrey Dapple wearily pulled off his rusty old hat, with its faded band of crape, his daughter could de- tect, plainly enough, a haggard change in his counte- nance. " I'm tired and worried, dear," said he, motioning ner- vously for her to lead the way farther inward. 66 And so you must be, to stay so long," said Dollie, as they entered a back room, whose open doorway com- manded a view of the whole stock. " I was afraid you'd been run-over, or got lost. Now, father, do sit down, and tell me what is the matter !" " Yes, yes I" he responded, peevishly ; " but go light the lamps in the store, my dear, or the neighbors will think there's something suspicious — something suspi- cious." The girl glanced at him inquiringly, as though both puzzled and alarmed by something very unusual in his words and tone ; but made no further remark until after the toy salesroom was respectably illuminated, and a ker- osene lamp, warranted not to explode until women or children were alone with it, stood burning on the middle of a little tea-table neatly set for two. The room was a goodly square, with one large window looking across a poor strip of yard to the back of a build- ing on a rear street, and having at its top a faded turkey- 24 THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVER. red curtain, gathered and tucked up in most slovenly and impracticable style along its sustaining rod. In a corner was a round stove, bearing a humming and fidgety tea- kettle then, but also attended on one side by that materia medica of the Doll family, a glue-pot. In another corner appeared an iron camp-bed ; in another a painted cup- board ; and in the fourth, a sort of work-bench, with vice, tiles, drills, a portable lathe, and what looked like a small brass box-work set full of cog-wheels. In the cen- tre was the tea-table, and, in various places over the much-worn ingrain carpet, struggled three or four ancient rush-bottomed chairs, on their last legs. Here, in the lamplight, the shabby Toyman looked less like a very old man than in the street ; yet his face was pretty seriously wrinkled, too ; and his white-streaked pale hair, bent shoulders, and overlarge old coat and waistcoat of napless black, certainly invested him with a drooping forlornness of aspect not contagiously redolent of the prime of life. " Kow, Father," said Dollie, in a sort of admonitory way, glancing curiously at him once more, as he sat glowering and sighing near the stove, " while I put the tea drawing, you must tell me what ails you. Because I know that something does ail you," added Dollie, vigorously, " and there's no use of your saying it does n't !" u Yes, daughter," returned the Toyman, sighing, and shaking his head drearily at the lamp, " something does ail me. I grow so much worse a Coward every day, that I should not attempt to go out-doors with other men at all ! I'm a miserable, miserable old man ! If you were provided for, poor girl, I'd sooner die any death, than live on in this way." THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVER. 25 Rubbing liis hands slowly together, and frowning at them, and saying this as spiritlessly as though it had been dictated to him, word for word, by an enemy, Geoffrey Dapple succeeded in making his daughter for- getful of everything save his apparent need of imme- diate magnetic comfort. It is a part of every woman's most solemn belief, that her particular hands possess a magical soothing power for all brows towards which she is affectionately inclined; and to get to work upon a good high forehead in affliction is ever her stateliest joy. Of course Dollie left the tea-pot and started for the paternal brow at once. " Why, Father I" she said, with a hand on his shoulder for a moment; and then the soothing process began. "You're only more nervous than usual to-night, and want to be magnetized before supper. I should like to know what there is to make you cowardly ; except the cars and express-wagons, which would just as soon run over anybody as not ? And you're not a miserable old man, any more than I'm an old maid." Her "passes" over his forehead did appear to soothe him, for he remained quite still under them several moments. iC Dollie," said he, finally, and with a slowness sug- gestive of confused thought, " do you remember a man with long, straight black hair, small eyes, and a red nose : say about fifty — yes, about fifty-years old V "N-n-no, Father. Why?" " " I've seen such a man to-day," he replied, dropping his voice and nervously pulling at his chin with a rest- less hand. " I've seen such a man, and he's seen me. He was a mountebank, selling some quack preparation .... I'm sure I know him, and he knows me : . . . but I can't 26 THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVER. seem to place him, — I can't seem to place him. — Dollie !" exclaimed the Toyman, suddenly upturning his face to hers, with a pitiable, craven twitching all over it, " I was mortally afraid of that man — and he knew it !" She kissed his forehead, and gently posed his head again for the passes. u I tell you, you dear old fellow, you've only had one of your nervous turns again," commented Dollie ; but the pretty face bending over his head wore an expression of anxious thought, for all, not devoid of vague appre- hension. " Well, no matter ; no matter for that now," he sighed. " I'd almost forgotten something else. I get more con- fused and forgetful every day." " That's because you're killing yourself over that In- vention of yours, Father. It's in your head the whole time.'' " And in my Heart, — as heavy as lead in my Heart !" wailed the man. "But I'll tell you about the other thing, now, my dear." Then did the shabby Inventor, sitting there under his darling's soothing hands, relate the loss of his watch, the arrest of the sailor -thief, the scene in the police court, and the daring escape. " As I really lost nothing by him," concluded he, " I was not sorry that the sailor got away ; for he was a handsome frank-looking young fellow, and would have made me sure of his innocence, if I hadn't seen his guilt with my own eyes. What's the matter, Dollie ?'' This last, because the girl's hands after a very unsteady pass or two across his forehead, appeared to hover ex- citedly over his eyes, and appeared also to shake with some new and covert emotion. THE WATCH A DUPLEX LEVER. 27 " Oh, nothing's the matter," said Dollie, stroking busily again. "He was a nice young man, was he ?" " Yes, yes : handsome and frank," replied the father, relapsing partially into his old confused style again. "He said that I might be arrested some day, myself, — I, myself! Could he have Suspected anything?" "He might have suspected that your watch was a duplex lever," put in Dollie, with a curious little flutter in her voice ; and again her plump hands began sliding downward towards his eyes. "I don't understand you, daughter. It's an English lever, you know." Down went the hands over his eyes. "Wouldn't it have to be a duplex leave- er, sir," laughed Miss Dapple, in great enjoyment of her own pun, "if it could be in two places at once ? Now confess you've been nervous ! Just think of your magnanimity toward a nice young man (and I'm so glad he got away !) who couldn't have got your watch if he'd been ever so bad." "Eh!" ejaculated the Toyman, endeavoring to free his eyes and spectacles, " why couldn't he ?" With a ringing laugh, full of the fun of having caught her sire in a pretty piece of absent-mindedness, the girl quickly withdrew her hands from his face : " Because you left youe watch at Home !" 28 A GLIMPSE OF THE SKELETON. III. A GLIMPSE OF THE SKELETON. TT~P sprang Geoffrey Dapple to his feet, glaring across J the room toward a well-known nail just over the work-bench ; where, sure enough, hung a white faced, chubby gold watch. " Have I been dreaming ? Am I crazy ?" he panted, clutching a pocket of his waistcoat, and still staring at the hanging timepiece as though it had been a ghost of a watch. " It's there ; and yet it's here ! Some cursed witchcraft has got possession of me. Look, child !" He had drawn from the pocket and held in his hand a watch exactly like the one against the wall, its black silk chain having been cut by the thief in its abstraction ! Dollie had believed that the watch claimed by her father in the street was really the property of the sup- posed thief, and, in her glee over the assured blunder, did not give enough attention to the whole confused story to realize that the forgetful old man had finally re- tained it. Hence, at sight of it now, in its exact dupli- cation of the one over the bench, the color left her cheek, and she lifted both hands. " What can it mean ?" The Toyman, his hands trembling so that the watch shook in them, held the latter near the lamp and ex- amined it closely. Something about it in that view A GLIMPSE OF TIIE SKELETON. 29 startled him anew, and, in great haste, he opened the back of the case. " Merciful Heaven !" groaned he, sinking into a chair, and dropping his face upon his arms on the table. " Oh, Father !" quivered Dollie, afraid to move, " you'll break my heart if you do so ! You'll break the plates too," she added, hysterically. He raised his head, stared at her in slow-coming com- prehension of her distress, and mechanically replaced the cluplicatory mystery in his pocket. "I want time to think," he said, very slowly. " Let us eat, now, and we shall be more in our senses after it. I'll tell you more, then. Come." Drawing closer to the table, he waited silent] v, almost stolidly, with gaze riveted to his plate, for his daughter's ministration ; nor did either speak again until the form of a meal had been completed, and the table and earthen service cleared away. Then the father called the daughter to a stool beside his chair, where they could both keep an eye over the Store ; and placing a hand on her pretty bowed head, said, almost in a whisper : " This watch which has come to me to-day, was — your Mother's." " My Mother's !" cried Dollie, clasping his arm. " Your Step-mother's." "She was not my Mother !" burst indignantly from the girl, as she raised her eyes, all sparkling with sudden feeling, to her father's rigid face. " She was my unhappy Wife !" continued the Toyman, deliberately, as though forcing himself to speak. " Her initials, ' L.D.' — Lydia Dapple — are engraved on the inner side of the back of this watch, as mine arc on the inside of mine. They were put there at her request, 30 A GLIMPSE OF THE SKELETON. that they might never wear out. I bought the two, ex- actly alike, on the day of our wedding. She was a handsome and— I truly believe, God pity me ! — a loving woman then." "She broke your heart!" exclaimed Dollie, pressing her lips to his arm. "She hated me and made you wretched. That hateful watch must have some of her spirit in it, to come back here, again, after being lost in the hospital." " It has come back because I am Unblest in my mem- ory of her," muttered Geoffrey Dapple ; " because I am under a curse to which all things must add weight, until I — " he half recoiled from his daughter's touch — " until I— die !" " Which you shouldn't speak about to me, if you don't want me to die first !" sobbed Dollie, bursting into tears. " You ought to take the watch right back to the magis- trata to-morrow, Father, and clear that poor young sailor's name, so far as you're concerned." "Dollie," was the quick, even stern, answer, "your Father dares not enter a Court of Justice. The skeleton from this home of ours would follow me there, and — Denounce me." " Denounce you !" repeated the girl, her head proudly raised, and her face passionately flushed : " Her spirit denounce You ? You, who bore so patiently with her tyranny over yourself and her persecution of me, until you had to almost ruin yourself to support her extrava- gance, and send me away to school ? You, who endured more from her cruel temper in a day, than I could respect any man for standing from me, in a year ? You, who couldn't help her removal to the hospital, and death there, — how could you, dear ? — when you, yourself, had A GLIMPSE OF THE SKELETON. 31 fallen clown so sick that you knew nothing for a fortnight, and had scarcely means to pay for my coming home from school to attend you ? You, whose work of years was lost on that day, and never found again, because it must have been the last act of her life to destroy it ? Father, when you make regret for her the ruin of your life, you insult the memory of My Own Mother, who never caused you a sorrow until she died !" She spoke very rapidly, catching her breath, and with all the impetuosity of her youthful nature blown into flame as by a chill wind from that only toward which her heart was cold. Yisibly alarmed and shocked, the Toy- man shrank from the arm she had begun placing about his neck. " Daughter !" answered he, reproachfully, " it is sinful, it is unnatural in one of your years, to speak so bitterly of the dead. Are you fitted to judge what a wife's ac- tions should have been, when such trying infirmities of disposition as mine often are were sometimes their provo- cation \ Ah, my child ! when you talk so, where shall I look for comfort ?" 6i Oh, well," cried Dollie, discharging every trace of temper from her countenance on the instant, " I know I'm the mischief when I get started ; but you 're such a worrying Old Dear sometimes ! Wouldn't you like me to stay with you this evening, instead of going around to Sophia Skeggs's ? If I let yon sit here moping all alone, after getting that goblin watch, you'll be spoiling the temper of all the dolls, as you have mine." And, this time, she forced her arms around him, as she knelt on the stool, and kissed his forehead. " No, my darling ," he returned, with more of his usual home-manner than he had yet shown, u you must go and 32 A GLIMPSE OF THE SKELETON. see your friend, as you promised. This is a very strange thing about the watch, and might make a younger man nervous, as you call it ; but I'm quite myself, now, and shall work a little at the bench this evening." Here the alarm-bell on the store-door rang frantically, owing to the headlong advent past it of a precocious lad, who, in consideration of fifty cents a week, came every night at Seven (save during Holiday seasons) to put up the shutters, and every morning, at the same hour, to take them down. " Oh, there's that hateful boy !" ejaculated Miss Dap- ple, as she took her hat and shawl from a drawer under the cupboard. And as she passed the same despised youth, on her way out, a something in the sudden set of his shapeless cap, which seemed rather ironically sugges- tive of the poise of her own jaunty " Jockey," caused her to step back for a moment and feebly box his large ears. Orlonzo Goggle was the supposed name of this boy ; and a boy with redder hair, more freckles, or a more contagious squint, was not to be found this side of Jer- sey. His years could not have been more than ten, though his ragged plenitude of cap, and astonishing un- occupied width of fustian sack-coat and pantaloons, made him look like a middle-aged 'longshoreman seen from the top of Trinity steeple. On the little finger of his right hand he wore a rakish brass ring, garnished with a sharp- ened nub, for self-defence in night encounters ; and both of his shoes ran down hill so violently over the heels, that the corrugated toes pointed upward and askew in reckless demoralization. By some ingenious accommodation of his squint to a nearly direct line of vision, the youth was able to dis- cover that the eyes of the Toyman, in the back-room, A GLIMPSE OF THE SKELETON. 33 were apparently watching him, whereupon he ostenta- tiously blew into his hands, rolled the massive cuffs of his mammoth sleeves still higher up, and scuffled intensely with his shoes in the corner near the show-window where the shutters were kept. Noting, over a shoulder, that his employer had sunk back in his chair, and was lost in thought over some object which he held in his hands, he artistically graduated his scuffling to silence, again, and then stole noiselessly along the shelves behind the coun- ter, where the choicest toys, and particularly the dolls, lay in state. Amongst the latter was a Five-dollar ver- sion of female beauty and fashion, whom the young van- dal took stealthily from her private-box, and caused to cough, work her eyelids, and throw her arms, by insidi- ously pressing a spring in some vital part of her system. Thereupon he made her do it again, as who should think : This is a rare and curious study of feminine character which can not be too deeply pondered by Those About to Marry. A sound from the back-room induced him to re- place the accomplished woman in her box with great haste, and skim away toward the show-window once more. Another quick look from thence showing the Toyman to be still in his dreams, he as noiselessly went down upon all-fours, and, from that, raised the lower half of his fustian body in the air : this shocking reverse in early life having its uses in allowing him to execute a brief promenade along the doorway and back again, on his hands, and giving passers in the street an idea that the Concern was getting-up a neat mechanical Santa Cldfus going down a chimney, for the holidays. " Ah, that was a bully go !" ejaculated the flushed youth under his breath, as he finally returned to upright proceedings. " Now for the shut's." T 34 THE MYSTERY OF THE WALKTXG DOLL. To see him carry out the tall shutters, propped by his forehead, was to expect a catastrophe in overbalancing with every one ; to hear him whistle some savage air of the circus while ever he was outside with one shutter, and leave it out there until he reappeared with the next, was to gain ideas for a new Phantom Chorus of distant locomotives ; and to note how, after all the store-lights save one were extinguished, the door was locked, and the key dropped inside through the newspaper-slip, he paused on the sidewalk to explore the entire lining of his im- mense coat for what proved, upon recovery, to be the ruins of a segar, was to suffer the conviction that Mr. Goggle might seriously embarrass the calculations of such provincial gentleman, or lady, as should take him for an infant. IV. THE MYSTERY OF THE WALKING DOLL. " T)OOR Dollie !" muttered Geoffrey Dapple, turn- JL ing the watch in his hands, and mournfully nod- ding to some suggestion of his thoughts, u she little thinks what I could tell her. Oh, Lydia ! Lydia ! if you could but come to life !" His despondent reverie was disturbed by a sound from the store-door, as of some one who first tapped timidly against the latter with cautious finger-tips, and then pro- ceeded by bolder degrees to a free use of knuckles. As a customer for toys would scarcely come so unseasonably, THE MYSTERY OF TIIE WALKING DOLL. 35 and his daughter always returned by the house-door, the Toyman answered the unusual summons with angry re- luctance. Half suspecting some mischievous boy of be- ing the tapper, he finally inserted the key in the lock as softly as he could, and opened the door with a jerk, when there entered unto him, with considerable celerity, a fig- ure whose form and features challenged no definite recog- nition in the dim light. " Probably you have made a mistake, sir," remarked Geoffrey, with some sharpness. " This is my store, and it is closed to business for the night." " To the toy and gimcrack business, I dare say," an- swered the stranger, promptly ; " but I've made no mis- take, Mr. Dapple, and I wish to see you concerning a piece of mechanism." " Who are you ?" asked Geoffrey, in an altered tone, placing a hand upon the other's chest. " I must know that before you enter a step farther." " Certainly. I'm Doctor Canary." " Your true name, I mean." u That is it." " "What are you dogging me for ?" " If there's anything canine in looking on at a police court, ascertaining that the prosecutor in a case is an in- genious inventor, and calling upon the inventor after bus- iness-hours to solicit his special inventive services, — if there's anything doggy in that, why then I'm your cur." The Toyman had turned up the blaze of the one burn- ing lamp in the store, closed the door and relocked it, and now stood intently regarding the ex-mountebank, who looked like some backsliding Temperance lecturer, with his long Indian locks, red nose, and shabby-genteel Chris- tian dress. 36 THE MYSTERY OF THE WALKING DOLL. (i Whoever yon are, you come here for no good. When and where have we seen each other before to-day ?" " Why, Mr. Dapple, since you're so anxious to claim me for an old acquaintance, I may as well admit, frankly, that my familiar address to you in the Square, this afternoon, was really no more than a professional trick. You were staring at me with spectacles that forcibly said : 'I'm determined to know you f and that miffed me, you see, into being rather spitefully familiar. It was the kind of thing to take with the crowd, too ; making them believe that I was well known in town." Geoffrey passed a hand over his brow, as though striving to reconcile something present with something past, and then abruptly turned toward the private apart- ment beyond. " If I am to be of any service to you," said he, dogged- ly, " of course you have more to tell me. Come this way." Dr. Canary followed him readily enough into the rear room, where, with much ease of manner, he deposited his slouched hat on the table, and drew a chair to the side of the stove opposite his unwilling host. ■ " Bless my heart, this is snug, Mr. Dapple," he remark- ed, casting an approving glance about the room. " There's a harmonious union of labor and rest — a bedstead and a work-bench, a teakettle and a gluepot. Do I detect woman's hand here ? No, I do not ; for woman's taste would never leave that window-curtain bundled aloft in that useless style. You must be a bachelor, sir, like my- self." At his mention of the curtain, though it was made without emphasis of manner, the Toyman sat rigid in his chair and eyed him with a newly questioning stare. " I say," repeated the intruder, not seeming to notice THE MYSTERY OF THE WALKING DOLL. o? the effect, "that you must be a bachelor, like myself. That staircase from the back of the store, which I noticed as we passed it, must lead up to some other apartment of yours. Say you would like to rent out a room up-stairs, say you would like to have a man who could appreciate you for company every night — I don't know but I could be tempted to come, myself." "I have a daughter," was the Toyman's mechanical response. " Happy to hear it," went on the ex-mountebank. " I'm her most obedient. Pleasure before business, you know, sir ; and so, before we talk about inventions, I'll just mention to you that I'm not the buffoon you may have taken me for to-day. I was educated to physic, but have had mis- fortunes and been compelled to do almost anything for a living. You cannot choose your own opportunities at forty. That painted wagon, furniture, costume, and tooth- powder belong wholly to a quack-medicine firm of note, who were greatly taken with my name and glibness, and hired me to act the c Great Odontolator' with their dentri- fice. This has been my first day in that character, and shall be my last ; for I won't stand their putting a disguis- ed Irishman over me to watch their property. The poet- ry, alone, belongs to me ; and, although it's my own com- position, has been attributed, by good judges, to Tupper and Titcomb. Literature, you know, like an extra stock of babies, is sure to be the gift of a poor devil who could starve just as quick without it. I'm decidedly literary, and if I had a combined bed-room and study on the upper- floor of a house like this, I might let fly a few verses that would tell for you about Chrism as — By Dapple's genius, even Toys become The tongue of Science where she else were dumb, 38 TIIE MYSTERY OF THE WALKING DOLL. And childhood, taking them in playful part, Finds theni the monitors of purest Art. See how his Dolls, of wood, of wax, or delf, In looks and action mimic nature's self; They wink, they bow; 'Papa,' 'Mamma' they talk; They laugh, they cry, they everything but — walk." With this felicitous dedication of an autobiographical sketch in which his manner had been a lively combina- tion of communicative frankness and sheer impudence, Canary was kind enough to take breath and give his host a chance to speak. Geoffrey sat listening to the rigmarole like a man in a startling dream, and half arose from his chair at its conclu- sion, in apparent mind to either leave his guest or knock him down. " Who are you ?" were his words again. " Well, sir," was the reply, begun in perfect coolness, "as you do not appear to find that question fully answer- ed yet, I'll tell you all that there is left for me to say. In conclusion of my many adventures, from Physic to Poet- ry, I'm am embryo dramatist, with a new original play at my finger ends ; and wish to procure, through your skill, to aid my stage machinery, a model in petto of a Walking Doll.—"' " Yes, yes" — interrupted the Toyman, trembling strangely. " Ah, now you take an interest. 'Tis well. "My play, Mr. Dapple, is to have a Walking Doll in it ; or, at least, the incipient machinery of such an article. The machin- ery must, of course, be small in bulk. About as large ae — let me see — about the size, say, of that bagging fold up there in your window-curtain." "What do you mean?" shouted Geoffrey Dapple, THE MYSTEET OF TniC WALKING DOLL. 39 springing from his chair, and taking a step toward the other. u Tell me where I have seen you before !" "My play,' 1 went on the imperturbable talker, smiling complacently up, across the stove, at the working features of the Toyman, — " my play opens with a scene in a popular bar-room. Great chance there, by the way, for fine points : Real beer-pumps ; Genuine punches made and passed around to the audience ; bar-keeper made up to represent a Celebrated Member of the City Government. Time of Action, four years ago. Enter Man with black hair and poor clothes, who wishes to be trusted for beverage. ' No Trust,' and Man walks disconsolately out again to side- walk, and there pauses to soliloquize. He is a physician ont of practice ; has no money, no sleeping-place, and no more credit for liquor. What shall he do ? "Where shall he go ? He has seen a shabby, elderly man pass him on the street with a kind of hangdog look, and slink into a toyshop two or three doors below. "While he goes on solilo- quizing, there comes a sudden cry for ' Help ' from the toy-shop, and the Man — having nothing else to do — flies to the rescue — " u I know you now !" screamed Geoffrey Dapple, ad- vancing with uplifted and shaking hands upon his tor- mentor, either to tear him to pieces, or — kneel to him for mercy ! " Yes !" answered the playwright, rising to his feet and sternly confronting him, "You saw me before, Old Man, on the day when your Wife went to the hospital." 40 COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA. CHAPTER Y. COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA/ a _.__ . v WHO has not seen theFifth Avenue, just before sun- set, on a softly hazy Saturday afternoon in late and golden October, can imagine but haltingly the more than regal Pride and Glory of New York. The rectilinear miles of rectilinear palaces on either side that noble ar- chitectural perspective ; the endless, dense procession, ever doubling on itself, of shining horses stepping high in the arrogance of jeweled harness, of carriages looming and glittering in every pattern of millionairy state, from the lofty four-in-hander with two footmen in silver and blue, to the mere enameled web-work of the deer-limbed Trot- ter's driver, with its sparkling fairy wheels spinning the sunlight into hub-lightning ; the walking iancy-dress ball of the flanking borders of glaring sidewalk, along which move innumerably to and fro the kaleidoscopic colors of promenading female fashion, tripping pertly to the Cas- tanet Polka of a thousand thoroughbred hoofs, and punc- tuated sententiously by black Admiration-points in the shape of broadcloth dandies; and all these, catching now the slender shadow of a marble spire, and now the full ra- diance reflected from snowy palace-fronts ; — and*all these, reaching and moving, in ever-varying face and prance and roll and dance, to and from the world's garden-map of Central Park, where Nature's Autumn motley and Dod- COME WHEEL, COME kV WHOA. ' 41 worth's music blazon and merry-make the mightiest of Vanity Fairs ; — form such a scene as only Paris and the Boi3 de Boulogne can duplicate. Perraitte divis cc&tera. Then consider the human face and form as they find their highest characterizations and dignity in that magni- ficent moving panorama of costly enjoyment. Where is that other city containing such splendid rich old men, with their fine broad shoulders, erect military bearing, Napo- leonic grey mustachios, and scrupulously elegant dress- ing ? Where is that other jeunesse dorte so immaculate in hats and neck-scarfs, and so brittle of legs ? Where else shall we find matrons, dowagers, and last-year brides, so queenly in satins and diamonds, and so various of noses and finger-nails ? Where else shall we look for budding; womanhood so bisque-mantle-ornament-like in toilet, and so unflinching of countenance and back-hair ? Mark, too, how the richest equipages in all the grand tenue are those of the rich republic's honored sons and daughters whose genius has immortalized her intellectual page, whose patriotism has illustrated her history, whose philanthropy has stretched the hand of help to myriads of her lowly ones, whose stern Republican principle has shrunk from no sacrifice of wealth and station to win freedom and manhood for the poor slave, whose meek virtues and Democratic earnestness have illustrated the Christian charity and moral force belonging naturally to a Free people. Here, in this sumptuous phaBton, lolls luxuriantly my Lady Groceress, whose lord's title is stenciled on a million of soap-boxes. Yonder, behind two bays worth as many thousands as they have legs, sits the illustrious Member of Assembly who, in one day, 42 COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA." manufactured enough naturalization certificates to elect him, and, in one month of office, earned more than those horses. Guiding that priceless four-in-hand, to the left, appears an ex-stage-driver, enriched in a night by petro- leum; his state eclipsed only by an adjacent four-in-hand under the supreme control of a noble-looking man whose name is honorable in Ethiopian Minstrelsy. Near that comer, with her trotting ponies, beams the favorite Actress, able to keep her stable and brown-stone mansion on thirty dollars a week. Proudly skilful with the gold- mounted tandem now approaching, is the great tailor of Blank Street, who dexterously takes away the lead in the line from the gorgeous landau of an immortal Pill man. And, crowded over near the curb, come the founder of a beneficent public Charity, the author of a noble Book, the ministering calico angel of a dozen war-hospitals, the inventor of a mechanism by which the whole world is a gainer : all riding in one — omnibus. On a golden Saturday afternoon in October, when the Avenue thus brilliantly epitomized the glories of the Re- public, a handsome close-carriage might have been seen taking a brisk start ahead of the main Park-ward pro- cession, near Forty-second Street, and rolling rather faster than the usual courtly pace toward a point ahead, where the heaped gravel and stone for a new building left but a narrow passage-way for vehicles. Perhaps the liveried coachman wished to gain the pass in advance of carriages coming the other way. At any rate, such would have been his advantage but for unexpected event. Side by side with the carriage, and going in the same direction, was a common dray, drawn by an ancient, buckskin, wall-eyed horse, and carrying two persons. Of these latter, the first, or Drayman, was a tall stately COME WHEEL, COME "WHOA." 43 young man, wearing an enormous slouched black som- brero, a faded blue military overcoat, and a pair of bone- rimmed evesrlasses. The second, sitting on the extreme tail of the dray, with his lower limbs dangling, was a shapeless, red-haired lad, audibly eating a defective apple. Leaning with his elbows on the iron bar between the two front uprights of his dray, the drayman seemed lost in contemplation of the sunset sky. Ours is not an opaque- blue sky, like that which was gotten up for Italy by the Old Masters and has remained up ever since ; nor can our sunsets be equal to those which Americans visit the south of France to see. Indeed, owing to the youth of the country, our sunsets are often so crude, that many native painters, in velvet coats, decline to make their American sunsets in the remotest degree like them ; and the azure of our main firmament is such an insipid hue, that our best Art repositories very properly refuse to keep any pigment at all like it on hand. Yet, the sunset visible as you looked up the Avenue that afternoon, was really creditable in some of its coloring ; and the wrapt dreamer on the dray, solemnly and soothingly danced into lethargy as he was by the monotonous jumping movement of his vehicle, gazed fixedly at it through his eyeglasses, forgetful of all grosser objects. As a conse- quence, the buckskin horse, believing that all was open country on his wall-eyed side, made a sudden weak bolt to that side, and brought one of the dray wheels into sharp collision with the handsome close carriage. The shock hurled the unprepared drayman flat upon his back between the rungs, jerked the shapeless boy into a street-puddle, and summarily stopped both vehicles ; whereupon a female cry of alarm was heard from the carriage, and a pleasant-looking elderly gentleman thrust 44 COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA.'' his bead through a window to inquire what the disaster was. Slowly arose the fallen drayman, to a sitting position, from thence unhurriedly swinging himself to a standing attitude on the Belgian pavement. Haughtily, too, lie proceeded to put a blanket upon his horse ; and then, returning to where the lad, much incommoded by the extreme length of the faded blue military overcoat which be, too, wore, was climbing back upon the dray, asked the question : " Are you hurt much, Orlonzo ?" "I'm all hunky-dory, Gen'ral," answered the youth, resuming his temporarily interrupted apple. "I'd like to know if yere not goin' to get yer wheels away from mine, thin, Misther Take-it- Aisy ?" roared the coachman, greatly exasperated by such deliberate pro- ceedings. Him the young drayman ignored, as not being in ex- istence, and still addressed the youth : "Orlonzo, the phrase 'hunky-dory' is a vulgarism. Never use it again." Leaving the child much impressed by his rebuke, the speaker now advanced toward the vehicle interlocked with his own ; the stoppage of which had compelled the stoppage, also, of some twenty-five hundred equipages in line behind it, and nearly a fifth of that number before. "I perceive," remarked the drayman, coldly, addres- sing the slightly astonished old gentleman at the carriage- window, " that my wheel has abrased one of your?, and defaced the armorial panel of your door. I beg leave to apologize for the offense of which my horse has been guilty, and will trouble you to exchange cards with me." J 5J COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA. 45 " Cards ! What for, my man ?" ejaculated the old gen- tleman, blankly amazed. " That we may know where to find each other — ' my man,' " was the rather stern retort, as the drayman drew a card from his breast and gravely handed it in. " You will observe that my address is : Jack Aster, Drayman. License 41144. Kesidence 22 Dame Street. Oblige me with your card, that I may know where to call and pay for the damage I have done." " My good fellow," cried the gentleman, half crazed by the shouts of a hundred coachmen behind, "pray do get your cart out of the way, and let us go on !" "I must know where you live — my 'good fellow persisted the unmoved Aster, folding his arms, and not heeding the voices of the horsemen, the thunder of the coachmen, and the shouting. " I may be a poor man, and you a rich ; but I'll pay you as exactly as I would a brother-drayman. Your residence, Sir? I must have it." "This carriage is not mine," sputtered the old gentle- man, too much excited about the awful blockade they were causing, to hesitate at any earthly concession likely to rid him of the terrible questioner. " It belongs to my friend, Mr. Lardner, of Lardner Place. Now do let us go on." " That is sufficient, Sir. I shall do myself the honor to call this evening." As he spoke, the drayman lifted his sombrero in a distant bow; then strode to his horse's head and so turned the sagacious animal, that his wheel was disen- gaged from that of the carriage, and the latter left free. Away sped the carriage, whose coachman had never before realized how dreadful a thing it is, and how pro- a ™~t™ i " 46 COME WHEEL, COME " wnOA. vocative of apoplexy from suppression, to occupy a position forbidding one to swear. Along followed the endless line of other delayed equipages, several of their coachmen glaring at Aster as they would not have dared to glare at a rich man. But he of the dray reflectively unblanketed his horse again as though no such things as coachmen came from Ireland, and abstractedly re- mounted his vehicle, to be lost in the sunset once more. In the scratched and liberated carriage, however, as it rolled onward with the others to the Park, he was not equivalently forgotten ; for the astounded old gentleman only sank back within the velvet cushions to stare in- creduously at a tall, handsome blonde occupying the op- posite seat, and express his feelings in disjointed phrases. " Upon my word !" ejaculated he. " To think of such a thing ! A drayman talking like that, and carrying visit- ing cards with crest and monogram on them ! What are we coming to, I should like to know !" And he added ; noticing that the young lady also exhibited some excite- ment, and held the card in her hand : " I greatly fear, Miss Lardner, that this absurd accident has spoiled the ride for you. Really, the fellow treated us like children !" Lucy Lardner was always very pretty ; but the vary- ing flush now playing at Aurora Borealis on her cheeks, and the bright, changing light preluding a full dawn in the blue heaven of her eyes, made her archly beautiful. "Mr. Gayle," she said, leaning toward that gentleman, and speaking rapidly, " I know this Crest and Monogram almost as well as I know Pa's ; and I knew the drayman, too." u Miss Lardner, you as-tound me !" " Yes, I peeped from behind the curtain, here, and re- membered Mr. Aster the very moment he lifted his hat. COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA." 47 I almost believe, that, if Pa had been with us, he would have asked Mr. Aster to dine with us this evening.'' "Eh!" exclaimed Mr. Gayle, smiling in the imper- fect and ghastly manner of one who believes that a rich joke is being practiced upon him, but don't see it yet. "Indeed, sir, I can assure yon," continued Lucy, earn- estly, " that, in any other place, or under any other cir- cumstances, I should have given the owner of this card an opportunity to recognize me." There was such hopeless incongruity suggested by the possibility of an intimate acquaintance between the high- bred occupant of a full feminine carriage-toilet, and the cart-driving wearer of bone eyeglasses and a faded blue military overcoat, that the old gentleman began to doubt his own sanity. " My dear young lady, pray pardon my last rude ex- clamation ; but are you really in earnest ?" " Entirely so, Mr. Gayle. You may be still more sur- prised when I inform you, that Mr. Aster's father is Pa's half-brother, though they have been alienated for years." " Dear me ! And he a drayman !" " But not the less a gentleman by birth, for that !" retorted Lucy, quickly. " I didn't know, though," she added, with a graver thoughtfulness, " that he had fallen so low in his necessities since bis return from the War. How shameful it is for That Woman to make his own dying old father an enemy to him !" This with great intensity. " Why, here's a romance !" commented the old gentle- man, plucking up a more vivacious spirit to hide his re- cent want of well-bred balance. ." Since you have so kindly admitted me to the latest Chapter, Miss Lucy, you ought to tell me what went before, as a matter of 48 COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA." dramatic justice. Now that I think it over, the name of Aster is not altogether new to me. There is a Phila- delphia family of that name — spelt with an ' e.' " " That is the very family," cried Lucy. " The father married a second wife, a scheming widow with a grown son, some seven years ago, and she turned him so com- pletely against his own two sons, that they were fairly driven from their home in less than two years after the marriage. You have just seen one of the .sons, and he is the only one we know much about. Five years ago he accidently dropped into Pa's place clown town to ask for a position as bookkeeper, and Pa recognized him by his name and story, and made him come home with him. He reluctantly stayed with us a few days, and seemed to feel what he called his ' crushing Dependent position ? so keenly, that we never dared oppose him when he resolved to join the army, or navy. He slipped off one morning without even saying ■ good-bye,' and must have enlisted at once.. And now that he is back again, I suppose he has become a drayman rather than accept anybody's as- sistance. And I admire him for it, Mr. Gayle ! Yes, I admire him for being manly enough to drive a cart rather than play the martyr at the cost -of his friends. There is more gentlemanly pride in it than could be shown in any other way. I'm so sure of it, that, if he were here now, even in his drayman's frock, I should deem it indelicate to remind him of his brief stay with us, even to introduce myself as a friend. It was fortunate for you, Mr. Gayle, that he found out whose carriage this is from you, and said that he should call this evening, (how proudly he said it, too !) ; for, otherwise, I should have put my head out, too, and called him by name right there in the crowd !" COME WHEEL, COME " WHOA." 49 " All, look out, look out, Miss Lucy Lardner !" return- ed the old gentleman, not unpleased to gain such a fam- ous story of real life for his next dinner-party, even though he must employ assumed names in repeating it ; *' There is too much romance about this model young drayman to make him a safe protege for a tender hearted young lady." " Oh, you know he's a kind of cousin, Mr. Gayle." Mr. Gayle might have explained to her that a Cousin of that indefinite relation, is rather more dangerous to feminine peace of mind than a foreign Count, or a hor- ridly homely man with the reputation of having brought ruin to half-a-dozen beauties. He might have told her, that the assiduous Romeo, who shrinks chilled, and in- clined to drink, from a maidenly offer to love him " as a dear Brother," begins to smoke in the parlor and makes himself at home around waists, when the same Juliet in- differently mentions him as a distant Cousin. But time was not allowed for that ; inasmuch as their carriage had now reached the Terrace in the Park ; and the music of the band, in its adjacent brilliant pagoda on the Mall, reminded them to sink silently back in their cushions, with that preternaturally rigid expression of countenance which induces the stranger in Central Park to fancy that there must be a man with a camera on some knoll within range, for whose photographic practice all occupants of stylish equipages sit mute and grim at the sound of the trumpet. 50 RUNG AND RANK. CHAPTER VI. RUNG AND EANK. ri^O Lardner Place Mr. Aster repaired at about eight ' I o'clock on the same evening, and there rang the bell of a brown stone residence shaped as nearly like a magnified packing-case as the architect conld make it for the money. Still wearing his mighty sombrero far down over his nose, flourishing a long, old-fashioned Spanish cloak, or Wrapper, from his broad shoulders, and pulling his moustache impatiently with his left hand, he might have been taken for a desperate Academy of Design artist come to paint a portrait by violence, or a Tribune re- porter arrived to learn all the revolting details of a fash- ionable elopement from the bereaved father himself, but for the heavy cane, modeled exactly after a cart-rung, which he carried over his right shoulder like a gun. The bell was answered by an old family footman in clerical black, who, upon discerning the visitor's face by the light of the hall burner, both bowed and smiled in a manner plainly anticipatory of a familiar greeting. " How are you Johnny," said Aster, to humor his ap- parent servility. " Is Lardner at home ?" ISTow, the real name of the aged servitor was not Johnny, at all, but Alphonse, and there was an alarming novelty in the sound of his master's name without the prefix courteous ; but, in the lack of opportunity for de- RUNG AXD RANK. 51 tailed explanation, it was only left for him to invite the sententious guest into a reception room. " Mr. Aster, I should say, sir, if I remember rightly V he timidly said, before going to announce. " Ha ! You know me, do you ?" muttered the drayman, looking keenly at him through his eyeglasses. " Yes, tell him Aster." Though still very palpably a victim of confused per- ceptions, the footman departed without a card ; presently •returning with the information that Mr. Lardner would be happy to see Mr. Aster immediately in the Third Parlor. " Then lead on, boy," observed Aster, seemingly too busy with his own thoughts to be conscious that the " boy " might have been his grandfather. " It is rather handsome in Lardner to ask a man of my estate into a parlor. Lead on." Passing through a fine hall, panelled in walnut, and ornamented with bronzes, he was conducted into the Third, or Extension, Parlor of a handsome suite, where a grave and portly middle-aged gentleman, iron-grey of hair and unbending of collar, was seated in sumpuous cushioned chair, holding a newspaper. "John !" exclaimed this gentleman, rising as the dray- man entered, " Are you indeed the same John Aster ?" The removal of the young man's hat from his curly black head allowed a better view of the action of his eyes, which opened wide at this welcoming speech, and became intensely stationary at the hearty hand-shaking thereafter. " My name, sir, is J. Aster ; and I believe that I am the same to-day as yesterday." " Sit down, then, John, and lay aside your cloak," pro- ceeded Mr. Lardner, a shade less genially. 52 RUNG AND RANK. " I prefer to wear it, sir," was Aster's reply. " I will take a seat, however : — not because it is a conventional condescension in you to ask me ; but because there is no good reason why I, as a Man, should remain standing be- fore you, as a Man. Our time, I presume, is equally valuable " — here he drew a pocket-book as large as a good-sized volume from under his cloak — "and I will, therefore, at once hand over to you the stamps requisite to repair the damage I did to your carriage this after- noon. Be kind enough to make me out a bill and re- ceipt it." From the chair which he had resumed, Mr. Lardner stared at him in haughty amazement. " There is no necessity for any payment, John. I shall accept none. The carriage is not injured. My daughter " — with a slight motion of his head toward the second par- lor, beyond the folding doors, whence the tinkling of a piano-forte sounded at intervals, — " has told me how she met you on the Avenue this afternoon, and prepared me for your presence here this evening. I inferred that your bearing after the accident was due to the fact that you did not recognize her." Aster pulled his moustache, gazed deliberately from one object of furniture to another all around the room, settled his bone eyeglasses anew, and, finally surveying the gentleman with glassy intentness, slowly put away his pocket-book. " Is your daughter white-haired with age ?" he asked, sneeringly almost. " Does she wear a Fall-overcoat, and speak baritone ?" " Sir ! What do you mean ?" snorted the rich man, sitting bolt upright and glaring wrathfully. " I mean this,'' snapped the drayman, returning the RUNG AND RANK. 53 glare : " that the person who addressed me from your carriage had those attributes, and struck me, sir, as be- ing an over-dressed and fussy old snob." " That was my worthy old friend, Mr. Gayle, who was polite enough to escort my daughter to the Park, sir !" thundered the indignant father, both outraged and as- tounded. " How dare you utter such language in my house !" " Dare !" repeated Aster, his breast swelling and his eyes shooting fire. Then, in an instant his head sank upon his chest, his hands dropped nerveless at his sides, and his tone sank so low as to be almost inaudible. u Lardner," — That gentleman started. — " Lardner, you must not mind my hasty speech. In these few past years my soul has been so embittered by the malevolence of Woman and the injustice of Man, that I can not look even upon the least intellectual and significant of my race without boiling hatred. Consequently, I hate you and your friends ; and, to go to the other extreme, I hate Myself." " Certainly your manner is greatly changed," replied the gentleman, stiffly. " I am hardly sure that I should overlook such unparalleled talk, John. When did you get back from the war ?" Again Mr. Aster looked slowly all around the room, and again concluded the survey by eyeing his questioner stonilv. Mi u Since you are so sure that I have been to the war, you may as well know that I returned a year ago." " Sure ? Why, we could guess as much from your own words before you went. And for what cause have you been so long in the city without letting us, your rela- tives, hear from you ?" 54 RUNG AND RANK. " Hay ! " ejaculated Aster, with a jump in his chair. Mr. Lardner also jumped at the shot-like sound, espe- cially as the rung-shaped heavy cane of the drayman simultaneously fell from between its owner's knees with a crash. " I speak English," continued he, very testily. u Are you deaf? If that cane had fallen on my corn, I should have thrown it out of the window. What am I to make of such undntiful, such inexplicable conduct, which not even your great misfortune in life^can fully excuse ?" Up rose the drayman to his feet, and, with one arm thrust within his cloak, looked fiercely down upon the rich man. " It seems," said he, breathing quickly, " that any one, and every one, can make a mock at my exile from a dy- ing father's house. Even you, learning it from the sneer- ing lips of Society, must taunt me ! — I ! who, in all my loss of a princely heritage, and reduction to the dust, would esteem it a stain upon my manhood to ask even a good word, much less a dollar — except for carrying a trunk upon my dray — from the best of you ! Lardner, I'll hear no more from you." " 'Nor I from you !" retorted that gentleman, also leaving his chair. " A lady may be able to get some- thing sane out of you, if I can't ; and I'll resign you for a while to your cousin." "Hat?" burst from Aster, with another j amp ; pro- ducing another jump, again, from the startled Uncle on his way to the folding doors. " Lucy, my dear," called Mr. Lardner, opening the doors very impatiently ; " here comes your cousin John, who insists upon being nothing but a drayman with me. RUNG AND RANK. 55 See if you can't make him more gracious while I am at the Club." " O, Pa !" sounded a rich, girlish voice. " Now, John, step in there, and Good-evening. Your pride with us is ridiculous. If you leave before my re- turn, of course you'll be here often again. Good-even- ing." And he was out of the room before another word could be said. With a decidedly curious expression upon his tragic countenance, the drayman stood like a statue on the same spot for a moment ; then ground his big cane into the velvet carpet, threw back his head, and sauntered heavily past the folding doors with a freedom but slightly removed from ruffianism. " Cousin Jack, is it you ?" " Perhaps." She was more than lovely in that silky blue dress ; she was more than queenly in her stature and step, as she advanced from the piano to meet him with extended hand ; she was more than a picture with her glorious blonde locks gathered in ripple, waterfall, wave, and curly single falling stream, and her white throat cut with a locketed thin strip of black velvet, tying behind ; she was unexceptionally a Beautiful woman in her delicate and classic brow, nose, and mouth, and soft blue eyes. Aster pulled his moustache as he resigned her hand, and seemed suddenly to feel more at home. Not troub- ling himself, however, to favor any particular school of etiquette, he omitted handing Miss Lardner to a chair, and, while she was seeking one for herself, laid his walk- ing-rung, or cane, heavily upon the piano, and tested a few notes of that instrument with a dingy forefinger. " You are a great stranger, Mr. Aster," remarked the 56 HUNG AND RANK. lady, all her cousinly feeling abruptly chilled by his air of reserve and musical nicety. " Wait a minute," said Aster, " until I get this tune." Indignation sparkled in the eyes and flushed the brow of Lucy, and she arose. " I will retire, sir, until you are at leisure." " Lucy," said the drayman, sternly, but still bending over the key-board, " you will remain here until Lardner returns." " My father, sir, is Mr. Lardner." u I dare say he thinks so to himself. — There, that was a tune." " I — I — don't know what to make of you ! You are insulting, cousin John !" cried the affrighted girl, taking a step forward, clasping both hands to her face, and burst- ing into tears. Not wishing to play any more, Mr. Aster strode from the piano to where she stood, and, by a powerful but not rude effort, removed her hands from her face ; drying the teare from the latter, before she had time to resist, with a large red silk handkerchief, smelling faintly of horse. a Cousin Lucy," he said, in deep, husky tones, holding both her hands, and magnetizing her with his grand eyes, — " Cousin Lucy, you great ladies of rank hold the poor drayman cheaply enough, at best, and would make a merit of allowing him to stand in your presence at all. Now, if I am a drayman, I am also a Man ; and too much a man to be either offended or discommoded by what a vain, light-headed slip of a girl can say, or do. It is my will that you should take your seat again ; as I design remaining here about ten minutes, and expect you to make me more gracious, as Lardner said." HUNG AND BANK. 57 The powerful psychological influence of his eyes, in- tensified by the bone eye-glasses, crushed down her spirit of girlish resentment and rebellion, like grass beneath a heel, and she could only give him one look of entreaty, and then bow her head. Leading her back to her chair, by one hand, as by a bridle ; and, after she was seated, making a few abstracted efforts to kiss her, in all of which her back-hair alone presented itself to his lips at every turn, he finally took such an attitude upon a chair at hand as suggested his greater familiarity with a saddle. Tilting toward her, then, the back of this chair on which he sat a-horseback, and folding his arms upon the top thereof, he spoke again : " You recognize me as your Cousin Jack ?" " Yes," she answered, meekly, still under the spell of his eyes and fluttering. " Your manner is somewhat changed, and your complexion more affected by the sun ; but I knew you at once this afternoon. Now that you are in different dress you look yet more natural. That very cloak you have on now, I remember as being the one which had been purchased, you told me, when you and your brother first left home and talked of going to the West." — Then, as a kind of revenge for the subjection in which his glance still held her. — " Pa helped you to pay the bill for it at last." « Hat ?" He had prefaced this exclamation with slowly opening mouth and a gradual rising from his saddle-seat ; yet jumped, himself, with the amazing final suddenness of it, and startled her sensitive heart into her mouth. " Oh !" she murmured, looking affrightedly at him, and pressing a hand against her throbbing bosom. 3* 58 EUNG AND EANK. " Forgive me, Cousin John, for reminding you of that time of trouble." Aster pulled his moustache, and settled into his wonted demeanor again, as though his exclamation had been in- voluntary. " Lucy, why do you think that such reminders wound me ?" he asked, tilting over still farther, and scraping his heels on the carpet. '• Because ;" and she made a vain effort to get away from his searching eyes, " you have an indomitable pride, I know, which can not bear the recollection of one mo- ment's obligation to another man." " Yes, I am proud." Then she changed the subject. " How long have you been in New York, Cousin John, since the war ?" " About a year." With a bewildered glare of the eye- glasses. " And have not been to see us in all that time, until now % Very well, Cousin John ! But we have not for- gotten you in that way. You know, I suppose, that your Father declines steadily, and that he is in New York, now, for medical treatment, with your Step-mother." " My curses on her !" roared Aster, suddenly violent and speaking through his teeth. "Heaven grant that I may not murder that Woman — Mur-rder her !" " Oh, no. Not that." " But I say Yes !" raved the drayman. " Don't con- tradict me. No woman shall do that with impunity. The hate of that Stepmother has driven me forth into the pitiless world, to cart trunks, boxes, and barrels of flour, and to help ' move ' whole families of my inferiors on the First of May. She is plotting to make my father rob me, in his death, of my birthright, to give it to her RUNG AND RANK. 59 reptile of a grown son and animalcule of a baby. But I'll foil her yet, by Heaven ! if only over the deathbed of the poor old man she has made her slave. Let her beware of me ! Let all her false sex bewar-r-re of me !" He was superb, leonine, ocean-like, in his wrath, and the girl feared and admired him. " Be patient," she soothingly said. " Nature and Right are on your side ; and Pa believes, and I believe, that Mrs. Aster will not succeed finally in her wicked- ness. Pa, himself, may yet insist upon a reconciliation with your Father, his half brother, and speak to him for you. Be patient, Cousin John, and trust in Providence." " I can't !" muttered Aster, doggedly. " Not trust in Providence ?" " No. I'm a Ritualist." " Now, John Aster," remonstrated Miss Lardner, not so much in terror of his commanding eyes at this point, " I know that a pure and lofty religious principle is yours at heart, and that you are more childlike under its instil- lation of orthodox faith than many a child. Be firm in that. Have ample faith, and you will yet gain your Fa- ther's parting blessing, secure your birthright, and be able to marry the true-hearted girl to whom your honor is pledged." " Hay ?" He had risen so high up the back of his tilted chair during the beautiful womanly exhortation, and jumped so electrically with his irrepressible exclamation at its close, that he went over, chair and all, to the floor, with a tremendous crash, shaking the whole house and scaring Miss Lardner to the other side of the parlor. " Oh !" she panted, pale as death. " D-d-did you hit your head ?" 60 RUNG AND RANK. Frowning darkly, and rubbing his high forehead, the drayman slowly struggled up under his Spanish cloak, and again stood erect. As he entered the parlor he had plac- ed his sombrero upon the head of a marble figure of Psyche, (to which it gave considerable character,) near the folding doors, and thither he now strode for it ; mere- ly pausing on his way to take his walking-rung from the top of the piano. " Our conversation, madame," said he, with suppressed fierceness, " has reached a point beyond which it can not go without driving me mad. Forgive me. My mind spins, and I am filled with hatred of all woman-kind. I must leave you now, begging that you will give my adieu to Lardner." " I have not oifended you ?" il 'No, girl." " Won't you come to a dinner-party which Pa gives next Wednesday week?" She asked it apologetically, almost. They stood together now near the street-door in the hall, and Aster's grave attempt to give her a chaste salute, in reply, was only prevented by the toppling down of his sombrero over his chin at the critical moment. The hat hurt her nose ; but she playfully drew back and opened the door. "At any rate, we shall see you often, now?" "Perhaps. Good-night, Lucy." " Good-night. — And, oh ! Cousin John ! If you should see her first, give my love to Dollie." "Hay?" It burst from him with such a spasmodic start, on the third step of the stoop, that he came near pitching down the remainder of the distance ; but, as Miss Lardner had THE NEW FIEM OF DAPPLE & CO. Gl closed the door on the very instant of her farewell charge, the lonely street, only, heard the cry. So, the Rembrandt figure of a drayman hied him home- ward, to commune with the silent stars and water his buck- skin horse ; and the maiden went back to await her papa, with dreamy trills upon the piano and dreamier thoughts of the great, manly heart which had aived and command- ed her like a child. Woman's nature, in its exquisite and flower-like ten- dency to look ever Upward, craves a Master in man ; and knows its most profound and beautiful fidelity to him, in every relation, as he makes the very creak of his boots a wholesome snub. VII. THE NEW FIRM OF DAPPLE & CO. TOU may imagine Miss Dapple's surprise at being waylaid by her father, in the narrow hall of their house on her return home that evening from Sophia Skeggs's, and very nervously informed that an old friend of his had arrived during her absence and would stay all night ; but your imagination must be equal to a whole li- brary of essays on the brotherly love of Englishmen for Yankees, if it can do justice to the same young lady's breathless amazement, when, at next morning's breakfast table, that old friend was stammeringly introduced to her as the Toyman's future partner ! 02 THE NEW FIRM OF DAPPLE & CO. " Long, straight black hair, small eyes, and a red nose." Him exactly. The man her father had been so afraid of in the street that day ; and had described to her, with so many signs of vague terror, for the purpose of taxing her memory in his identification. This flashed through her mind much sooner than it would have done through a man's, and the intuitive creature at once divined a pow- erful enemy. Perhaps a creditor. And to have him always in the house, too ; and her father (grown older, and more haggard and nervous, in a single night,) seeming equally dispirited in his company and unwilling to give her a moment's time for question- ing by himself ! Such simultaneous invitation and defeat of curiosity were almost too much for her woman-nature, and made Dollie decidedly blue for the first time in her green young life. It must be said for the ex-Odontolator, however, that, questionable as had been his method of gaining a share in the business ; much as it partook of the morality of an Erie director: he certainly laid himself out to make mat- ters as pleasant as possible, and quickly became an inval- uable help to the concern. Geoffrey Dapple, like every inventor of genius, was but a wretched tradesman ; and his daughter, of course, was just that delightful failure in the same line wdiich Eve proved to be when she sold out all her share in the first Central Park for a diabolical pip- pin. But Canary was immediate and immense. lie threw himself into things, like a fresh head of steam into a languid engine ; commencing by kicking the morning- and-evening Goggle for utterly refusing at first to recog- nize him as an authority in the establishment, (or as any thing else, save a putter on of "frills,") and concluding by bursting into poetical legends on show-cards all over TIIE NEW FIRM OF DAPPLE & CO. 03 the toy-store, and inventing a striking new improvement in barkinoj-dosra. ' ' As eggs are eggs, so boys must still be boys, Their future foibles symbol'd in their Toys. This one to horses, this to drums inclines ; A third, with spade and hoe the carpet mines ; A fourth with ' blocks ' his future castle builds ; A fifth saws chairs in feign'd mechanic-guilds ; While for the sixth his ' Savings Bank ' contains The Politician's, or the Merchant's gains." and — "The little maid with Doll her hands between, Is Woman down a long perspective seen," were among the practicable poetic gems contributed to the stock by this sudden toy-Tapper, and their proverbially philosophical spirit told magnetically on the souls of par- ents and guardians. Even Mr. Groggle, after laboriously spelling one of them out, was heard to observe in an un- known tongue, but with commendatory emphasis, that it was " gay old lallygag ;" and, for ever after, held the composer in high respect as an " ink-slinger." That Canary had ever practiced in any mechanical trade, or, indeed, done respectably in anything, before, was not likely ; yet, from the first morning, his labors in the toy vineyard were a success ! Possibly he, like many another man of more vanity than logic, had wasted many a year in waiting for the Great things which he believed himself exclusively fitted to undertake, while indifferent- ly, or contemptuously, passing-by whole swarms of Little things, from every other one of which he might have made fame and fortune. At any rate, he throve magical- 64 THE NEW FIEM OF DAPPLE & CO. ly as a toy-merchant ; and was hardly less magical in his immediate change of manner toward Geoifrey Dapple. But the latter would allow no geniality, or practical ben- efit, to change* his own apparent sentiment regarding the man who had terrorized a partnership from him. He be- came silent, soulless, and miserably older : his furtive glances under his shaggy brows at the new partner were alternately cringing and revengeful ; he was ever slyly vigilant, too, that Dollie should have no opportunity to find either Canary or himself alone : and poor Dollie scarcely knew whether to cry the more in her chamber at night from pique or sorrow. The properly trained female mind is very apt to seek balm for early sorrows in evening church-going ; especial- ly on very dark nights and when the church is fully half a mile from home ; so, the worried and confounded Miss Dapple presently discovered a Methodist meeting-house some twenty blocks away, where she could be miserably good two evenings in the week ; and thither she began going in edifying spiritual abasement so soon as the great conundrum of the home-situation became too much to bear without piety. On one of these evenings, as she came out of the Church into an unexpected rain, the mysterious new member of the firm of Dapple & Co., met her on the steps of the sacred edifice with an extended umbrella, and had her comfortably tucked under his arm before she could utter a word of protest. " Now, Miss Dollie," said he, when they had turned the first corner, "please walk slowly, and I'll tell you why I've come to-night to beau you home. You didn't expect me?" THE NEW FIRM OF DAPPLE & CO. 65 " No, sir," said Dollie, very near crying between fear and vexation, u I certainly did not !" " And can't guess what brought me ?" "No, sir. I don't think Father sent you ?" "Not he," said Dr. Canary, with vivacity. "He fell asleep by the stove, or I should not have dared. He's like a jailor over me." " O, Dr. Canary," exclaimed Dollie, with sudden im- petuosity, " what is there between you and my Father ? I'm sure there must be something dreadful ! Does he owe you money ?" " Now don't be excited, my good little girl," remon- strated Canary, holding gently back. " I want to be a good friend to your father, (and to you, too, if you'll permit), but you must see that he treats me offishly. Hav'n't you the slightest idea why ?" " He never tells me anything now." With a sigh. " Don't I always treat both of you well ? And hav'n't I more than doubled the business ?" " Yes, sir." " Then why do you always treat me as though you disliked the very air I breathe ?" " O, Dr. Canary," said Dollie again, in a low, tremu- lous tone, " because — because — I can't help thinking that you must have done something cruel to Father, to get into his business, and change him so." Dr. Canary walked a few steps in silence, and then asked, with more apparent thonghtfulness : " Did it never strike yon, Miss Dollie, that your father may have done something to give an unscrupulous man an iron hold upon him ?" Dollie shrank from him and half released her arm from his. GO THE XEW FIUM OF DAPPLE & CO. " What can you mean, sir ? My Father has been un- fortunate ; but he never did wrong." " At any rate, Miss Dollie, he's fortunate in having you for a daughter, and does right if he appreciates yon. Now do try and answer me like a friend, to-night, aud you'll not repent it. "Was there nothing in your Father's conduct, before I came, to puzzle you about him, some- times ? He's got the look of a man who has had some- thing heavy on his mind for longer than you've known me." " That's because he has never stopped grieving for my Stepmother," said Dollie, lulled into momentary confi- dence ; " and because he lost the clock-work of a Doll he'd almost got to Walking, on the day she was taken to the hospital from falling off the store-ladder by the window and fracturing her skull. He had brain-fever for weeks after it, and has never been able to recall his invention since — do all he can. He expected to get rich by that Walking Doll ; and you see he is forever trying to make it work, even now, at Lis bench." "Ah I" muttered Canary, lowering the umbrella more closely over them. "He grieves for your Stepmother and for his lost invention.— What do you suppose is his rea- son for being so nervous about that curiously bundled-up window-curtain ?" He must have thrown out this sudden question as a surprise ; and it did surprise — even agitate — the girl at his side to an extent scarcely warranted by any reasonable suggestion of the query. " That curtain !" ejaculated she, involuntarily grasping his arm with both her little hands, and bringing him to a dead-halt on the moment. " What do you know, sir, of it ? What business is it of yours ?" THE NEW FIEM OF DAPPEE ft CO. 07 "I know nothing more than I said," he returned, ap- parently somewhat taken aback himself. "I merely referred to your fathers excitement when I made my first and last comment upon the eccentric taste of a curtain arranged like that, and to my having caught sight of him this morning, when he thought me busy, studying, and talking to, the shadow of the curtain on the wall. Shall we move on again ?" Dollie drew a long breath, as they went, and seemed relieved; and also ashamed. "Excuse me, Dr. Canary, for acting so foolishly. My Stepmother was fixing-up the curtain, I believe, when she fell from the ladder, and poor Father has never al- lowed it to be touched since. He did love her so ! — I think," she added, very quickly, as upon an afterthought, "I could kill any one, Myself, for touching it I" " I understand, now. One of love's sorrowing super- stitions. We are almost at home, now, Miss Dollie, and I must talk fast. Try to think well of me. As an elder friend, I mean. I'll neither explain nor excuse the means I took to become your father's partner so suddenly ; but, if you'll take the word of a broken man who has been his own worst enemy, and is not actually capable of much prolonged enmity against anybody else, — I am his friend now, and yours. Will you try to think well of me until you see me do something to make you think otherwise J" There were an earnestness and a pathos in his voice which touched the sensitive heart of the girl kindly. " I will try. Dr. Canary." And they were at the door. Dollie's night-key admitted them to the hall, which they had scarcely entered when the old Toyman emerged therein from the room back of the store, and stood re- garding them like some murdered man's ghost. 68 dollie's confession. " Father,'' said Dollie, " Dr. Canary came to church, for me with an umbrella." As for the bearer of the umbrella, he went straight on up the stairs to his own room, in a matter-of-course way. "Father, are you ill?" asked Dollie, seeing him still motionless there and awfully eyeing her. For reply he suddenly -seized her by the dress, like a maniac, and dragged her into the room. VIII- dollie's confession. 44 E ^VERY word he has spoken to you!" hissed Geoffrey Dapple, clutching his daughter's tender shoulders with pitiless fury, and holding her scared white face close to his. " Tell me every syllable he has uttered to-night, you false-hearted girl, or I'll choke it from you !" "Father!" ' His withered, parched lips trembled miserably as he glared into her dilated, frightened, horror-lightened eyes, and he breathed through his nostrils as though each breath might end in a gush of blood. " Tell me, I say, every word that man has spoken to you !" he panted again. " No lies ; no equivocations ; or I'll put you out of his reach forever ! Quick ! When did this intimacy begin ? Speak your shame, and then be cast into the street !" " Father!" die- cried again in a wail, a prayer, of dollie's confession. 69 agony ; then sank upon her knees under his furious grasp, and looked up with that face of blank, introspective hor- ror, which, as that of a sinless Wife wrongly accused — aye, and contaminated ! — by the foul madness of Jea- lousy, has, more than once, spoken an outraged Woman- hoods' first unholy thought toward the one justifying and evil Revenge. Even in his dernentedness, the unhappy father read in it something to fear more than the spectre raised in his own wrath ; and drew his hands slowly from her shoul- ders, and pressed them convulsively against his temples, and stared at her fearfully. " My Child ! my Child ! what have I said ?" " O, Father ! Father !" "Dollie? Little Dollie?" — His hand was trembling CD on her hair, now, and he whimpered like a child — "Where are we? Why are you not in bed; and I — " With the other hand groping over his brow, in a lost way, he sank brokenly down to his knees beside her, and, catching her softer glance again, — "You have been — with him ! With hem 1" Drawing back from her, his raised hands half clenched, his every feature drawn and quivering, and his eyes standing out in fascinated terror, he tottered, swayed, and fell on his side upon the floor with a moaning cry. In a moment all but his long-endured suffering was forgotten, and Dollie held his head upon her bosom and wept over him. " My own dear, darling Father," she sobbed, " you've said no harm ; and I've been an undutiful, ungrateful girl, not to tell you what you asked the moment you first spoke. I never spoke to »Dr. Canary, alone, (How could 70 dollie's confession. you !)■ before to-night ; and to-night he has spoken only of you." "Of me?" moaned the Toyman, pitifully. "Ah, Yes,— of Me." "And only with kind solicitude of you, Father. I was angry when I saw him at the church-door, I never liked him, because his being here seemed to make you unhappy. For a minute, I thought you might have asked him to come after me with the umbrella, and was provoked at you, dear, for it. I never liked him, Father, until he told me that he had come only for the chance to let me know that he wanted to be a good friend to both of us, and wished me to think well " " You do like him then V 1 interrupted the old man, with agonized shrillness, grasping her wrist. " Only a little, you know, Father. I mean, I think better of him than I did before to-night. He says as much, himself, as that he was hard with you, perhaps, in getting into our business ; but now that he is in, and is helping us so much, he wants us to look on him as a friend." u I see, I see," muttered Geoffrey Dapple. " Oily words, oily words. So he'll work and worm himself into, and around, and over, and under, all that's mine ; and then rise up and strike. The Blow. Oh, if we could both die here and now — here and now !" " Father," whispered Dollie, shuddering at his words, " what can there be between you and this man to make you fear him so ? Why must I see you act as you do everyday, and talk as you do now, and not be told Why ? He is the man you saw on the wagon in the Square, and you told me that you did not know him, and yet were Afraid of him ! He came here that DOLLIE S CONFESSION. 71 very night, and has been here ever since. O, do con- fide in me, and tell me what you " " Hush !" ejaculated the wretched father, clasping her spasmodically in his arms. " Speak lower ; lower. If he heard — if he heard — he might come clown !" u I wish he would come !" cried the girl, turning pas- sionate. " I'd tell him how I Hate him for making a cow- ard of my Father ! Think well of him ? If I were a man, and he tried to make me afraid, I'd kill him, if I had to do it with that clock-work of the Walking Doll, over there on the bench !" That was a wild speech for a daughter in her filial anger ; but what was there in it to make the old Toyman start away from her to his knees, with livid face and hands beating the air — as he did % " He has Told you I" he almost shrieked. Dollie did not seek to win him to her again this time. A strange shadow seemed to creep over her wistful coun- tenance as she looked at him, and she drew off her bon- net and cast it upon a chair before replying. " He has told me nothing, except what I have repeated to you. If he had told me anything against you, Father, I should not have believed it. O, if I had only refused to hear a word from him ! But he shall never speak to me again.'' "Never speak — " " Never, Father ! What a woman can do to make him uncomfortable and ashamed here, shall be done. I'll not even look at him at the table ; I'll answer none of his questions in the store, before customers ; I'll hate him so — -" " No, no, no !" whimpered the Toyman, stretching out his shaking hands to stop her : " you must not. He'll turn 72 dollie's confession. on me and rain me ! Spare me, Dollie " — lie was fairly praying on his knees to her — " have mercy on your poor, old broken-hearted Father !" She arose almost grimly to her feet, and lifted him, unresisting, also, and led him to a chair, and stood over him as on the night of the two watches. " If you have any love for me at all," she said, with scarcely a trace of emotion left in her girlish voice ; " if you ever loved my poor dead Mother, I ask you, Father, in the name of that love, to answer me One question. I will never ask more, and will never speak of this one again. I promise you solemnly. Are you in the power of Dr. Canary?" His dishonored head sank upon his breast in abject helplessness ; in a despairing motion of assent. Then her head sank, too, though he did not see it ; and her boson heaved with the dying sigh of a hope lost forever. " I understand, dear, and will try to act prudently. He has been polite to me, and I shall do nothing to offend him." " He must have all," groaned Geoffrey Dapple : " my home, my good name : perhaps — O, my breaking heart ! — perhaps my Child." In the unmanned despair of the concession to such a possibility as that, by a father's lips, there was greater, far greater invocation to a daughter's sense of dastardly wrong, than in anything those lips could utter in the frenzy of mistaken rage ; yet Dollie heard it calmly, and smoothed his poor, heated brow with steady hand. " God will take care of us," she said, after a pause. u I can trust in Him. You have given me your con- fidence, Father ; and now, before I kiss you Good-night bollie's confession. 73 I want to confess something in return. — Please don't try to look at" me. — Yon spoke just now about my ' liking ' Dr. Canary. You would not have spoken in that way of it, if I had been brave enough to tell you this before. Father, I — I love already." * Dollie ;— Dollie ?" " While I was at that school, near Philadelphia, there were little parties given for us scholars once a fortnight, and some of the best people in the village were invited. With one family there used to come a young man who lived in Philadelphia, but was staying in the village for a Summer, and he — lie — got acquainted with me.— Oh, Father, w T hat is the use ! we fell in love with each other, although I wasn't much more than a child. I'd have written to you about it, dear, or told you when I came home ; but he was in some trouble at home witli a Step- mother, and asked me to keep our attachment secret for a while. When I came home you were very sick, you know, so I couldn't tell it then ; after that he asked me in a letter to wait a little while longer — he feared he would have to leave his home altogether, because of his Step- mother, and earn a living for himself. I couldn't make him believe that you'd think none the less of him for that. He said he knew nothing about work and would be very poor until he had learned. I saw him here in New York afterwards. He came here, once, when he was sure you had gone out, and told me he must go to the war. Father, we Engaged ourselves to each other before he went. I've not heard from nor seen him since, and I have loved him dearly all this while. Will you forgive me for not telling you until now ?" " My daughter, can you forgive me tP. 74 THE CIRCUMAMBIENT HEIR. " Dear Father ! Nothing shall come before my love for you, or near to it, until you are happy again." " And nothing," cried Geoffrey Dapple, rising with a sudden fierce manhood to his feet, and clasping her pas- sionately to his heart, — " nothing shall make my love for you too poor to teach the father's duty to the man." (If the fire in his eyes was not good to see, his voice and manner were soft and rehabilitating in paternal affection.) " Good-night, my dear. — God bless you." IX. THE CIRCUMAMBIENT HEIR. /^\ HEAT souls are said to grow nobler by misfortune ; vJT even as the unappreciated and auricular George Francis Train of the brute creation is believed to thrive upon thistles. Superior minds have a reputation for deriving humane softness from the shocks of adversity ; even as an old straw-bed is all the more yielding to hu- manity's touch for being well shaken. At any rate, Great souls and Superior minds are forever being unfor- tunate and shocked : — at least they always consider them- selves great and superior : — and the wonder is, that, with so many mills all the time working, there are not more nobility and softened humanity ground into the world. Aster's high-toned soul and mind, as they peered through the bone eyeglasses at the rather limited con- veniences of their owner's room in Dame Street, may have grown nobler and softer by the edifying survey ; THE CIRCUMAMBIENT HEIR. 75 but, if so, their native modesty prevented any striking display of such touching improvements. Their intensi- fied glare of apparent disgust may have been but the dis- torting effect of their superhuman effort to meekly con- ceal their actual sublime ennoblement and softening, even as a hugely tickled man will (in church, or at a funeral, say,) sometimes screw his face into an appalling frown to keep from laughing ; yet that small whitewashed back- room, plentifully hung in second-mourning with cobwebs which just swept the nose, and depressingly furnished with pumpkin-colored chairs and washstand, a tow shake- down in a corner, and a w T ooden bedstead so much out of mathematical proportion with wear that it seemed in the first movement towards standing on its hind-legs, — was a home-view T not calculated to exhilarate one who had a crest and monogram on his card. Sitting near an ingenious fairy stove, which required but one shovelful of coal a day to keep the room cool, and upon which stood his shaving-pot, Aster propped his chin with his closed razor, and chewed the cud of sweet and bitter fancy tobacco. " From sleeping upon that fiendish mockery of a bed," brooded he, " with my feet higher than my head, and the noise of the old quills in the pillow crackling in my ear at every turn, I awaken each morning from broken slum- bers with a rush of blood to the brain, and am more and more soured against the whole human familv. What have Orlonzo and I had for breakfast this morning? Hash — by the gods, hash ! with raisins and a lock of somebody's hair in it." He ground his teeth. " I have eaten hash, and my adopted son has eaten hash, until there are more small buttons and heads of carpet-tacks inside of us than our blood requires. The butter has a 76 THE CIRCUMAMBIENT HEIR. moral, showing how sublime a thing it is to Suffer and be Strong ; but there is a weakness in the tea and coffee which neutralizes the admonition. And there is my opulent Father, living in Jenkins Place, and enjoying more doctors and broiled game than would kill and dress for Greenwood a score of draymen ; while my leopardy Stepmother not only keeps his doors closed against Me, but also schemes to get the property willed at least to her baby !" He made motions in the air of tearing an infant in two, and throwing one half into the coal-scuttle and the other out of the window. " As I told Orlonzo last niofht, if it ever comes to a hand-to-hand conflict between that baby and me, one of us must Fall ! My very blood boils, — and so does the shaving-pot. "Which shows that even nature sympathizes with my wrongs. My hand is too much excited to shave just yet with safety, so I'll have'a few words with Mrs. Haggle to make me steady." Thus concluding his soliloquy, Aster stalked to the door in considerable agitation, thrust forth his curly black head, and pronounced the name of his landlady in a tone to make that woman's flesh creep. • " Yes, Aster !" returned a sharp voice, so close behind his protruding head that the embittered man immediately jerked that temple of intellect back against the door-edge with a bang. " If you was to go on the roof next time, and call a little louder, I might be able to hear you, sir, by putting my ear to the chimbley." This delicate sarcasm respecting his manner of roaring for a friend, did not at once banish from the drayman's face that expression of suffering which had been vividly painted thereon by his bump ; nor did he witness the widow's passage into the room without a certain quick glare of suspicion. THE CIRCUMAMBIENT HEIR. 77 " Mrs. Haggle," said he, in deep bass reproach, " you must have been at the keyhole, madam." The landlady, who was a woman 's-rights matron of impressive figure, forty Summers, and brown locks cut short in her neck, took a chair in a gentlemanly manner and tilted back in it an inch or two. " If I choose," said she, chewing a wisp of broom, " to look through my own keyhole, to see if a lodgings with breakfast and tea is using my coals like water, I'm not aware that even Man's legal tyrannies can stop me." " But suppose," exclaimed Aster, turning pale, — " sup- pose I'd been putting on my — hat." "Aster," returned Mrs. Haggle, impatiently, "I've been married myself." " And Haggle is dead !" retorted he, darkly. " I take. Your hashes three each day ate he, physicians were in vain. Madam, the late Haggle may have been willing to go ; but I am not. I am weary of hash. There must be a change." "And do you think, sir," sneered the lady, using her wisp as a toothpick, " that merely because your're a Man, you have a right to tell a Woman do this and she doeth it, go there and she goeth it? Hoes your footy little board buy my independence, as in everyway man's equal, from me ? No, Aster ; and I won't have you telling me it does. The tyranny of your sex has put it upon woman to set the table, and if your sex don't like hash, it can lump it." " It's too lumpy already," ejaculated the much-endur- ing man, " and you cooked your thimble in it last night. After eating of it I have frequently dreamt that I dwelt in marble halls; while Orlonzo plunges and moans on the shake-down to that extent that I sometimes think 78 THE CIRCUMAMBIENT HEIR. he must Lave swallowed something alive. Do you hear, madam ? Something alive /" "Don't you dare raise your voice to me, sir!" cried Mrs. Haggle, in a manly voice ; at the same time bring- ing down her fist smartly on her knee. "I've been a brother to you and that boy, and now } t ou fling sarcaz- zums in my face for it ! Hav'n't you told me about your family troubles ; and haven't I told you, over and over again, that meat cut fine is more fattening'for them that is reduced in that way than anything else except tripe ? And you won't have tripe. Hav'n't you refused to tripe, in language that I repeated in my speech at the Sorosis last evening and was frantically applauded ? You don't know how to appreciate a woman, my good man ; but when we get votes, and sing bass, perhaps you'll think that she can at least drive a dray !" "I hate the women of both sexes," gnashed Aster, goaded to frenzy by her subtle feminine irony ; and he walked the floor in a tempest of wrathful recollection. " But for a Woman, I might now be eating broiled chick- en in a rosewood chair. — Madam " — he paused suddenly before her and savagely clutched his vest — "I'll be re- venged upon women. I'll marry one ; one with the stamps : and feed her, by Heavens ! on hash. I'll borrow some of your hair to put in it, too ; because I've noticed that your hair never cooks crispy.'' "What Mrs. Haggle might have replied to this bitter outburst of a tortured soul, was averted by a rushing sound in the hall, and a tumultuous dash into the room of Orlonzo Goggle, bearing something of a pillowy shape in his arms. u I've played my points," carolled the enthusiastic boy, striking up a kind of barbaric dance between landlady and lodger ; " Vve played my points !" THE CTR0UMA.M3IENT HEIR. 79 " Why ! I do believe — " screamed Mrs. Haggle. " Boy !" gasped Aster, recoiling as from a spectre. " I've fetched the kid, Gen'ral," chuckled the shapeless youth, suddenly releasing a satin -capped little head from under his arm, and placing a Baby on the floor. " Yah-a-a-ah, ah-yah, ah-yah-ah-ah 1" To say that the look cast upon Mr. Aster by Mrs. Hag- gle was Awful, would be doing gross injustice to the word Withering. To say that Mr. Aster turned frightfully Red under it, would be a culpable oversight of the terms fatally Crimson. " As — ter ! And in My house I" " No ; you bet ! In the missuses house," corrected Or- lonzo, his mouth stretched alarmingly. As — tee ! — I think I'd better go." Down upon the wretched boy pounced the crazed As- ter, like a vulture of eccentric shape and infirm temper on an imprudent young pullet. Fiercely he shook him, until the trailing faded blue military overcoat and rag- fair of a cap combined to the eye like one of Macbeth's witches. " You sinister scorpion ! "Where did you find — This-s-s ?" " Oh, see here, now, this is played — this is," piped the youth, dexterously slipping out of both cap and coat, and dancing backward with fists in position. " What's the good of goin' and tryin' to punch a man that aint yer size ? Why don't you take and hurt the kid that's been playin' points to get your rhino ?" " Ha !" ejaculated his adopted sire, staggering as from a blow, and with bone eyeglasses gleaming new meaning at the infant howling on the carpet. — "Not my half- bur-rother V " That's the little cuss," assented the once more ecstatic 80 THE CIRCUMAMBIENT HEIR. Goggle, nodding tempestuously. " The gal bad him out in front of the swell crib in Jinkins Place, in a little swell kerridge, and skooted back down the basement a minute fur somethin'. I see it, — 'cause I'd just sold my last Hirruld to an old file at the corner, — and I went for the kid, and fetched him bully !" Aster and the landlady gasped at each other, after the manner of two gold fish in a tank not sufficiently aerated. "Is this a Providence?" muttered he. " What's to be done ?" panted she. "I'd strangle it, /would," suggested Orlonzo. After a moment's thought, the woman lifted the babe from the floor very tenderly. Ah, yes. Despite all the strong-mindedness and Sorosism in the world, she couldn't change the nature God had given her, and was still a Woman, of the Mother-sex, for all her short hair. She lifted the babe as only a woman could, and made the scowling drayman try to take it gracefully as only a man couldn't. " You must carry it right straight back, Aster." " And not — ?" He grinned sinisterly. " !No. You shan't drownd it in any tub of mine." The sorely tempted man held the little thing about as comfortably as though it had been a can of nitroglycer- ine, and eyed it with thoughtful hatred. " Miserable pink little wretch !" were the words literal- ly ground from his heaving chest. " Shall I take no re- venge ?" "You'd better take it right home on your dray," urged the womanized Mrs. Haggle, hastily, "or it'll squirm worse 'n that." " Mrs. Haggle," said Aster, a ghastly smile stealing around the corners of his moustache, " there are some sacri- THE CUMCTTMAMBIENT HEIR. 81 fices that human nature can't be exact in to an extreme. The damp imp shall live ; but my wrongs must not go entirely unavenged. — Madam " — with a demoniac air he suddenly turned the infant over upon its face on his left arm, — " Madam, I'll trouble you to turn your head away for a moment." She obliged him, her woman's wit instantly compre- hending his almost maternal purpose ; and, in a moment, the howls of the Tiny Tim were accompanied by some such sounds as E. Forrest, tragedian, produces, when, in the agonies of Spartacus, he repeatedly smites his gladia- torial breast. " And now I'll take it home — you purple little beast !" he cried ; something new having come to his thoughts, apparently, to exasperate him in a new spot. Savagely dragging on sombrero and Spanish cloak, he strode swiftly from the room without another word, leav- ing Mr. Goggle and the mistress of the house to eye each other in momentary abstraction. The youth was the first to recover. " It's to be tookt back is it ? After a man's pickin' it out of the kerridge, like a oyster, and dodgin' the peelers behind more 'n a dozen fat uns ! Now how's the Gen'ral ever goin' to get his old man's spondulicks ? Oh, } r es ! He'll get it ! My eye he will ! Muchly !— Maddim," — in precocious and supernaturally sarcastic imitation of the gentleman's late manner — " I'll trouble you to turn your cocoanut the other way ; I want to cuss." 4* 82 STEPMOTHEE, SIEE AND SON. X. STEPMOTHER, SIEE AND SON. EIGHT o'clock a.m., in Jinkins Place; and the bright sunlight streaming into a luxuriously hand- some bedchamber in such a health-giving sheet, that stately Mrs. Aster the Second bethought her of the doc- tor's interests and closed the yellow damask curtains on it. She was a fine woman. — It's painful to say that, when we know how she had fooled and perverted the sick old man over there on that gloomy cathedral of a rosewood bedstead ; but some of the most artful womanly malignity in the world does seem to show occasionally in faces and figures rather superior to the average personal charms of severe virtue, — and she was a fine woman. Just above the medium-height ; noble of bust and statu- esque of neck ; crowned with hair of a dark auburn hue, drawn low and smooth on the temples with a severity safe only with such classic brow and nose as hers ; eyed like Somebodyzini's Madonna ; and having chin and mouth indicative of Purpose. Peculiar eyebrows, or eyes not matching her hair, would have operated neatly as a drawback to the virtuous aggressiveness of her general expression, had she possessed them ; but her wickedness refused to dramatize itself in any such style ; and the STEPMOTHER, SIRE AND SON. 83 general similar failure of sinister womanly characteristics to come out in eccentric eyes and eyebrows may account for the fact, that all Braddonized ladies are not immedi- ately arrested on suspicion by the police, when they appear in public. Mrs. Asters mouth and chin, as be- fore noted, informed her face with Purpose, which is a trait of countenance not common enough to be vulgar and not rare enough to be unique. She was an unques- tionably fine woman of, say thirty-eight ; and her crimson- bound cachemire breakfast robe made her picturesque. Mr. Aster the elder, raised high on his couch with pil- lows, and just waking from a doze, watched her as she drew the curtains, and beckoned her to approach. He was the wreck of a fine man ; the gaunt, white-haired spectre of the handsomest of the Asters ; and, withal, an invalid whose sumptuous surroundings were not needed to inform the beholder that he had been a dignified Gen- tleman. "My dear," asked the wife, placing a cool hand on his brow, " shall I ring for your breakfast now ?" " Not immediately, Adelaide." His voice low but distinct. " You've slept a little at last. Are you refreshed ?" " Yes. And you, my child ? It was a hard night for you. Where is baby ?" " I slept more than you thought, and baby has gone out for an early airing around the the block, with Jane." " Is'nt it cold for that ?" " Why it's Indian Summer now, you know, my dear." " Ah, yes. Sit down a moment. Adelaide, I've been dreaming again about my poor boys." " Yes ?" She spoke sadly and kindly. " We never hear from them now. Never." 84 STEPMOTHER, SIRE AND SOX. " You forget," she said, sighing and looking down, "what Mr. Stalker told you about John." ' The old man groaned and closed his eyes for a mo- ment. " Oh, Adelaide, can that be true ! Has a son of mine sunk to be a — thief? Isn't it possible that Stalker made a mistake ? They've been away five years — I think. They must have changed in looks ?" Mrs. Aster shook her head sorrowfully, and patted the long thin hand nearer her on the coverlet. " Mr. Stalker said he was sure. Besides, John admit- ted his name before the magistrate." Again the invalid groaned and closed his eyes. " Adelaide " — he had enclosed her hand between his, and was looking into her sympathizing eyes pitifully — a I did not drive my boys away from me ? They took an unprovoked, a w T icked dislike to you, my child, and left their home of their own accord. You know that '?" "Yes, dear Husband, I was the unhappy cause." And Mrs. Aster hid her face on the pillow. " My dear, I meant no reproach to you, God knows. Don't weep, my child. They are unnatural, ungrateful boys, and left me, and hated you, because I would not lead a lonely, uncared-for life to please them." " Perhaps I, and my poor Theodore, were interlopers," murmured the wife, her comely face still disconsolately hidden. " Strangers coming into a home can change it very much." " But you and Theodore changed it for the better !" exclaimed the sick man, with sudden, angry energy. " Their undutiful selfishness grudged me the happiness I found in it, Adelaide. They were angry because I chose to be my own master, and preferred your counsel to STEPMOTHER, SIRE AND SOX. 85 theirs. We'll think no more about them. I disown them as my children !" __ " Oh, not that." " I do. They have deserted me, and wronged yon, and onr baby shall have what they have forfeited." All of which was virtually the repetition of a conver- sation which had passed between husband and wife a score of times since the former had fallen into the weak retrospective qualms of the sick-room. Mrs. Asters irreproachable hand Avas on the bell-cord to ring for breakfast, when a sudden noise tumultuous from down stairs, and a rushing, stamping sound coming higher, arrested the wifely act. Nov had she more than barely taken the first startled step toward inquiry, by opening the door leading into a hall, when a man in Spanish cloak and sombrero unceremoniously brushed past her into the room ; the two servants flying after him being only stopped at the threshold by her presence there. A younger woman would have shrieked, a weaker one shrieked and fainted ; but this lady simply turned and stared, until Until she saw that the audacious intruder had hastily placed a baby on the nearest chair. Then she convulsively closed the door in the faces of the two panting servants; and was on her knees beside the baby, and up again with it in her arms, and down again with it on the bedside, in less time than it took the astonished invalid to ascertain that something else than breakfast had come. M Oh ! ! My child ! my child !" . With one vigorous hurl of his whole lank body the repentant kidnapper-apparent was on his knees beside 86 STEPMOTHER, SIRE AND SON. the bedstead, presenting so much hat, eyeglasses, and cloak, that he could scarcely have been recognized even for an American. " Father !" cried a deep voice. a Father !" " John?" " John !" The first John was by the old man, who sat upright, and stared, ghastly and incredulous, at his son : the sec- ond by the Stepmother, who sprang to her feet, recoiling. " Yes, Father, your own boy : come back to ask pardon for whatever he's ever done, and to counteract a viper !" u And you ?" cried the Stepmother, — "And I brought your miserable spankling back, in- stead of adopting it out through the Herald" snarled young Aster, flashing his bone eyeglasses upon her like lightning. " You brought it?" she ejaculated in a suffocating voice, turning pale as death, and clasping the sobbing babe so closely that it gasped. " Adelaide — John — what is this?" panted the father, laboring with his racking breath. <(i It is Retribution," was the son's stern answer. " That caricature of childish innocence was snatched from his circumambulator in the open street, scarcely half an hour ago, and brought to me for vengeance. I'll not name the bringer ; but I have brought back the brought. Examine your offspring, woman, and see if a single pin in him is misplaced." "Oh, John, John," groaned Mr. Aster, the while his weak hands pushed back the sombrero and vainly tried to remove the eyeglasses ; "can this be you, my son ? Com- STEPMOTHER, SIRE AND SON. 87 ing, after so long, in this way % What have you done ? Where is your brother ?" " I have brought safely back, sir, that woman's pro- duction, when I might have drowned it ! My brother is probably at some government station since the war. I am poor, and drive a dray. The horse is scarcely worth your notice. " " A dray !" repeated the invalid, aghast. " A dray : upon which I brought that screaming result of treachery here with me just now ; and upon which I gave a short ride to the girl, who was dragging the empty circumambulator about two blocks from here, afraid to come home and tell you. " And now, Father/' he con- tinued, rising proudly to his feet, "I've shown you that I still live, and that I'm no disgrace to you. I wanted you to know that much. If you want me at any time, to bring home a barrel of flour, or haul a trunk, my dray is !No. 41144, and I live at 22 Dame Street. I'm sorry you're sick, and I'm just as sorry that you prefer the attentions of Mrs. Aster to your own flesh and blood." " You insolent, ungrateful " The sufferer endeavored to lift his wasted arms in pas- sionate malediction, but fell helplessly back into his pil- lows at the effort, too weak to finish it. Then the Stepmother, who, since her last exclamation, had been standing silent as some maternal statue, spoke, in her usual soft voice and ladylike manner : " John, you must never come here again while your father is so ill, if you can not respect him enough to speak more like a gentleman of his wife. I am indiffer- ent on my own account, but you see how you have afflicted him. You see, also, that he has turned his back 88 STEPMOTHER, SIRE AND SOX to you and will say no more, now. Had you not better go?" Jack Aster, Drayman, removed Lis sombrero for the first time, and bowed profoundly. "Madame, I drive a buckskin horse at present for a living, and board with a woman who wants to vote ; but, upon my word, there's enough refinement left in me to appreciate such a perfect work of art as you are. You're such irresistible high Art that you've succeeded in over- coming Nature in a father's heart, and turning that heart against the son. From the very first, you were Art against Nature ; but I warn you, Madam, I warn you, that if you go to the extent of trying to even collect the debt of Nature, you may possibly be prosecuted by the natural creditors." Something in that warning must have stung her, for her nostrils worked curiously ; yet her voice in reply was gentle and steady as before. M I tell you again, John, that your feeling toward me, whether just or unjust, affects me in no way. I am your father's wife, however, and do not choose to remain silent as to your accusation virtually against him. lie has judged you for himself, and well knows why you wear this drayman's disguise " " But, it is not " " — and pretend to have been nothing else than a dray- man. He knows, from one to whom you even confessed your name, that your real way of living is by picking pockets ; and " "Hay?" " — that you are at any moment liable to* re-arrest, for having escaped by violence from the custody of the police authorities ; " STEPMOTHER, SIRE AND SOX. 89 " Now, by all the " u — who do not pursue you at present, because the prop- erty was recovered. Your father has learned, from his own judgment, and not from any counsel of mine, to distrust the worth of a son who, after years of desertion, is h'rst heard of as stealing an old man's watch " " Hay I* — " and then not even having the grace to conceal the honorable name dishonored by the act ; even though the questioner had no official power to enforce an answer to his question, but asked it to see if any shame still re- mained in your breast. Your father could ascertain for himself, and without my suggestions, that, while you and your brother were at home, your sole idea was the alienation of his regard from every one save yourself- ; ' " Madam, I -" " — and that you stole from his private safe, and carried away with you, the Will made by him " " Hay V> " — when he believed you to be worthy of his greatest testamentary generosity, and which he subsequently re- voked by making another, though not at the solicitation of me or mine ; wherein you and your brother were righteously punished for your unnatural behaviour, by bequests materially lessened " (The exhausted Aster was now hastening down stairs from the sick-chamber with fingers thrust into his ears, and she after him with the baby.) " — and so worded that, in case of farther offence on your part, or on the part of your brother, they, too, would be forfeited, and the whole property go to those who, while he was abandoned and disgraced by his own sons, were true to him in sickness as in health, tending 90 TEDIUM LARDNEROUS. him with a solicitude such as only a "Wife and Stepson could show, heeding his every wish and whim, standing between him and the undutiful violence of a son not too honorable to crown a career of error by planning the ab- duction of an innocent babe whose " Slam ! went the heavy hall-door, and the discarded son fairly reeled to his dray at the curb, his bone eye-glasses all awry, and his whole romantic air eloquent of danger- ous mental and physical prostration. Another five min- utes, and he had been talked to death ! XI. TEDIUM LARDNEROUS. REGINALD LAKDNER, Esquire, Dealer in Hides and Magnate of " the Swamp," was one of those American mushrooms of wealth whose supercilious ab- stinence from bar-room socialities, and disinclination for lengthy familiar conversations with hiccupping strangers on the horse-cars, show what conceited upstarts they are. When a man of his stamp gives dinner-parties ; and not only gives dinner-parties, but also addresses his guests upon other topics than the latest excitement in beef tal- low, or the recent unaccountable fall in prime South American, he at once challenges the bitterest sarcasm of any author who, from chronic untidiness of hair and col- lars, or a too great addiction to other gentlemen's wives, has been accidentally omitted from one or two fashiona- ble family gatherings in mercantile circles, and furnishes TEDIUM LARDNEROUS. 91 him with such rich satirical matter as shall sometimes help along a lame story wonderfully. If Mr. Lardner could read (of which there were grave doubts in distinguished literary society), he must have been aware, that anything social in his doings, beyond the explicit advertising requirements of Hides, was sure to make him an object of withering intellectual contempt, and afford just the scathing Chapter some badly tangled novelist wanted to help a few of his more rascally char- acters a move or two onward ; yet he gave a dinner-party which was not visibly connected with Hides ; and for- feited his only possible chance of escape from retributive publication, by failing to invite certain eminent literary men who could have conversed learnedly upon atheism, and picked their teeth at his table. u Pa," observed the daughter of this ignorant mush- room, as she sat at her rosewood dream of a desk in the (useless-to-him, of course) Library, " you never gave Cousin John's card back to me, and how am I to send his invitation V " I think I must have tossed the card into the grate that night, when he offended me so grossly by his re- marks about Mr. Gayle," returned the mushroom. "If you are so tender to his wonderful sensibilities, Lucy, you may at least prepare a future defence for yourself, against cousinly accusations of neglect, by simply addressing your invitation to the general c care ' of ' Xew York City,' and sending it to the General Post Office. There's a chance that he may see it advertised, before the day, in the published list of letters remaining uncalled for." " Well, Pa, then I shall certainly do that ; for I wouldn't have the poor fellow think we had slighted him. I'm sorry he treated you as he did ; but I'm sure 92 TEDIUM LARDNEEOrS. you can make allowance for the tortures of a proud na- ture under a sense of unmerited and humiliating adver- sity."* " But a proud nature need not turn ruffianly under its troubles," was the disgusting suggestion of the mush- room. " The young fellow positively treated me without any respect at all ! However, he is one of your eccen- trics, I suppose, and I'll not let him vex me too much until after I've seen what I can do for him and his brother with his father. I certainly hope, though, Lucy, that, if he comes to dinner, he will at least suspend his dray- man's manners for that occasion." " Of course he will, Pa," responded Lucy, warmly. " He's a gentleman by birth, you know, and it comes natural to any one who has ever been a gentleman to conduct like one at table, at least." (Unsophisticated girl!) "I can't help thinking, too, that we shall find him very different when he comes this time. We know how proudly sensitive he used to be about his position, when you first brought him home ; and to come here again as a common drayman ; and after I'd been so fool- ishly timid, too, as not to speak to him from the carriage, was enough to make him act stiffly. Why, Pa ! he is so morbid in his pride, that whenever I said anything to him that evening, after you'd 'gone to the Club, about what had happened to him while he first knew us, he seemed actually incredulous of the evidence of his ears. It amounts to a disease. I think it pains him to hear one word about the past." " Or even to be reminded that we are his relatives. But, as I said before, I'll not notice John's dray man isms too particularly, until I've done what I can for him." Thus spoke the mushroom. — Who, by the way, might TEDIUM LARDNEEOUS. 03 have been more fittingly and intelligently occupied in sorting Hides than in criticising other people. The day of the upstart dinner arrived, and with it about a dozen well-dressed persons of both sexes and no intellect, and three Beats who acquiesced readily in all that those persons^said — when there was no particular reason to dissent. Came Mr. and Mrs. Grimky, <>f In- numerable Street, worth at least a dozen brown-stone blocks, yet had never read Browning's last poem ; came Mr. Sniffers, of Wall Street, so deep and dull in the Share Market, that he hardly knew there was such a book as Byron Cox's " Dreams of a Maniac ;" came Mr. Richardson, an English author on his travels, (And the American Byron Cox not asked ? But let it pass !) ; came Mr. Bozwood, nominally a silent member of the American book-selling firm having the contract to show Mr. Richardson in the principal cities, but really a dis- guised detective kept perpetually at Richardson's elbow to see that no other booksellers got a literary engagement out of him ; came the supercilious Mrs. Thompson- Street, (maiden name of Thompson. First Thompsons English. Came over with the Conqueror — as kitchen- servants, probably,) accompanied by old Street, her hus- band, who had no hyphen in his name, and was as ignor- antly rich as unintellectual stupidity always is ; came Mr. Gayle ; and came a clergyman or so. Mr. Lardner's furniture was all imported ; nearly all his servants were imported ; he labored under a common delusion that his wines and segars were imported ; and he received his guests with important expressions of im- ported sentiments of dire import. " Mr. Richardson," said Mr. Lardner, in his most im- ported manner, speaking to the Euglish author, " you TEDIUM LAEDNEK0U8. "But don't you remember, Cousin Tolm hoi ed liim last time I" ' 4 M\ pride, Lncy; mv Man's pride would not -rmit 'i • other* ise." "Oh yea, arse: don*! mind my nonsense But Pa would have preferred to deal with you as a n- hew, D knOM . r than U a «lr:i\ man/' I "Hai I •h jumped; the one with speaking, the ot r at '! the sudden exclamation; and several psons I into jumping also. *F '■■fir by the window, Cousin thn," Id 1 i • < tied and conscience-stricken young ady, I '• i can talk a moment by our; ves. •■ Don't I sharply," (he was staring right thtagh • head ;) "1 didn't mean it. You must try to 1 less with ;/c W. \c only a minute before Di ter's ad 1 want to say something particu • to - i friend. Hi en Dollie Dapple nee la well ti'll vou," sighed Aster. u No." u \\\11. til , ■'- I shamel You'd better see her >on, d her, and she saw yon coming r three stately steps forward. Her disease was plainly n the spiral passage, which must be so adapted, in its :apacity and time of conducting the subtle metal, to the r arying natural balance of the figure, as to preserve an iquilibrium and help a change of gravity simultaneously, rhe two or three clumsy steps which GeofTrey's Doll did uake under difficulties, were enough to incite his whole ife to the task of making her perfect, and continued fail- ire only spurred him on the more. For some time, the new wife bore patiently enough rith her husband's devotion to his invention ; and took harge of his other interests with such energy that the tore-business improved apace, and Dollie could attend »ublic school and present a clean, well-fed appearance, ^fter a while, however, as the novelty of her situation apsed into monotony, and GeofTrey's neglect of every- hing in life but his Doll, assumed more the character of 1A4: THE STORY OF THE WALKING DOLL. an injury, she began showing a fretfulness which soon intensified to chronic infirmity of temper, and both the Toyman and his daughter were the victims. The former endured all her scoldings with the patience of mental abstraction, until they were directed with furious con- tempt against his Invention. Then they became too much for his philosophy, and he retorted in such wrathful terms that all hope of peace left the house for good. De- claring that if her husband cared more for a nonsensical doll-clock than for his wife, she was not going to work and stint herself any more for him, Mrs. Dapple became vengefully careless and extravagant, went out calling when she should have remained at home, threatened a score of times to throw the sacred Doll into the fire, and was so high with poor little Doliie that the child learned to hate as well as fear her. In this unhappy state of things, (from which the lady's prudent father very wisely held himself aloof until he died,) the Toyman's first manly measure was the sending of his ill-used daughter to a boarding-school near Phila- delphia. This cost money, and was fresh food for Mrs. Dapple's ire. In this case, too, the inventor retorted hot- ly ; and, one day, after a particularly furious quarrel, actually ran from the house to cool his anger in the street. Upon his return, in a few moments, he found the store-ladder reared against the tall window of his work- room, the red curtain curiously tucked and bagged up around its rod, and his wife lying close-by upon the floor, like a dead person, with blood streaming from a ghastly wound on her head ! Stricken with horror, and a sense of guilt, at the sight, he fled wildly to the street again, calling for lt Help." The tirst stranger to answer was a dissipated-looking charac- THE STORY OF THE WALKING DOLL. 145 ter from a neighboring bar-room, who, after hearing the crazed husband's incoherent ravings, said he was a " Doc- tor," and pushed and pulled the frantic Toyman back into the fatal room. Thither followed an excited crowd from the street, to whom the ready Doctor, after exam- ing the insensible woman's wound, and surveying a chair near the window, explained that Mrs. Dapple had fallen from the ladder and fractured her skull. He seemed, in- deed, to comprehend the whole situation at a glance ; for after one look at the pale, muttering Toyman, who stood wringing his hands over his wife, and one sweeping look around the poor, disordered room, he declared that the woman must be taken immediately to an hospital. " Some one there, call a hack !" he cried, addressing the group of excited faces in the doorway. " Be quick, I tell you !" The hack came, and, without a word of remonstrance from her husband, Mrs. Dapple was hastily borne into it by a superfluity of kind hands, and so conveyed to the hospital ; for Geoffrey had been little better than a mani- ac since re-entering the place, and did but groan, and Avring his hands, and stare in helpless horror here and there. As the hack drove off, and the volatile crowd re- treated after it, he fixed upon the Doctor a look of awful incredulity, suffocated a moment with some unutterable word in his throat, and, clenching 'his hands, dropped senseless to the ground. There followed long weeks of fever and delirium, dur- ing which his wife died in the hospital, and was buried ; and Dollie came home from school to nurse him slowly back to strength and reason again. Finally, when he arose from his bed, a bowed and shat- tered man, to love his daughter as he had never lovechher 7 146 A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. before, and hold the window and its furled curtain in a kind of horrified sanctity, the Walking Doll was nowhere to be found. XVIII. A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. It was about Five o'clock in the afternoon, and Dr. Canary had just ornamented the show-window of the Toy store with a new Jegenclary card — " Come in, good friend, and buy your home a joy, In doll, or wagon, for your girl, or boy; Nor be discouraged, though the last, you say, Was prized, and broken, — aye, and thrown away! E'en buy another. Mark your playhouse great, Where dolls are angels, and a wagon state : See how they're petted, prized a moment, — lost, Though honor, virtue, human blood they cost ! What's your extravagance to that, in span, Where Fate's the player and the toy is Man?" He paused awhile, to study the first popular efTect of this philosophical contribution to the literature of his new trade ; and soon had the satisfaction of seeing the other side of the window bordered with such a throng of read- ing patrons as the latest verse at Dapple & Co.'s invaria- bly attracted in these days. From his point of observa- tion behind the dense flight of paper kites which partial- ly lined the inner sashes, he was able to study the varied face* directed toward his amazing lines ; to note that the A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. 147 younger ones evidently relished them as a joke, and the older ones as a bit of choice advertising morality ; and to detect one pair of small, foxy eyes, peering through an opening in the cloud of kites into the dark store itself. " So, there you are again, ray friend Stalker !" he mut- tered to himself. " There you are, my smart boy, looking as knowing and frank as you did in the police-court that day. Perhaps you'd like to see the old man alone, for just a moment, in reference to that watch business again ; and perhaps you'll get a chance if you only hover around the premises long enough. I wonder that a man of your good taste don't drop in once in a while and have a chat with the Poet of the Establishment." The said Poet grinned to himself behind a large blue kite, snapped a couple of his finger-joints, and walked slowly down the store to the connecting doorway of the memorable room beyond. 2sTow that he wore a gentle- manly black suit, and his nose had lost much of its former bloom, he was as respectable a figure as any popular warehouse could ask for its salesman-in-chief; and the graver expression coming over his countenance, as he leaned against a side of the doorway and looked within at his partner working there as usual, made him appear al- most like a man whom one could trust. Indeed, a superficial reader of faces might have sup- posed that his was thoughtfully alive with a very kindly compassion, as he leaned there watching the haggard old workman at the bench, and apparently taking pitying note of every passage of the file. " Isn't it most time to rest, partner ?" " I'll rest when I'm tired." " Ah, that's a correct principle, and I don't know that 148 A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. it ever struck me before. Only let a man really rest when lie's tired, and he'll live to be a hundred years old. A Yankee never does, and so he puts on his rosewood, or mahogany, overcoat at about forty-five." ~No response. " I should think, Dapple, that the Concern might afford gas in this room nowadays." u If you want it, you can have it put in." Geoffrey had not once looked up from his work since first addressed, and answered like an automaton. " I don't want it, I'm sure," said the unruffled Dr. Canary. "I spoke wholly on your account, partner. You'll lose your sight, yet, and then I shall have to take the Walking Doll in hand, myself." " You can do it now. You're Master here." " Not quite that." With a laugh, and change of leg. " It's strange that you should have lost your first model of the clock-work and Balance, as you did ; but, being a physician, I can understand how that long term of con- gestion of the brain blotted the first clear points of the invention out of your head, so that you've never been able to bring the Doll so near a Walk since." The old Toyman filed away at the piece of brass in his vice, as though he heard not a word. " The question is ; will it ever Walk ? It seems to me,* partner, that you're trying to accomplish an impossi- bility." Geoffrey looked up now ; and regarded the persistent " talkist " with anything but a friendly smile. "If it's an impossibility," said he, "the sooner I shall go mad over it, and the sooner you'll have all you can get. It's the only thing that saves me from going mad just now ; and if you're a wise man — a Wise man, I say — you'll be A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. 149 contented with what you've got, and leave me this in peace." " Upon my word, I'm sorry you continue to regard me in that light," observed Dr. Canary, with an earnestness of voice and manner unmistakably regretful. " Howev- er," continued he, " as the subject appears to offer noth- ing but offense, I'll change it. You ought to know, Mr. Dapple, that I've noticed three eccentric characters affect- ing the front show-window quite particularly, during the week, and think, from their actions, that my presence in the store has an influence in keeping them out. As you never leave the house in these times, and I am on view all day, you may miss them altogether, or they you ; and so occasion inconvenience to somebody. Suppose I spend a few hours out to-morrow ?" "I don't know who you're talking about," answered Geoffrey Dapple, shortly. " Go and come as you please." " One of the three," continued Canary, " is a foreign- looking chap, in a long black coat, and the biggest hat I ever saw. He wears eyeglasses and a moustache, and has flattened his nose against the window at least three times. The second is a stoutish, well-dressed woman, with a thick black veil. She only came close to the window once ; but I've seen her pass-by several times in one afternoon, and al- ways eyeing the place, apparently. Both of these myste- rious individuals lose all interest in the establishment the moment they catch sight of me. The third is a man who takes a sweeping stare into us through the middle pane at least twice a week. I know who he is — a detective po- liceman." Down dropped the file from the Toyman's hand, and the Toyman again turned a lowering, scowling face upon the speaker. 150 A CONVEET FROM RASCALITY. "In the devil's name what more do you want of me |" he passionately asked. " What more is there to gain here, that you must make-up a fool's storv, to remind me, that you can give me over to the law ? I tell you, if you are a wise man — a "Wise Man — leave me alone with this work of mine, and don't torment me too much ! I'm a father. That's your security nowT But I'm a man, too, of weak flesh and blood — almost a madman — and one turn too much of the screw may drive me, some day, to spoil your game by rushing from this place and giving Myself up ! You don't want me to do that. Your power would end then, and I should be less in the devil's hands than I am now !" " Geoffrey Dapple !" exclaimed Doctor Canary, vehe- mently, " you must be quite a lunatic, to twist what I have said into that shape. I hadn't the slightest idea of reminding you of anything known to me. The man with the cloak and the woman with the veil are real people, and have some secret purpose with reference to something, or somebody, in this house. Were I the father of your daughter, I should certainly take pains to find out what they meant ; — that is, if I did not know them. A beau- tiful girl in humble life, in a city like this, — " u She's nothing to you !" " Nothing, of course, partner, but an object of sincere respect and admiration. As for the policeman, he is the same who helped you to recover your — But here's Miss Dapple." Dollie coining back from Lardner Place, and with her eyes downcast in troubled thought, did not see Doctor Canary until he stepped aside from the doorway to let her pass into the room, and answered his " Home again ?" with an abstracted little nod. He waited long enough in A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. 151 their view to see the daughter kiss the paternal cheek, which seemed neither to invite nor repel; then paced with folded arms to the street-door of the store, looked moodily out upon the bustling and darkening thorough- fare for a few moments, and finally ignited the lamp over the only desk in the place. The Muse was at him again, and, with quill oft-fluttering undecidedly in air, he perpetrated still another show-card — "A doll that's broken by the wear and tear Of various handling by the rude and fair, Is hereby offer'd at so low a price, That* you may purchase without thinking twice. Not badly injured ; for the break's so slight A little handiwork would set it right ; And we might mend it of ourselves, and sell At price the earlier, — it would Look as well. But there's the prejudice ! You'd scarce allow That any value is its portion now : The thing's scarce worthy taking home, you croak ; It's whole at present, but it has been broke ! " It may occur to the hypercritical, that the ex-Odonto- lator's verse was occasionally of a rather saturnine flavor for the usually-feeble literary tastes of toy-buyers ; but the great point of such things depends principally upon their unlikeness to anything of the kind before attempt- ed; and surely no other toy-store in the city ever dreamed of pointing its toys with such excruciating morals. If a rash infant-visitor induced parent, or at- tendant, to read a particularly depressing card aloud, and was thereupon thrown into such unwholesome melan- choly that nothing but a drum would suffice to bring cheerfulness again, the store sold an instrument of mili- tary music, and dwelt loudly in the infant's mind for 152 A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. ever after as the place whither you could not take him without being absolutely compelled to buy him a toy. Orlonzo Goggle had been much chastened in mind by some of the earlier cards, as was hinted in its place, and upon arriving to put up the shutters on this occasion, pondered for some moments over the latest Moral in the window. " Well, boy, how does that suit you ?" asked the poet. " Oh, donH you sling a quill, some !" expatiated the critical youth, winking affably with all one side of his face, and rolling his head in an encouraging manner. " DonH you sock it to 'em gay ! If you was to jerk one of them air sick old songs into a newspaper, wouldn't the old tiles as reads them blow their bugles ? You bet yer !" And the child thrust a finger inside his cheek and produced a sound like the discharge of a cork. Strongly suspecting that this remarkable opinion con- tained more or less of that free sarcasm which the able journals of the day delight to lavish upon such new books of poetry as have not been advertised in their columns, Dr. Canary gently lifted the appreciative youth with his right foot, as a slight hint that shutting-np time had arrived in a double sense, and then withdrew to the back-room, where the evening meal awaited him. For a man of marked social instincts ; for a gentleman inclined to relieve the act of eating with conversational graces ; the parental and filial personalities of that par- ticular tea-table were not, at first view, cheering. The father, with his working apron still on, had an elbow upon the edge of the little household board, and rested his brow on the upraised hand in such semi-devotional hiding, that he might have been either silently invoking Heaven, or concentrating a headache. The daughter, A CONVERT FEOM RASCALITY. 158 presiding in her usual place over a trio of cups and sau- cers and a small family of obese French china tea-things, wore a troubled absent look, not encouraging to the bold- est talker. In short, Dr. Canary saw immediately that a silent meal was the entertainment proposed, and — in- stantly resolved to alter the programme. " Miss Dollie," he said, fairly compelling the girl to meet his eye, as she handed the tea, by the very keenness of his glance, " I have been trying again, this afternoon, to make friends with your father, and he has snubbed me worse than ever. Upon my word, I don't think I deserve it ; and upon my word, I sha'n't give up yet ! We might be a thoroughly cosy little family here as well as not ; and why can't we ? We are thrown together every hour in the day, and what is the use of all this continual glumness ?" Dollie nervously busied herself with the sugar-bowl, and the Toyman pretended to cut something on his plate. " Mr. Dapple," continued the speaker, turning sud- denly to him, " do you wish me to clear out ? Say the word, and, from this hour, you shall never see my face again ! " He certainly meant it. There was no mistaking the honest expression of his countenance at that moment, and the daughter looked furtively at his profile in expec- tant perplexity ; but Geoffrey Dapple regarded him with a fitful stare in which dislike, suspicion, and craven fear, alternately appeared ; and finally answered, with eyes cast down again : — st We only ask you to pay no heed to us at all." " And what do you say, Miss Dollie ? " " I have no right to say anything." " But will you answer me one question ? " 7* 154 A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. " I can not promise, Dr. Canary." "You think that I hold your father, here, in my power ? " " Yes." " Now that is frank, and I like it," said he, giving all his attention to her, and paying no heed to her father's quick ejaculation. " I'll be as frank with you, my girl. Mr. Dapple is no more in my power for harm, than I am in his ! I have merely played a trick upon him, working upon his own exaggeration of circumstances which really amounted to nothing at all. A rascally trick, I admit, but nothing more than a trick. He thinks that I know — " " For God's sake — !" shrieked the Toyman, half rising from his chair, and clasping his hands toward his tor- mentor in agonized appeal. Dollie stared from one to the other in confused affright. " I am determined to finish what I have to say, this time," exclaimed Doctor Canary, smiting the table with impatient hand and showing scarcely less agitation than his companion, — " I'll make a clean breast of it this time, — and no one will be hurt by it but myself. I say that you, Mr. Dapple, think I know of that against you, which, if blazoned abroad, would bring you to — to grief. As surely as I worked upon that delusion to get for myself a home and a living here, just so surely it is a delusion ! I solemnly swear here before both of you, that nothing which I could prove, or even truthfully tell, of Geoffrey Dapple, would harm him. What is more, partner," — and he once more smote the table — " I am fully convinced that all your self-accusation is groundless • — purely the morbid effect of nervous disease." A CONVERT FROM RASCALITY. 155 The effect of this partially incomprehensible speech was startling : Dollie, pale and breathless, seemed to drink every word with her eyes, until the latter alter- nately clouded and flamed with their terrors or hope ; and her father, after shaking like one in a palsy, dropped his head upon his outspread arms and broke into convul- sive sobs. u I have j>racticed a trick upon yon, aided by the self- delusion written on your own face, I say," continued the strange mortal, his voice growing shrill with excitement. " I was in desperate circumstances ; I had been born a gentleman, and was being forced into the lowest degra- dation of a mountebank ; misfortune, folly and misery, had made a temporary rascal of me at last ; and your face and what it recalled, as you stood by the wagon in the Square that afternoon, put the devil's-trick into my head. I've felt fit for a halter every day I've been here — every hour, every minute ; and if I haven't confessed until now, I've at least worked like a horse to increase your business and make myself worth more than any honest partner you can get. No use to make any farther pretence of eating, this night," he added, rising hastily from the unheeded table ; none of us feel like that, now ! I'll go up to my own room ; but, before going, I resign the partnership which I have gained by the one, only, real rascality of an unfortunate life. I should like to stay with you still, if you'll keep me, as a clerk. I've taken only clerk's wages out of the business so far, as you know, and shall be satisfied with still less, if you will let me remain. Enough said. I'll go up-stairs now." — And he went. Left alone, father and daughter neither moved nor spoke for several moments. What She had heard was so 156 ONE OF THE THREE COMES E\\ strange, so incredible, so charged, seemingly, with, things and results darkly belonging to some other life than hers, that her senses still refused to accept more than one reality as proved — the final honesty of Dr. Canary. What the Toyman had heard was at first the breathing of a wild, vague hope, and at last. As he raised his head from his arms, Dollie spoke : " Father, I believe him." u Then his last trick — Grant, merciful Heaven, I may not think too much of it while he sleeps ! — is more dev- ilish than the first." XIX. ONE OF THE THREE COMES IN. WHEN they met at breakfast next morning, the old Toyman was grim and lowering, as though the scene of the last night had never occurred ; and the girl's listless air and heavy eyes proved how little that scene had conduced to give her restful sleep ; but Canary was as brisk as any bird of his name, and an- nounced that he should go down town that morning to order certain additions needed for their holiday-stock. Not seeming to be at all troubled this time by the unso- ciable bearing of the others, he talked glibly of nearly everything in the toy line, without appearing to expect anything more than occasional monosyllabic answers ; though it was noticeable that he no longer used the word "partner," and really made no more show of indepen- ONE OF THE THEEE COMES IN. 157 dent authority than might have rightly pertained to an energetic head-clerk. Indeed, he said : ,% I'm your clerk, now, Mr. Dapple and Daughter, and mean to see if I can't make the old Store renew its youth for the coming Christmas. With your consent I'll get a few evergreens to trim the window, the sign, and the shelves ; and we'll arrange a Christmas-party of dolls on the table near the window. Do you approve the idea, Miss Dapple I" u It would be very nice," was the girlish and quite gracious answer ; for Dollie couldn't help it. " Upon my word, I wish the "Walking Doll could be ready this year," added the new clerk, with a questioning glance at the still sullen Toyman. u I could celebrate her pedestrianism in such a poem as I've never scribbled yet." If, by being absent that morning, he designed giving them a farther chance to discuss his eligibility as clerk, or according the parent an opportunity to receive those three mysterious haunters of the show-window who, as he had said, seemed to consider him an obstacle to the nearer revelation of themselves, his speedy departure for a tour of the wholesale toy-repositories in Maiden Lane did not answer either purpose. Scarcely had he gained the street, when Geoffrey began donning, in feverish haste, his own old overcoat ; shaking his head and mut- tering, the while, like one grievously stirred. " Are you going, too ?" asked Dollie, disappointedly ; for she had faintly hoped that he would let her improve the opportunity of their being alone once more to gain more from his confidence. " I must follow him,* , returned the broken man, not looking at her. " I most know what he is about." And before she could speak again he hurried into the st^re, and so to the street. 158 ONE OF THE THREE COMES IN. Poor Dollie ! In a state of mind between aggravation and despair, she washed and cleared the table-equipage spiritlessly enough ; and then, after waiting upon a few customers, took her doll-dress sewing to her own chair behind the counter, and there gave herself up to all the vagaries of meditation consistent with the needle. She was surprised to find how much comfort seemed to grow from Doctor Canary's attribution of her father's myste- rious change of nature to nervous disease ; and the more she thought of either man, the stronger grew an unreas- oning inclination within her to be rather thankful than otherwise that Canary was to return again. If the mys- tery between them, whether a delusion or a reality, must still remain an unexplained terror to her, she would pre- fer having a third person with them in their home, — her father's and her's — to save it from entire reserve, or reti- cence. As a quarrel in a family often makes the presence of an otherwise indifferent visitor curiously acceptable to either side, so the company even of Dr. Canary was now regarded by her, in the light of what she had re- cently seen and heard, as preferable to his absence, both for herself and her father. She believed that she could foresee in its farther continuation a farther fulness of paternal confidence, if only from the probable ultimate necessities of the situation ; and, besides, — if it must be confessed, — there w r as an intuitive instinct far down in her woman's nature, which, despite all refuting circum- stances, extended a kind of soft, sympathetic charity to the ex-mountebank for his own sake ! " Father has never been himself since that dreadful sickness," thought Dollie, " and I was crying half the night to think that he might be going crazy. What could he mean by saying that the ' last trick ' was worse ONE OF THE THREE COMES IX. 159 than' i the first,' and praying that he might not think too much of it while Dr. Canary was asleep ? His look is so dreadful sometimes, and — Oh, my ! "Who's that ?" In truth, that which suddenly caught her eye as she glanced disconsolately up from her work for an instant, was quite remarkable enough to justify the exclamatory break in her meditations. Pressed closely against an outer pane of the show-win- dow, was a human countenance, rendered fierce and foreign by moustache, bone eyeglasses, and a prodigious slouched hat, and projecting from a funeral peak of Spanish cloak, like an over-balanced, fantastical kind of ball from the summit of some black kind of fountain. The prominent features were not exactly beautified by being mashed into startling and discolored conglomeration against the glass, in their owner's ardor to see as far through the building as possible ; yet Miss Dapple quick- ly recognized that owner, and was disposed to faint. Apparently Mr. Aster had become satisfied, by this time, that no other than she animated the establishment ; for he at once walked in with a forbidding air, and pre- sented himself at the counter before her. " I wish, young woman," said he, gruffly, and twirled his moustache in a darkling manner, M to procure such a doll as will immediately poison an up-stairs family's infant the moment its head is drawn into the infant mouth. A small one of wax, enamelled with strychnine, will suit my finances, and rid a distracted neighborhood of a howling young wilderness." " Mr. Aster !" said Dollie. " Ha ! Do you recognize me ?" exclaimed he, glancing quickly around the store, with a rather startled demean- or. " Then, if the old gentleman is around, I'm lost !" 160 ONE OF THE THREE COMES IS". "If you mean Father, he's out," returned Dollie brid- ling. "Then come to my arms, my darling!" cried Mr. As- ter, twirling himself over the counter by a hand-spring of the most agile description, and gathering the fair one into such a wild suffocation of cloak and big hat that only the back of her head was visible to the scandalized dolls on the shelves. " Mr. Aster ! Leave me alone, sir !" came a choking voice from the engulfing waves. " Let me go this mo- ment !" And Dollie tore herself from him, and uplifted a face glowing with indignation. "Sold again!" ejaculated the young man, apparently undergoing the miracle of being abashed. " Some other has wooed you and you have bestowed on a wealthier suitor your hand." And with a reversed hand-spring, he w T as sitting on the other edge of the counter again. " I want you to be-iiAVE !" exclaimed the flushed girl, laying resentful stress on the last sylable. " Ah ! you do ? How much for this doll ?" asked Aster, ferociously seizing the nearest miniature of extreme fash- ion.—" But you needn't tell me, for I see Two dollars marked on the feet. Now then, Woman ! do you know what you've done ? Only broken a man's heart — that's all. Shall he expire; and unavenged? Arouse, ye Goths, and glut your ire !" And he twisted the doll's head off. "Now, you othei Woman, I'm better than I was, and here's your two dollars." This terrific little drama of woman's infidelity and man's revenge so frightened Miss Dapple, that she took the proffered " greenback " as though it had a handle, and began fanning herself with it. " By the great boots !" soliloquized Mr. Aster, what ONE OF THE THREE COMES IN. 161 time lie tore the doll limb from limb, " when I think of the times I've fluttered around that window like a pensive carrier-dove, and the number of times I've allowed my- self to be driven off by him whom I now take to be my successful rival, I feel like going and erecting myself in Central Park as a colossal statue of Love Sold at a Sacri- fice." " I didn't know you'd been here before," said Dollie, shyly. "By an extraordinary oversight, I forgot to leave my card," observed J. Aster, loftily. " You behaved so strangely in Lardner Place — " "Hay?" Such was the concussion of the atmosphere upon the explosion of this lightning-syllable, that four dolls in chairs fell over on their noses, and a mechanical toy representing a monkey-fiddler was started into immediate agonies of musical improvisation. " Dear !" ejaculated the startled Miss Dapple. " What have! done? I forgot." Mr. Aster had turned toward her so far that his right leg, which was quite a Map of the World for patches, de- scribed an obtuse angle on the counter, and his bone eye- glasses looked suspiciously at her, with two dolls and a drum reflected in them from the shelf at her back. " Dollie, you know the latest Wrong against me ?" "As true as I live, John, I didn't mean to mention it." " Your Paternal told you?" "My Father?" "Yes — It was his watch, you know?" The fair one had been inclining more and more toward him, of late ; but now she drew back, as from a sling, and surveyed the whole cloak-part of him with fear and 162 ONE OF THE THREE COMES IN. trembling. She thought of her sire's return home with the watch ; of the discovery ; of the story of its recovery, and the Toyman's paroxysm of terror thereafter. Then she approached again, and actually placed a hand on the cloak in her new earnestness. "John," she* whispered, pleadingly, "my father has been a different man — a crazy man, almost, — ever since that day of the watch. He did not recollect your name in telling me about it ; but now I remember that when he described the — the — sailor, I thought he must have looked like you. Oh, John! will you answer me one question ?" " Yes ; especially if it's : ' Wilt thou take this woman to be thy'—" . " Oh, John ! who did you steal that watch from ?" "Hay?" Mr. Aster enunciated this with such shot-like sharp- ness, that Dollie jumped as though nearly assassinated with a pin, and several picturesque jumping-Jacks sus- pended from a cord over their heads faintly kicked at each other. "Gracious me! * * * My heart's in my throat! * * * I remember, now, it was put into your pocket, but you didn't steal it. I shouldn't have mentioned it at all." The lenses of the bone eyeglasses, — which now reflected a Noah's ark and a company of soldiers, — were seen to be foggy with emotion, and their deeply-injured wearer's proud head sank slowly upon his breast until his Spanish cloak and hat looked like a huge black cloud with a rag- ged black sun arising from it. "I am the unhappiest mortal on all this planet, I do believe !" he growled sullenly. " Outcast from a father's ONE OF THE TIIEEE COMES IX. 103 house, suspected by everybody of picking pockets, travel- ing around in deep disguise, and received coolly by my sweetheart after years of absence, I feel just fit to apply the torch of the incendiary to myself with my own hand, and expire in my own ashes." " Now, John," murmured Dollie, growing kinder, "don't go on in that way. I don't understand about you; but I haven't meant to treat you coolly." " You scorn me, because I am — Poor !" moaned Mr. Aster ; intending to curl his lip contemptuously, but fail- ing signally ; and making a horrible face instead, on ac- count of a sudden crarnp in the foot which he had par- tially folded under him upon the counter. "Not for a moment !" returned the maiden, energeti- cally. " Can you believe that I think the less of you for misfortunes which you can not help? Why, I would think it nobler, tomorrow, to ride with you upon your dray " "Hat?" The jar of the sound, and Miss Dapple's involuntary jump, together, started the wheels in a mechanical mouse on the corner of the counter, causing it to scamper fran- tically to the floor, with a suppressed whirring noise, and shoot around there in a head-bumping manner. " Mercy on rne !" panted Dolly. " I didn't mean to ! You're so proud and sensitive, and I don't know what, that it's dangerous to speak to you about anything at all." Aster scratched his head in a dreamy manner, and either looked puzzled, or slightly squinted. " You're so figurative in some of your expressions, my dear, — I suppose it comes from having all these cards of poetry around you — that my mind wanders a little in the 1CA ONE OF THE THREE COMES ESV agonies of our conversation," lie said, vaguely. " But let me ask you if that document of mine is all safe ?" " It's still up in the curtain, John." " Never moved since ?" "No. That curtain is never touched by any hand. That is why I put the Will there. It couldn't be safer." " Dollie," said Mr. Aster, with sudden languor of tone and look, " I am convinced that you are true to me, and would fain sip a kiss. Dollie, my pretty one, you're prettier than ever, and — " here he leaned so lengthily to pursue his face that he was almost flat upon the counter, — " and I must pluck a rosebud kiss before I'm a mo- ment older." While struggling with the coy beauty for his inestim- able prerogative as a lover, he could not have been aware of the remarkable foreshortening presented by his prone, patched, and cloaked figure to the eye of any person en- tering from the street — especially as he had raised and was swaying one heelless boot in the air in the ecstacy of the combat. Geoffrey Dapple had come in, and reached his side, before he realized the peril of such abandonment. " Daughter !" exclaimed the Toyman, sternly. u What does this mean ? Who is this ?" Miss Dapple, in a pitiable flutter, introduced Mr. Aster as he still lay prone upon the counter ; and, while the young man made an effort to dissipate all unfavorable impressions by an intense fit of coughing, and endeavored to render his descent to the floor dignified by certain tragic scufflings witk his feet, the father keenly scrutin- ized his features. u Aster ? — Aster V queried Geoffrey, repeating the name and scowling from under his shaggy brows at its MRS. DEDLEY CAN NOT FORGET. 165 bearer. " "Why ! — You must be the sailor that — Where did you get that watch f" — It is worthy of remark, that Mr. Aster did not pause to answer this rather personal question : but, with his bone eyeglasses — which now reflected a box of blocks and half a dozen cornelian rattles — trained with terrible magnetic power upon the old man's middle feature, re- tired backward to the door, as from some high-stepping theatrical ghost, aud disappeared down the street. XX. MRS. DEDLEY CAN NOT FORGET. THE human mind, as purified and elevated by the en- nobling uses of pecuniary adversity, has a curiously keen perception for the shallow follies of the wealthy, and a manly contempt of the newly rich man's wretched social devices. Mark the possessor of this purified mind, when, with hands in his blue overall pockets, he is oblig- ed to defer momentarily his further inspection of some neat cloud-effect from the middle of a street, in order that a nabob's gaudy carnage may get by. You shall read in his frank countenance, on that occasion, such im- mediate penetration of the rider's real, unworthy charac- ter, such indignant superiority to any wish for a crested vehicle of his own, as must give you new ideas of the deep-seeing and unaffected manliness of such a mind. Follow that same incisive mind into the household, and 166 MRS. DEDLEY CAN NOT FORGET. observe Iioav infallibly and instantly it detects the richly vulgar Snob, as distinguished from the True Gentleman of its own acquaintance, by the simple test of that spuri- ous person's greater fondness for coat and pantaloons of the period, and for visiting-cards engraved instead of printed in colors. These things stagger the skeptic whose creed it is that the finest of minds may err at times. They stagger him so badly, that a policeman of hasty judgment might almost arrest him for gross intoxi- cation ; yet, withal, this piercing mind, dexterous in re- velation as it is, still belongs to the list of merely human gifts ; and, so belonging, sometimes does a little injustice to the subject of its analysis. For instance ; because the elder Mr. Aster had devoted a number of his early years to the wholesale Soap business, this mind came near tearing its hair over his subsequent setting-up of a carriage and pair ; and exhibited what, in any other mind, would have been taken for dark malig- nity, when still ' later, or upon his first marriage, he adopted a crest. Finally, when he added a monogram, which resembled the skeleton of some strange beetle and has been noted as appearing (with the crest) even on his misjudged son's draying card, the same merciless mind sneered to such an extent that the True Gentleman of its acquaintance suspected dyspepsia, and proposed a couple of glasses of hot rum, with ginger. Now the elder Aster was not a bit of a Snob, in him- self: unlike the infatuated Lardner, he gave all his ideas and opinions, as an intellectual being, to the business he understood — to Soap : the carriage rested heavily on his soul as a kind of top-heavy contrivance into which he, or his wife, was compelled to go as ballast whenever the coachman felt like enjoying a drive ; and he never looked MRS. DEDLEY CAN NOT FORGET. 167 at his crest and monogram without sighing to think what neat stamps they would make for a first-class article in Shaving Soap. In short, the coach, crest, monogram, and all attendant assumption of lordliness, were due exclusive- ly to the Aster ladies. They demanded them ; and the eminent Soap-man, like many another husband the of Let- us-have-peace school, was scorned by the purified mind for what he could not help. Here we have a clue to his whole character as it relates to this story, an inferential explanation of his bondage to the second Mrs. Aster ; and all needful suggestion for such logical domestic incidents in a novel as are playfully termed strained and unnatural by those facetious news- paper critics whose own powers of fiction are chiefly available for sparkling articles on Our Daily Circula- tion. The henpecked invalid was sleeping heavily in a huge pillowed chair before the fire, and the nurse had with- drawn to a seat by the further window, when Mrs. Aster came softly upstairs from Lunch, and, after a keen look at the slumberer, passed on, also, to a chair by the same casement. " Has he said anything since I went down — anything I mean, about his feelings ?" she asked, in a low tone. "Just before falling asleep, Ma'am, he said that he wished he dared ride out this afternoon." " Nothing else ? Nothing about feeling better ?" " He seemed quite comfortable still." " I am sometimes afraid," remarked Mrs. Aster, as in explanation, " that he speaks of being better to me, to re- lieve my anxiety, when he really feels no change." " He said," returned the nurse, looking gravely at the lady, " that he wished his brother would come soon again. 168 MRS. DEDLET CAN NOT FORGET. I think, Ma'am, that his mind dwells a great deal upon Mr. Lardner." U I daresay. You did not remain in the room, I be- lieve, while Mr. Lardner w r as here ?" " Perhaps I should have done so, Ma'am, as you had a caUer and could not be here yourself." Something in the slow, half- questioning manner of this reply caused Mrs. Aster to look more intently into the eyes of the nurse ; and what she read there induced a change in her own manner. "Mrs. Dedley," she said, leaning forward and speak- ing more earnestly, " the peculiar circumstances under which you have known my son, Theodore, and his espe- cial recommendation of you to me, incline me to treat you w T ith more confidence than I could show to a stranger." " Thank you, Mrs. Aster; in my place I shall always be grateful to every one related to Doctor Danforth, and anxious to merit any confidence they may honor me with." "Have you ever been a Mother, Mrs. Dedley?" "JSTo, Ma'am." u I thought," went on the lady, after a brief pause, " that you looked like a person who had known domestic trouble. I feel sure, at any rate, that your present sta- tion in life has not always been yours." " I have not always been a nurse," was the non-com- mittal answer. " That is what I mean, of course. You have seen bet- ter days, and may be aware, even from experience, that there may be family circumstances which can not be kept wholly secret even from the rarest visitors, and must, of course, be visible to every one staying in a house ; yet which no member of the family likes to talk much about." MRS. DEDLEY CAN NOT FORGET. 160 The speech was eminently diplomatic, and would have meant nothing if the conversation had ended there ; but Mrs. Dedley — probably from past observation — saw the true drift of it immediately, and replied in such terms as to open the way for further confidence. " Yes, Ma'am, I know that very well. Xhe sick and healthy, alike, have need to be guarded against talking too much of family matters, or being talked to of them." " I see that you understand me," said Mrs. Aster, glancing toward her husband's chair. "The sick, how- ever, are approachable to designing persons, where the well are not ; and there are often reasons why an invalid's best friends should take every measure to protect him, in his enfeebled state, both of body and mind, from influences to which, if well, he would not wish to yield." ''The sick," responded the nurse, pointedly, — " espe- cially sick rich men, — are often approached for purposes that none would have the assurance to suggest to them in their well moments." For an instant Mrs. Aster eyed her assistant with searching sharpness, as though inclined to suspect her of more specific knowledge in the immediate premises than appeared in what she had said ; but the countenance before her seemed free from any lurking design, and she promptly reverted to her original manner of matronly confidence. " You have been with us but a little while, Mrs. Ded- ley," she continued ; " yet I take your intelligence as a guarantee that you have noticed the care I take to guard Mr. Aster from the intrusions of certain alienated mem- bers of his own family. They did not come near him while in health, and cau have no better purpose in com- 8 170 MRS. DEDLEY CAN NOT FORGET. ing now than to practice impositions for their own bene- fit. One of his two unworthy sons, who undutifully deserted him several years ago and have entirely disre- garded him ever since, forced his way into this room recently and behaved like a ruffian beside his father's sick bed. The other one is away somewhere, I believe in the Government service, and is, probably, no better. Mr. Lardner, my husband's half-brother, has been a stranger to the whole family many years, and only comes now to make interested excuses for two young men whose past ingratitude to their father has been equalled by nothiug but their abuse of myself and my son. His daughter, — who may, or may not, be intended for the son I have particularly mentioned, if her father's scheme succeeds — is likely to call here at any time to see her ' Uncle.' I do not wish that even she should have oppor- tunities to practice any of the family blandishments; and, as it may not be consistent with my dignity, as Mr. Aster's Wife, to be always present when those who come are unfortunately prejudiced persons as regards myself, I should like to be sure of your certain attend- ance in my stead." Mrs. Dedley had known perfectly well that it was coming to this, and received the whole wintered revela- tion and commission without change of her usually grave demeanor. " Mr. Aster may wish me to leave the room at some such visit," she said. " He will not," was the deliberate reply. " This is no conspiracy against any wish of his, Mrs. Dedley, and you must not so understand it. He dreads these people, in his weak state of health ; and, though he cannot well refuse to see them, — indeed /do not wish that, — is more MRS. DEDLEY CAN NOT FORGET. 171 than willing to have some other person by while they are present." " Then I have no right to object, Mrs. Aster." The handsome Stepmother leaned an elbow upon the window-sill, and turned partially aside to gaze for a while into the street below ; but presently her thoughts suggested a finishing touch, and she spoke again. " Were you a Mother, Mrs. Dedley, all my reasons for this course might be plainer to yon. The unnatural young man I have spoken of, and his interested, or de- luded, abettors, hate me without cause, and would like to make my own husband a sharer in the feeling. I am determined to thwart them, while Mr. Aster is sick ! "When he gets well I need not interfere. On my own account I have no fear ; but I have a babe to remember ; and I should wrong even my son Theodore were I to neglect my rights and dignity as the wife of a gentle- man." " I do not forget your son," said Mrs. Dedley, with the strong emphasis of deep feeling. "I will do any- thing that can be asked in his name." The invalid stirred in his great chair by the fire, drowsily calling " Adelaide" ; and the handsome lady hastened to bend over him in affectionate solicitude, as a good and true wife should. Fairer face could not have risen out of sick man's dream ; and who shall say that it was false — to him ? 172 ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. XXI. ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. THE beautiful symbolical analogy by which a red ball, suspended from any convenient projecting pole by a string, is made to inform the slowest intellect that there is Skating in Central Park, comes, probably, from that same school of subtle wooden association of ideas which evolves a barber from a striped stick, and a pawnbroker from three gilded spheres. Why the national symbol of Japan should be synonymous with the asser- tion that ice has now attained certain inches of thickness in New York, may be as obvious to some exceptionally similibific minds, as is the reason why Mr. Horace Greeley's imperfect education, sympathy with the slave, and intense knowledge of impracticable market-garden- ing should be accepted as the singularly felicitous combi- nation of accomplishments exactly fitting a man for eminence in Political Economy. In fact, when even the ordinary mind remembers how many astounding shades of unexpected signification there are in that very com- monest of railroad-objects, a rheumatic Irishman with a red Hag, there would seem to be some really marked as- sociation of attributes between a frozen-pond and the old-fashioned sign of an oyster-house. Be that as it may, however, the "ball" was "up," and the grand Lake of Central Park swarmed with skaters, on the afternoon in December to which this chapter refers. It was one of those clear, cold, exhilarating days ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. 173 in Winter, at least a fortnight before the first snow, when sky and earth both seem to be thoroughly scoured in prep- aration for any elemental entertainment that may take place next, and streets and roads look smooth and clean enough to make every horseless man regret that he did not study for the livery stable in early life. Strangely enough, though, the opulent in steeds and chariots, re- garded as a class, do not make their great efforts on a splendid riding day like this. Through the Park and up Harlem Lane trail the usual number of buggied and sulkied aged men and preternatural youths with fast horses on their minds : — they, it is believed, are com- pelled by law to drive out in Accommodation-Trains, stopping at all the bar-rooms, on every afternoon of the year; and their generally embittered expressions of coun- tenance show how wearing such legal compulsion must be : — but the nabob carriages are " few and far between ;" and as for patrons of the saddle, they are so very rare that if they were beefsteaks they would be sent back to the cook. To her credit be it recorded, Miss Lucy Lardner was no exotic daughter of a tropical Wall Street stock-broker, to shrink from the brilliant air of such an afternoon as this ; and, mounted upon a delicate bay thoroughbred, she was one of the few hardy young fashionables looking down from saddles upon the five thousand skaters on the Lake. At her side, and surmounting a fine grey, was her escort, Mr. Dinwiddie Pamunkey, a heavily-whiskered young Southerner, whom she had amiably bantered into service, at a last-week's party, and who tried so hard to keep from shivering, that his words had the effect of be- ing spoken in a flying railroad train off the track. Lucy, in her long, heavy broadcloth riding-habit, picturesquely 174: ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. Kussian with rich fur trimming, and her masculine black silk hat modestly veiled, looked like a pretty picture from a French handkerchief-box. That Mr. Pamunkey thought her enchanting was plain from every indication of his manner, even though he evidently anticipated galloping consumption as the sure penalty of his ride with her in that Polar atmosphere. " The yar is quite an inspiration, I do de-cl'yar," said he, his train going over a very sharp tie at the last word. " I had no ide-y&v that we should find it so pleasant h'yar. Excuse me, though : the company of Miss Lardner th'yar would make it pleasant anywh'y'ar." u Don't try to be complimentary to-day, Mr. Pamun- key," laughed Lucy. " You look so cold that I'm asham- ed of myself for bringing you out. That great white sheet of ice, with its swarm of moving figures, always reminds me of a vast lump of loaf-sugar covered with flies." " Quite an ide-ya,r, I de-cl'yar !" returned the gentle- man, secretly wondering where one of his ears had gone, and privately speculating on the ultimate chance of sav- ing a frozen nose. " Don't be uneasy on my account, Miss Lardner ; have no f 'yar, that I am not happier h'yar than I could possibly be elsewh'y'ar." " Thank you, Sir ; it's quite chivalrous in you to say so. You don't have winter scenes like this at the South." No ; not exactly like it in every minute particular : but Mr. Pamunkey remembered a snow storm once in Mem- phis. He remembered it especially, because he was there at that time to attend a fashionable marriage which ter- minated curiously. v As the newly wedded couple were coming from the church, a rejected rival met the bride- groom on the sidewalk, and asked him if he was ready ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. 175 to stand up to what lie Lad done ? The bridegroom said he reckoned he was, and passing the bride to ker father, drew his loaded Deringer. Both parties then began firing across a handkerchief held by two groomsmen, and, at the fourth shot, the bridegroom was slain. The bride's father then shot the survivor, and was, in tarn, mortally wounded by the latter's brother. This brother was subsequently stabbed dangerously by a cousin of the bride, who had scarcely done the deed when the brother's nephew brought him down with his revolver. An uncle of the cousin then pierced the nephew's heart with a sword-cane, and, himself, fell by the hand of the neph- ew's stepfather ; nor did the remainder reach their car- riages until the nephew's stepfather had expired under the fire of the cousin's half-brother, and the two grooms- men had (after a brief misunderstanding) shot each other. While Mr. Pamunkey was relating this, in his own musical Southern patois, their horses were standing with heads pointing over a leafless hedge, on a road high above the Lake, and into which several minor paths ran at short intervals. Much impressed by the sketch, Miss Lardner was about to offer some thoughtful comment upon it, when the attention of both was suddenly diverted to a remarkable spectacle slowly emerging from a cross-road close at hand. First, beyond the line of hedge, appeared a buckskin horse's head, shaped somewhat like a fiddle- case ; the ears laid flatly back and one eye resembling "a large, imperfect pearl. As this apparition gradually de- veloped into a whole steed, a tremendous horse-laugh indicated that the intelligent animal had observed the two thoroughbreds ; yet his cloaked and dreamy rider was so abstracted that he did not appear to notice the 176 ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. startled gentleman and lady. At the tail of the buck- skin horse, on foot, and with a pair of immense skates dangling from his arm, appeared a squinting and shape- less child in a dragging faded blue military overcoat, who blew vigorously upon such of his finger-tips as could be readied in his enormous sleeves, and sniffled in a man- ner distressing to hear. u I see you passin' the car I was a ridin' in, Gen'ral," the youth was saying, " and an old file settin' on the brake said you looked like a clothes-pin on a line in a gale. I was near bustin' him in the eye, on'y he was too old to be highsted." " Orlonzo !" exclaimed the abstracted rider, his bone eyeglasses turning slowly toward the lad, " your language is always disgusting. Did you pay your fare with the torn stamp I gave you ?" "You bet yer !" chuckled the child. " But the Con- ductor said if I came that air game again he'd punch me. I played my points I" Miss Lardner and Mr. Pamunkey had been involun- tary and amazed overhearers of this short colloquy, and the latter could restrain his astonishment no longer. " What a queeyar pay-yar!" ejaculated he. " Cousin Jack !" cried Lucy, involuntarily. Mr. Aster — for it was he — looked sharply toward them, for the first time, upon hearing himself thus named, and immediately steered the buckskin horse to their nearer vicinity. " Mr. Pamunkey, my cousin, Mr. Aster," said Lucy, wishing that her relative's knees were not quite so shiny, but too honest to ignore the tie. " Honored, I'm shu-war," said Mr. Pamunkey, bowing, and evidently too much astonished to say more. ASTEK-RISKS ON ICE. 177 " Sir, to yon !" returned Aster, promptly forcing the buckskin horse between the bay and the gray ; which at once laid back their own ears in compliment to the stranger, and exchanged laughs and bites with him on the spot. — " Sir, to you ! Lucy, is Lardner with you ?" a Pa could not come, on account of — " " We'll drop the subject," interrupted Mr. Aster, im- patiently. " Come down to the Lake with me, and I'll show you how to skate." " But Mr. Pamunkey is my escort, sir !" the lady ex- claimed, her eyes sparkling ominously behind her veil. The drayman reluctantly directed his eyeglasses to the whiskers of the chafing Southron, and regarded them with darkening jealousy. " Pamunkey, do you skate ?" " I reckon not, sir !" was the sharp negative. " Then I put it to yon, Pamunkey," rejoined Aster, with ill-suppressed dislike, " whether a person who can't skate, should stand in the way of a lady's going down to the Lake with a gentleman who can skate ? Be frank, now, Pamunkey." " Miss Lardner," called that gentleman, growing more exasperated as Mr. Aster dodged swiftly back and forth between them in such a manner, that, lean and sway as he might, he could not see the lady's head at all — " Miss Lard- ner, as you are now in your cousin's cay-ar, I shall ask your permission to withdrawar." " Keep still, Cousin John !" commanded Lucy, riding imperiously forward a step or two. " I shall give no such permission, Mr. Pamunkey. My cousin has no right to force any such alternative upon me. If his boy, here, will take care of our horses, we may all go down to the Lake together." 178 ASTEE-KISKS ON ICE. Aster wore a pair of wash-leather gloves, and gnawed one of them savagely while she spoke. " Miss Lardner," returned the gentleman, bowing and smiling again, " I know no law highyar than what you desiyar. — Don't try that again ! — d'y'ar ?" (do you hear ?) This last unexpected sentence was hurled, with sudden loss of temper, at the buckskin horse, which had tried to bite his arm. " Don't threaten my horse, sir !" thundered Mr. Aster. "Leave him alone, and he'll leave you alone — unless you've got some straw about you." To make her meaning the more peremptory this time, Miss Lardner pushed aside her veil, and spoke with curl- ing lip. "If my Cousin does not at once apologize to you for that speech, Mr. Pamunkey, I shall ask you to escort me home instantly. I ask your pardon, myself, for such rudeness." " Don't mention it, Miss Lardner." He had hardly repeated her name, when Aster, with a curious expression of repressed pain on his pale face, rode suddenly against the other's nearest calf, and extended to him one of the wash-leather gloves. " Pamunkey," he said, in a forced voice, " let us shake hands. I wish to overlook this whole thing. I have no mother, and my many miseries make me despise my species." Doubtfully as the apology had been worded, there was a gleam of real anguish in the bone eyeglasses, a slant of despairing desperation about the sombrero, which made Dinwiddie Pamunkey shake the offered glove. While men are equally favored rivals for a fair one's preference, they have little charity or pity for each other; but when ASTEE-EISKS ON ICE. 179 one reads what he takes for the misery of love finally re- jected in the other's unfriendly eyes, there arises in his breast a kind of compassion to make him forbear much. — At least, it sounds as though it ought to be so, whether it is or not. " Now, Cousin Jack," said the pretty peacemaker, " if you'll promise to be more amiable, I'll promise never to tell your sweetheart." "Hay?" It was a wonder that all three were not thrown — so violently did all their horses jump at the startling sound. "The ide-javV ejaculated Mr. Pamunkey, who had also jumped. " There !" murmured the equally shocked lady. — w I'm always forgetting." — Then, as a quick diversion — " Do let us leave the horses here, with the boy, and go down to the ice at once !" Dinwiddie Pamunkey was off his horse in a moment, ready to assist her to dismount, and speechless was his fresh indignation when a wash-leather glove coolly pushed him aside, and the dismounted drayman offered the same glove for Miss Lardner's foot. Speechless was his mingled amazement and horror, when Mr. Goggle, who had taken in the whole past conversation with greedy ears, lightly tapped him just above the waist with the back of a hand, and then danced and ducked back and forth at him with arms raised in the first pugilistic position. U I can play my points," growled the youth, with threatening emphasis; "Zcan fetch yer!" " Orlonzo !" exclaimed Mr. Aster, reproachfully, " give me my skates and take charge of these three thorough- breds at once ! What do you two mean by brawling thus in the presence of a lady P 180 ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. " We two ? The ide-y&v !" was all the incensed South- ron could say ; so choked was he with wrath. u Mr. Pamunkey, please " whispered Lucy, with such a glance of distressed entreaty that he again re- strained his anger. As a reward, after gathering a portion of her trail on one arm, she pointedly accepted his escort with the other ; and this preference so embittered the much-enduring Aster, that the latter, swinging his skates, stalked after them down the avenue to the Lake with the most awful expression of countenance ever worn by a cousin. So proudly sensitive was the man ; so morbidly alive to any human notice not devoted exclusively to himself; that he could not bear the slightest exhibition of girlish coquetry without feeling himself bitterly ignored on account of his draying. Arriving after them at the edge of the fine esplanade by the Lake, he grimly strapped on his skates without a glance for anybody, and then darted out amongst the skat- ing thousands on the frozen surface. " Very unceremonious," observed Mr. Pamunkey. " He is the most eccentric man I ever knew," answered Lucy. So, too, thought the skaters when the maddened Aster hurled himself irresponsibly forward and around on his gritting pair of cast-irons, apparently courting as much of the ill-will of mankind as could be got out of their combined hatred. Now progressing with his face to the front, now with his back, he spread demoralization in every direction, and heaped the ice with the forms of the slain. " Lle'll strike that old gentleman !" cried Lucy, af- frighted. " He's done it !" exclaimed Mr. Pamunkey, aghast. ASTEE- RISKS ON ICE. 181 Mr. Aster, very much sideways, had indeed borne down like lightning in the track of a Gentleman of the Old School, who, quite unsuspicious of all danger, was gliding respectably along in fur overcoat and cap, and now smote against him full length from behind, with such amazing force as to send him flying like a whirlwind into the arms of a policeman guarding an air- hole. Caroming thence, at an acute angle, and, with his vast hat down over his nose, the fell destroyer, his arms fiercely folded, struck out right and left on either side a boyish form which he seemed to have knocked down for that express purpose, and quickly described a long and graceful curve of prostrate young men and maidens, some of whom must have anathematized him with their dying breath. Anon, while apparently bent upon describing a five-pointed star on the ice, he operated in the throng like an exploding shell, so great was the carnage ; and the shrieks and groans arising on all sides, as he ground now over this one's fingers, now over that one's " chignon," reminded several ex-military spectators on the esplanade and banks of certain terrible war-scenes in the Rebellion. As for a very nervous middle-aged gentleman on the es- planade, for whom the spectacle appeared to possess an agonizing kind of fascination, he so lost all control of him- self as to jerk his arms in all directions and cry " Look out, there !" at every fourth throb of his tortured heart. " This is dreadful !" murmured Lucy, involuntarily clutching the arm of her escort. " Feyarful, I de-cl'yar!" muttered the Southron. Ever saving himself from falls, when going over a set of lingers, or striking a fleshy skater, — by frantically grasping the nearest shoulder, or impinging to the per- pendicular against the nearest solid family group, — the 182 ASTER-EISKS ON ICE. suffering Aster still pursued Iris prey with fierce gravity of countenance, Lis flying Spanish cloak alternately catch- ing under the chins of wildly affrighted skating-boys, and flapping up across his own frowning face like the dislocated wings of some enormous bat. A man of less character, less inordinate Pride, would have fallen upon a soft boy after his very first strike-out, and acknowl- edged what was really the truth, viz — that he knew nothing at all about skating, and had no power in him- self to refrain from slaughter : but this stern amateur, when he found himself helplessly gliding and shooting toward all points of the compass, and as often backfore- most as with his face the right way, simply yielded to fate with all the dark recklessness of his poisoned nature, and achieved his innumerable collisions with all the sto- lidity of a " steam-man." As groaning limpers, suckers of fingers, and rubbers of heads, continually retired to the rear, the panic spread through the whole skating army, and a headlong flight of increasing hundreds set in for the esplanade and banks. Lovers calling for their sweethearts, brothers for their sisters, fathers for their sons, made the uproar of the final sudden rush appalling to the ear, and, as the grim Aster passed through the now huddled ranks like a devastating chain-shot, or, anon, seemed diabolically bent upon swooping after some unprotected straggler on one skate, the scene grew terrific. Several single policemen had already made violent efforts to catch the fleet drayman in their arms, and been swept away like flies, or sent skim- ming backward in helpless velocity ; but some ten of the stoutest of them now linked hands across the ice, and bore down cautiously upon the irresponsible man. With sombrero over his nose, bone eyeglasses askew, and the A8TEE-RI8K8 ON IC:E. 183 rear of his cloak standing out like half an umbrella, lie met them like the wind. Double went the chain under the tremendous impetus given to its middle man, and over went four stalwart forms in dragging confusion ; but the chain held, and, in a moment, Mr. Aster was sitting, much flushed, upon a pile of four policemen and conver- sing with the survivors. It was noticed from the banks, that, after a few words, the grey-coats stood aside, in attitudes apparently expres- sive of mingled respect and be wilderment, and deferen- tially allowed their captive to haughtily remove his skates, and retire, in a series of " clear-the-gutter" slides, to the crowded esplanade. From this it has been since inferred, that, when Mr. Aster gave his name to the captors, they very naturally mistook it (the difference of sound between an " e" and an " o" in the last syllable being but trifling) for that of a wealthy family, whose founder had bequeathed the most famous of Libraries to New York ; and could not think it right to arrest such an il- lustrious citizen. At any rate, the much-enduring man rejoined his two friends ashore under no greater personal detriment than a profuse perspiration and some disorder of toilet ; nor did his chronically contemptuous demeanor change under the muttered execrations of the countless skaters swarming back to their element, or the continued shrill " Look out, there !" of the nervous middle-aged gentleman, — who had become hysterical. " I'll never go anywhere with you again — never 1" ex- claimed the cruelly mortified Miss Lardner to him, as the three walked up the path toward where the horses waited. " Pamunkey, just walk on a little ahead," said the drayman, with unwonted mildness. 184 ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. " If Miss Lardner desiyars — " began Mr. Pamunkey. " I desire it, Pamunkey," interrupted Aster, with a kind of mournful dictation. " Just walk on — here's a segar for you ;" and, from an inner pocket, lie benevo- lently handed the other a badly frayed Regalia quite re- markable for its green and bright yellow sub-tints. "Put that in your pocket until dinner-time," said Aster ; but Mr. Pamunkey, although walking on ahead, was so ill- tempered and extravagant as to instantly throw the fra- grant gift away. " Lucy, you thought my skating foolhardy V " It was simply scandalous, sir I" " Perhaps so, girl. But I was tired of my life, of which I cannot yet make out the meaning. Forgive me if I have pained you, Lucy. Forgive a miserable and moth- erless man." His voice trembled, and the girl's cousinly heart once more forgave everything. "Cousin John, your strange ways are enough to alien- ate a saint — which I don't pretend to be," she said, more leniently ; " but I suppose I must accept your apology. — Only, you must never treat a friend of mine rudely again." " Didn't I give him a Havana segar just now ?" remon- strated he, impatiently. " Pshaw ! — But no matter for that now. I've just time to tell you, that Pa wishes me to call upon your Father to-morrow ; and I've made up my mind to return good for evil, sir, by speaking a good word for you, then. Pa has already obtained your Father's consent to investigate about that watch you stole — " " Hay ?" — Mr. Pamunkey, on ahead, fairly skipped, he was so ASTER-RISKS ON ICE. 185 startled, and Lucy gave such a start that her hat assumed the Greeley tilt. " I meant — oil dear ! — to say " But Mr. Aster was hastily retiring from her toward the buckskin horse, his bone eyeglasses glaring stonily at her, his left hand pulling his moustache, and his whole demeanor significant of a wildly spinning mind. Still glaring thus, he mechanically mounted the buckskin horse, and rode solemnly and wordlessly away, followed by Mr. Goggle ; his face turning farther and farther backward to maintain the baleful stare, until a turn in the road hid rider, horse, and follower, from view. " The ide-jSLY !" exclaimed Mr. Pamunkey, to whom the young Orlonzo had uncermoniously tossed the bridles of the two horses. Lucy's feelings were too much for any extended re- mark at that moment. " Please assist me to mount," was all she could say : and the gentleman found his own best assurance of early composure in imitating her subse- quent silence. They were to see the melancholy drayman often again, that clay ; for, as they rode slowly down the main avenue of the Park toward the city, Mr. Aster appeared, station- ary and unexpectedly, first at the opening of one cross- way, and then at another, like some sinister equestrian spectre : his glass eyes fixed relentlessly upon them, and his buckskin horse laughing horribly at theirs. 186 THE OWXER OF THE WATCH. xxir. TnE OWNER OF TnE WATCH. IIS" whatever degree of contempt the reader of this work of art may be inclined to hold the insensate Lardner, and masculine Lardnerism generally, the pre- sent conscientious artist has done considerable injustice to a fairer subject if the same sentiment is entertained for Miss Lardner. She was not that grim anomaly some- times termed an Intellectual woman : for she neither in- sulted gentlemen in a bass voice, nor wanted to attend surgical lectures. She was not the conventional strong- minded woman : for she seldom had a cold in her head, and was not near-sighted. She could make claim for none of these shining exceptional gifts, which, as every one knows, have given the world so many noble and use- ful feminine inventions, discoveries, business-triumphs, and mechanical improvements ; but her friends credited her with a sprightly, though unassuming, Intelligence, allowing its possessor to rank with that wholesome girl- hood which is every young man's natural ideal at a dis- tance, and his pleasantest presentment of the real nearer at hand. Like all normal maidens of her years and means, she looked, in street, or ball, toilet, exactly like all other maidens of similar hair and complexion, the only difference being some little peculiarity in minor hair-dressing details ; yet, to the eye of affection, she was distinguishable from almost any rival blonde of the day, even when the two were not close together; and the TIIE OWNER OF TIIE WATCn. 187 friendly ear could detect in her conversation an occasional arrangement of words, if not actual words themselves, -which seemed in some way slightly different from that, or those, of all other fashionable girls. It would be going too far, perhaps, to say, that her style at the piano, and selection of music, w r ere not precisely similar to the one style and selection of all young-lady players ; and the most liberal credulity as to individuality in belles would reject the conceit, that you might close your eyes, and yet be able to tell whether she, or any other young lady of your acquaintance, were the singer of an Italian air; but she certainly thought more of her own particular friends than all the other blondes of the day thought of the same ones, and thus merits nearly as much considera- tion for individuality of character as it is possible for any young lady of fashion to claim. Lucy was deeply interested in her Cousin Jack, despite his amazing eccentricities, and really carried her father along in the cause, where he had else shown high dud- geon from the first. When the Cousin made his earliest appearance in her home, before his abrupt departure for the war, she had been greatly attracted, in her girlish fancies, by the romantic suggestions of his domestic mis- fortune and aristocratic sensitiveness ; but now, when the embitterment of adversity gave him a certain fierce, athe- istical, piratical air, and his manner with her, as with everybody, was that of intolerant superiority and brist- ling injury, she could not repress a still profounder con- sciousness of attraction. There was a subtle magnetism about the melancholy and world-soured drayman which enslaved her the more every time she saw him ; which triumphed despotically over every protest of her delicate mind against his hat, cloak, eyeglasses, and contemptuous 188 THE OWNER OF THE WATCH. demeanor, and made her such a partisan as even be scarcely deserved. If her deepest feeling here did any serious wrong to Miss Dapple's claim, she did not mean that it should do so. In her own supposition, it came nearer an irrepressible tribute of reverence, so to speak, to a character stronger than her own, than to the familiar love of a mere maiden for a mere young man ; and she honestly thought that her real anxiety for a reconcilia- tion between the discarded son and his sire, was based upon nothing more of self-interest than an enthusiastic desire to see an injured gentleman restored to his proper sphere. Let this analysis of a womanly character common to the world ever since " Jane Eyre " was written, serve as an introduction of Miss Lardner as a visitor, or caller, in Jenkins Place. She was there, nominally by her father's wish, but as much by her own, to show the sickly elder Aster, that his reconciled half-brother was earnest in his lately avowed friendliness, and to plead, as she might have opportunity, for the outcast son. Mrs. Aster's stately departure, soon after her arrival, for a supposed shopping excursion, had been such a concession to the theory of inferred dislike and consequent temporiz- ing etiquette as came most fortunately for her particular purpose ; but she observed, with some misgivings, that the ladylike nurse showed no intention to leave the room. All her pointed drawings near to her Uncle's chair, and sudden severe assumptions of painful constraint, were quite lost upon the demure Mrs. Dedley ; she was not more successful when, after brushing down a light table and chair with her skirts, and dragging the coal-hod half- way across the room by her crinoline, she brought to the invalid some bottle he had asked the nurse for; and THE OWOTSB OF THE WATCH. 189 when even her emphasized "Let me be your nurse, alone, Uncle Philip, for a little while," failed to move the obdurate woman from her seat by the window, Lucy desperately resolved to speak out, nurse or no nurse. " Before going away, Uncle Philip," she said, with a rather determined expression about her pretty mouth, " I must mention John's name. AYe feel so sorry for him — Pa and I." The old man's pallid countenance, which had hitherto looked pleasantly upon her, now contracted to sternness, and she saw that lie was offended. Nevertheless, her hon- est eyes still met his inquiringly. " My dear," he said, feebly but coldly, your heart is a great deal stronger than your judgment. Mention no names but your father's and your own." "But, Uncle, you are so unjust to Cousin Jack," per- sisted she ; " you believe such impossible things of him. Oh, wonH you let me tell him that he may come here once more and ask your pardon ?" "Don't, my child, — you can't understand — " pleaded the invalid, faintly. " Where is Mrs. Dedley ?" " She shan't come until I get through, Uncle Philip !" was Lucy's stout retort, as she imperiously motioned the nurse to come no nearer. " I only want to say a little to you about Cousin John, and that I must say. Uncle, he's no more guilty of taking that watch in Chatham Square than I am ! I never knew all about it myself un- til to-day ; for John goes almost mad at the mere mention of it ; but, this morning I called upon Miss Dapple, a friend of mine, and found out that her father is the very person who recovered the watch !" Since the sick man's call for her, Mrs. Dedley had been 190 THE OWNER OF THE WATCH. standing ; but she now sat down again, and looked strangely at the animated speaker. " My friend says," went on Lucy, watching her Un- cle, only, " that the watch has since turned out to be not her father's at all, but one exactly like his ; and her fath- er was sure, when he came home that day, that the per- son — your own son, Uncle Philip — arrested for the theft, was no thief at all !' ' " Then why didn't he return the watch to the court, and clear John ?" asked Mr. Aster, palpable excitement giving him feverish strength for the moment. " Because — because," faltered Lucy, — " I don't know why he didn't. But he did not ; and yet he says — or, at least Dollie says he says that he did not own the watch. He had left his own watch at home that day." This confused explanation had an unfavorable effect ; for the sick father's face fell again, and he sank back into his pillows. " You've been imposed upon, child ; or you are trying to deceive me," he muttered peevishly. " I'm sure that what I tell you is true, though I don't un- derstand Mr. Dapple's action," said Lucy, recovering from her momentary flurry. " Why won't you let Pa go to Mr. Dapple and inquire about it, Uncle Philip ?" " He may go if he chooses," sighed Mr. Aster, weari- edly ; " I have no hope for my degenerate son — none. Talk of something else, my dear." "But I must go now, Uncle. I shall come again, though, before long ; and stay more, if you'll have me. I'm sorry if I've worried you ; but I know you're dread- fully deceived about Cousin John. It must sound strange- ly, I know," she added, coloring deeply, " for a young girl like me to be vindicating a gentleman to his own THE OWNER OE THE WATCH. 191 father; but you'll forgive it jet, and thank me yet, I know ; and I don't care much about any one else." " I like you very much, already, Lucy. You look like my brother." Then Miss Lardner said good-bye, hardly knowing whether to congratulate herself or not, and was sliglitly surprised to notice that the nurse, instead of calling a ser- vant, seemed bent upon conducting her to the street- door herself. !Not feeling any great admiration for this person, after her recent refusal to be hinted into some other apartment for a while, Miss Lardner descended the stairways with an unnaturally supercilious air, nor stopped to bestow a word upon Mrs. Declley ; yet that grave ma- tron spoke to her, when they had reached the street hall, and in very astounding terms, too. " Will you think me too bold, Ma'am, if I ask you to step into the parlor a moment and hear something I have to say ? It may be important to you." " Can you not tell me here ?" asked Lucy, surprised be- yond expression by the odd address. "If you prefer it," answered the nurse, quietly. "I think I can tell you who lost that stolen watch." " You?" ejaculated the young lady, staring beyond all good manners. a Will you step into this room, now V 9 = Hardly realizing what she was about, Miss Lardner fol- lowed into a gorgeous parlor made dim by Venetian blinds, and, declining, by a motion of her hands, to be seated, looked keenly at the now shaded face of Mrs. Dedley. "Miss Lardner," commenced the latter, speaking low and rapidly, u you spoke of a Mr. Dapple as having re- covered a watch stolen, a3 he thought, in Chatham Square. 192 THE OWNER OF THE WATCH. May I make free to ask if you know about what time the event happened ?" " In the Fall, I believe — September, I should think." " Is Mr. Dapple a toy-maker ?" " Yes." " Then I think I can explain why he did not return that watch to court. It had been his dead wife's watch." " Why, — then — it must — really have been stolen !" cried Miss Lardner, bewildered, and with a presentiment of evil." " Yes. It was stolen from me." " From you ! Mrs— ?" " My name is Dedley, Ma'am. I was nurse in a hospital before coming here ; and before that, again, I was a pa- tient in the hospital, with my cot next to that of the sick wife of a poor toymaker named Dapple. We became ac- quainted, as we lay there side by side so long, and the poor woman told me one day that her watch, bought in better times, was just like her husband's, except that it had her initials inside. She died in the hospital, and left her watch to me ; for her husband never came near her while she was there. I was walking in Chatham Square, one afternoon this Fall, and that watch was picked from my pocket." " Oh, Mrs. Dedley !" exclaimed Lucy, clasping her hands, " I am so sorry to hear this ! I had hoped that the watch had come honestly into the hands of the — the — person they took it from." " It was a rough, heavy man, with red whiskers, who robbed me, Miss Lardner. He ran against me, and then ran into a great crowd standing around a showman's wagon. I missed my watch in a minute afterwards, but knew I could do nothing." THE OWNER OF THE WATCII. 193 " You're sure that was the thief," cried Lucy. " I am sure. I had compared the watch with the City Hall clock, a moment before he ran against me." u You've made me more glad than I can tell you," said Lucy, impulsively shaking hands with her. "I'm sure it is your watch, and I'm sure you may recover it now." " Eo," returned Mrs. Dedley, without apparent emo- tion, u I do not want it if Mr. Dapple has it. It was his wife's, you see, ma'am, and he should keep it. There seems to be a singular Providence in his getting it so." u I must speak to you again about this, Mrs. Dedley," remarked Lucy, after an interval of reflection. u Shall you be here all the time ?" " Yes, Ma'am. I don't wish to be bold, Miss Lardner, but is the poor Toy maker doing well ? I mean, is he any better off than he was when poor Mrs. Dapple went 2" " I only know Miss Dapple, you see." " Excuse me, then. I was so sorry for that poor woman." As Lucy Lardner returned home that afternoon, she asked herself half a dozen times, whether she had been awake or asleep for the past two hours ; and was hardly able to decide just how much of herself \o believe in. 9 194 MOTHER AND SON. XXIII. MOTHER AND SON. TO fight circumstantial Injustice and great odds suc- cessfully, — successfully, mind, — and extort confes- sion of defeat, are very often equivalent to a quick ascent from the loneliest unpopularity to the very peak of mob favor ; for it is not in the nature of mankind in the mass to sulk very long under complete conquest, aud it is in that nature to finally adopt and glorify the conqueror if he shows any tact at all in his victory. A triumph not complete in all respects — a successful temporization with ultimate wrasuccess, so to speak, — leaves plenty of chronic malcontents to keep the truce hollow ; but don't you be- lieve, my professional Oppositionist, that a thorough and radical overthrow means anything less than a speedy cold shoulder for you from your late devoted followers, and an early round of cheers from them for the man who whipped the nonsense out of them. Theodore DaTiforth's fight against all the other medici of Riverside Hospital had culminated in such a sweeping success, that only his dexterous tact in victory was requi- site to make him the popular idol in another week. Up he went to unexceptional favor, from the famous day of the Governor's visit, and " The Little Game-Cock " be- came the term of endearment by which his late unscru- pulous enemies at once learned to designate him. Who doesn't like a pet name ; who doesn't like it all the better with an adjective of diminution ? Napoleon MOTHER AND SON. 195 the First complacently tolerated the endearment of " Little Corporal," a great Western statesman was cheer- ful under the loving designation of " Little Giant," and a cheerful New York editor once responded blithely to the affectionate salute of u Little Yillain." Although a professing Christian, and therefore prejudiced against that gamey rivalry of roosters which gives New Jersey a superiority over all the other States in the main, Dan- forth couldn't help feeling a certain pleasant tingling of vanity under his sprightly new appellation — though he certainly was the least bit dashed, one morning, when he overheard a patient of his telling the House-Physician, that so-and-so had been administered to him by "that ere young fighting-cock in specs." He accepted the title as a felicitous condensation of all the admiring good-will an ambitious young man could ask ; and, as he rode in a horse- car toward Jenkins Place, one cold evening, there came into his mind a strong temptation to tell his lady- mother of the nominal honor he had gained. Had Mrs. Aster shown her usual tolerant equanimity when greeting him, he might, indeed, have been thus vainly facetious ; but, to his mild astonishment, she pre- sented a cloudy brow for his filial salute, and actually sighed as she suffered him to cast an arm over her goodly shoulders on the parlor sofa. " Nothing happened, I hope ?" he inquired. " Father's not worse to-day, is he ?" " Oh, no ; he is sleeping very comfortably," was the answer. 6i Can't I see him, then, before I go ?" " It would be a pity to rouse him. Most of his best sleep, you know, comes in the earlier part of the night. He coughs a great deal after that." 196 MOTHER AND SON. " Yes, I understand. Too bad, though ; for I'd like to shake hands." u Have you been well, Theodore ?" " I am feeling brisk as ■' — a " Game-cock," he was go- ing to say, but dexterously caught himself and said — " can be." " We like Mrs. Dedley very much." " I'm glad of that. I thought you would." This was all commonplace enough, and their frequent style of opening a home-conversation ; but Mrs. Aster still failed to look like her usual unruffled self, and her son could no longer abstain from the question he had wished to ask at first. " "What makes you look so ' bine ' to-night, mother ?" " Because I am very much disturbed indeed, my son," returned the lady, at once throwing off all assumption of ease, and startling him with a sadly worn and anxious look. " I wrote you this morning to come, not that your Father might talk with you, as I said, but that I might tell you something you should hear from me alone." Now I wonder, thought the young man, uneasily — I wonder if something actually has turned up about Mrs. Dedley's character, after all ? But he said — " I hope it's nothing very unpleasant." " It is so far from pleasant, that I should never have spoken of it to you in my life, 'Dory, if I had not been forced to do so." " Forced to do so !" repeated Danforth, turning to stare more amazedly at her. "Yes, forced. Theodore, do you remember anything about your — own father ? Anything at all ?" Her son's countenance changed at once to an expres- sion of grave concern, and his voice sympathetically fell : / MOTHER AND SON. 197 " I remember very little, mother. I have not tried to remember." " He was a cruel father to you, and a cruel husband to me !" exclaimed Mrs. Aster, with intense bitterness. u He neglected us for his dissipated, degrading associa- tions, until I was obliged to leave him, taking only what I should have had, and work out a living, myself, for his child and wife. I should have degraded both of us to his level by remaining longer under the roof of that man !" " Let the dead rest, mother," was the gloomy reply. "But what if the dead will not rest?" rejoined his mother, pressing his arm spasmodically with both her hands. " What if I have an enemy who not only threat- ens to tell the story of the dead to my sick husband up- stairs, but might even seek to alienate you, also, from me, Theodore, by making my past misery your present shame ?" The astounded young man drew further away from her on the sofa, that he might gaze more searchingly into her agitated face ; his own countenance whitening as he spoke : " What is this you are telling me 1 An enemy ? Who is he % What can he tell to injure any one living ? Didn't Mr. Aster know, before marrying you, that you were teaching school because you had been obliged to leave my father ? My precious mother ! tell me what you mean !" '•Theodore!" — her voice was soft with affection, and her hand was placed half pleadingly upon his knee, — " I fear nothing for your Stepfather, and have even dared this enemy to tell him all he can ; but it breaks my heart to think of your pride, and perhaps some of your pros- pects in life, being brought to the dust by common tattle 198 MOTHER AND SON. of your mother's past ! How can you hold up your head again, after I have been spoken of around you as a drunk- ard's runaway wife ?" " "Whoever speaks of you in that way, around me, will never hold up his head again, for I'll knock it off his shoulders !" returned Danforth, passionately. " But who in the world can this insolent ' enemy ' of yours be ?" " A detective policeman." " What?" ejaculated the young man, with a startling sharpness worthy an Asterian " Hay." " A detective, I tell you, who has been employed by Mr. Aster to trace out the evil-doings of his worthless sons. I, also, have paid the man for professional services ; and, upon failing lately to extort an extravagant reward from me, he revealed himself as the officer who had served the writ of injunction upon what your father called his 6 stolen property,' and insolently threatened to use his knowledge, as I have said." " Can I believe my ears ?" cried Danforth, gazing at her in a kind of incredulous horror. " You — my mother — dealing with the detective police ? Then I should feel disgraced indeed !" He started violently from the sofa, took two or three quick turns between that and a win- dow, and sat down again. " For heaven's sake, mother, what earthly business can you have with a private police- man ? My blood boils at the idea." " Theodore ! Theodore !" pleaded the agitated mother, in tremulous accents, "you should not speak to me harshly." " But this is unwomanly ; mad !" he exclaimed, striking the sofa-back at each sharp inflection. " It has always been my great pride to hold you as such a Lady ; to com- pare you with other women in society and think how A MOTHER AND SON. 199 much more of real womanly dignity you had than they I — And now to hear this !" "My son — !" she commenced; and, with a sudden choking sound, hid her face in her handkerchief. Shocked at the effect of his words, Danforth moved penitently to her side once more, and gently drew down her hands. " I didn't mean it, mother," he whispered, pleadingly. "I was foolishly excited. I'll hear all, now, and behave better." " You are the only creature iu the world, Theodore, who can wound me," she said, her swimming eyes turned lovingly upon him once more. " My dear mother !" " What you blame me so much for, was done to save you and your poor little baby-brother from wrong. I only hired the man to be more zealous in proving the ut- ter un worthiness of John Aster, who would regain his outraged father's favor only to malign and persecute me." M Was a policeman necessary for such a purpose ?" asked her son, smiling faintly. " To deal with such as he — yes ! He is a common, low carter ; a thief, even !" And her voice grew strong again. " To find excuse for coming here, and insulting me at his sick father's bedside, he stole your baby-brother from his little carriage in the street, and brought him up to me and to his father with a made-up falsehood about recovering him from some one else ! My husband is helpless ; you are not here to protect me from this ruffian, and I have — done as I say." Theodore Danforth did not draw away, or start from his seat, again; but, respectfully holding his moth- er's nearer hand, he looked down and drew a heavy- breath. \^ /. 1 1 M .il 200 MOTHER AND SON. " Mother, if you need protection from anybody, while Father is ill, or at any future time, it shall be my duty to give up every thing else, and stay only at your side. But you know that I have always been against any inter- meddling of ours between the Asters and their father. I know little about them, except that they hated me, with- out much provocation of my own, when all three of us were comparative boys in Philadelphia. This I do know, though : that, whatever one, or both of them, may be, — and we don't know that Phil is even living — there ought to be no kind of iuterference between them and their father. Mr. Aster preferred you to them before, and he will not wrong you for them, now. If he could be capa- ble of such a thing, you should find a worthier protector than himself in me ! Don't let us be afraid to do what is right, even if John Aster tries to do what is wrong. I tell you, mother, I have never felt satisfied about those young chaps' desertion of their home on our account. There was something wrong, and reproachful to us, in it. I'm often fearful that you resented their anti-Stepmother boyish airs too much to their father, and helped the trou- ble in that way. At any rate, let us wash our hands of the matter now, and let father and son settle it between themselves. Any other course must subject us to such comment as would hurt both of us far more than anything the world could say about what you so undeservingly suffered in the past. Only say the word, and I'll not only see this rascally, insolent policeman myself, but also see that he never presumes to set foot in your presence again.'' This long and animated speech, which was delivered with an earnestness growing more vehement at every ad- ditional sentence, seemed to arouse no strong particular MOTHER AXD SOX. 201 emotion in Mr.?. Aster while she listened ; bnt, when her son stopped speaking, she quietly disengaged her hand from his and lifted her head to its usual stately poise. " You have done your part in giving the advice, Theo- dore/' she answered : not coldly, though with far less softness than before. "' I shall not go an inch beyond what I consider my duty. If you feel that you can af- ford to despise what, as I have told you, has been threat- ened, the threat has no terror for me. To-morrow I shall finally dismiss the detective myself; and if, after that, he troubles me again, why, then, you shall deal with him." " I suppose I must submit," was the rather disconsolate comment upon this decided ultimatum. " Something is due to my dignity as a self-respecting woman," added the lady, her lips and chin wearing then* firmest expression ; " and, while I am Mr. Aster's wife, his sick-room, at least, shall have some guard against the license of those who come as much out of wanton disre- spect to me. as from artfully feigned consideration for him. I'm greatly obliged to vou, Theodore, for showing some little chivalry, as a hospital champion of women, at any rate, and securing such a coadjutor for me as Mrs. Dedley." "Which mixture of suggestive self-assertion and mild motherly sarcasm so subdued the " Little Game-Cock " of Riverside, that he made but a spiritless display in their farther conversation on other topics, and finally went forth again to his horse-car in a depressing reverie. He was both puzzled and apprehensive ; suspicious of harm and helpless to avert it. 202 MR. STALKER IS FTNAXLY DISMISSED. XXIV. ME. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. " \Z OU say, Mrs. Dedley, that you think she made JL an impression upon Mr. Aster with the story about the Toyman ?" " Mr. Aster seemed excited at first, Ma'am ; but didn't appear to place much confidence in it at last. But I've told you all they both said, Mrs. Aster, and you can judge for yourself." That lady, once more picturesque in her cashmere breakfast-robe, occupied a chair at a small writing table or table-desk, in the room next the invalid's, and the nurse stood before her. "You say, though," continued she, watching Mrs. Dedley 's staid face, " that you feel sure of the truth of this story, and that you are certain the watch was stolen from you." " From all the circumstances, Ma'am, I must think so." " It is strange !" remarked Mrs. Aster, pensively. Then, with something of severity in her tone and look — " I am sorry you told Miss Lardner what you did : for she and her father will now be vexing Mr. Aster afresh. You took a great liberty." " My only object, Ma'am, was to get her to say some- thing about the family of the poor woman who died in the hospital. I heard- what she said of them to Mr. Aster, and thought it might be no harm to ask her more. She could not have been much offended, Ma'am ; for she thanked me." ME. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. 203 " That, you say, was after you had described the pick- pocket to her ?" " Yes Ma'am." " She imagined, I suppose," said the lady, with a con- temptuous little laugh, " that your description of the man at once cleared another person of all suspicion. She can't be very bright, I'm afraid, if she thinks a person like that would take to stealing without some attempt at disguise. Especially when she knows that he wears a kind of dis- guise even now." " Then you think, Ma'am " " I say," interrupted Mrs. Aster, laughing again, " that it would be perfectly easy for any dishonest creature to put on a red wig and beard before turning highwayman. If the man ever was decent, he is the more likely to dis- guise his person before resorting to crime ; — or, at any rate, to such petty, contemptible crime as the picking of women's pockets." " It seems likely," was the laconic assent. " Certain, you might almost say. But Miss Lardner and her father have now secured a new story, as they think, and will worry Mr. Aster with it, even though he were dying. You see, now, how imprudently you have acted. If you had only waited to see me, first, I should have advised you to say nothing at all about the watch. They will probably harass you, now, as well as my husband. They may want you to go into some court, yet, and testify." " Oh, I nope not, Mrs. Aster !" exclaimed the nurse, trembling nervously and looking very blank, " I could never do that !" The handsome lady in the chair gave a little, unpleas- ant laugh once more, and nodded faintly to herself as 20A ME. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. though in silent acceptance of some private idea which had not received her fullest patronage before. " I hope not, too ; for that would make the whole family disgrace public." And she added, indifferently, as the nurse turned to leave the room : " My son, Doctor Dan- forth, was here last night, and seemed very much pleased to hear that I liked you so well, Mrs. Dedley." " God bless him, Ma'am !" said Mrs. Dedley, fervently; and went, to be a closer guard than ever over the sick husband. It is an unpopular thing to say : but in all womanly character there is a strong natural tendency to what is rudely termed Humbug, and the most stupendous exem- pliners thereof are generally your majestic, or Imposing, women. That queenly creature, whose head fully attains the height which the tip-top of a royal crown might reach if worn by the average of her sex ; whose swelling form always presents a grand sloping and retreating outline distinctly visible and individual down the longest per- spective of women, no matter what other form of human kind may stand between her and the observer ; whose walk is ever, as it were, from a throne-chair to receive the last inferior person presented ; is invariably a marvel of infinite conscious shams, and gives at least half her private thoughts to the most tormenting envy of women who are not queenly. Feeling that she has been built, if it may be so expressed, for the Imposing school, and is under imperative physical obligation to pretend a serene spiritual altitude no more really hers than the most dumpy matron's, she derives much of her final apparent sense of superior womanly power from an irrepressible contempt for those surprisingly numerous social compan- ions who insist upon being awed by her ; and generally MR. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. 205 marries the least significant of men at last, in honest pre- ference to a union with any corresponding Humbug of the masculine sex. Hence, while an artist in novels is describing the performances of one of these imperious and coldly powerful creatures, he often chuckles to himself in an unseemly manner, and facetiously deprecates his own agency in making her appear such an awfully imperturb- able exception to every rule of nature. If Mr. Dickens did not find vast amusement in drawing his " Lady Ded- lock," he was singularly blind to glaring imposition ; but it is more than probable that he did laugh cheerfully to himself many a time over her parts of his manuscript. It has been shown that the imposing Mrs. Aster gave several peculiar little laughs during her brief colloquy with Mrs. Dedley, and finally nodded significantly to her- self, as who should say : " Of course you are afraid to testify in court !" Did she laugh at the thought of any hu- man being pretending to thwart her schemes with contro- verting facts ? Did she nod in darkly gratuiatory acknowl- edgment of her own subtle power in mastering and prof- iting by the weak points of all around her ? !Not at all ! She laughed contemptuously, not to say blood-curdlingly, and nodded faintly, not to say ominously, simply because it had become a habit with her to do these crushing things whenever her actual clear ideas were humiliatingly scarce ! By her Imposing physical aspect, and that inconvenient in- sisting-upon Purpose of her mouth and chin, she had, long ago, been forced into all the conventional shams required by those tyrannical involuntary appearances ; and it may be questioned whether her whole character as a trampler upon others was not as much clue to this tyranny of phys- ical circumstance over herself, as to any particularly sinis- ter tendency of her spiritual nature. 206 MR. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. She was expecting Mr. Stalker every moment after the nurse had retired, and, in her genuine woman-nature, dreaded him as fairly as Miss Lardner might have dread- ed such a visitor : yet must she meet that man as a daunt- less and Imposing woman, whose long course of Imposing- ness had such an obligation for one of its indirect conse- quences ; and it must be admitted that prolonged prac- tice gave her a certain exceptional self-control for the sham. He came in at last, ushered by a circumspect servant, with all a man's evident consciousness of the peculiar magnetism of such a woman ; but he was self-possessed, too, and took the chair indicated by a motion of her hand with a certain briskness indicating plenty of subordinate confidence in himself. "A fine, bracing day, Madam," he remarked, with- drawing his gloves ; " but a hard one for the poor. If I had plenty of money, I think I should work-up a few des- titute families and send them some coal for Christmas." " Did you understand my note ?" asked Mrs. Aster, going at once to business. " I got the blank card in an envelope, which you once arranged should mean a call from you, Ma'am," answered he, " and was happy to understand from it that you had overlooked my hasty conduct when I had the pleasure of waiting on you last time." " That would have been the very last time, Mr. Stalk- er, had it not been for certain things in my own conduct then which might have led you to think there was yet some likelihood of your services being still farther needed. I wish you to realize distinctly and finally now that you are dismissed from all interest in any matter con- cerning this family, and must never come here again." wM MR. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. 207 " If that's your wish, Mrs. Aster," returned Mr. Stalk- er, with an injured but respectful air, u I've no particular care to come again ; but I'm sorry you've got to say it as though I was some servant being discharged for stealing from you : that's all." u You have not been an efficient servant," observed the lady, coolly accepting the term, " and I might have dis- pensed with your services at an earlier day on that ground alone. You have not shown the skill with which both Mr. Aster and myself credited you on your own showing, at first. But no matter about that just now. You need not come again;" and she turned toward the desk, as though assured that he would go. " Stop a minute, Madam," exclaimed the- detective, still respectful. " What have I done unskillfully ? Hav'n't I put a brand on a man you wanted branded ? It's a thousand times more to do that than to hunt down the smartest real thief that ever came here from England. " "What do you call a brand ?" asked Mrs. Aster, turn- ins; toward him asfain. " The owner of that stolen watch is now in this house, and has described to John Aster's friends the person of the real pickpocket. Those friends know the old man who recovered the watch, thinking it his ; and, at any time, the whole matter may be taken into some court. You have not half done your work, I tell you." Mr. Stalker seemed momentarily nonplussed by the in- formation, and rubbed his nose discomfitedly. " Who could foresee such a turn as that ?" he said, lamely. " I thought -it was a part of your business to foresee some things," retorted the lady, giving signs that she was tired of talking. 208 ME. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. " Well, suppose it does come into court," urged the detective, confident with a new idea, — " suppose it does? The old man swears the watch isn't his; your person, here, swears to the property ; the policeman who made the arrest, and the old man, and I, swear that the watch was found upon young John. If your person knew the thief why wasn't he stopped ? A likely story, thinks the magistrate ! I don't see' that the game is up at all, Mrs. Aster ; for all the proof is on our side, yet." " We'll not talk about it any longer," said Mrs. Aster, peremptorily. " I choose to retain my own opinion. You should also understand," she added, favoring him with an angry look, " that the threats you had the insolence to make the other day — and which should have prevented my toleration of your presence here again — are vain im- pertinences. I have related them to my son, and he would resent them in a proper manner if I said the word. That is all I have to say to you." She arose, as she spoke, and went toward the bell-rope with the apparent purpose of ringing ; but a movement and look of her inefficient servant restrained the uplifted hand. He, also, left his chair, and, while pretending to arrange some papers in his hat, eyed her with a kind of glowering, bull-dog resentment. " This is my final dismissal, is it, Ma'am ?" A haughty inclination of her head was his only an- swer. " I take it, then, just as yon give it. You make an insult of it that I haven't provoked — not to-day, anyhow, — and I'll take it and wonH pocket it. Now look here, Mrs. Aster — " he contracted his brows, and beat time with a finger pointed at her — " if you treat a man like a dog, you mus'n't be surprised if he acts up to that character ; and MR. STALKER IS FINALLY DISMISSED. 209 if I barked when I was here before, I'll bite, one of these days. — " She pulled the bell-cord on the instant, and fixed her attention exclusively upon the door. " Very- well ! very well !" he blustered, in haste, " you're bold over me to the last. But, as sure as my name's Stalk- er, I'll be even with you for it ! Mark my words, I' 11 make you repent this day. I happen to know — " the sum- moned servant at the door threw him instantaneously back into his smooth professional manner — "what you wish to find out, Mrs. Aster. Thank you. Good day, Ma'am ;" and he retired deferentially, as though just favored with a tradesman's commission. Left to herself, the indomitable lady walked heavily, with drooping head, to her chair again ; sat languidly down, and, with elbows on the writing-table, covered her face with her hands. Thus she remained, nearly motion- less, for ten good minutes ; at the expiration of which time, when she arose a second time and went to a mirror between the windows, her countenance looked strangely worn and older. Looking in the glass, she beheld the incongruity of an ordinary troubled woman's haggard expression of features, and a queenly, Imposing woman's tall and stately form : whereupon her practical sense of propriety triumphed over all unqueenly weakness, and a few magical passes of a forefinger along the dark, smooth bands of hair across her brow made her fit once more for the homage of this sham-loving world. An inch to a woman's stature and a finger's length to the lace of her bust, are sometimes all the distance between the honest truth she might have been and the artful falsehood she is. 210 A FEW CANARY SEEDS OF COMFORT. XXY. A FEW CANARY SEEDS OF COMFORT. HAD Miss Dollie known how to faint, she would have celebrated the first home-meeting of her father and her lover by a first-class performance in that line ; for the parent's greeting was so uniquely unfavor- able to the prospects of Hymen, and the cavalier's retreat so unlike the general rampancy, and tearing-around of Innocence unjustly accused, that the average sweetheart would have taken the combined blights as something more than she could stand, and so would have logically fallen. Sound health, however, and ingenuous abstinence from tight-lacing, made this wholesome maiden undra- matically firm upon her feet under the sharpest trials, and when Geoffrey Dapple turned to question her, after Aster's disappearance, she met his sternly searching look with nerves none the less true because her cheeks were like the lily: " What has He been doing here ?" asked the Toyman, panting. " Quick !" he exclaimed, striking the counter with his fist ; for she hesitated. " Tell me what business a daughter of mine has with an escaped pickpocket — quick ! — quick ! — " u He's my — my — the young man I knew at boarding- school," stammered the girl. " He's a disguised thief, I tell you ! and there's no shame left in you !" thundered Geoffrey, pounding the counter like a madman. "He is no thief, Father ! You don't know what you say to me," returned Dollie, flushing furiously. A FEW CANARY SEEDS OF COMFORT. 211 Here a third speaker struck in quickly — Doctor Canary, who had advanced unnoticed from the back-room. — "If you'll excuse me, Mr. Dapple, I'll remind you that you discredited that young man's guilt, yourself, in the court-room. I followed you in there, if you remember, after the policeman had ordered me to move off with my wagon ; and you said, when the prisoner appealed directly to you, that you made no charge against him." As always at the sound of that voice, though its words were ever so friendly, the Toyman lapsed at once into sullen silence. " I'm sure the watch came to him honestly," added Dollie. " He is a gentleman cruelly ill-treated by his relations ; and you, Father, by your mistake about that hateful watch, have plunged him into disgrace. I think you might take it back to the Judge, and say it isn't yours, and clear him !" " You'll drive me to a Judge, yet — between you !" was Geoffrey's hoarse, unexpected response; and, mut- tering to himself, he passed hurriedly on to the room beyond. The next morning after this it was, that Miss Lardner called ; and, in Dollie's pleasant little room upstairs, the two fair champions of the clouded young Aster told each other all they knew about him, and passed a unanimous resolution that he should be sustained under every eclipse. It has been shown how the rich man's daughter gained curious and agreeable information by her visit to Jenkins Place that afternoon ; but Miss Dapple still lingered in the par- tial darkness which had been dispensed by the hapless young man himself, nor enjoyed the comfort of being able to do anything practical for his righteous cause. A "revival " was in progress at the church where the 212 A FEW CANARY SEEDS OF COMFORT. Toyman's daughter had found so much consolation before, and thither she went on the night after her old school- mate's visit, to gain that strength of heart which is cer- tainly given to some worthy young women by a sense of religious forms subserved. Closely veiled, and plainly dressed, she meekly sought a retired seat under the gal- lery, and had scarcely settled herself therein when, to her unspeakable surprise, she saw Doctor Canary gravely passing to a place on the second row ahead of hers, his eyes decorously unobservant, and his general bearing that of a deacon. What could he be doing there ? and would he see her ? were two worldly questions which at once threatened to make her devout aspirations but fitful for that evening ; and strive to avoid them as she might, they still drew her natural attention from the good minister above her to the familiar figure before her. Upon the conclusion of the services, which, owing to the slow speech of certain impromptu exhorters, were protracted to near midnight, Dollie made a lively effort to reach the door without recognition, hoping to flit homeward as she had come ; but a sudden realization of the lateness of the hour, and the presence on the imme- diate sidewalk of various elegant young men of the dollar- jewelry circles, made her shrink for a moment, and thereby fall under the protection of the ex-Odontolator. Without a word he drew her arm within his, as on a former occasion, and escorted her, not so reluctant as she might have been, through the dazzling ranks of the dol- lar-jewelers. Once past those Apollos of the servant- girls, however, he made himself appropriately agreeable, and commented briefly on what they had just heard in a manner indicative of as much moral refreshment as the best of men could have received. A FEW CAXAIIY SEEDS OF COMFORT. 213 " But I may as well admit at once," lie quickly added, " that I came here to-night on your account again, Miss Dollie. It was my only immediate opportunity to speak with you alone, and I had to take advantage of it without asking permission." " I wish you had come for a Higher purpose, Doctor Canary," was Dollie's desperate attempt to say the sage thing. " I came," said Canary, with some emphasis, " to alle- viate, so far as I may, the troubles of the only human beings I have present ability to benefit ; and regard that as about as good a purpose as one can take to church, even. Our interview must be short, and you should ex- cuse my going straight to the point. I recognized that young man in the store yesterday. Of course he is a friend of yours ?" " Ye-s," said she, faintly. " You don't credit his guilt : neither do I. You should know, however, before speaking about him to your father again, that the watch was, certainly, not his, who- ever the true owner was." " O, Doctor Canary ! you can't mean " " JSTo ; not that. I saw the whole thing, in both street and court. The young man — he was a sailor then — pulled out the watch from his pocket with his handker- chief, and was dumbfounded by the discovery. He was unwise to give his real name in court to that detective, (your father told you all about it, I suppose,) for there was no call for it." " He was too Proud to deny it !" ejaculated Dollie. K That was it, eh ?" answered Canary, with a smile in his voice. " But this is what I wish to tell you particu- larly : From my wagon that day, I had my eyes on every 214 A FEW CANARY SEEDS OF COMFORT. man and boy in the crowd, to pick out the characters most likely to come up to my chair and let me try my tooth-powder upon them. I saw a rough-looking, red- haired fellow skulking about the sailor, while I was recit- ing my doggerel, and believed that he was trying to sound the sailor's pockets. The same fellow broke through the crowd at the first outcry, in pretended pursuit of an offi- cer. He was the thief, Miss Dollie, and slipped the watch into the sailor's pocket ; though why he did that, I can't comprehend." " It was a plot against Mr. Aster by his bad relations," certified Dollie, making one of those entirely unreasoning jumps at a truth which have done so much for the repu- tation of Woman's Wit, as it is called. " I am sure there was some intelligence between the rough fellow and that officious detective," said Canary, musingly. " However, I've no business with the matter, except to tell you what I have told. — By the way, I'm returning good for evil here, Miss Dapple ; for your friend rather unnecessarily knocked me down in his final escapade !" " Doctor Canary," said Dollie, in a low, earnest tone, " I can't thank you too much for your unvarying thought- fulness for me, and the delicacy with which you have treated both Father and myself ever since — that is. of late. I do sincerely believe that you mean to be a real friend to us." " I am glad to hear you say that, Miss Dapple. I wish I could win your still better opinion by withdrawing altogether from a relation into which, in a time of des- perate and degrading fortune, I forced myself by villain- ous means. But, do you know," and his voice became deprecatingly regretful in its sound, — " I am really afraid A FEW CAXAEY SEEDS OF COMFOET. 215 to leave your Father now ! His diseased mind lias been so affected by my first coming ; so possessed by the actu- ally insane idea of my power to do him some deadly injury ; that no excuse for withdrawing which I could possibly devise would fail to drive him into some mad freak of nervous terror. You see how he perverts all that I can say or do ? It is one of the most awful char- acteristics of Evil, that when a man has once rashly called it to his aid, it clutches him with a thousand claws, and holds him to his unholy bargain to the last." He sighed, unconsciously, before adding : " I have made — am makings rather, — all the atonement I can. I stay with you, as clerk, only to save your Father from the worst result of the great injury I have done him." " You are nothing but our friend now," was all the reply Dollie could trust herself to make. She fully meant that much, though. " May I advise you, then, once more ?" " Certainly, Doctor Canary. I trust you fully now." " A thousand thanks for that, my good girl. If the oharity and trust shown me by you, had been given in past days of mine by those from whom it was far more my due, I should never have sunk to — I never should have given you so much better cause to deny them to me." He paused ; and then said, with a hasty resump- tion of his livelier demeanor : " I must counsel you to say nothing more to your Father about the watch just yet. You saw how he took what I said yesterday. Re- member his condition of mind." " And must Mr. Aster be left under that dreadful suspicion ?" murmured the maiden, disconsolately. " For a while, I'm afraid." u Can't you do anything, Doctor Canary ?" 216 A FEW CANARY SEEDS OF COMFORT. " I could go before Mr. Justice O'Blackstone and tes- tify to what I saw from the wagon." " And that would clear him — ?" " Taken with other circumstances it might,— and leave him to answer for assaulting an officer in his escape." " Oh, that would be nothing !" exclaimed Dollie, san- guinely. They were strolling very slowly along, with heads pretty closely together ; and a skulking, homeless-looking walker of the street, not half a block behind, may have taken them for lovers. "Nothing so disgraceful," assented Doctor Canary, slowly. " But just consider this, Miss Dollie : if your Father were an ordinary man, his having so long kept a watch not his own might prove an awkward circumstance for himself ; as he is a sick, a mentally diseased man, it would kill him to go into a court for any purpose. I'm afraid. you must temporize yet awhile." " Yes ; you are right," sighed the girl. " If you'll bear in mind what you have hinted to me — that some family- persecution may be at the bottom of this whole singular affair, it should occur to you that Mr. Aster does not owe his trouble to your Father, and, with his present knowledge, can not expect your Father to do much in the matter. Let that be your comfort." Then, as they were within two blocks of home, this oddly-secured friend significantly took leave of the grate- ful, though silent, girl, as though his way parted from hers there ; and she, fully understanding the kindly pur- pose thus tacitly subseiwed, hastened onward alone. It would seem scarcely worth while, and almost too preraphaelitish, to note the petty details of separate peo- ple going prosily into an old wooden house late at night A MAX AXD MEN. 217 for no more romantic purpose than of merely retiring to rest ; yet it is the whim of this narrator to say, that — first Miss Dapple let herself in at the house-door, with her own night-key ; then, in ten minutes after, Doctor Cana- ry admitted himself at the same door, with his night-key ; and, last of all, later by about two minutes than the latest, a slouching figure of a crazy Toyman admitted itself to the store, with the store-key. XXVI. A MAN AND MEN. aO into ecstacies, all ye tradesman-snobs and Snob- esses, all ye Wall Street upstarts and Upstartesses, all ye banking and railroading mushrooms and Mush- roomesses, — for that fatal Lardner is giving a party to- night, and madly intends to expose himself again by appearing temporarily forgetful of Hides. Rejoice, then, with exceeding great joy, ye unintellectual lacquies, and go to the idiotic show in all the shop-keeping pomp of shoddy ; — what time that Great American Author, Byron Cox, Esquire, lounges in sarcastic gloom at the sign of " The Perfect Trust," and moistens neglected genius with lonely beer. The sum of money being wasted this night, that vulgar money-changers may forget their native coun- ters and shelves and absurdly attempt to show an intelli- gence for what they were never born to, would secure the publication of that Xew Work of Mr. Cox's which all 10 - 218 A MAN AND MEN. the ignorant publishers have besottedly refused, and pay for enough advertisement of it in the great daily journals to make those noble cemeteries of genius rear columns in its praise. But what care ye for that, Lardners all ! "What care ye, in your tawdry assumption of airs at which your butcher-boy, shoe-cobbling, codfish-selling ancestors might blush in their graves, if the young Cox's heart is breaking and the bar-keeper knocking for his money? — What's that you say ? — He is hiccupping at this very moment ? — Ha ! — But let it pass. On that night (to conveniently change the tense and regain our composure thereby) the Lardner halls sparkled with the bad taste of three hundred mercantile forgetters of their grandfathers ; some of whom balanced, swayed and whirled to the immoral music of Offenbach ; while others grouped, knotted, and strayed to and fro along the walls, in kaleidoscopic changes which were but poor imi- tations of what Mr. Cox once saw in a genuine European gathering. Such feminine toilets were there as would make a man of mind hold his head to tell where they commenced, and cover his face to see where they ended. — Such a satin, or silk, this thing ; and lace drooping so- and-so over that ; and a panniered what-you-call-it pinned with rosebuds and leaves over that ; and a French- something waist over that ; and shoulders, and castles in the hair over that — "In diamond-powder, plumes, and glistening things, Queens without crowns, and angels without wings." Such young masculine toilets were there as would fire the sanguine imagination with a first clue to something very faintly military, only to send it miserably wool-gath- ering at last on a straggling man-millinery line of conclu- A MAN AND MEN. 219 Bion. — Such blue dress-coats with brass buttons and white satin linings ; pink silk under-vests, and black inexpressi- bles of a tightness to make tongs seem fleshy; white gloves laced at the cuffs, and hair parted in the mid- dle— "Straight as the soldier, supple as the Knight, Alert alike for glove or sword to fight." Under chandelier systems of blazing planets, and be- tween Tropics of vased and columned leaves and flowers, these queens, angels, soldiers and knights were either dancing or talking to music, when the gazelle-like Mr. Brown, of Grace Church, who officiated as King of the Front Stoop, made a mild effort to delay the entrance of an imposing figure in sombrero and cloak. "I beg your pardon, sir ; but who — " " Assster !" hissed a scornful voice, while a wing-like flourish of the cloak seemed to add — "of the Library of that name." And, before farther parley could be had, the haughty young man strode bitterly into the princely mansion and went fiercely up the sumptuous stairway in a tongs-like manner. The liveried servants, at their posts of waiting in the hall and on the landing, shrank from the dark vision, and the embittered drayman paused not until the aged foot- man, Alphonse, cowered before his dreadful eyeglasses in an upper " entry." " Johnny," said Mr. Aster, " which is Lardner s room ?" "M-M-Mr. Lardner, sir, is downstairs," stuttered the servitor, to whom the speaker was a perpetual astonish- ment, u and if you'd be pleased, sir — " "Here!" said the guest, relaxing, and handing him a ten-cent stamp. "Probably you're underpaid and 220 A MAN AND MEN. have a family. Now show me at once to Lardner's room." Being old, without firearms, and seeing no reinforce- ments near at hand, the almost fainting footman pointed involuntarily to a neighboring door, and slowly backed- away down the passage. At once opening the door indicated, Mr. Aster passed into a large, handsome bedchamber, and, carefully remov- ing hat and cloak, placed them neatly upon Mr. Lardner's couch. Then, advancing to the toilet bureau, and helping himself to comb and brush, he arranged his curly black locks in a style at once forbidding and Byronic, simulta- neously whistling a savage air from African minstrelsy as though in contempt of the strains from downstairs. This concluded, he washed his hands, brushed his coat with the hair-brush ; and, pulling up his coat-sleeves in such a manner as to give the finish of his rather scanty shirt-cuffs to his general toilet, went down to the company. It is a common delusion with those who go to fashion- able crushes in novels alone, that a notable figure always attracts immediate general attention on such occasions, everybody gazing at it with insatiable respectful curiosity, and the heroine with a simple white rose in her hair re- joicing that she has not contemplated a top-panel of the door for three consecutive hours in vain. Some such tribute of universal respect might have been achieved by Mr. Aster had he entered the brilliant scene walking on his hands, or mounted upon a pair of stilts; and it is possible to believe that his discharge of a pistol in the particular doorway by which he arrived might have drawn the attention of Miss Lardner to that part of the building; but he merely stalked in with his hands in his pockets, and was not supernatural ly visible through a solid thickness A MAX AND MEN. 221 of some eight rows of full toilets ; his only astonished imme- diate admirers were some eight or ten middle-aged gentle- men near his door, and Lucy did not discover his presence until, in the middle of a quadrille, she caught his eye- glasses shining upon her from behind the marble figure of Psyche. " Mr. Aster," said Mr. Gayle, soon after this latter inci- dent, advancing with extended hand, " how are you this evening, Sir?" " As well, Gayle, as a slighted man can feel," returned the young man, refraining for a moment from the ab- stracted pastime of writing his name on Psyche's leg with a stubby bit of lead-pencil. " Sorry you feel, so," returned the fine old gentleman, growing red in the face and turning inexplicably gruff. " Miss Lardner has deputed me, Sir, to inform you that she has but just discovered your presence here, and would be happy to receive you on the other side of the room we are now in." " All right, Gayle. Tell her I'll be there in a minute," assented the drayman, carefully rubbing out his last signa- ture with a moistened finger, and thereby giving Psyche's symmetrical limb a lifelike appearance of being severely bruised. " I must beg, Mr. Aster, that you convey your own message," observed Mr. Gayle, with much stiffness ; and immediately walked away. " That's because I am Poor !" muttered Aster, looking resentfully after him. Then, rising too far upon his tip- toes, to discern his fair cousin, he fell partially into the arms of the rich Mr. Sniffers, and simultaneously asked him : " Where's Lucy ?" The rich man pushed him up again with great heat, 222 A MAN AND MEN. eyed him contemptuously an instant, said : " In the kitch- en probably," and hurried on. " Insult upon insult," thought the sensitive being, more embittered than ever ; " and all because my nails may be rather darker, my shirt-front a little more horsey than theirs ! So be it. I'm a Man and will even act like one." Supremely proud in this inalienable consciousness and resolve, he promptly passed through a space between two ladies, which seemed so inadequately narrow, that the ladies themselves couldn't credit it until they suddenly found themselves back to back when they had formerly been shoulder to shoulder; he walked straight on, as through an open country, between husband and wife, dancer and partner, talker and talkee, leaving domestic and social alienation behind him at every step ; and finally found himself face to face with the lovely object of his jaunt. Seated upon a sofa beside Mrs. Thompson-Street, and sharing her conversation with Mr. Pamunkey, who hung over the back of the gilt and ebony throne, Lucy saw the approaching gentleman as he was divorcing the last hus- band and wife on his route, and grew uneasy in anticipa- tion of a storm. " Miss Lardner," he said, speaking but coldly, yet bow- ing so low over her jeweled hand that his stiff black beaver sack-coat stuck out behind like a gothic doorway, " I am happy to find you at last, like Hope at the bottom of Pandora's trunk. Allow me to offer the compliments of the season." As it did not happen to be New- Year's Day, this last sentence had a certain formal, or forced poeti- cal, sound "calculated to chill the warmer currents of familiar friendship ; but his amiable cousin welcomed A MAN AND MEN. 223 him heartily, and introduced him to the hyphen ized lady. Momentarily cheered by his reception, he became sprightly — even gracefully witty, and bowed to the stately dame. " Happy to know you, Mrs. Thompson-Street," he said, with engaging ease of manner. " I was once acquainted with a respectable colored family that lived somewhere in you." " Sir ?" ejaculated she of the hyphen, witheringly ; while Lucy turned cold. " Thompson Street, you know : — crosses Bleecker," ex- claimed Mr. Aster, with intense humor. " Play on i Thompson ' and play on * Street.' Ha ! ha ! — Pamun- key, just bring me one of those chairs over yonder." Both Mrs. Thompson-Street and Mr. Pamunkey turn- ed very pale and trembled excessively ; but, while the entertaining drayman, believing that his order had not been heard, went moodily after a chair for himself, Lucy whispered u So eccentric, you know. Pray don't notice it," and partially restored their well-bred composure. Returning with a chair — which he had obtained by the amusing device of informing a weak-faced young man whom he found occupying it, that a lady in a blue dress and red kid shoes was anxiously inquiring for him in the third parlor, — Mr. Aster pkced it as close to his cousin as he could, and, tilting gently back in it, surveyed the crowded carnival of the great rooms with much critical dignity. " Ladies," said he, taking their silence for respectful attention, and quite ignoring Mr. Pamunkey, — u Ladies, this busy scene before us reminds me of Xerxes, who, when surveying his vast army, asked — either of his own 224 A MAN AND MEN. soul, or of somebody else ; I'm not sure which — "Where will all these be in a thousand years hence ?" — Here Mr. Aster paused to let their minds act — " When I look upon these gaudy myriads here before us now, I again ask my- self the same question : Where will they all be in a thou- sand years from now \ Where f " — He uttered the word with mournful intensity, paused to let their minds act, and then said, with awful distinctness, " N ot One!" Again he paused, and shook his head with inconceivable mournfulness. — " Dreadful thought — Not One !" Struck by his manner, attitude, and blood-curdling tones, a num- ber of ladies and gentlemen now gathered curiously about the sofa, and he went on : " If we think of this, as we look at this busy scene, and reflect that man witkereth like the grasshopper, how can we avoid asking ourselves "What is Alan ?*' He waited to let their minds act, and then said, solemnly : " He is !" (Here the sensation be- came almost painful, several persons believing that they could detect a shade of meaning in the speaker's words.) " And what shall we say of Woman r continued Mr. Aster, willing to improve their understanding so far as time would allow, " What shall we say of man's partner in his joys, no less than his sorrow ? Wliere will She be in a thousand years from now '( Where? " He seemed to put it as an appalling general conundrum, and paused to let their minds act ; then dropped his voice almost to a whisper — " She will not r Nothing could have relieved the feelings of his deeply- moved auditors at this terrible moment but the sudden dance-music of the band ; at sound of which Lucy ar« -se with seeming alacrity (probably she feared tears if she listened longer) and rested her hand upon the proffered arm of Mr. Pamunkey. A MAX AXD MEN. 225 " I am engaged for this one, Cousin John," she whis- pered, " but shall expect to find you here when it's over." The stern moralist looked blankly after her and the others, as they thus deserted the shrine of wisdom for that of folly; but quickly brought his bone eyeglasses around again as far the rigid face of Mrs. Thompson- Street. " They have left us at the first sound of Frivolity's horn," said he, in an entirely new poetical figure ; u and I will address the remainder of my remarks upon Man to you, Madam." tt Oh, you must excuse me, Sir," exclaimed the lady, arising in great haste, " I see my husband in the next par- lor, and "must join him." Thus wholly deserted by his disciples, the drayman moved, with a heavy sigh, from the chair to the sofa ; where, with his figure extended at full length, and face upturned to the ceiling, he abstractedly played a tune up- on his teeth with an open blade of his jackknife, and pre- sented to many astounded passers-by a truly remarkable spectacle of philosophical absent-mindness. Here he rested, unconsciously exercising a powerful fascination over the weak-faced young man, who, having returned from his vain and toilsome pursuit after the lady in a blue dress and red kid shoes, now stood staring stonily at him from the place where his chair had been. Here he re- posed in misanthropical reverie, until Lucy came back with her partner, and, after sweetly excusing herself to the latter, proceeded to rouse him from his dreams. * Cousin John," she whispered, '* you're the most ag- gravating man I ever saw ! Get up and come with me to the Conservatory. I've something to tell you." Slightly dishevelled in aspect, Mr. Aster slowly arose to 10* 226 A MAN AND MEN. a sitting posture, and regarded her with languid indiffer- ence. " Where's your Pamunkey ?" asked he, drearily. " Why don't you go and stay with your Pamunkey ?" u Will you come with me !" exclaimed Lucy, very near stamping her little foot. Ascending to his feet as though slowly pulled up by a rope around his neck, the young man allowed her to ac- company him in the way he should go ; his heavy, irreg- ular step, and general appearance of having just got up, creating quite a little nutter of comment amongst the observant minority of the company. An evergreen bower, adorned with statuary, flowers and birds, had been erected, across the rear -part of the hall, from one of the parlors to the brilliantly-lighted Conser- vatory, and, upon reaching the latter through it, Lucy was delighted to observe that none of the guests had pre- ceded them thither. " Now, while they are all dancing, or looking on," she said, seating herself in a rustic settee behind a tall tropical tree, and pointing her cousin to a chair near-by, " we can have a little quiet chat together. Cousin Jack, you're too ridiculous ! What did you mean, Sir, by snubbing poor Mr. Gayle, and giving that perfectly absurd Essay on Man ?" She certainly was a lovely girl. Dressed in delicate blue, lace, and pearls ; her plentiful blonde locks of dusky gold gathered into as many graceful problems as there are ideas in a hair-artist's head ; and her clear red and white complexion evolving a very soul of sensitive deli- cacy, she was assuredly an angel without wings. Mr. Aster drank in the vision now until his very eye- glasses seemed melting with ecstatic emotion, and, raising A MAN AND MEN. 227 her hand to his lips, he kissed the dainty glove with a sound like the quick removal of a plaster. " Goodness !" he exclaimed, licking his lips, and pro- ducing his jackknife again. " Don't question me of any- thing beyond this moment I" " What are you doing with that knife ?" asked Lucy, in alarm. "I am about," said Aster, opening the knife and rising, " to commemorate this exciting moment. Upon the bark of this aged tree our joint initials shall be cut, as in ancient fable." " No, Sir !" ejaculated Lucy, hastily restraining his arm. " That is not an * aged' tree, and Pa paid several hundred dollars for it. You shan't touch it with that horrid knife." c - Then let me cut them on the seat of the settee," said Aster, with a wild gleam of hope. " JSIo, Cousin Jack, I won't have you cutting the Con- servatory to pieces at all. Now please put up that ridic- ulous knife." Though reluctantly restoring the bauble to his pocket, the sensitive drayman could beam upon her no longer. In her pretty petulance and sudden pretence to absolute command, his powerful mind discerned that disposition to Take Advantage which, alas ! so often possesses wo- man when she imagines herself to be exceptionally irre- sistible in her Best Things, and he saw at once that he must take her down. " The term ' ridiculous,' " said he, sourly, " is offensive to me, and must not be repeated during the interview I have granted you. I may be Poor," he continued, bitter- ly ; " but I'm a Man. — Do you understand, girl, — a Man !" " And it may be barely possible that I am a Woman," retorted the pouting fair. 228 A MAN AND MEN. " Come ! no sarcasm with me !" exclaimed be, passion- ately. "If you brought me here for that, I'll stay no longer. I'm a Man, by heavens !" He repeated this assertion as though anxious that its darkly original significance should check every tendency to irreverence, and smote himself upon the breast in a clothy manner. " I might survive it, if you didn't stay," remarked Lucy, with a rather irritating smile ; and began humming the air sounding from the quadrille band. Mr. Aster promptly walked to the door opening into the evergreen bower, locked it, and returned. " I'll cut off some of that disgusting noise," he growled. " If there is to be any music here, I'll make it myself. Let me hear no more singing either. It makes my head ache." Lucy arose with marked hauteur from the settee, and curled her exquisite upper lip at him in rebellious disdain. " I can forbear much with your eccentricity, Mr. Aster ; but coarse insult", is more than I shall endure. Open that door, sir, and permit me to retire." " Lucy," said Aster, crossing his limbs, and gazing up at her with a darkly menacing smile, " it is your duty, as a woman, to love, honor and obey. Raise your voice to me again, and you shall never be my Wife." " Sir-r-r ! Do you dare — !" " I dare do all that may become a Man," quoted the irritable drayman, leaping up : "who dares do more is a nun." Simultaneously with which agitated misconcep- tion of Shakspere he fiercely pressed her back into the settee by the shoulders, and towered imperiously above her. As she stared up into his determined countenance, to A MAN AND MEN. 229 which the refracting power of the bone eyeglasses gave a kind of four-eyed expression, the light of defiance gradu- ally faded from her own lovely face, and she became weak woman again. " Please sit clown again, Cousin John," she pleaded, tremulously, "and let me tell you what I spoke about. — Oh dear ! I didn't mean here." But Mr. Aster had sunk down beside her on the settee, and thrown his long right arm over the rustic branch- work behind her. " I'm a Man," he muttered abstractedly, and his extend- ed arm seemed slipping down. " Please don't." "Lucy," murmured he, growing faint with a character- istic change of mood, and not only allowing his arm to do as it pleased, but also sinking languidly against her, — "Lucy, how can you prefer such insects as Gayle and Pamunkey to me?" " I don't prefer anybody. — Won't you move ?" " Pamunkey," said Mr. Aster, evidently unconscious that she had spoken, " is a rebel ; while I'm a loyal man. I have fought for the flag which he tried his best to dis- solve ; and he talks like a colored man." " Does the fact of your having been a loyal sailor — " "Hay?" The jump she gave, and the jar communicated to the settee, and to the leaves around them, must have startled Aster also ; for he withdrew his right hand from behind her, and with it pulled vaguely at his moustache. Then Lucy remembered suddenly that, although en- gaged in the war for the Union, he had not been an Officer, and, with woman's wit, recognized the shock she had thoughtlessly given his morbidly sensitive pride. 230 A MAN AND MEN. " I didn't mean it, dear Jack," she whispered, tenderly. " I know you have never been appreciated. But now let me tell you the good news. — Are you listening? — I've been to see your Father lately, and I've been to see — Dollie." "I'm a Man," communed Aster with himself, still pulling. " And she is true as steel to you ! But that's not news. Do you know that Pa is coming in here to tell you some- thing the moment I go back to the parlor?" No answer : — only a flitting expression around the eye- glasses as of marked personal dislike. " Well, you scandalous flirt !" pursued Lucy, delighted with what she had to reveal, and enthusiastically antici- pating his coming electrification, " this is what Tve got to tell you first : In — your — Father's — house — at — this — present — moment — is — the — real — owner — of — that — watch you stole !" "Hay?" The very recoil of the tremendous exclamation seemed to jerk him back in rigid paralysis against the branch- work of the settee, and the laugh with which his cousin had been springing away from him was shocked into a hysterical catching of her breath. "I mean the one they thought you stole," she hurriedly added, hastening to the door and nervously unlocking it. "Now Pa'li tell you the rest." And she was gone. When Mr. Lardner came in he found the young man sitting bolt-upright, exactly as Lucy had left him, staring straight into horizontal space. " Good evening, John," he said, speaking low but quickly. " I see you are astonished by the news. Others will be in here in a moment, and I must use as few words A MAN AND MEN. 231 as possible. Mrs. Dedley, a new nurse at your Father's, owned the watch, and can describe the real pickpocket. I'd advise you to call there at once and insist upon seeing her. — Here they come." And, as a number of flushed dancing couples, emerged into the Conservatory from the bower, Mr. Lardner gave a significant nod, and hurried away. To the music of a grand promenade march, numerous richly dressed revelers filed into the glassy temple of flowers, where murmuring fountains and dainty perfumes made a purer air than that of the glaring parlor ; and much moved were many of them to find the stony dray- man amongst the statuary of the place. Those who had heard a part of his earlier Essay on Man, inferred that he was in a kind of magnetic trance, preparatory to farther philosophical revelations, and made haste to get away before he should resume his teachings. Others took him for some author-friend of the family, in misanthropical retirement ; and an occasional muttering sound, which some interpreted into "Jemima Ann," and some into " I'm a Man," made his general effect somewhat depress- ing to the senses, if not distracting to the intellect. While passing speculation as to his identity and disease was yet rife, the eccentric gentleman suddenly sprung himself erect, with a movement like a very stiff knife opening, and passed to the door and through the bower in such a ghostly manner, that the terrified weak-faced young man tumbled half-way into a fountain in his nerv- ous haste to get out of the way. Five minutes thereafter, a muffled crash and prolonged bumping noises in the street-hall called a swarm of startled hearers thither ; when it was discovered that a figure in a Spanish cloak and sombrero had pitched headlong down 232 ANOTHER OF THE THREE COMES TN. the grand stairway, and was irascibly picking himself np at the foot thereof. " Are you hurt, sir ?" inquired a score of voices. Mr. Aster, w r ith his vast hat driven down almost to his neck, solemnly drew a tremendous silver watch from his vest pocket and shook the broken glass out of it. " A shovelfull of ashes would have saved this," ex- claimed he, bitterly. " If Lardner is present, let him learn to sprinkle those stairs with ashes in the Winter- time." — And passed severely into the street before answer could be given.- XXVII. ANOTHER OF THE THREE COMES IN". OHEISTMAS being distant but a week, the toy- store was as suggestively fanciful with evergreens as Doctor Canary's taste could make it, and looked like some fairy wood full of all the dissipations of a city. Ladies in full dress and of intolerably w r akeful counten- ances seemed to find no discomfort in holding to lofty branches by their spines ; young gentlemen with pain- fully red cheeks and chronically incredulous eyes, pro- jected from all sorts of leafy depths in utter defiance of the laws of equilibrium ; companies of strongly idealized soldiers hung devotedly under their commanders upon perpendicular pink roads from the slenderest boughs ; flights of drums, trumpets, muskets, and swords, were forever taking place on strings from spray to spray ; ANOTHER OF TJJE THREE COMES IX. 233 Noah's arks appeared majestically sailing out of harbors without A's; and no end of jumping-jacks, boxes of blocks, villages, and a thousand other incredibilities, turned up glowingly in as many arbitrary groves. Cus- tom, too, was so brisk ; and so many who looked into the magic wood, and were edified by the varied poetic le- gends, sent others to look and buy also, that Dollie and the rhyming clerk were almost prostrated with pros- perity. — At certain hours, that is. From noon until about Two o'clock of each day there was a complete cessation of trade ; and, during this interval of rest, dinner was eaten by the strange little family, new efforts made to arouse the old Toyman from his savage gloom, and new poetical devices composed for the instruction of the public. On the afternoon succeeding the last return from church, a heap of " false-faces " in the show-window bore this new moral : — For pleasant mumni'ry of the Christmas tide, A quaint False-Face shall rival all beside, And, being banded to the smoothest brow, Make strangely Monstrous what was fair but now. Ah, happy Children ! that, in careless glee, Can Demons seem, and yet so trusted be; Ye little think, in all your mimic play, Of falser faces, taken for a day; Which, when the wearers fain would throw them by, Still leave behind some trace to catch the eye — To mock the trust that penitence would ask, And hold poor nature yet behind the mask ! Jf this rather dismal morsel, for the anguishment of the younger circles, indicated that the Canary muse was be- 234 ANOTHER OF THE THREE COMES IN. coming yet more cynical, it certainly did injustice to the domestic manners of the poet; for the latter, apparently softened still more than before, by his church-going, now treated both father and daughter with a patient gentle- ness almost womanly. In vain, however, were all his efforts to arouse, or conciliate Geoffrey Dapple. At breakfast, on the morning after the last conference be- tween clerk and daughter, the Toyman's manner to both was sufficiently repellant ; but at the former he cast such frequent covert glances of malevolence, and returned to him such snarling monosyllables for the most friendly forms of address, that even Dollie eyed him with pained surprise. When, after working as usual at the Walking Doll (which seemed no nearer life than ever) all the morn- ing, and dining, in his usual sullen moodiness, with them at noon, he donned shabby hat and overcoat, and left the house without a word, both Canary and Miss Dapple stared after him in uneasy bewilderment, and wondered what could have wrought such fresh injury to their cause. " He has left us all alone !" said Dollie, from her sew- ing-chair behind the counter. " He trusts me less than ever, for some cause," answer- ed the clerk, at his desk : and at once composed the legend of the False-Faces. While thus the deserted twain held possession of the fairy wood ; the one sewing cheerlessly upon a doll's bon- net, the other giving the last touch to his forlorn lines, there entered unto them a brisk, sharp-eyed man, who, after a keen glance at every visible object, bowed to Dollie, and went confidently to the desk. " How are you, Doctor T he cried, with the cordiality of an old friend, extending his hand. " Quite well, thank you, Mr. Stalker," returned^" ANOTHER OF THE THREE COMES IX. 235 Canary, "with equal familiarity, shaking hands. " You're a stranger." u Well, yes," said the detective, staring about him again. u I haven't had time to be as friendly as I could have wished." " Miss Dapple. — Daughter of my employer," observed the clerk with a slight wave and bow. " Your servant, Miss. Happy to have the honor." And Mr. Stalker scraped, lifted his hat, and coughed. " I've seen you outside the window several times, Stalker," continued Doctor Canary, " and wondered / what kind of toy you were making up your mind to buy. Some of the poetry seemed to hit you hard, I thought." li There you're right, Sir," said Stalker, smiling agreea- bly from the lady to the gentleman. " I've read some of the poems of this establishment with a relish that I never expected to derive again from toys ; and now, that I'm inside at last, I can appreciate the subject — and the in- spiration." — With a bow to Dollie. " Neatly said ; very neat — for you," answered the poet, complacently ; " but you should not have been too shy to drop in before. I daresay that Mr. Dapple, him- self, who is now out, would have found something to say to you about that watch." Dollie started, colored, and stared from her chair at the detective, and that gentleman looked rather startled himself. " Oh, — ah — yes," said Mr. Stalker, in some confusion. " Mr. Dapple was the gentleman. To be sure." Then he grew instantly cool again with some new conception of how to act, and added : " As Mr. Dapple's out, Doc- tor, and you're his clerk, I may as well have a little pri- 236 ANOTHER OF TIIE THREE COMES IN. vate talk with you, about that matter, if the young lady will » " Miss Dapple has more right than I to hear whatever } T ou can say about that," interrupted Canary, in his blandest style. " That may be, that may be," returned the detective, a little testily ; " but the lady will excuse me if I say that it's a professional rule with me to deal always w r ith the gentlemen first. It sounds ungallant, I'm aware ; but the bright eyes of the fair sex put a man out so !" " I'll go up-stairs, Doctor Canary," said Dollie, begin- ning to put aside her work. " No earthly necessity for that, Miss Dapple," inter- posed the clerk, with a reassuring laugh. " If my old acquaintance here is so very susceptible, I'll take him off to my own room above — if you'll excuse me. Step this way, Mr. Stalker." And, followed by the detective, he passed back to the door leading into the hall, and through that disappeared from the maiden's view. The room to which the pair now ascended \^as upon the second floor, with two windows looking out upon the rear of a building on the next street. Sunlight, or moon- light, could get into it as either planet was near the zenith, consequently it was sufficiently illuminated, when the two men entered, to reveal how scant and poor was the furniture. " Ugh !" exclaimed Stalker, shivering as he took the chair offered him, " how cold you are up here, Doctor. I don't wonder you proposed staying down below." " I'm poor, yet," said Canary, shrugging his shoul- ders. " Why,, this institution certainly hasn't got what you might call a rich look, Doctor," assented the other ; and ANOTHER OF THE THREE COMES IN. 237 peered curiously about him. " I don't see so much as a trunk to cany your name." " My wardrobe is too small yet to have a house of its own," returned Doctor Canary. But here his jocularity ended, and after a gravely questioning glance at his com- panion, he adopted a different tone. " Stalker," said he, what is this you've got to say about this affair of the watch ?" "Nothing. I didn't come to talk about any watch. You introduced that subject yourself. I'm here on dif- ferent business altogether." " Be that as it may," rejoined Canary, sternly, " I must still know something from you as to the watch. Stalker, I saw that whole trick from my wagon, and I know that you had a hand in it. I've heard more since, and under- stand the whole game, except one point." " The deuce you do !" exclaimed the detective, staring. " I do. But this is the point I'm curious about, and you must enlighten me. How the mischief could you tell that Dapple would miss his watch, and take the one found for his ?" " If you see through the thing so far," answered Stalk- er, doggedly, " — and I don't see how you've got hold of the points — I may as well own that I couldnH tell it. I raised the cry of ' Look out for your pockets,' thinking like as not that some one in that crowd had been gone through by my ' pigeon,' after he'd done my trick for me ; and was ready to turn suspicion on the young sailor the moment any one sung out." " Yes ; I could make out that much myself." " The deuce you could ! Well, when the old gent made a racket, and I crowded him onto the sailor, I'd no more idea of his taking to the watch as he did, than I 238 ANOTHER OF THE THREE COMES IN. had of your doing it ! Not a bit ! I expected the young fellow would be found in possession of the watch, and was going to suddenly discover that it was mine ! Yes, sir ! And when things turned out all the better for my game by the old gent's freezing to that ticker, as he did, (Is he crazy ?) I was about ready to think that Providence was in it." " You model Christian ! And what purpose had you in plotting so for the ruin of an innocent young man ?" " It was business. I was being paid by his Stepmother to get him into some scrape that would dish him with his Governor." " And you really have the rascally impudence," said Doctor Canary, raising his eyebrows, " to admit the whole thing to me in this cool manner !" " That game is up ; and why shouldn't I ?" asked the man, with perfect composure. " Suppose I happen to take a present interest in this wronged young man ; and suppose I make oath in Court to what I saw, and what you have confessed ?" " I don't think you'll do it," said Stalker. " What is to prevent ?" " I'll tell you. Do you think I'm such a fool, Doctor, as to drop on myself in that way, if I didn't have some- thing in hand to make myself safe with you ?" " Now you're arriving at your real purpose in coming here, I see," said Canary, regarding him with anything but favor. " The sooner you tell it and are gone, the less inclined I shall feel to pitch you out of the window." " Just wait till you hear," rejoined the other, coolly. " When did you recognize me ?" asked Doctor Canary. " Just after you'd got in here," was the answer. " I didn't know you in your tooth-powder uniform ; but I ANOTHER OF THE THREE COMES IN. 239 happened to see you down-stairs in the store doorway one morning, and knew you in a minute. Now, then, here's my ' real purpose,' as you call it : ." — But, as conversations between middle-aged men alone are always uninteresting, while even the silence of a pretty girl — if only on account of its extreme novelty — is just the contrary, we may revert again to Dollie, as she alternately waited upon customers and took turns at her sewing. Eeadily deciding that Mr. Stalker could be no other than the officio us personage to whom both Geoffrey and Canary had ascribed a mysterious leading agency in the crimination of her lover, she distracted her pretty head and moistened her pretty eyes with painful conjec- tures as to his object in coming there. Was her hapless Father about falling into fresh trouble because he had so obstinately retained that miserable watch? Had the detective seen her lover on the occasion of his unfortu- nate visit to her, and come to gain information for a second arrest? What other object than one of these could such a caller possibly have % Working herself up to a high pitch of anxious excitement by reasoning of this kind, the girl finally resolved to question the detec- tive peremptorily herself, when he should reappear with Canary , and learn the worst. While she listened, however, for the returning foot- steps, even though heeding the duties of trade, Mr. Stalker reached the Street by passing out through the hall, and Doctor Canary came back into the store alone. A momentary cessation of custom allowing Dollie to give all her eyes to the clerk, she at once saw that some strong emotion had been working upon his face, and, in her frenzy of apprehension, hurried to meet him and involun- tarily caught one of his hands. 210 THE STEPMOTHER-TONGUE. " Oh, Doctor Canary ! "What is the matter ?" " Nothing to worry you, my poor child," he said, gently, holding her fingers in a re-assuring clasp. " No fresh trouble for Pa, or-or-Mr. Aster ?" " Not the least. The owner of the watch will never reclaim it, and the true thief may soon be known." " Oh thank you ! thank you !" cried Dollie, forgetful of his still despondent aspect in her own recovery from a great fright. " You never speak but to comfort me, Dr. Canary ;" and she heartily grasped his hand again for a shake of sheer gratitude. To her surprise, he ended this ceremony very abruptly ; nor could she comprehend what he meant, until, follow- ing his suddenly amazed look over her shoulder, she be- held her Father's haggard face staring in at them through the window ! Before either could change attitude, the Toyman was in the store, his whole demeanor wild with inexplicable fury and his pace almost a stagger. Looking at neither of them, apparently, he seemed bent only on reaching the back-room ; and, before the wondering Canary could get out of his path, had dashed him furiously aside with the strength and passion of a madman. XXVIII. THE STEPMOTHER-TONGUE. DEATH had made a hasty call in Jenkins Place and left his blank white card upon the face of the poor little baby-boy. An old man in that house had been ex- THE STEPMOTHER-TONGUE. 241 pecting him. for more than a year ; yet he passed the hos- pitable door of age as though it had not been, and broke into the playhouse of infancy like a thief in the night. And the old man who had been slighted, and the moth- er who had been robbed, talked together in a common sorrow ; he, with the regret of one whose recreant guest instead of acting the noble enemy had proved a dastardly trickster ; and she, with the repressed despair of an in- domitable queen, who, in fighting to retain her crown, had lost its heir. " Adelaide," said the old man, holding her hands, as she sat, tearless and in black, beside his pillowed chair — " Adelaide, you have still a son, but I am left childless at last — yes, worse than childless ! I could have prayed to be taken while something yet lived to call me Father." "He is better off," was the unmeaning answer, more eloquent of something broken than of aught hardened. "We can't doubt that, my dear. — Alas !" " I have you, only, now, my Husband." " And Theodore." " Yes,— and Theodore." The sick man turned his heavy eyes upon her as she sat there so calm and pale in her old place, and his drawn features softened with that touching, pitying tenderness which, like ivy on a ruin, covers all that is not beautiful in the countenance of age. u I spoke of myself as the greater sufferer," he said, very slowly, " because I would see you roused, my dear, to some natural self-assertion of your mother-feeling. If I could see you cry, heartily, as I myself have cried, I could forgive my own worst selfishness that had made you ac- cept the one relief nature gives. You will break-down if you go on in this way." 1 1 242 THE STEPMOTHER- TONGUE. " Dear Husband," she said, kissing his thin hand, and looking piteously into his face, " I can bear what Provi- dence has sent upon me, without weakening in the face of the duty I owe to you. I am thankful that we are still spared to each other. "When I think of that — and when do I not ? — I am strong for every trial. Only—" She paused and dropped her head upon the arm of his chair. " Only what, my child f" " There are persons who will be glad that poor baby is dead !" "As they will when I, too, am in my grave ! J ' exclaim- ed Mr. Aster, with quick emotion. " Look up, Adelaide. Never droop your head to them / They are as much my enemies as yours ; and in hating their poor little brother they have only carried out their ungrateful, unnatural ha- tred of their Father." "No!" cried the wife, raising her head as she spoke. " They bear no hatred to You." " I spurn the distinction," ejaculated the sick man, im- patiently. " By loving me, their Father ; by being true to me ; you have gained their cowardly, unnatural ha- tred. Does that mean love for me ? Adelaide, I'll nev- er forgive them ! They shall not profit by my death. Let them herd with outcasts — criminals — like themselves, and reap what they have sown." "Perhaps /have wronged them," answered she, speak- ing low, and looking down. " Perhaps this grief has been sent upon me because, in my jealousy of your love, I have wronged those who envied me what I sought too large a share of. I am not guiltless of having spoken evil of them to you, when I feared they were seeking your ear THE STEPMOTHER-TONGUE. 243 to speak evil of me. It may be that Philip is dead. If lie is, may he forgive me in his grave I" "Adelaide!" " Let me finish. — I believe — yes, I am sure — that John is innocent of the criminal charge against him. Believe your Brother and his daughter in that. Strange stories may be told when love fights to supplant love. And, Philip," — here she turned deadly white under his aston- ished gaze — " strange stories may be told when revenge seeks to alienate the loving. What if some tale-bearer should tell you, that I — whom you raised from a widow-hood of hard and thankless toil, to become the highest object of your love and honor — was once a fugitive from a husband whom the law recognized as sinless against me — whom the law championed as rolled?" " Sick and weak as I am," cried Mr. Aster, his voice shrill as a child's, and his face purple with the blood rush- ing violently to it, " I'd strike down the liar to the earth, and trample on his slanderous mouth! — Yes, though he had once been my son !" u A gentleman to see you, sir : — your son," said Mrs. Dedley, gliding in like a sinister echo. - Lying back in his pillows, too exhausted to utter an- other word, the sick man stared at the intruder with a look almost of fright. " Let Mr. Aster come in," said the Stepmother, with a quietness of manner contrasting curiously with her wrought-up condition of a moment before. Not a syllable disturbed the sudden silence of the room, until the door reopened, and a young man in cloak and eyeglasses entered with such long-reaching strides as one might take who, at a certain fixed distance from his start- 244 THE STEPMOTHER-TONGUE. ing point, expected to either leap over or kneel before some object. Instantly then Mrs. Aster arose, and, with finger against her lip, stopped the new-comer at the very edge of either his contemplated leap, or posture of homage. "Your father," she said, under her breath, " is too weak at this moment to bear the least excitement. You must be as quiet in your greeting as possible." Paralyzed as he had been in mid-career by her gesture of warning, and rendered motionless, just as he had stopped, by her disconcerting words, the cloaked son re- mained for a moment some paces from his father's chair in the amazing straddling attitude of one in the act of stepping across a very wide creek. In another moment, however, he drew his last limb over the stream, walked up the bank to the chair, and took his sire's listless hand. " Father," he said, in some agitation, " I have returned. You're not looking so well, sir. I have returned." As the invalid, w T ith his eyes closed, paid no attention •to this friendly and gratifying announcement, Mr. Aster moved on tiptoe to a chair facing his father's and the one which Mrs. Aster had quietly resumed, and seated him- self upon it as though he were being gradually lowered thereto by some cog-wheel graduator of descent. " Asleep ?" he said, in a whisper to make the strongest person's flesh creep. " No," returned the wife, softly ; " only very weak at this moment. He can hear what you may say." " He always was very able — he always w r as a very able man," rejoined the young man, evidently with a view to charm the paternal ear, and, at the same time to not .commit himself. "As I said before, I've returned." Mrs. Aster bowed, and placed a hand soothingly on her THE STEPMOTIIER-TONGUE. 245 husband's arm. Thereupon the son coughed thoughtfully, glanced at her black dress, and, reaching to the poker, poked the adjacent grate-fire with great agility for several moments. "I saw the little death in the papers," he finally ex- plained, " and that is what has brought me. I am sorry ; but I have noticed that when infants do die they general- ly die young. If an infant has got to die in infancy, it would seem advisable for it to die young ; because then it is more innocent than if it was older." At the conclusion of this touching and comforting re- mark, — which had been delivered with a decent mixture of lowness of spirits and natural sagacity — he thoughtfully extended the hot end of the poker toward one of the in- valid's hands, to ascertain, apparently, whether his father was really awake, or asleep. As the elder Aster, still keeping his eyes closed, drew back the hand and murmured an indignant exclamation, Mrs. Aster hastily arose, took the poker away from the young man, and then returned to the chair. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself!" she said, sternly. "Did anybody speak?" queried the discarded son, with sudden superciliousness of aspect. " Did a voice in the air remark, with Stepmotherly affection, that one of her victims ought to be ashamed of himself? I thought I heard a disagreeable sound of some kind." And, after gazing a moment around the atmosphere with his bone eyeglasses, he began shoveling coal from the skuttle into the grate with a racket to wake the dead. " Tell him to go ! tell him to go !" moaned the invalid, irascibly. " Ah ! you are awake, my Father," exclaimed the young 246 THE STEPMOTHEE-TONGUE. man, playfully reaching over and tapping him on the knuckles with the shovel. — " O, I beg your pardon ! I didn't think about it's being hot." "He's burnt me again. Tell him to go !" whispered the elder Aster, who would not look at his degenerate offspring. With a frown of profound concern upon such portions of his remarkable countenance as the eyeglasses permitted to have any expression of their own, the younger Aster now took cognizance of the paternal order for his depar- ture, and regarded the figure in the chair with evident commiseration. " Does my Father's mind wander in this way frequent- ly ?" he inquired, with great anxiety. " I think, from his last remark, that he must take me for his medicated step- son.'' " He knows you but too well," said Mrs. Aster. "Ah; you think so, do you, Madam?" returned the son, with a haughty stare. "How do you reconcile that fact with a certain expression of dislike visible about his countenance at this moment ? — ]STo, Father !" he added, earnestly appealing to the invalid, " I am not Theodore ; but your own favorite son." " Go ! Never let me see you again !" exclaimed the old man, raising his brows for a moment, and motioning with a hand toward the door. The favorite son addressed a significant glance to his self- con trolling Stepmother, and wagged his head mourn- folly. "You see, now, he does not know me. Remember, Madam, never tell him of this in his lucid moments. Suppose I had taken him at his word !" Thus far the lady had endeavored to play a thoroughly THE STErMOTHER-TONGUE. 247 neutral part between the two, her only demonstration of marked feeling having been that which related to the poker; but now she quietly placed her lace handker- chief over her husband's face, — thereby restoring him, as it were, to privacy — and fixed a look of unmistak- able reproof upon the persistently self-deluding in- truder. " As forbearance with you, Sir, seems only to encourage you in a sad mistake," she said, in a clear, even tone, " I must tell you once more, on behalf of a long-enduring Father, who is too ill to bear the excitement of adminis- tering the deserved rebuke himself, that you are known for whom you are, that your manner of introducing your- self into this room a second time is no less offensive to a parent's lacerated natural feelings than was the manner of your first ill-advised intrusion " " But, woman, I " — " and that, by audacity and a disregard of all filial respect, you can never succeed in removing impressions made long ago by your desertion of him whose only offense against you was his marriage with one, who, if you could not love her as a second mother for his sake, should, at least have commanded your respect and for- bearance as his wife and a joint-sharer of your family- name; who, not fifteen minutes ago, was pleading for you, even though you have so despised and reviled her ; and who, if you would but come here in a proper spirit, after giving up your dray, " "Hat?" — " Don't startle your Father in that way — might be more ready than you think to mediate, between reviving parental affection and filial penitence, for a restoration of that early love and confidence which are now but 248 THE STEPMOTHER-TONGUE. retarded, if not placed almost beyond earthly recall by two unfeeling invasions of the sanctity of a sick- room, " " But, Stepmother !— Adelaide !— I " — " and which, so far from being helped, or hastened, by the coming hither of Mr. and Miss Lardner, with covert appeals as much against your father's wife as in favor of your Father's sons, are put farther and farther off by such alternate confusion and husbandly indigna- tion in your Father's mind as prey dangerously upon him in his present debilitated state ; nor are any more likely to be speedily invited, I am afraid, by the strong appear- ance of some preconcerted arrangement between your- self and Mr. Lardner under which you are to wed Miss Lardner " " Hat ?" " Don't frighten the words out of my mouth, sir, — in case her father shall succeed in convincing my poor sick husband that it is his duty to discard from his pro- tection and support those whose great sin, in Mr. Lard- ner's and his friends' opinion, has been their unswerving attachment to him, and yield his all of love and fortune to sons — supposing that both still live — who, until the hour of sickness, and,, as they think, of peril to their mercenary interests, have never seen fit to even let their only remaining earthly parent know of their continued existence; and, even when there is mourning in his childless house, are not deterred from coming hither to practice what almost sound like jests upon a father weep- ing for his poor little baby-boy, and a mother, who, if she does not weep, only restrains herself to save from excitement an invalid now suffering under a physical weakness — " TOYMAN AND DRAYMAN. 240 Here young Aster flew, with starting eyes, from the room. Turning to the sick man, again, patiently as before, the unconquerable woman gently withdrew the handker- chief from his face. " Are you tired, dear husband V " Yery," replied he, in a voice just audible. For he was weak. XXIX. TOYMAN AND DRAYMAN. AT about one hour past noon, on the last Sunday before Christmas, Mrs. Haggle's parlor, in Dame Street, presented a domestic scene which, had it been pre-Raphaelited upon canvas by some appreciative artist ; duly aggravated with impossible light and shade ; and hung-up untitled in a gilt frame, would have been variously interpreted as a modernized sketch from Don Quixote, a view of an Italian Interior, or Lafayette and his Family in the Prison at Ohnutz. Aside from the general tendency of the astonishingly painted window-shades and the insoluble pattern of the wall-paper to place the apartment itself in any century and country most agreeable to the imagination, Mr. Aster's solemnly foreign appearance, as he sat tilted back with feet against the stove, Mr. Goggle's undefined stat- ure and nationality, as he lay sleeping under a counter- pane upon the haircloth sofa, and Mrs. Haggle's equivo- II* 250 TOYMAN AND DKAYMAN. cation of sex, as she sat on the other side of the stove in short hair and strong-mindedness, were points out of which your artist of sentiment could have made a picture meaning any possible subject that a collector had not yet added to his gallery. For some moments Mr. Aster's moody expression of countenance had been about equally appropriate to Don Quixote resolving to try the penance of Beltenebros, an Italian husbandman brooding over a bad grape season, or the imprisoned Lafayette wishing for a habeas corpus, and Mrs. Hago-le could stand his silence no longer. C7c5 CD " You've got the blues again, Aster," she said, with manly directness of address, " and don't seem to realize that it's my own parlor you're taking no notice of me in." " I am trying," was the answer, in a deep, self-com- muning kind of voice, u to explain to myself the mean- ing of this life of mine." " Has it never struck you, Aster, that it means dyspep- sia?" inquired Mrs. Haggle, unfeelingly; her rights as man's equal being outraged by his abstractions in her company. "Dyspepsia?" he repeated, with a brief and bitter laugh. " !S T o, Madam ! When there is dyspepsia in this house, there will be rheumatism in the infernal regions." "I understand you now, usurping tyrant of my sex !" exclaimed the woman, hotly, — " and after such a chicken for dinner, too !" "Madam," said Aster, suddenly rousing, and looking reproachfully at her through his bone eyeglasses, "how many times has that one superannuated chicken been up- on the table % Why am I hungry now ? Why is my adopted son, here, sick now ? Because, in order to make TOYMAN AND DRAYMAN. 251 that one fowl of the year last through the whole Holiday month, you have given us nothing but the scramp of it for three days. By heavens, Madam ! I couldn't have believed that one chicken could be carved so much without reaching the eatable part." " I should like to know, young Man," retorted Mrs. Hag- gle, passionately, " if I didn't give that sick boy of yours a piece of the chest this very day ?" " It was the neck, Madam." " Don't contradict me, Aster ! It might have been cut off high up, but it was the chest." " It might have been some part of the chest, as distin- guished from any part of the trunk," said Aster, grimly. " Ah, you think you can talk sarkazzum to me because I'm only a woman," responded the landlady, tauntingly ; "but I can tell yon, my good young fellow, that your domineering man's-airs don't frighten me at all. I've pampered you and that boy, until he's sick and you're despotic." "I am maddened by hunger," said the drayman, dog- gedly. "That's because your appetite is morbid, Aster." Something in this very reasonable explanation of an unnatural craving for food seemed to touch some irritable chord in the man's diseased nature ; for he started under it and contracted his brow as in pain. " I am told," he said, passing a hand quickly across his forehead, "that my pride is morbid, my sensibility mor- bid, my misapprehension morbid, and my appetite morbid ! Mrs. Haggle " — and his look and manner became wild — "if this sort of thing goes on, I shall be driven to drink, and come home some night with an impediment in my speech. I am hungry half the time, I don't understand a 252 TOYMAN AND DRAYMAN. quarter of what is said to me in fashionable society, and you and my Stepmother together will yet talk me into my grave." He paused, slapped his forehead, and added : " My woes are augmented by this fancy of my adopted son that he is about to die, and must have his vagabond of a father sent for. If I were sick could I send for my Father ? No ! He thinks me morbid and despises me." And the agitated speaker attempted to clutch his bosom in his agony, but was arrested and turned exclamatory in the act by a pin. " Gen'ral," cried a sleepy voice from the sofa at that instant, " have you sent for my daddy V\ Diverted from his own thoughts by the sound, the dray- man hurried to the sofa and bent over the boy. " No, Orlonzo ; not yet." No further remark coming from the youth, Mr. Aster looked anxiously at his flushed face a moment, and then turned apprehensively to Mrs. Haggle. "I believe he spoke in his sleep," said he, thoughtfully. "If he is no better in the morning I must have a doctor.'' As has been intimated before, if the landlady was strong- minded and masculine in many things, she could also be weak-hearted and womanly in a few ; and some appeal, in this little episode, to her softer nature, drove the harder out of sight in a twinkling. Moving her chair to the sofa, she placed her hand softly on the boy's hot head, and then shook her own. " He has more fever," she said, u and ought, as you say, to have a doctor. — There's the door-bell, Aster, just go and see who is there." " I'll watch the boy, and you go," responded the dray- man, with some hauteur. " In justice to my family I can't 'tend door, Madam." TOYMAN AND DRAYMAN. 253 " Then, of course, I must go myself," wa3 Mrs. Hag- gle's answer, as, with renewed asperity of demeanor, she turned about to leave the room, Scarcely had she taken a step, however, when Aster stepped quickly before her with hand restrainingly outstretched. " Pardon me !" he said, in an altered tone. " When you reprove me, Madam, in words that are only womanly, I am shamed to have forgotten the gentleman's privilege and duty of being ever the servant to her who is servant- less." And, after a bow in which his eternal eyeglasses slid to the extreme end of his nose, he hurried to the street-door. Of all mankind, Geoffrey Dapple was the very last to be expected in Dame Street on a Sunday, and when the drayman beheld his shabby, stooping figure in the door- way, he momentarily mistook him for a beggar, and be- gan feeling in his nearest pocket for a certain torn frac- tional note, which, being ineligible for other use, was just the thing for charity. " Your name is Aster," said the Toyman, eying him with all the power of his spectacles and shaggy eye- brows. " Mr. Aster," was the rather stern correction. " Can I speak to you by yourself for a moment, or two ? — I must do it !" Regarding the old man with reproving severity, the dignified drayman motioned, after a second's hesitation, for him to step inside, and then closed the door. " Now," said he, " what do you want ? What have you been drinking ?" Not noticing the last question, Mr. Dapple glanced suspiciously down the dim hall, and nervously fingered his unshaven chin. 254 TOYMAN AND DRAYMAN. " Can any one hear us here V? he asked, in a sharp whisper. " If you come on very private business," answered Mr. Aster, pleasantly humoring the adventure, "I have no hesitation in stating, that the parlor keyhole directly at our back is now being improved, to its utmost capacity, by the lady of the house." " That's false, Aster !" cried a shrill voice from nowhere, immediately followed by a scurry and skirty sound in the same direction. " Can't we go into some room for a moment ?" whis- pered the startled Toyman, shrinking back to the opposite wall. Warned by the ghostly sounds they had heard, and struck by something impressive in the visitor's manner, Aster merely said " Come up," and led the way up-stairs to his own bed-chamber. Once safely within there, the strange old man closed the door behind himself with eager haste, and, leaning, almost breathlessly, against it, turned a wild, questioning face upon the drayman. " Where did you get that watch ?" Concluding, perhaps, that, unknown to himself, his time-piece had become celebrated, and must be in de- mand, per secret agent, for some incorrigible collector of curiosities, Mr. Aster modestly replied that he had " bought it." "Who of? — who of ?" was the impatient return ques- tion. Not wishing to lower the value of the silver marvel by stating definitely that he had purchased it in Chatham Street, Mr. Aster twirled his steel chain with a great show of indifference, and replied in general terms : — " Of a leading jeweler." TOYMAN AND DEAYMAN. 255 " That can't be, that can't be," ejaculated the Toyman, working his claw-like hands as though he could tear him to pieces. " There are initials on the inside. No jeweler would dare to sell it. — If you don't want me to go mad and tear you, tell me whom you stole that watch from !" "Hay?" And the drayman recoiled as the word shot from his lips, while the very window-panes vibrated. " There — there — there," purred Geoffrey, as though soothing a startled animal ; what time a strange cunning seemed mingling with the hungry violence of his eager look, " I know you didn't. It came to you honestly. But oh, tell me, as you value your salvation, who is she who took it from the dead — from Lydia Dapple, my dead wife ? You got it from her, and can tell if she knows — if she lenows — ." He could say no more, but actually sank upon his knees in an attitude of piteous, abject sup- plication ! Aster's eyeglasses devoured him with a gleaming wild- ness scarcely less than his own, and Aster himself could barely ask, in faltering voice — " Ha— a— ay S" " Mr. Lardner has sent for me," panted the poor crea- ture again, a and has told me that she who last owned the watch is in your father's house. Tell me what she knows : — for you must have known her, to get the watch hon- estly : — tell me if Lydia told her " " Confound Lydia !" roared Mr. Aster, suddenly realiz- ing that he was being mixed-up in some " woman-affair," and shrinking from the idea with a horror born of long misanthropy. " I never got any watch from Lydia " " Say no more !" interrupted the old man, hoarsely, springing erect as he spoke, and dragging open the door. 256 IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. Then, turning upon the young man a look of mingled resoluteness and despair, and lowering his voice to a kind of intensified whisper, he said : " Mark me ; it had been better for others, as well as for me, if you had told me what I asked. Thief, or honest man, you have scorned the prayer of misery and made it desperate. Good bye." He went out from the room, and down to the street, leaving the drayman staring blankly at the wall. XXX. IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. FOR a flirtation, a stolen interview, or an evening's relief from any possible use for the human mind, there is no place in America like a private-box at the Italian Opera. The shrine of Mozart, Rossini, Meyer- beer, Donizetti, and Yerdi, was devised and set up to re- lieve certain highly cultivated Court aristocracies of the Old "World from farther patronage of the vulgar moimte- bankery to which the dramatic stage had degenerated ; and has since been so modified and adapted to suit their peculiar needs and tastes, that its appropriateness for the intellectual diversion of a miscellaneous Republican de- mocracy like ours is about as obvious as would be that of a Charlotte Russe for the noonday meal of a hearty ploughman. The great, rough, honest West — the most thoroughly and distinctively American portion of this Republic — is frankly unsnobbish enough to face this fact in the best national spirit of independence, and seldom IX A BOX AT THE OPERA. 257 requires much time to bankrupt the misguided impressario who attempts to profit by an imaginary Nobility there ; but here in the East, along the piers and slips of the Eu- ropean ferry, where JSTew York tries to be the Brooklyn, Philadelphia the Hoboken, and Boston the Communipaw of London and Paris, our ever-provincial fashionable so- ciety readily pays the board and travelling expenses of the tawdry Court music-box, for the mere privilege of I sitting around it, in perfect mental vacuity, so many / nights in a year, and being taken (by country persons) ' for the very style of superior beings who started this sort of thing. Human nature, however, is stronger than all the simu- lative ability of imitative social art, and a private-box at the Italian Opera in an American city has really no more to do with understood music, or specific mentality of any kind, than has a room in a hotel. Excepting a few barbers' apprentices who play the flute, and a few pretty young pianoforte-birds who are in love with that tenor who sings most melodiously through his nose, the only person in the open part of the house who attaches any idea whatever to the music is Byron Cox, Esq., (from whom the above statement of the whole case has been procured for this work at the ludicrously inadequate price of a glass of beer) ; and more flirtations, stolen in- terviews, and hours of feeling about as intellectual as a wax flower, have been enjoyed by the true discerners of the only sensible uses of an Academy of Music in this country, than were ever encouraged by moonlight and a distant hand-organ combined. It was on the night of a particularly incomprehensible performance by the imported music-box at the ^N'ew York Academy of Music, that Miss Lardner and Mr. 258 IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. Dinwiddie Pamunkey occupied a small, well-furnished room in the proscenium, and were dimly perceptible through the open window thereof to about one thousand vacant-minded wearers of the handsomest frocks and coats in the city. They had a certain vague, mechanical consciousness between them, that reminiscences of all the pianos, brass bands, and hand-organs of the period were being run through the Italian language by divers walking mouths npon the stage below their casement ; and that a final vowel, carried np to ear-split above the line in a spiral scream, and kept balanced on a thin shake there until it wore out, was expected to evoke from every body such demonstrations with hands and handkerchief as are fre- quently of use to frighten some shy grimalkin from her leap to a bird-cage ; but, beyond this, no special require- ments of place disturbed their social privacy, and sounds of Italian mirth and woe were to them bnt as the hum of many servants in a basement. " My de-yar Miss Lardner," said Mr. Pamunkey, who, in his heavily furred coat, sat in the shade of a curtain, u wo'n't you leave me the poo-ar consolation of fancying that I have been too precipitate — that you may yet be persuaded to regard me with a nearer feeling than that with which you have hitherto honored me ?" " It gives me real pain, believe me," returned Lucy, " to repeat it, but I can give you no encouragement, Mr. Pamunkey, to hope for any future variation from the reply I have been obliged to make you. We have been such good friends that I must regret your recurrence to that which should not again be mentioned between us." " I know it's taking advantage of the delicate confi- dence which induced you to come with me he-yar to- IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. 259 night," said the gentleman, struggling to regain a com- posed demeanor ; " but I fe-yar that I am not ne-yar so good a philosopher as I once thought myself. The ide- yar of being accepted by you as a friend, which once seemed such a prize for my ambition, is now a torture, Miss Lardner, when its consummation proves the limit of my success." " Then I have acted unwisely in accepting your escort hither, Mr. Pamunkey. I have perilled my self-respect by relying too confidently upon your respect for me." Both were compelled, here, to frighten away imaginary cats in response to a quivering vowel just balanced in the air by the soprano, and when the Southerner fell back again behind the curtain he wore an apologetic and dep- recating air. " You are too seve-yar, Miss Lardner. I heartily ask pardon for speaking as I did, and ought not to blame you if you withdrew your confidence from me entirely. Pray forgive me. You need have no fe-yar that I shall so abuse your reliance again." " We'll both forget everything, except that we are very good friends," said the young lady, with a pleasant- ness of manner calculated to dismiss the whole subject without harshness to any one's feelings ; and directed her dainty lorgnette to a party of acquaintances on the oppo- site side of the house. When a man's love-suit has been once decisively re- jected, his only wise course is to withdraw at once from the unreciprocating object of his passion, and practice a regular daily system of distracting interests until his heart shall be restored to its normal condition. Poets and sentimentalists to the contrary nothwithstanding, this restoration is possible in every case. The good Father 260 IN A BOX AT THE OrEEA. above never created man or woman, to be made perma- nently the worse merely for love refused ; nor placed it exclusively in the power of any one human being to break another's heart. Love abused is ever the work of the two involved principally, though their shares toward the end may be vastly disproportionate ; and love refused leaves no incurable wound in any human heart if the de- feated can but muster common sense enough to retire promptly from the lost field to the hospital. Too many rejected lovers, however, will persist in do- ing as Mr. Pamunkey did. He continued hovering around the steps of her who had rejected him, perversely inviting as many repetitions of his wound as there were moments in their conversation, and all the time intensi- fying his own pain by outraging nature with the pretence that their earlier trustful friendship could be at once resumed. Like other women under these circumstances, she protected herself by encouraging this last baneful sophistry ; and now the poor young Yirginian sat wor- shipping her beauty and trying to believe that they were " very good friends " again. A grand double aerial balance of spiralized vowels by the soprano and first-tenor had just been lost in a hideous crash from chorus and orchestra, when — as though sum- moned from nether regions by the sound — a sinister figure in Spanish cloak, sombrero, and bone eyeglasses, entered the private-box and looked glassily down upon the two occupants. " It's that — it's Mr. Aster !" exclaimed Mr. Pamunkey, a pang of jealousy dividing the sentence. " Why, Cousin John !" said Lucy. Favoring the Southerner with a merely passing glance of considerable depreciation, the stately intruder shook IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. 201 bands with his surprised and blushing cousin in what might have been called a rather pumpy manner ; and, drawing a third chair to a symmetrical position on her flowing skirts, seated himself without farther ado. " This is Mr. Pamunkey," hinted Lucy, in some em- barrassment. The two gentlemen exchanged distant nods, as informing each other that they should be mutu- ally acquainted at their next meeting if convenient ; and the new-comer took this opportunity to remove his enor- mous hat for the first time, and abstractedly hand it to Mr. Pamunkey to hold. "I beg you pardon, Sir. — The itfe-yar!" muttered the latter, balancing the valuable trust on the tips of his gloves for a moment, and then pitching it passionately in- to a corner. Upon which Mr. Aster, with great deliberation, arose far enough from his chair to remove the other's opera-hat, upon which he had been sitting, and threw that into the corner also. " Gentlemen !" whispered Miss Lardner, quickly, " be kind enough to remember that I am present." " Yes, Sir," observed Mr. Aster, reprovingly, " remem- ber that Miss Lardner and I are present." "Respect for you, Miss Lardner, shall induce me to overlook, temporarily, the extraordinary conduct of this — person," said the exasperated Southerner, speaking with intense emphasis, and darting a furious look at the offender. " I appreciate your great forbearance, Sir. Cousin John, if you can be civil for a moment, I should like to know how you found us ?" Leaning back in his chair, until certain buttons and a widening girth of white linen, as seen behind the opening in his cloak, gave him the appearance of having a gigantic 262 IN A BOX AT THE OPEEA. and poorly-toothed mouth at his waist, the self-possessed young man dressed his hair with his fingers, and replied, in general terms, that he had recognized her from the floor of the house, and had taken the elderly gentleman beside her for her father. u Yon couldn't see me, Sir, from down the-yar !" ex- claimed the freshly-aggravated Virginian, forgetting him- self. " Mr. Pamunkey — now please !" pleaded Miss Lardner, as usual. "I beg your pardon. I'll say no mo-war." " That will make it pleasanter for all parties," com- mented Aster, with an air of complacent approval. " I have frequently noticed, that interruptions by a third par- ty corrupt good manners. If you'll just be good enough, Sir, to exchange seats now with Miss Lardner, and, by an exclusive attention to the stage, qualify yourself to inform us when Kirby dies, my Cousin and I can pursue that pri- vate conversation upon family affairs which your presence here has interrupted." Repressing his wrath only long enough to join with them in the socially- obligatory applause just then demand- ed by the basso's brilliant and tremulous descent into the sub-cellar of his voice, — Mr. Pamunkey sprang to his feet, recovered his hat, and addressed himself in a forced and jerky manner to the alarmed young lady : — " I must beg your permission, Miss Lardner, to with- draw from the box, until this — this gentleman shall see fit to leave you. I do not desi-yar to lose my temper in a lady's presence, and must really ask leave to reti-yar. I have the honor, Miss Lardner, to take my leave, tempo- rarily." And, with an exceedingly nervous bow, he re- treated hastily from the box. Df A BOX AT THE OPERA. 2G3 u Now, Sir/* Baid Lucy to her cousin, pointing iraperi ously toward the door with her fan, u you can go too !'' " Thank you, Lucy,'' said Mr. Aster, smiling agreeably ; " but I've given that up. I can't afford it." rt "What do you mean P " I mean," said he, with some impatience, "that I nev- er go out to take anything between the Acts. If I did, I'd be too proud to take it at Pamunkey's expense." Miss Lardner drew the curtain of the box, that they might not be too conspicuous to the party in the opposite proscenium-apartment, and then turned upon her eccen- tric companion a look of the keenest reproach. "Cousin John/' she said, biting her rosy lips, '"you certainly are the most ridiculous man alive. Too seem quite good-natured this evening — for you, — and yet you have driven one of my kindest friends away in anger." "I endeavored to treat him as an equal," responded Aster, drawing himself up. " I made no stranger of him. If you desire it, I will go down to the bar-room and ask him to return.'' u Dear me ! "What's the use of talking reason to you ! How dare you mention such places to a lady ?" Aster's face darkened at this, and, reaching for his spacious hat, he seemed inclined to depart. k 'I see how it is,'' he sighed. ; " You've got on your good-clothes and can't stand anything plainer than a man with fur on his overcoat. So be it, then. I took you for a friend of mine, and wanted to talk to you a minute by yourself about my Father, and — that other matter ; but I haven't got fur on my coat, and I'll retire again to the cheap part of the house." The extreme point and bitterness of his concluding sarcasm, accompanied as it was by a despairing gleam of 264- IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. the eyeglasses, were too much for the young lady's soft heart. The strange mastery of this man over her weak womanly nature asserted itself again, and she tapped his cloaked arm coquettishly with her fan. " Don't be too absurd, Cousin John. I really wish to talk with you about what you've mentioned." " Then all is forgiven," rejoined he, dropping his hat. — " Just wait a minute." After a struggling and diving motion with one of his arms under his astonishing cloak, he suddenly thrust his right hand over his cousin's lap, and deposited about a score of monstrous peanuts on her costly lace handkerchief; reserving, however, a few for himself. " We can eat and talk at the same time," said he, genially. " Take the hateful things away !" exclaimed Lucy, hor- ror-stricken. " I'll throw them on the floor if you don't, I tell you !" The man's morbid sensitiveness was alarmed again, and, fiercely clutching the despised delicacies from their resting place, he tore back the curtain from the front of the box. " Let the public struggle for them then," growled he, with suppressed fierceness ; and was about to cast them forth, when the affrighted girl caught his arm. u They'll go all over the stage and into the orchestra," she gasped, in a frenzied whisper. " Let them, then !" hissed Aster. " They're of no value to me now. I'd as soon drop them on that fiddler with a bald head as not." " Oh-h-h — I'll take them, then," groaned Lucy, in des- peration. " Put them on that chair." Doing as he was requested, and dropping the curtain, IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. 265 the excitable young man leaned back again in his seat and cracked a nut. " We've but a minute now," said Lucy, " before the Act begins. Have you been to your Father's since you were at our house 3" Mr. Aster nodded. " How were you received ?" m "My Father," said he, gloomily, " did not recognize me. He evidently took me for one of his wife's relatives, and told me to depart. After which my unnatural Step- mother talked me blind. I was talked wild !" he exclaimed, smiting the chair holding the peanuts with such force, that — to Lucy's joy, — the latter flew in every direction. " She must work against us continually," commented Lucy ; and, in a still lower voice — " she has not yet let him know what we have found out about that wicked charge against you. Cousin John, Pa has seen Mr. Dap- ple. — Have you ever seen Mr. Dapple since — since that day?" " I have," said Mr. Aster, sternly, " and he asked, by heavens! who I stole — stole, mind you, — the watch from?" " Now that you confide enough in Pa and me to men- tion the watch yourself," whispered his cousin, eagerly, "I'll tell you something. The owner of the watch is found, and can describe the real thief; and Pa has told Mr. Dapple that he must return the watch to the court. See, now, how we're working for you, while you're doing nothing for yourself but delivering Essays on Man, and driving that hateful dray — " "Hat?" The ear-piercing sound not only made the young lady drop her lorgnette and jump almost out of her ermine- 1 1 266 IN A BOX AT THE OPERA. trimmed opera cloak ; but also startled even Byron Cox, Esq., who, in his cheap standing-place down near the orchestra, had been much exasperated before by the talking in the box, and now said " Silence ! For shame !" in a deep, husky voice. " I never did — ! You'll frighten me to death yet, Cousin John. I didn't mean to remind you of your pov- erty, I'm sure.''' "No matter," said Aster, wildly, "No matter." " You've startled every idea out of my head," added Lucy, greatly disturbed. — " There's the Act commencing, too. Will you come to see us on New Year's Day % I sha'n't receive general calls; but jou must come, and learn what more has been done." To this hastily-offered proposition Mr. Aster nodded in a vague, preoccupied manner ; and, noticing a motion of the door to the box, sprang thither, and pushed said door open with such haste, that Mr. Pamunkey, who was on the other side of it, received a bump on the forehead. "I'm going now," said he, hurriedly, dragging the other gentleman in by the hand, and then shaking that mem- ber with immoderate violence. " Hope you'll pardon me for keeping you out in the cold, and overlook any pecu- liarity of manner, Pamunkey. Will you, Pamunkey ?" " I've no ide-y&r" began Mr. Pamunkey, irascible and out of breath — "I've no ide-yar, Sir, what you mean by—" "Here!" interrupted Aster, still wild in look and man- ner, as he quickly caught the opera-hat from the other's hand. "Make no apologies. Here's your hat again. Good night, Lucy. Farewell P." And he slipped away through the door as though quite unable to bear that at- mosphere a second longer. MRS. DEDLEY ASKS FOK INSTRUCTIONS. 207 " The ide-jar !" ejaculated the overwhelmed Southern gentleman, discovering that his hat was half full of peanuts. " Please close that door, Mr. Pamunkey," said Lucy, not much less overcome. " My cousin must certainly be los- ing his senses." XXXI. MRS. DEDLEY ASKS FOR INSTRUCTIONS. FROM the evening when his imposing Mother gave him such an imperfect yet alarming insight of her plots and perils, Theodore Danforth lost much of his healthy vivacity of manner ; and became subject to fits of abstrac- tion which led his professional associates at Riverside to suspect him of malignant Febris Amantiurn. In other words, the giant minds of the medici brothers entertained the subtle fancy that he had prescribed a young woman for himself, and found her hard to take ; and, as this di- agnosis of his case was not much nearer a discovery of the real disease than medical students in a hospital generally come, the young man allowed it to pass undisputed. Be- tween Mrs. Aster and himself there had never been much harmony of opinion respecting the policy pursued toward the drayman ; but neither that, nor the reminder of his father's character and fate, could have disconcerted him so much as the lady's almost incredible confession of her pri- vate dealings with a man of Stalker's calling. That, in the young man's mind, was ominous of everything humil- iating and perilous Sloth 0ll ld befall a woman. It struck 268 MRS. DEDLEY ASKS FOE INSTRUCTION'S. cruelly at the exultant filial pride, with which, despite his unavoidable knowledge of her actress-art, he had always regarded his handsome mother ; and to have seen her humbling herself to him, that she might no longer fear the dastard threats of an ignoble secret agent, was to know thenceforth the miserable hnman shortcomings of one of the few unselfish idealizations of youth which all so wither upon their pedestals as mind matures and the heart grows wordly-wise. Taciturn in his new gravity, he was preparing to follow the House-Physician in his round of certain wards, on the morning after Miss Lardner's experience of Asterial ec- centricity at the Opera, when the Warden stopped him with the intelligence that a lady was awaiting an inter- view with him in the reception room. " A lady ?" answered he, surprised. " Did she give no name, Warden ?" " No name," responded the official. u But, for all the thick veil, I think it's Mrs. Dedley." " Word from home, then, I suppose," mused Danforth, at a loss to find any other explanation. " Very well: I'll see her." Excusing himself to Doctor Kirke, he repaired forth- with to the room indicated, and recognized the nurse, even before she had spoken or raised her veil. " Good morning, Mrs. Dedley. No bad news from home, I hope ?" " No, Sir. Mr. Aster still improves, and Mrs. Aster is well." She said it with an assumption of her ordinary staid manner; but the young doctor detected repressed embar- rassment in a certain avoidance of his direct glance and an unnecessary smoothing < r s that c MRS. DEDLEY ASKS FOR INSTRUCTIONS. 2G9 "No disagreement, I hope, between my Mother and yourself, Mrs. Dedley ?" " None, Sir,— yet." There was no mistaking the connection of some peculiar significance with this reply, and, after looking keenly at her in silence for a moment, Danforth drew his chair nearer to hers and lowered his voice. " I must conclude, then," said he, u that there is some likelihood of such a disagreement, and you have come here to speak with me about it. Is that it ?" " Something of that kind, Sir," returned Mrs. Dedley, hesitating. " Not exactly that, either. I should not have taken the liberty to trouble you about an ordinary con- tingency. Doctor Danforth," — and now her eyes met his steadily — " I have come to ask instructions from you. Now that the poor little babe is dead, and your Mother has really no further need of a nurse to aid her in taking care of Mr. Aster, do you desire me to remain there still ?" " I should think that was a question for my Mother to settle," answered he, more puzzled by her look than her speech. u But, if your Mother proposes no change, do you wish me to remain, Doctor Danforth ?" " I don't understand you, Ma'am." " I hoped you would understand, Sir ; as it's very un- pleasant, and, perhaps, improper, for one in my station to be more definite on such a subject," said Mrs. Dedley, much embarrassed again. " I must ask you to speak fully, and in plain terms, at once," rejoined Danforth, sharply. "I do not get the least glimmer of your meaning yet." "I must not mince matters then, of course. Since I have been in your Mother's service, Sir, it has beeu a part 270 MRS. DEDLEY ASKS FOR INSTRUCTIONS. of my duty, prescribed in so many words by her, to re- main always in the room with Mr. Aster while such rela- tives of his as she did not wish to intrude upon were call- ing, and to inform her afterwards of all they said and did. In directing me to do this, Mrs. Aster said that such a course would be necessary in order to thwart the design of those, who, by working unrestrained upon a sick gentleman's weakness, might help undeserving interests opposed to — yours, Sir." Theodore moved uneasily upon his chair during this carefully-worded speech, and colored with mortified manly pride at its conclusion. " I think you have misunderstood Mrs. Aster," he said, making an unsuccessful attempt to appear honestly in- credulous. " She has intended your extra service only for very exceptional emergencies : — for times when some ill- advised intruder should wish to cause an excitement in my father's sick-room. She desired you to be there as a restraint, in her absence." " ]STo, sir," said the nurse, with uncompromising deci- sion of manner, " that was not all. In plain words, I have been engaged in helping Mrs. Aster to prevent a reconciliation between her husband and Mr. John As- ter. I am very, very grateful to you, Doctor Danforth, and have acted this part entirely out of gratitude to you. If you instruct me to continue, I'll try to do 'so " " Stop a moment, Madam," interrupted Danforth, ve- hemently. "What particular circumstance brings you here with this confession now ? You must have some especial object." " I have, Doctor Danforth. The watch which Mr. Aster has been led to suspect his son of stealing, was MRS. DEDLEY ASKS FOR INSTRUCTIONS. 271 mine ; was picked from my pocket in the street by a coarse, common man whom I should know again, and who was not your Stepbrother. The thief, frightened by the police, perhaps, must have slipped it into your Stepbro- ther's pocket, in the crowd. At any rate, an old man, who thought, in a momentary panic, that he had lost his own watch, made an outcry, and had your Stepbrother arrested, and claimed the watch found on him. Your Stepbrother escaped from the court-room in the middle of the proceedings, and, by some means, your mother heard of the case, and told her husband." " Yes !" ejaculated Danforth, a new light falling upon his mother's mysterious detective association. "Well, sir, the man who mistakenly claimed that watch — and it was just like his own, which he had really left at home, I hear, — turns out to be the husband of the poor, unfriended woman-patient in this hospital, who gave the watch to me with her dying breath. Your Step- brother's friends have found all this out, and I understand that they intend to clear the innocent man by calling Mr. Dapple and me into Court. If that happens — Heaven help me ! — I may be forced to reveal something of your own family-matters. Your mother has not allowed me to tell Mr. Aster what I know ; and he," she concluded, slowly and significantly, " might be surprised to learn it, for the first time, from the newspapers." With head resting on hand, Theodore Danforth pon- dered it all in gloomy discomposure. A detective mak- ing his Mother afraid, and a hired nurse telling him this story ! Wrong, wrong, all wrong : and retribution al- ready coming on. He raised his head, and both startled and pained the woman by the keenly distressed expres- sion of his countenance. 272 MRS. DEDLEY ASKS FOR INSTRUCTIONS. " If yoa leave there," said he, with an effort, " where can yon go ?" " I think I can make provision for myself elsewhere, Sir, if you instruct me to leave yonr Mother. 1 think that I could escape the Court-business by going." " Very well, Mrs. Dedley," he said, in a subdued and measured way, " then we will end this interview with a very few words. I'm obliged to you for your confidence in coming to me for instructions, and appreciate your fidelity to the idea that you have been acting for my in- terest. You know what is Right and what is Wrong in such an unfortunate family-affair as this, quite as well as I can tell you, and will not expect me to discuss a thing so delicate and painful. Your duty is plain. Do what is Right. If you consider yourself under any obligation to me, discharge it generously by sparing my Mother as much annoyance from what you may do as may be possi- bly avoidable in doing it. Do that much for my sake ; the rest for the sake of your own self-respect and honora- ble principle. Do you understand me ?" " It is just what I expected you would say, Doctor Danforth. I shall do as you advise." " Then, Good-bye, Mrs. Dedley. Wherever you may be in future, my best wishes shall be yours." The woman hung upon his extended hand for a mo- ment, and looked into his troubled eyes as though yearn- ing with a kind of motherly tenderness to comfort him ; but he withdrew the hand and turned his head aside, and she went from him without farther speech. Left alone, the young doctor dropped back into his chair and stared moodily at the ground. He saw his own fair prospects clouding under some coming calamity of which only a vague foreshadowing reached him now ; SACRIFICE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 273 but that he could have smiled at. He saw his own su- preme ideal turning to sordid dust before his eyes, and that he wept over. XXXII. SACRIFICE OF THE WALKING DOLL. WHO said it wasn't Christmas-Eve ? The maker of that sour-minded assertion should have been in Constantinople, or Teheran, or any other unChristian place ; for he certainly had no business in good old Gotham, where the night of the twenty-fourth of De- cember is lighter in men's hearts than the brightest noon- day of all the rest of the year. Wasn't it Christmas-Eve, indeed, when every living thing, from Harlem Bridge to Castle Garden, knew, and felt, and proved that it was ! Wasn't it Christmas-Eve, indeed, when a million of people all forgave each other every offence of a twelve- month, and experienced nothing but good- will to the whole world, and couldn't have got up one angry thought between them if they'd tried ever so hard ! Wasn't — But never mind. All the gas-lights twinkled, like stars caught and put into cages, and winked to each other that there would be no charge from the Gas Companies for that night. All the great streets let the little streets cross them as much as they pleased, without showing the least anger ; and all the little streets got so sloppy with amiability that the keenest detector of crossness could hardly believe that there was a single cross-walk amongst them. Ail 12* 274 SACRIFICE OF THE WALKING- DOLL. the people were out-doors in one unbroken army of good- humor ; swarming in and ont of the glittering shops ; joyfully scudding along over the nice splashy pavements ; laughing merrily at the car and omnibus drivers who now and then ran over a plump child for a joke ; and seeking out the poor in all the poultry markets and meat- stands in town. Men slipped down on knobs of ice be- fore area railings, and jovially hoped, as they limped pleasantly up again, that the owner of the sidewalk would have a Merry Christmas. Women were cheerily dashed with melted snow and festive mud by the facetious wheels of passing vehicles, and gleefully wished that the honest drivers might all have plum-puddings to-morrow. Old gentlemen took actual pride in letting stout and rollicking poor men tread on their corns, and then beaming genially on the good fellows. Away uptown, and over along either river, the thicker necked revelers remembered that it was Christmas-Eve, and could hardly bear to kill those they amusingly robbed. Away downtown, the lighter- fingered roysterers silently blessed those in whose pockets they found their Merry Christmas. All the rich, who were at law with each other, agreed to keep away from court for that night. All the j>oor who were starving, exchanged resolutions to stop starving until Christmas Eve was over. — Wasn't Christmas Eve ? That man '11 be a murderer, or Congressman, yet. All through this Eve of rampant good-will and good- humor, Dapple's famous toy-store was crammed with impersonators of Santa Claus, nine-tenths of whom expe- rienced nothing but amiable fondness for their fellow- creatures while standing still on wet feet until the other tenth could be waited upon. Dollie and Canary darted, and bustled, and handed down this, and wrapped-up that, SACRIFICE OF TJIE WALKING DOLL. 275 and took the money for the other, until midnight ; enjoy- ing their Christmas Eve all the more, perhaps, in that they had no time to think about the haggard, glowering, and weird figure crouching sullenly by the stove in the back-room. Shut in there by himself ; no longer knowing or caring bow his own old world of toys caught sunshine or shadow ; the broken-down man sat, hour after hour, in one droop- ing position near the fire, holding listlessly in his hand the unsightly clock-work of the Walking Doll. There he brooded, unmindful of the busy hum beyond the little door ; unmindful of the hour of night, or time of year ; unmindful of all that walked the earth, save the dead woman who often moved before him in that tall window yonder, and the man who saw her, and saw him, when she lay bleeding on that very floor. That man stood now where he had stood a year ago ; lived his life ; was mas- ter of all that had been his ; and, after treading him down out of his place ; down into the hopeless, sleepless, maddening misery of the damned in life ; could dare to mock him with a hypocrisy of pity, and, through it, wile away his last true heart ! What price was this he was paying to his enemy to live ? All that a death, even the most shameful, could take from him — even his daughter's soul ! And this ! — this futile, never-moving clock-work in his hand — what was it but the wreck of his own intel- lect ; growing no more from that fell moment of its lost solution than his mind had traveled from the awful memory of the loss. It could never get beyond that. His manhood, wrecked upon that horror, could never drag away from it on any wave ; could only work its own shattered outline in shifting sand, and be mocked by it, and be held to further crashing ruin by it. 276 SACRIFICE OF THE WALKING- DOLL. "Merry Christmas is here, with a laugh and a cheer, — Let all your old troubles and quarrels be ended ; For the friends that are near brew the punch and draw beer, And pledge a good wish to the foe who's offended : Though with him. was the spite And with you was the right, In bumper to bumper forgive him To-night. For whoever makes plea 'neath the Evergreen Tree, A prince of good fellows and welcome should be." So sang a crew of roysterers, grotesquely attired, as they swaggered, not over-soberly, past the toy-store ; and Doctor Canary, who had paused a moment near the show-window to listen, smiled sadly at the words. It was quite midnight, the last buyer had departed, and Dollie, after restoring to their shelves such articles of the wonderfully lessened stock as had not been sold, was pre- paring to retire from business. Still the splashy outer street resounded with horns, bacchanalian bellows, and other murmurs of general happiness ; and the clerk could not help remarking the contrast between such notes of world-wide rejoicing, and the sudden gloomy silence of the old house they stood in. " I'm afraid this Christmas just coming in brings but little holiday-feelings to you, Miss Dollie," he remarked, while rolling back his sleeves before carrying out the shutters. " I'm very, very tired," said Dollie ; and looked it. "Mr. Dapple has not shown himself at all to-night." "No. Since he came home so miserable, on Sunday, he has not been in the store once." "Do you think of going up to your room immediately, Miss Dollie ?" asked Canary ; and added, before she could answer, "I think it may be well for me to have a little private conversation with your Father to-night." PACRIFICE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 277 " I shall go up-stairs right away after bidding Father good-night. I wish I dared give him Merry Christmas." " May this be the last dark Christmas for either of yon !" said the clerk earnestly ; and forthwith commenced the shutting-up duties devolving upon him through the illness of Mr. Goggle. Dollie passed wearily enough down the evergreen grove to the unblest room of the Walking Doll, and found the old Toyman still sitting, as has been described, in the attitude of some sinister goblin at a banned hearthside. To her whispered " good-night, and God bless you !" he offered no response ; nor seemed to heed the all-loving kiss pressed tenderly upon his wrinkled forehead. She stood over him a moment with unspeakable sorrow in her regretful parting glance ; then went softly from the room and up to her own chamber. Doctor Canary, entering soon after, also stood over the unheeding dreamer of dark things ; but, instead of pass- ing on thereafter, placed a hand kindly yet firmly upon the Toyman's shoulder. " Geoffrey Dapple," he said, measuredly ; u do you know that this is Christmas : the time to forgive your enemy ?" Slowly lifting and turning his head, until his sunken eyes met those of the speaker in a look of baleful hatred, Geoffrey made this answer : "I am here to be Alone. The rest of this house is yours. If there is a devil in hell to warn you, go out of this room : — yes, go out of this house! — for to-night. I have been thinking all too much of you here, and you are fool, as well as enemy, if you tempt me to more thinking with the sound of your voice." Again his gray head sank, and he was lost in his own dark thoughts. 278 SACEIFICE OF THE WALKING DOLL. " I shall go for no such covert threats as those, Geoffrey Dapple," returned the other, quietly withdrawing his hand from the stooping shoulder and resting it upon the mantel-shelf above. " I must talk to you of some things to-night, and you must hear me. Unscrupulous enemy as you call and think me, I am made unhappy — wretched — by the daily, the hourly sight of your insane self-tor- ment. The few months of my life here have been months of repentance, and attempted atonement, for my first night in this room. I should have left you forever after the first week, but for what I knew would be your frenzied interpretation of such departure into a preliminary of your final disgrace and ruin. If I worked upon a morbid delusion of yours to get here — and I confess it, as I have before, with contrite shame — you, in your persistent mis- judgment of me as a cold-blooded villain, where I was only the rogue of temporary circumstances, have forced me to remain. Ask your own child — your true- hearted, devoted daughter, — if this is so, and she will tell you—" " That her Father's guilt has brought her, too, to the feet of a villain, and damns her to his arms !" screamed the Toyman, with maniac fury. "Wretch ! Don't name her again, or I shall — I shall — do worse than I have ; worse than I have !" Canary stared down at his panting, quivering figure with mingled surprise and compassion ; but responded in the same quiet, intensely earnest way as before. "Diseased brain never conceived madder fancy than that. Let it be answered by what I am about to say. Mr. Dapple, I have wronged you in but one matter, — only one. God knows that I have profited nothing by it. I have toiled for you as none but a friend could have SACRIFICE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 270 toiled, and have patiently borne more than the full pen- alty of my first offence. I have even borne a blow from you. What have I gained? I am as poor as when I came. If you have really believed me guilty of seeking to rob you of your child, what more can I offer in my own defence than the announcement that, at the close of this year — only six days hence — I shall leave you and yours to forget me forever ?" Up rose Geoffrey Dapple to his feet, as in a new fren- zy, and clutched the back of his chair an instant as if willing to strike the other down with it ; but the steady, controlling eyes of Canary held him motionless until the fit was over, and then he answered like one wearied with a run. " I followed you and her in the street. I saw you hold- ing her hand. I am sold to you by her. I know all/' u What under heaven can I say," asked Doctor Canary, in distress, " to relieve you of your astounding misconcep- tion ? Your good daughter loves and is beloved by Mr. Aster. I have sought her only as her elder friend and your friend. You wrong her cruelly." " Have you taken counsel with her rich friends, and bargained with the lover you supplant to clear him of a shame ?" asked the Toyman, incoherently, thrusting for- ward his haggard face with a bad, cunning, taunting leer twitching in its every line, and speaking in a harsh, grat- ing voice. "Is his vindication to have the credit of dragging me before the law, and making me tell why I dared not give up that watch ? ISTo ! It will not be your doing, but his. You are my Friend, and my daughter's Friend ! You do not denounce me ! You do not call the witness to tell how she came by Lydia Dapple's watch, and what the dying woman in the hospital told 280 SACRIFICE OF THE WALKING DOLL. her of the husband who never came to sit by her dying bed I" " This is raving !" exclaimed Canary, aghast. " All that you are saying is incomprehensible to me !" " Raving, you say ?" retorted Geoffrey, glaring at him with implacable malignity. " Was the rich Mr. Lardner raving, when he sent for me to go to his place and be questioned, and told that I must go into a' court-room, and told that the woman would be there ? Was he rav- ing when he told me that the first clue, as he called it, came from my own daughter V' " I have never breathed a word concerning that watch to any living soul who could harm you," answered Cana- ry. " I know nothing of Mr. Lardner, or of Mr. Aster, beyond the name of the latter." " Enough from you !" said the Toyman, fiercely. Then, after a long downward look at the clock-work still in his hand ; as it had been every moment that night ; his face turned grimly rigid and he spoke again in a voice just above a whisper : " You said that to-night was the time to forgive an enemy." u I said it in the kindest, most honest spirit, Mr. Dap- ple." "Do you see this?" asked Geoffrey, in the same re- pressed, intense tone, holding up the futile clock-work. " Do you see this work of years, and years ? When you first entered this room, and lifted that woman's head from the floor, this work was nearer an end than it is now; and I've toiled at it ever since. When this is finished, Canary, I'll forgive my enemy." '* If it must be, I can wait." " Aye, when it is finished : when the Doll Walks," continued Geoffrey, holding it out at arm's length, and DOCTOR CANARY'S DREAM.* 281 keeping his fierce eyes fixed burningly upon the other's face. " I hate you now, as living creature never hated another before : but when the Doll Walks, when this work is finished, I'll forgive you !" "With the last phrase his voice arose again to shrill emphasis, and, with a sudden, furious motion, he dashed the clock-work to the floor, breaking it into fifty pieces ! " It shall never be finished !" he cried, and laughed hoarsely in his throat as he pointed downward. The man thus devoted to eternal hatred recoiled, shocked and pallid, from the exulting and awful figure of his enemy ; nor uttered another word. Reaching the door, he threw one last glance at the demented Toyman ; then left him still laughing like a satyr and pointing to the fragments of the Walking Doll at his feet. XXXIII. DOCTOR CANARY'S DREAM. LEFT him, and went dejectedly up to his poor room, where a fire still smouldered in a little grate, and the Christmas moonlight fell in ghostly shafts through the two bleared window-casements. Still shuddering, and fancying that the hoarse laugh yet sounded from the accursed room below, he neither lighted a lamp, nor thought of bed ; but, stealthily draw- ing a ricketty chair to the side of the grate, seated him- self there, and strove to recover his composure. What unparalleled and irreparable iniquity had there 282 doctor canary's dream. been in his offence to bring such ending as this ? Made unscrupulous for a time by the solitary choice between starving and acting the mountebank, he like, ten thousand other men, had preferred guilt to shame, and practiced upon a diseased conscience to help himself to a living. There was guilt in that, certainly, and something das- tardly, too : yet, having once made himself known to his victim, and taken the first advantage, he had repented sincerely almost in a day, and striven earnestly through every day since to repair the evil he had done. His offence had been unpremeditated; — all in a moment, from the victim's own infatuation, he had received the temptation and been induced to follow its leading ; — and why should a mercenary folly, or even a crime, so precipi- tated, subject him to such penalty ? Once committed to the wrong path by a first step, he had not- dared to leave it lest the wrong he had done should bear worse fruit. But he had made all the atonement he could ; and now, when at last he would finally leave this maniac forever, his expiation was crowned with a Curse ! Staring moodily, hopelessly, from his dark corner into the fire, as he silently reasoned thus, Doctor Canary went back still further into his own life, and sighed to think what a bitter failure it had been. There was he, as a boy, left by the early death of both parents to the guard- ianship of an uncle, who, although kind enough, and sufficiently attentive to the general duties of a guardian, had left his unbalanced character to take what chance- shape it would in boarding-school and at college. There w T as he, as a young man, with a goodly paternal legacy at his command, studying medicine and leading such a wild life as a fatherless student with plenty of money was sure to lead. There was he, at twenty-one, disowned by DOCTOR CANARY'S DREAM. 283 his guardian for his venial follies, and eloping from a fashionable watering-place with a penniless beauty taken there for a much richer bargain. There was he, in an- other year, risking his all in a wild speculation, and losing it. — Then the effort to practice a profession but half studied ; and the descent by that to poverty ; and the home-love turned first to indifference and then to fierce reproach by adversity ; and the resort to the weak man's strongest tempter in trouble ; and the fiercer re- proaches; and the Impatiently raising his head from his hand, in the im- pulse to shake off these miserable memories by a physical effort, Doctor Canary chanced to cast his eye across the intervening moonlight to the unlatched door of his room, and believed that he saw it move. Sitting motionless, as the fancy had caught him, he stared more intently thither, and was sure that the shadow on the panels had not deceived him. The door was opening ; slowly, — slowly; without a creak or a jar. Like the observer, it was in shadow, being within the angle of darkness between the window and itself, yet the keen eyes upon it saw the edge gradually moving toward him ; until a dim figure, crouching near the ground, and looking like some lumber- ing animal, at first glance, was in the room. The thfng, — whatever it was, — stopped where it had entered, and remained perfectly stationary for several moments ; — for so long, and so near the floor in its crouch, that it ap- peared to blend with the darkness around it there. A moment it was a blank ; and then it was a dog-like out- line again ; and then it moved once more. Around the foot of the bedstead it came, seeming to rise higher at every motion : slowly, — slowly ; not a board of the floor creaking under it. In another instant it must catch the 284 doctor canary's dream. moonlight on some portion of its form, as it goes along the side of the bed ; but now it pauses again, and lifts itself still higher, and its breathing can be heard. Some- thing moves slowly out within the line of light. A paw ? A foot ! Swift and noiseless as a mouser, Canary was upon him from behind, and dragged him out into the full ghostly radiance by the throat. An opened razor fell shining and clanging to the ground, and the wretched Toyman stood gaunt and rigid as a ghost in the clutch of a brother-spectre. " Madman !" whispered the captor, slowly relaxing his hold. " What would you do ?" His eyes fixed and glassy, his grey hair hanging over his brow in wild dishevel ment, and his face ghastly as death itself, the old man remained motionless on the spot to which he had been dragged, and uttered no sound. u Madman !" whispered Canary again. " Was this the meaning of all your threats ? Would you avenge the Walking Doll this time with a real murder?" JSTow, Geoffrey Dapple cowered in the cold moonlight, and moved his lips, and rolled his eyes, but still made no replyt " Go down to your bed," said Canary, pointing to the door, " and never seek again to trouble other men in theirs. I said to-night that Christmas was the time to for- give an enemy. I forgive you this freely. It shall be nothing to me but a dream. Go." Still cowering, the apparation half upraised its claw- like hands, made a choking, inarticulate sound with its mouth ; and then, cringing away toward the wall in shadow, passed out of the room. MAD AT LAST. 285 Canary softly bolted the door, and sank down npon his bedside. " An awful dream !" muttered he, " an awful dream. Merciful Providence ! he would have killed me in my sleep I" XXXIV. MAD AT LAST. THOUGH the gas was turned low in the criminal re- ception-parlor of Mr. Justice O'Blackstone's Station House, a large red-hot stove gave the light most welcome at such a cold Two O'clock A.M. as that of Christmas, and the police Captain, Sergeant, and Roundsman, loll- ing in arm-chairs about the glowing cylinder, found it most congenial to their rather dreamy social mood. " You say you heard the chimes at Trinity, Pilkins?" said the Captain to the Sergeant, with a yawn and a stretch. " I heard a few arias," returned the Sergeant, who had once belonged to a glee-club, and greatly prided himself on his h'ne critical powers in music. " The performer chucked a good deal of ability into i Watchman tell us of the night ' ; but there wasn't that breadth of expression in it which I should like." " I heard him doing Vever Lammeriker once," put in the Roundsman, " and I must say that I could do it bet- ter myself with a comb and a piece of paper." " Probably you think so, Jinkins," answered the Ser- geant, mildly scornful ; " and I dare say your old woman thinks so ; but that don't make it so. You take a chime 286 MAD AT LAST. of bells, and put 'em in a steeple, and they don't equal a violin for delicacy of expression if you're going to play the i Carnival of Yenice ' ; but for a shy at ' Home, Sweet Home,' or a turn-up with the ' Blue-bells of Scotland,' they're equal to the accordeon. You take a chime of bells and try to come any fancy flourishes on 'em, and then you aint there ; but for simple themes, like a !Nay- tional Hymn, for instance, they're agreeable to the me- lodious ear. I should think," added the Sergeant, medi- tatively, " that they would do i Old Bob Ridley ' delicious." " Give me a pianner," said the Roundsman, gruffly. " If the leading citizens of your "Ward want to subscribe for a piano for you, Jinkins," observed the Sergeant, with covert sarcasm, " I dare say you could learn to play on it with one finger after seven or eight years' practice : but I don't exactly see what call there is for a choice between a chime of bells and a piano. I, myself, should prefer a chimney to a steeple for the top of my house : but if one of our leading builders should remark to me upon the architecture of Trinity steeple, I don't think I should say ' Give me a Chimney.' You take a chime of bells " "I would'nt take 'em, on no account,' exclaimed the Roundsman, who was highly offended. " "Where could I put 'em ?" " Hallo !" cried the Captain, rousing from a doze, " Who's this?" Some one had walked in from the street, and when the Roundsman turned the nearest gaslight higher, it was found to be a forlorn and hatless old man, grey haired, shabbily dressed, and in his " stocking-feet." These last were wet and disfigured with the foul snow of the streets ; the back of the aged wanderer's coat looked as though he had been down in the same defiled purity more than once ; MAD AT LAST. 287 and, at first glance, the whole figure suggested the hard- est experience of the hardest weather. " Well, old man, what's up now ? After a night's lodg- ings ?" Asked the Sergeant. Looking from one to the other of the officers, and from them to the various official furnishings of the room, the apparent vagrant gave no sign of understanding the ques- tion. Despite his wild look and wandering manner, how- ever, the keen-eyed Captain decided at once that he was not intoxicated, and humanely asked him to come near the fire. " Fire !" ejaculated he, in a strong, sharp voice. " Why I'm hotter now than a hundred stoves. I've got a red-hot stove in my head, with flues down my arms. I could throw off heat, Sir, with my hands, to warm a town !" " He's in a raging fever, Captain," whispered the Ser- geant, who sat nearest the door and had been e} 7 eing the old man more closely than the rest. " I thought he was drunk at first ; but I see now that the flush on him is fever." " Where do you hail from ?" asked the Captain. " I'll not answer that until the Judge asks me, and I'll not give my name nntil the Judge asks me," returned the unfortunate, with inconsequent violence of manner. " I've come to give myself up." The officials exchanged glances at this, and, at a private signal from the Sergeant, the Roundsman arose lazily from his chair, as though tired of sitting, and moved carelessly toward the side of the old man. "You'd better keep quiet, and let me take you home," he said, in a soothing, friendly way. " I tell you," exclaimed the old man, still addressing 288 THE STEPBROTHERS. the Captain, arid rolling his dilated eyes wildly, " that I've come to give myself up ! I charge yon, in the name of the law, to arrest me." " What for ?" <*Murder." He had scarcely uttered the word when, with a wild cry and the leap of an infuriated animal, he flew at the throat of the Eoundsman and bore him crashing to the floor. " You wasn't on the bed ; but I can throttle you here !" he yelled. " I hate you ! I hate you ! and I'll kill you for robbing me of my child." Instantly the Captain and the Sergeant threw them- selves upon the madman, and dragged him from the throat of the prostrate man, who was already purple in the face. Glowing with a fever which made his hot face and hands seem luridly transparent ; his eyes glaring and rolling, and his teeth grinding together ; he fought all three of them until they had tripped and thrown him, and even then howled and tried to bite like some wild beast. XXXV. THE STEPBROTHERS. MISFOETUKE, having once sighted a Fine Nature of the masculine gender, goes for it with the per- tinacity of any other old maid running down the hapless callow youth who has once been scarlet-rash enough to squeeze her hand after champagne. Shrewdly noting that F. IS". Esq., is generally too superior to this sordid world THE STEPBROTHERS. 289 to possess any such, vulgar quality as energy ; quickly dis- covering that, in his chronic indisposition to make the exertion requisite for any profitable pursuit of his own, he shows a certain loftily gloomy pride at times in proclaim- ing her pursuit of him, the old girl makes the most of her negative encouragement, and has him committed be- fore he can summon life enough to get out of her way. Jack Aster's other name was Fine Nature, and if the readers of this, his veracious biography, have not seen how logically such misanthropical flirtation with Misfor- tune as his must surely lead to serious relations between the two, those readers little realize how unspeakably averse a Fine Nature usually is to anything so energetic as an effort to withdraw from the incipient disaster in- to which it has once maundered, nor how more than will- ing Misfortune is to finally receive the languid Hamlet to her bony arms. Lamentably embraced thus — and very earnestly believ- ing, of course, that it was all somebody-else's fault, — Mr. Aster presently discerned, through his bone eyeglasses, that the notorious disinclination of his Platonic bride to " come singly " was to have no exception in his case. Sev- eral crushing Sisters-in-law trailed in to impose upon him, and she whose malignity he recognized in the sickness of his adopted son, Orlonzo, was not the least severe. Christmas morning found the persecuted drayman just where Christmas Eve had left him — seated, worn and anx- ious, beside his own bed, whereon lay the sick boy. There, after fairly driving Mrs. Haggle to her widowed couch, he had watched and attended all through the weary night ; giving the restless sufferer his medicine, cooling his hot forehead with wet towels, and putting more coal into the little stove than that landlady' s-friend could bear without 13 290 THE STEPBROTHERS. constantly blushing at his extravagance. The boy had scarlet-fever, and often cried deliriously for his own father. " Why don't you come when the Gen'ral tells you, you old bummer?" was his cry and moan again and -again; and the deeply affected Aster had finally determined that nature's imperious entreaty should no longer be denied. Forgetting once more her assumed sex, and neglecting to remember, even, that woman's right to vote and carry canes still languishes in Congress, the childless Mrs. Hag- gle was gentle as a mother with both of her boarders, in this calamity, and did all that a renegade Sorosister could to vindicate that benignant royalty of the suffering which God has made feminine. " There is a young man in spectacles wanting to see you in the parlor," said she, entering the sick-room an hour before noon, and encountering Aster, all equipped in cloak and sombrero, within a few paces of the door, — " But where in the world are you going to ?" . " As I said to you when you took down the breakfast- things," answered he, " I must go and hunt-up the poor lad's mockery of a father. He's asleep, still, you see, but every time he turns, the word ' bummer ' reaches my ears. Nature, Mrs. Haggle, — Nature is stronger than circum- stance, and we must yield to her call. — But who is this down stairs?" "I didn't ask his name, Aster. I was so provoked at his insisting upon seeing you that I didn't care to know his name." "Some new lunatic, I suppose, to ask who I stole a three-story brick house from, last," growled the drayman, under his breath. " Very well, Madam. If you'll remain here for a short time, I'll go down." Descending to the parlor in his most tragic manner, and THE STEPBROTHERS. 201 entering therein without removing his thunder-storm of a hat, Mr. Aster beheld advancing toward him a very medical-looking young man not entirely strange to his memory. " Brother John," said Theodore Danforth, extending a hand in some embarrassment, " I'm afraid you're not very glad to see me ?" Exuberant love of kindred certainly was not the strong characterizing expression of the drayman face divine at that , moment ; though an extreme charity might have attributed the apparent failure to see the out- stretched hand to some casual defect in the bone eye- glasses. " There are a few objects in art and nature," responded Aster, " which I might, possibly, derive a shade more ecstacy from contemplating. The Apollo Belvidere, for instance; Church's Niagara; or the foul fiend." Here he did catch sight of the hand, as it was drawing slowly back, and, inspired by second-thought, carelessly hung his hat upon it. " You might place that on the table," said he, explainingly. Though slightly astonished at this commission, Danforth fulfilled it with perfect gravity, and returned to the charge : — u I suppose I should scarcely have expected you to re-, ceive me in any friendlier manner, Mr. Aster; but my motive in coming forbids me to take offence at that. I regretted to hear, from the person letting me in, that you had sickness in your room, and should not have persisted in seeing you on any lighter account than that upon which I have remained. Will you favor me with a few mo- ments' conversation ?" After studying his look a moment, and finding some- 292 THE STEPBROTHERS. thing therein to give the end of his own nose a percepti- ble upward tendency, Mr. Aster waved his visitor to the nearest chair, and, seating himself upon another immedi- ately before it, began rolling back his right cuff in a se- verely methodical manner. " Take hold," said he, thrust- ing forward the bared wrist. Fancying that this must mean some mystical manner of shaking hands, as approved and practiced by whatever secret benevolent society claimed the impressive gentle- man as its ornament and life-member, the young phy- sician grasped the proffered article with modest diffi- dence. " Take out your watch." "I beg your pardon — " Indeed, he dropped the wrist and drew his chair away with considerable precipitation, upon beholding Mr. As- ter in the act of protruding for his inspection one of the sharpest and longest tongues he had ever seen. " Excuse me ! I don't understand — " " What is the matter with me ?" asked Mr. Aster, in a rasping voice. " How's my pulse \ What fatal disease does my tongue indicate ? How many times an hour ought I to take a tcaspoonful of aqua soda fizzibus, cum sarsaparilla ?" " Upon my word, John, I don't take," returned Dan- forth, uneasily. Folding his arms with great care, and leaning far back in his chair, the caustic drayman regarded his stepbrother with a withering smile of contempt. " Am I to understand," inquired he, " that you came here otherwise than as a physician ? Do you, T. Dan* forth, M.D., who are now reveling on the fatted calf stolen from me, presume to come to the rightful heir THE STEPBROTHERS. 293 amongst his husks upon any less compulsion than profes- sional necessity ? For the credit of human nature, I de- cline to believe in such impudence." " I presume to come here, sir, because my errand is one quite honorable enough to defy all unjust aspersions," answered Danforth, with fine spirit. " If, after the mod- ifying maturity which your judgment must have acquired in these few past years, you still esteem me blameable for the misfortunes which have befallen you, I shall make no penitential overtures for a reversal of the confirmed opin- ion. I did hope that, as men, we might agree to discuss calmly the causes of our alienation as boys. Wilfully, I nev- er gave either you or your brother any personal offence ; but if you are determined to misjudge me still, I shall not trouble you with a defence." "Have you ever driven a dray, verbose boy ?" asked Aster, pulling his moustache fiercely. " Have you ever lived on hash for three hundred and fifty-eight days in the year, and on chicken's chest for the other seven ? Have you ever been fondly addressed as a loyal sailor and a pickpocket, alternately, by your fashionable friends and Sunday callers ? Have you ever sat up all night with the only living thing that loved you through thick and thin, and raved to think that you hadn't the means to make even its last sickness luxurious ? Of course you hav'n't. And why ? Verbose boy ! — and why ?" he repeated, pas- sionately. " Because you and yours have walked into the richness of my Father's house, and crowded me and my missing brother out into the cold. I'm a Man, sir; a Man, by heavens ! and I can't ask you to lay your head on jny bosom just at present." The verbose boy received this outburst, — winch was quite coherent for the speaker, — without visible anger. 294 THE STEPBEOTHEES. In fact it seemed to affect Mm almost pathetically, and he replied in a gentler manner than before. "I admit, of course, that you have lost much by your renunciation of home, Brother John, — if you'll allow me to call you so for this occasion, — yet I cannot see that I, personally, have gained in proportion. Let that pass, though. Your Father and my Mother chose to become husband and wife without particularly consulting their children, I believe, and whatever difference there is be- tween you and me comes chiefly from the dislike of your absent brother and yourself for — that marriage." Mr. Aster nodded and frowned. " In what I have further to say," resumed Danforth, coloring, and speaking with hesitancy, "I must ask to be excused from direct personal mention of one whom — whom — you have reason for — for considering inimical to your interests ; but who is very dear to me." u I am beginning to see something respectable in you, Theodore," remarked the drayman, softening, " and you may speak your piece in your own way." "I am obliged to you. — Without stopping to debate how far you and your brother were unwise in premising an enemy for yourselves from the first, and leaving home as before the schemes of a rival in your Father's affections at last, I am here to tell you, that I have never approved, and do sincerely regret, the intervention between your Father and yourself which has prevented your reconcilia- tion ; and that I shall earnestly do all I can to render it of less future effect. I have ferreted out your address, and come here to you on this blessed day of Peace and Good Will, to express to you the sincere hope, that an- other Christmas may find you, and, I pray God, your absent brother, too, restored to your proper places in your TIIE STEPBROTHERS. 295 Father's heart and home. God joins Father and Child no less than Husband and Wife ; and none, for any pro- vocation, should seek to put them asunder !" " Theodore," said Mr. Aster, thickly ; his bone eye- glasses gleaming with unwonted gentleness, and his Spanish cloak less aggressive than usual ; " I'm poorly to-day ; but Fm a Man. We'll shake hands for the sake of Christmas." And he did shake the readily offered hand in three solemn ups and downs. " You have very faithful friends in Mr. and Miss Lard- ner," continued the stepbrother, rising, and again shaking hands, "and through them you may hear, at the com- mencement of the New Year, I hope, that their efforts in your behalf have not been all in vain." " You're a Man, Sir !" murmured the drayman. And now Theodore Danforth, looking unflinchingly at him, colored painfully once more, and spoke in a low, rather tremulous tone : " One thing more, Brother John. I have kejrt it for the last, because after saying it, I do not wish to add an- other word. With shame, with profound shame, I apolo- gize to you for the one mad outrage justifying all you can feel of resentment — yes, of horror ! — against the misguid- ed perpetrators. It shall be fully atoned for, though I gain malediction where I love best in this world. I am ashamed of it with my whole nature, and could hang my head before you when I think of it. — Don't speak. Let me say this, and leave you without another word between us : I know, and, before the New Year, — at any cost, — your wrongfully influenced Father shall know, that you are entirely guiltless of having stolen that watch !" " Hay ?" ^ The exclamatory question burst from the man's lips 296 " GOOD-BYE, GENIAL." like all the explosive force of his vitality, leaving Lira rigid and glaring in the middle of the floor ; causing the Stepbrother to leap like a shot duelist in his retreat from the room, and sounding so sharply through the whole house that the alarmed Mrs. Haggle called : " What is it ?" from the sick-room above. After standing for full three minutes, like a statue cloaked and eyeglassed to save it from taking cold, Mr. Aster mechanically fished from some inner pocket an enormous bull's-eye watch, of silver made smooth to imi- tate tin, and eyed it, as it lay in his palm, with some- thing like fear. "What was the meaning of this life of his ? Why did his mind spin in this manner % He shud- dered, put the slippery jewel back almost stealthily into its frayed resting place, and, with endless hat drawn down far over his face, stalked away like a troubled ghost to hunt the paternal Goggle. XXXYI. "good-bye, gen'kal." SOON after dark that night, when the doctor called in Dame Street on his way home, for the second time that day, he looked longer into the sick boy's throat, and kept his fingers longer upon the fevered pulse, than he had during any previous visit. Finally he shook his head, looked very grave, said u Scarlatina maligna," and went his way without further explanation. " GOOD-BYE, GENIAL." 297 " Aster, do you know what that means ?" whispered Mrs. Haggle. In reply to which the drayman lifted a very pale face from the shadow of his hand and nodded a disconsolate affirmative. " The father will come in the morning ?" " The woman in the house said she would tell him to." " I'm afraid it'll he too late. The poor little thing is sinking fast. I could tell that from the doctor's look and his not ordering any more medicine." Aster drew a long sigh and bowed his face again. All through the night those two sat beside the couch of the boy, who alternately slept the unresting sleep of weakness, and rolled and muttered in delirium. Ever unconscious of the place where he was and the anxious faces watching him in the dim room, he dreamed only of his infant years of brutal usage and street-life, and be- wailed the hardships of hunger, blows, scanty rags, and freezing nights without shelter. JS~ow he was begging a stale roll from a baker, and being kicked to the door for his presumption ; anon he was whimpering and cursing for mercy under the fists of drunken father, or mother ; and next he would be blowing his fingers, and shivering like a leaf, and saying that he never did see such a cold stoop as that for a hunky-boy to sleep under when it was a snowing. Sometimes a policeman would be a shoving of him out of the way ; but it was noticeable that he only laughed over this official propulsion, as though taking it in very good part. Whatever may be the infirmities of the Metropolitan police, it is certain that they do not in- clude the dauntless fierceness with small boys which so eminently illustrated the valor of the old-time Jack-of- clubs. Civilization has taken a step forward here, at any 13* 298 "good-bye, gen'ral." ra te. — In other moments the lad would be selling news- papers at the Jersey Ferry, and criticizing the country coves who was always a wantin' the wery partickler paper a chap hadn't got, and was never a wantin' them he had got. And always at the close of each reminis- cence, and as he sank into sleep again, he muttered for Daddy, and drowsily wondered why the old bummer didn't come when the Gen'ral told him ? What think you of this for a child's life in your opu- lent city, Messieurs Wall Street Money-Kings? What is your opinion, Messieurs Merchant-princes of the Avenue ? How are you struck by it, my millionaire Churchman ? Is there not something vitally false and wrong in your pretension to human hearts and Christian civilization, when the children of the drinking poor can thus be without respectable parents, finished educations, good wardrobes, and courtly public treatment, while you are making money, and building palaces, and subscribing to ritualism \ Something vitally false and wrong, Gen- tlemen ; as you may yet learn to your cost, unless you become very sorry for what you have done, and send suitable donations in cash to the address of Byron Cox, Esquire. Morning dawned at last, and slowly brightened into day, and with the latter came he whom the sick boy had, as it was supposed, called Daddy. A low-browed, slouch- ing figure of a man, with frowsy red hair like a mangy fur-cap, rusty red whiskers like worn-out brushes, and such spades of hands and clods of feet as might have be- longed to an honest ploughman, if their owner had not, with the strange perversity of his class, preferred vice and misery in the slums of a city to virtue and comfort in the farmer's snug home. To judge from the most fre- "good-bye, gen'ral." 299 quent genealogical phrase applied to him by his most intimate friends, he was a person of immediate brutal extraction ; and, as though in keeping with this attribute, when he entered the sick room of his son, there followed at his heels a dingy white cur, whose tail and ears seemed to have been drawn far in, lest their possible abstract vivacity should detract from the exceeding gravity of his broad, triangular countenance. The man had scarcely begun scuffling toward the bed, in obedience to a motion of Mrs. Haggle's hand, when the cur was there on his hind-legs, his soiled forefeet rest- ing on the counterpane, and his nose touching the boy's hand. For an hour past Orlonzo had seemed to be in a stupor — scarcely breathing — and the pallid drayman sat holding a wet cloth upon his head ; but no sooner did the cold nose touch him, than he opened his eyes, uttered the nearest approach to a laugh that his great weakness would permit, and feebly patted the animal's chunky head. "Why, it's old Daddy !" he said, faintly enough, but with positive glee,— u my .old Kieyoodle, Daddy !" Then it was observable that, despite their barely per- ceptible protrusion, the ears and tail were capable of very vivacious expression indeed ; for the latter wagged a whole half of the body vehemently, while the former drew the other half out almost to the boy's shoulder, in their violent but futile effort to come together. Is this your Dadd} T , my dear ?" asked Mrs. Haggle, uplifting her hands in startled, shocked surprise ; while Mr. Aster mechanically drew back with the wet cloth, and the worthless father stood, like some dismal rag- image of sodden poverty, at the bed's foot. " He aint nobody else," said the sick boy, making a 300 " GOOD-BYE, GEN'RAL." weak effort to rise upon his elbow, and sinking back again. — " I can't get up to look at him ; my cocoanut's like it had a balloon in the top of it. Mayn't the old bummer get up here a minute, Gen'ral V The drayman, with face of marble, was suddenly vio- lent in the start he made to lift the animal ; but the latter, as though understanding the request from some old association of sounds, leaped quickly to a place close beside the prone figure of the boy, and, instantaneously nestling up against him, dropped his head on his extended fore-paws, and seemed to sleep. "Twig that, Gen'ral, and Missus Haggle!" spoke Orlonzo, stealing an arm over the creature's neck. " Him and me's slept this way under a stoop many a night, when I was a waitin' fur Extrifs about the War. I took him when he was a pup from an old woman that give me a stamp to drownd him, and him and me's licked a crowd of dead-beats many's the time ! He — " turning his eyes heavily toward his father — " tied Daddy up that night you took me out of the street, Gen'ral ; 'cause he said I loafed, and didn't sell papers enough, when me and Daddy was crusin' together. — I'd just as soon a froze that night as not." " My poor child," said Mr. Aster, with quivering lip and a pretence of a cold in his head, " I thought you wanted your father." " Don't you know me, 'Lonzo ?" asked the latter indi- vidual. " Wasn't it kind of me to bring that air dog, that wouldn't be drove away 'till you'd come back ?" " You was always a beat," murmured the lad, wearily, with his discolored cheek against the dog's. " Nobody's been kind to me but Daddy, and the Gen'ral, and Mrs. Haggle." " GOOD-BYE, GENRAL." 301 "Whereupon the landlady's head went suddenly down upon her arm at the bedside, and Mr. Aster frowned at a bedpost until his bone eyeglasses were crowded nearly to the end of his nose. " 'Lonzo," quavered the elder Goggle, shuffling around toward him, " I don't think you ought to be so hard on me, my kid. I was a doin' somethin' for this here Gen'ral only day before Christmas. I went and signed a swore-to paper, for a cop named Stalker, sayin' that I stole the very watch that he's been nabbed for takin'. I've got to be off south to keep out of the stone-jug this very afternoon." " Ha-a-ay ?" groaned the drayman, in a broken voice ; while even Mrs Haggle stared through her moistened fingers. " I shouldn't have spoke of it now," said the man, forlornly; " only I want my kid to let up on me." "What might have been said farther was prevented by Daddy, who, at that instant, lifted his head, with the scarlet hand still upon it, and uttered a low howl. Aster and Mrs. Haggle started to their feet, botli at the sound and what they saw in the sick boy's face. As they did so, Orlonzo opened his eyes again ; smiled brightly at the landlady and his father; feebly patted Daddy once more ; said " Good-bye, Gen'ral," in a faint voice ; and so passed out into the streets of a City where are eternal Summer and a love of the Highest for the lowliest. 302 RETURNED TO niS RELATIVES. XXXVII. RETURNED TO HIS RELATIVES. ~Y~\THILE these episodes were occurring in Dame V V Street, the old wooden house in the Bowery had witnessed events and changes no less afflictive of the occupants. It is scarcely necessary to add, that, after his Christ- mas dream, Doctor Canary made no attempt for sleep that night ; but, upon recovering from the first shock of the murderous vision, noiselessly replenished his little fire, and seated himself before it to meditate upon the suggestions of his immediate situation. His first impulse was to steal quietly from the house at once, and never be known to the father and daughter again ; for in the idea of meeting the former in the morning, after the crisis of the past few hours, there was warning anticipa- tion of such characteristic conduct on the Toyman's part as would reveal something of the night's sinister mystery to poor Dollie. But this impulse temporized and died out while the thinker reflected, that, upon discovering his secret departure, in the morning, Geoffrey would surely conclude that he had gone to denounce him, and might thereupon be driven, by the frenzy of despair, to commit some desperate extravagance — possibly suicide. Again heaping blame upon his own head for the disin- genuous folly by which he had thus intangled himself, the Doctor straightened in his chair, and, casting his weary eyes upon a fresh flare in the fire before him, began considering what would be his wisest manner of RETURNED TO HIS RELATIVES. 303 greeting the would-be-assassin at breakfast. Neither could well escape meeting the other there, as the house- hold system was conducted, and the saner man's control of the other would depend much upon his very first ex- pression of countenance and phrase. It was near morning, and Canary was yet silently schooling himself on this last conclusion for the coming test of nerve, when heavy, bat not noisy, footsteps sounded to him from the hall, and, turning his head, he heard that some one was again at the door of the room. Rising in haste, he stept quickly forward to meet this second intrusion summarily, and was struck with mingled surprise and consternation at encountering a very differ- ent figure from that of his first visitor. In short, the dim light of the hour enabled him to discern the "un- mistakable outward seeming of a tall policeman, who, upon observing him, as he stood on the threshold, first made a shadowy catch at the club in his belt, and then walked in. " Oh ! there is somebody up, then," said the police- man. u Yes. Speak low, or you'll have everybody up," said Canary, with vague misgivings. " "What's the matter ?" " What are you doing here ?" asked the policeman peering into his face, and quickly catching him by an arm. " I belong here." " How come the store-door below open at this time of day ?" queried the public guardian, still holding him. "Open?" " Yes. Standing ajar. I came in through the store, and through the back-room, and on up here. If this is your place you're mighty careless about locking-up." 304 RETURNED TO HIS RELATIVES. Canary stood petrified for a moment by a dozen vague apprehensions. The thought of a burglarious explana- tion never entered his head. " I'll go down with you," he whispered, at last. "We shall find out more there. Walk softly, if you please." "With as little noise as possible they descended to the room behind the store, where, upon hurriedly lighting a lamp, the Doctor at once discovered that the wretched master of the place was not there. " Well," said the officer, " what do you make of it ?" " This," answered Canary, hurriedly : " that the pro- prietor, Mr. Dapple, who was sick arid delirious last night, has escaped from the house, and must be wandering the streets. My name is Doctor Canary. I belong here, and am apprehensive of the worst consequences to the deranged man. His daughter is asleep tip-stairs ; but I have been sitting up, in case I should be needed by the invalid." " ~No idea where he'd be likely to go ?" asked the policeman. " Any where whither a disordered brain might lead him. There must be an immediate search." a You'd better come with me, then, and give informa- tion at the Station-house. He may have been taken in there." " I do hope so, officer. I hope nothing worse has hap- pened. Couldn't you ascertain and bring me word ? Then I could go back with you. I'm puzzled what to do. I think I ought to remain here, as Mr. Dapple's daughter might come down while I was absent, and be frightened to death at finding neither her father nor my- self in the house." " I'll tell you what I'll do," said the other, after a short RETURNED TO HIS RELATIVES. 305 pause iii hesitation : " I'll take your word for all this, and report at the Station-house. If no one comes from there here in an hour or so, you'd better go yourself, and give a close description of the man." This proposition seeming to cover all that could be clone with effect at the moment, Doctor Canary hastily assented ; and, after giving the friendly official some in- formation respecting the general appearance of the Toy- man, saw him depart for the station. When Dollie came down some three hours later, to prepare breakfast as usual, the abrupt discovery of Can- ary, pale and careworn, conversing with a policeman in her father's room, made her start back in the doorway with a hand pressed against her heart. " What has happened V was her instinctive ejacula- tion. Both men turned quickly about, and the officer, at a sign from the clerk, walked briskly out into the store. " Miss Dollie," said Canary, " There is no immediate cause for alarm. I was talking to this — in fact, the store- door was left open, or unlocked, I should say, last night, and the officer discovered it." " But where's my Father ?" cried the girl, glancing affrightedly about the disordered room. — " Oh, Doctor Canary ! what has happened ?" " If you'll only try to be calm " " Where is he, I ask you ? Something dreadful has happened, I know by your look !" And she looked as though it would be possible for her to faint, after all. " Miss Dapple, please sit down and hear what I have to say," said Canary, peremptorily catching her hand and leading her to a chair. " There ! ISTow we can talk with some presence of mind. Under the influence of fever, 306 RETURNED TO HIS RELATIVES. jour Father left the house last night, and was taken into a Station-house until " " Oh, heaven !" cried Dollie, panting for breath. " Now, my dear young lady ! — I tell you there's no cause for immediate alarm ! — he was taken in at a Sta- tion-house, I should have said ; for he wandered thither himself ; and kept there until word could be brought to us. The officer has come for me, and I'm going at once to bring him home in a hack." With her arms crossed on her knees, and her head resting upon them, in sudden abandonment of despair, Dollie sobbed hysterically. " I really thought you had more strength of mind than this," Canary added, almost harshly. u I can do nothing while you give way in this weak manner." " Let me go to him !" cried she, starting up convul- sively under the reproof. " You've done enough to him already, — my poor, poor Father !" For reply, Canary seized her by the shoulders, and firmly, but gently, forced her back into the chair. " You may say what you please to me, child, after I have come back with your Father. At present, show some of the real good sense which I know you to possess, and attend to my directions. While I am gone, clear the room of these pieces of clock-work on the floor, make a good fire in the stove, and re-make your father's bed for him. I'm a physician, and give you these directions as a physician only. Your Father has but reached the crisis of a disease which has been coming upon him for weeks, and has done no more than many a delirious man has done before him. May I depend upon you to do as I have directed, or must we waste more time in talking about it ?" RETURNED TO HIS RELATIVES. 307 He thoroughly understood her half-hysterical condition, and had adopted the tone and manner best calculated to rouse her from it. " I'll — I'll obey you, Sir," she sobbed, submissively. " That's a brave girl ! I knew you would. — Now Mr. Officer, I'm with you." And, hurrying to rejoin that messenger, he went out with him to look for a hack. Spiritlessly, and shedding many tears, the Toyman's daughter at once set about the duties assigned to her ; realizing no more than that she had been told to do so by an authority not to be combatted, and feeling too much stunned by her calamity to reason with herself concerning it. Though trembling in every limb while picking the many fragments of the Walking Doll from the floor, no con- jecture of how they had come there affected her bewildered mind ; nor did she even remember that Canary had been last with her Father on the preceding night. Something dreadful had befallen her unhappy home while she was sleeping, and the day just begun was to be one of greater misery than had yet been theirs. Such was the extent of her realizing consciousness ; and all her sensations, as she went mechanically through her usual morning routine, were as those of one who, waking from pleasant dreams, suddenly grows heavily sick at heart in the recollection that some familiar human form lies dead in the house. As for Canary, upon securing a hack, he took leave of the officer and drove straight to a house in a cross-street not far from Justice O'Blackstone's court, where lived the celebrated Alderman MacFinnigan. In his better days he had employed this illustrious man in his stable, and aided him to import his mother and sister from Ireland ; consequently, he felt the more bold to call upon him for help in his own time of need, and hesitated not to call 308 RETURNED TO HIS RELATIVES. him, even from his bed, for that purpose. To the Alder- man's credit be it said, when he recognized the caller, and had heard the story, his first indignant haughtiness of demeanor disappeared; and after informing Mrs. Mac- Finnigan, whom he had soundly beaten the evening be- fore, that he was going to see about one of his friends that was in trouble, he got into the hack with his old employer, and accompanied him to the Station-House. There, muttering and moaning upon a narrow cot in an off-room, his eyes closed, his hands clenched, and his whole appearance that of some miserable old vagrant dragged in dying from the dirt of the street, they found poor Geoffrey Dapple. " I have had him placed in this room, and rid of his ropes, since you were here first this morning," said the police-surgeon in attendance to Doctor Canary, as the latter entered with the Alderman. " His violence is all over now, I should say." " I'm a thousand times obliged for your kindness, sir," returned the Canary, eyeing the prostrate figure anxious- ly. " Do you still agree with me as to the cause of this ?" " I see no ground for any difference yet," remarked the surgeon. u I take it to be a case of extreme conges- tion of the brain, superinduced by intense and — /should say — long- continued febrile inflammation of the membrane. Since I bled him he has quieted down. A narrow escape, though, from apoplexy." " Under the circumstances, he was not. responsible for his words and actions after he had wandered in here last night ? He was in delirium ?" " ~No more responsible, morally, than a confirmed luna- tic." "You hear that, Alderman ?" observed Canary, turning THE CUESE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 309 to Mr. MacFinnigan. " You wo'n't object to his return to his relatives after that '?" "Divil a bit," answered that powerful ruler. "I'll ordther his discharge in the shake of a shtick ; and I'd do as much for a frind of yours if he'd broken his own broth- er's head in a shindy." As a consequence of which friendliness of disposition on the part of the Alderman, Geoffrey Dapple, wrapped in his enemy's own coat and great-coat, was presently car- ried out, still moaning and muttering, to the hack ; and in that started for his home, sustained by the arms of a policeman, and of the man whom he had sworn to hate and tried to kill. XXXVIII. THE CUESE OF THE WALKLNG DOLL. ^VTTHILE there's life there's hope," is a phrase V V often upon a man's lips, but rarely in his heart. It is, in fact, one of the numerous consolatory generalities of speech with which we, of the more practi- cal sex, are accustomed to solace our neighbors in their apprehensions, but consider altogether too general to be harbored for the alleviation of our own particular dreads. With woman, however, it is a real belief and power when all else is incredible and impotent. She, by her beauti- ful adaptation through nature for such saving ministra- tions to those* in mortal extremity as the masculine heart and hand, be they ever so gentle, can not eveii devise, has 310 THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. an instinct of hope which makes her strong, when a man turns weak with hopelessness ; and while one little vital spark remains to be sheltered and breathed upon by a ministering love ever incredulous of death, she cannot believe that it will go out ; cannot yield the Hope — strong as her own life — that it gives her to the last. The broken, moaning, ghastly wreck of a man borne tenderly home to Dollie, was such a father as a son would have received back to no less loving arms without a hope to save ; but she, after her despair had died in the one shriek she gave at seeing him carried through the store like a dead man, looked up to Heaven in tearful gratitude when they told her that he yet breathed, and was his faintly glimmering life's best stay through the indomita- ble Hope that was her love's belief in Herself ! O, Woman ! Better in good and worse in wrong than we. Whether your rights below the sceptre are honored by man in his purest manhood at the altar, or denied by him in his consciousness of contagious impurity at the ballot- box ; whether the proudest knee bends to you in hom- age, or the basest foot spurns you in shame ; whether you wear youth's rosy wreath in love's first march afield, or bend beneath the silver cross of age in life's last reverie beside the hearth ; still is it yours to claim an empire old as the world when man is piteously thankful to feel but your royal hand upon his brow ; still is it yours to hold your deathless Hope 'twixt death and him, and say : "Here is my throne: let Kings come bow to it!" They laid poor Geoffrey upon the bed where, for three long months before, he had known but little rest, and the girl took her place beside it, there to watch, and minister, and believe in his recovery, through many a day and night. THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 311 His mortal peril came more from the gradual wearing away of his strength by the long fever of mind and body which had preceded his paroxysm of madness, than from the merely temporary violence of the latter ; but so weak was he now, that, although the crisis of his malady had passed, Doctor Canary, and the physician called in by him, were at first fearful that he would sink beyond mor- tal help before another day had dawned. With the go- ing down of the wintry sun, however, his moanings and mutterings ceased, and he appeared to sleep ; and when, at midnight, he opened his eyes, faintly called his daugh- ter by name, and then slumbered again, there was hope, even for the men. Canary and Dollie watched together until morning ; by which time, — the decrease in the sufferer's remaining fe- ver not having been accompanied by a proportionate fail- ure of his remaining strength, — it became apparent to the former that the great danger was past ; and so he told his companion before going out to secure help for her in her domestic duties. She thanked him with a bow and a look, and when he had left her, fell upon her knees at the bedside. Going right at his object with an irresistible energy which seemed to have been born in him only since his acquaintance with Toys, the clerk had Dollie's friend, Sophia Skeggs, and her brother, x\lgernon Skeggs, in the store, to help, before he had been away an hour ; besides also securing an Irish servant-maid who actually did not stipulate for stationary wash-tubs. These assistants gain- ed, and a late breakfast got under way by the last-men- tioned prodigy, he reappeared in the sick-room to report what he had done, and meet the physician again. During that whole week, of course, as New- Year's Day 312 THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. was jet to come, the business of the toy-store would be very brisk ; but, had Dollie been at liberty to think of anything beyond the room in which she was, there might have been some wonder in her mind at the temporary ad- dition of two new clerks. To be sure, both were without experience, and were likely to be rather less efficient com- bined than would one ordinary boy with some knowledge of the business ; yet, in their acquisition two salaries were imposed upon the establishment, and they at least repre- sented an increase of fifty per cent over the force which, on all past occasions, had proved sufficient. Doctor Canary, though, knew well what he was about, and took no end of pains that day to drill his new recruits in the manual of toys. This was not a trifling labor ; for Miss Skeggs, though apt enough in acquainting herself with the stock and its private price-marks, had a certain chill- ing and Best-Society way of snubbing female customers, which would have done credit to any one of the feminine aristocrats who preside in the " Cloak Departments " of the great Broadway drygood-houses ; while Mr. Algernon, although a perfect lamb — not to say sheep — to any one who ever entered to ask where somewhere else was, could not, for the life of him, help presenting a Noah's Ark when a Box of Blocks was asked for, or avoid mistaking the price-mark in cents for so many dollars. Thus, while Miss Sophia would be holding in great contempt, at one end of the counter, some doting young mother who had come to buy a whole line of amusements for her darling at home, Mr. Skeggs, at the other end, would be trying to sell a small pasteboard dog to an amazed country gentle- man who had desired a drum, for Seventy-five dollars. Yet, before dark, the indefatigable head-clerk had suc- ceeded in reducing even these crudities to passable finish ; THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 313 so earnestly did lie devote himself to the task. And when nine o'clock came — the closing-hour at that season — and the new clerks had gone home, and the store was shut for the night, this same faithful drill-sergeant proved how tired he was, after it all, by resting, with head on crossed arms, upon his old poetical desk, for at least an hour later. Then, perhaps, he was rested. At any rate, he proceed- ed immediately thereafter to the room where Dollie sat be- side the Toyman's bed, as though she had not moved since the night before, and stole in so softly that she did not discover his presence until he was leaning over her charge. " This painless, unconscious rest is better for him than all the medicines," he whispered, after listening a moment to the breathing of the sick man. " It is, of course, the sleep of extreme weakness ; but the fact that he has any strength left at all, after what he has passed through, is the best evidence that he has a constitution to bring him to his feet again in a fortnight." " He always knows me when he opens his eyes," whis- pered Dollie : " but I don't think he remembers anyone, or anything, else." " Why do you think that ?" " Because his look is so peaceful, and like his old self. Oh, Doctor Canary ! you can form no idea of how differ- ent he looked before his trouble." " You forget that I saw him at the very first moment, as it were, of that trouble," said Canary, in a voice so low that it was scarcely audible. "I don't wish to remember it," answered Dollie. " I wish I could forget it myself, Miss Dapple." Silence reigned again in the dimly lighted room for several moments after this, the clerk standing in mute 14 314: THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. contemplation of the unconscious Toyman, and the daugh- ter hanging watchfully over the pillow. Finally, after softly feeling the pulse of the invalid, and again listening with inclined ear to his breathing, Doctor Canary whis- pered to the girl once more. u Miss Dollie, I have certain things to tell you to-night, and do not believe that you will have better opportunity for listening than now presents itself. If you have enough confidence in me to feel certain that I would not make such a request in such an hour without the warrant of a grave necessity, you will not, I am sure, refuse to with- draw far enough from this bed to prevent the likelihood of any portion of what I may say being heard by your Father." The light from the just-burning lamp behind the stove was not- sufficient to reveal the speaker's features very clearly to the girl, as she looked up into his face with momentary surprise ; but she could discern enough evi- dence of grave entreaty and emotion in them to match the keen urgency of his manner. Without a word she bent lower over the pillow an instant, then carefully arose from her chair and tacitly permitted him to place another for her almost immediately under the furled cur- tain of the tall window. What was to come now she knew not ; but the events of the past three months had accustomed her to a kind of necessitated secrecy with Doctor Canary, which involved an obligation to submit, in some measure unprotestingly, to his requests for special privacy. As she took her new place by the window, though with eyes still intent upon the sick-bed, he leaned against a side of the casement, and, folding his arms, looked down upon her. THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 315 " To commence," he said, barely above a whisper ; " your Father's reason 1 , certainly ; and his life, too, I think ; have been saved by what he is now so weak from in both mind and body. The congestion was an alternative of a softening of the brain, and in escaping the latter and suf- fering the former, he may be said to have gone to death's door in being saved from worse than death. We have great reason to thank God that he lies there, however weak, upon that bed to-night, instead of being either a raving maniac, or a hopeless imbecile, in some barred asylum. The alternative has been perilous — very peril- ous to his life. I was almost without a hope for that when we laid him here yesterday morning ; but he has passed the crisis in safety, aud needs only such loving care as yours to make him well again. I recognize God's forgiveness and mercy to myself in my being able to leave him thus." " Leave him ?" echoed the girl, withdrawing her gaze from the bed and turning it upon him. " Yes. I shall go away to-morrow morning, never to return again. I brought misfortune when I came ; and pray Heaven that it may all be included, and lost to you and him, in the misfortune which will bow my own head in my departure." Slowly turning her gaze to where her Father lay, again, Dollie uttered no comment. " I have done all that I can to save you from incon- venience through my absence, Miss Dapple. Mr. Skeggs and his sister have learned enough of the run of things to-day to attend store for you, and the young lady has promised me that her mother shall come with her in the morning to help and relieve you in your charge here. The servant girl, as I have seen for myself, will do her 316 THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. part of the household work faithfully. This is all I can do to lighten the burden which I have sinfully helped to bring upon you. In leaving you, at once and forever, I shall do still more to that end, and the best." As on a former occasion, the Toyman's daughter held out her hand to him, and clasped his earnestly. " When my Father is himself again," she whispered, " he will know you better ; know you as I do ; and for- give everything. He can understand then, Doctor Canary, what a good, generous friend you have been to both of us, ever since that — that first day." " He may learn to forgive me after I have gone,*' re- turned Canary, with sorrowful emphasis ; " but never while I am here. Night before last, after you had gone up to your room, I made my kst and fruitless appeal to him. I solemnly asked him, if only for the sake of the Christ- mas just coming in, to forgive him whom he thought to be his enemy, but who was really his penitent friend. I told him that he should be rid for ever of my presence, and of all knowledge of me, at the close of this dying Year ; and, in reply, he dashed the Walking Doll to pieces at my feet, — that the remotest possibility of its completion might be synonymous with the greatest pos- sibility of his ceasing to feel the deadliest hatred for me ! Miss Dapple, by my one wrong act I have wrought such a picture of myself in your Father's brain, that its color- ing of what I was to him at first, can never be wholly changed by anything I might be to him at last. To find me still here when he besjan to realize all things once more, would make him mad again. Had he escaped this saving prostration, I must still have gone, as I told him on that fearful night. It is much better that I should go at once." THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 317 Dollie went stealthily to bend over her Father, who had moved ; and, on returning to the window, did not sit down. " You are the wiser judge of what should and must be," she said, looking wistfully out into the night through the tall window. "If it is for the best that you should leave us in this way, I can only say, sincerely, that I am sorry to lose such a friend as you. have proved yourself to be, Dr. Canary ; I can only promise that it shall be a part of my gratitude to you to persuade my Father, when he is himself again, to judge you justly." " Rather help him to forget that I ever lived, if he can ; and do you, too, dismiss me from your memory with the other misfortunes of these past accursed months !" exclaimed Canary, bitterly. "Never mention my name to him even ; or, if he speaks of me on awaking from the rest now given him, strive to make him believe that I have been but a part of the miserable dream commencing at this very window." " Was it a dream f whispered Dollie, turning sharply toward him with a look which he could feel. — " O, Doc- tor Canary, was that all a dream ?" "From my inmost soul I believe that it was — have always believed that it was !" he answered, with intense vehemence, — " a distempered imagination's circumstan- tial delusion, growing from a violent nervous shock. This it is that saves my bad work here from being the deliberate Crime of a hardened villain, instead of a mo- mentary rascal's desperate trick of chance. One of my objects in soliciting this last conversation with you, was to reassure you as to your Father's unhappy belief in my power to ruin him through that dream." "I don't know what I have dreaded ; — but something 318 THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. awful; worse than I dare name," murmured the girl, greatly agitated. " Did the neighbors who wrote you to come home from school when he was so ill, relate to you the circum- stances of your Stepmother's accident ?" asked Canary. " They had told me she had fallen from the ladder, and been taken to the Hospital ; and they told me, while I watched by Father, that she was dead." " When I came in here with him, and found the wo- man bleeding, almost on the spot where we now stand," returned Doctor Canary, hushing his voice at the lowest breath, " I felt assured that she had fallen from the top of the ladder, after fixing that curtain up there as it now is, and struck her head against a corner of the chair be- low. I told the crowd in the store that it was so ; and, seeing the poverty of the place, and Mr. Dapple's help- less condition, took the responsibility of ordering her re- moval to the hospital. But after she had gone thither, and your Father saw me eyeing him again, he raved of — Murder." Smothering an exclamation of horror, Dollie sank into the chair beside her. " — I gathered from his incoherent ejaculations of terror and despair, that he and she had quarrelled bitterly ; that, in the momentary frenzy occasioned by some in- tolerable taunt of hers respecting his invention, he had furiously thrown the Walking Doll at her : — seen it strike her upon the head ; seen her fall upon the bed ; — and had run wildly out to the street, unbelieving what he had done ; and had come back again, still unbelieving — to find her bleeding to death under this window !" u Then," gasped the girl, cowering, and pressing both hands to her throbbing temples — " then what T heard TIIE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. 319 him raving of in that sickness, was no dream. — Oh God ! that we might both die this night !" " It was a dream, and no more," muttered Canary, his mouth almost touching her ear, and his hand resting ten- derly on her head. li He threw the clock-work, and it must have passed through the window ; but the wound upon that woman's head was made by the chair, and from the chair's edge I, myself, wiped blood and hair ! I have tried to tell him this a dozen times ; would have sworn to his innocence in any court, at any cost to my- self; but, in his madness, he would never hear me. He was distempered in his mind, already, when his wife's temper wrought him up to violence; and has been a monomaniac ever since. The Walking Doll has been his curse; but now it is destroyed, and he will awake from his dream — " Both started and held their breath at the instant ; for, by the faint light in the room, they could see the Toy- man's head rising from its pillow, as his arms feebly out- stretched in seeming welcome of some form invisible to them. " Lydia — forgive — " he cried, in a strong, plea- sant voice of surprise ; then sank back again into motion- less silence. The awe-stricken pair were at the bedside, in a mo- ment, the girl uttering tremulous words of soothing, and the man bending over the haggard upturned face in anxious scrutiny ; but Geoffrey Dapple was lying exactly as he had lain before, and gave no sign of greater con- sciousness. " He has better dreams already," said Canary, softly, " and will believe what you have to tell him when his mind wakes fresh and new from this clearing rest. The Curse of the Walking Doll will go from his heart and 320 THE CURSE OF THE WALKING DOLL. hearth with me ; and, in this world, he shall never know me more." Turning from his contemplation of the unheeding father, he rested his hand upon the back of the daugh- ter's chair ; and added, in the same soft, lulling voice, — " If the blessing of a contrite sinner can bring good to such as you, true-hearted girl ! I leave it with you as my last and only tribute. Your filial patience and devo- tion first awoke my self-reproach in this house, and I felt more guilty under your earliest look of just contempt than if the eyes of a whole court had pronounced me criminal. And then you trusted me, when my only plea was penitence for having forfeited all worldly trust. May you — and he through you — be ever blessed for it ! His ears are mercifully closed to all but the voices of a better dream than I have brought him, and he can not hear me now, — can never hear me again ; — but with you I leave it to convince him, that, whatever I was to him, I never have been unworthy of his utmost trust to you. I say it here by his bedside ; and he may believe it, and think more forgivingly of me for it, when I am far away, and you repeat it to him." " I am sure he will. O, Doctor Canary, I am sure he will !" murmured Dollie, tremulously. She was crying to herself, and could say no more. Kor was more said by either that night, though they kept watch all through it side by side, and took turns in ministering to the needs of him who was never to look on one of them again. When the light of morning found them thus, and the footsteps of the servant sounded on the stairway outside, Canary arose quietly to his feet, lifted the pale girl's hand for a moment to his colorless lips, and after one NEWS IN LAKDNEK PLACE. 321 long look of piteous meaning at both father and daughter, passed silently from the room, to be seen there no more for ever. XXXIX. NEWS LN LARDNEE PLACE ME. LARDNER, as heretofore intimated, was one of those rich and presumptuous plebeians of whom no right-minded literary man can either think or write with any patience. In addition to his preposterous per- tinacity in believing his counting-house mind capable of considering other matters than the Hide-market intelli- gently, he was responsible for all the poverty and want in the city ; blameable for the poor sale of paintings by in- numerable great American artists as compared with the sale of inferior imported works by Frere, Dore, Landseer and others ; guilty of causing inordinate taxes to be col- lected of the noble working-man ; reprehensible for call- ing himself a " miserable sinner " in church when he was really worth money ; despisable for holding all the cor- rupt shoddy contracts by which millions on millions were infamously plundered from the Treasury during the War ; and directly chargeable with having influenced all the publishers to decline, with some contumely, the new novel by Byron Cox, Esquire. Here's a disagreeable character to waste intellect upon, and his appearance in this genteel tale has been tolerated as seldom as possible. Having once been admitted, how- ever, — but only because his house was needed for the in- 322 NEWS IN LARDNER PLACE. evitable dinner party and ball — he must needs be endnred in another little scene or two. Therefore, at a whistle from the prompter, the toy-store, dividing exactly in the middle, disappears on either side of the stage, and this disgusting man, with his eternal commercial newspaper on his knees, is discovered sitting in his Library -chair, while Lncy occupies a seat on the opposite side of the writing- table. " Pa, I can scarcely believe my own ears," said Lucy. — "Actually gone away, you say?" " As I have already told you, my dear," answered Mr. Lardner, gravely regarding the backs of his hands, " she and her son left the house within an hour after she had handed the man's letter to her hus — to Mr. Aster." '■ And she herself handed the letter to Uncle !" " She did. A woman of nerve, at any rate ; and he" conduct under this terrible discovery had something reaH grand in its resolute quickness. She was white as death, and wept bitterly when my brother entreated her to re- main, — even sank upon his knees in his agony ; — but left the house within the very hour which had brought her proof that he was not her husband." " Where can she have gone VI said Lucy, more to her- self than to her father. " That is not known yet at the house. Young Dan- forth is to wait upon poor Philip in a day or two with intelligence of what may occur." " What a dreadful blow for poor Uncle, Pa. It will kill him." " It is strange," said her father, musingly ; " but he seemed far stronger and better this afternoon than I had thought he ever could be again ! The shock of this as- tounding calamity has actually frightened away his disease NEWS IN LARDNER PLACE. 323 I think. "Why, Lucy, lie walked the floor while I was there, and talked with a passion and strength of voice startling to hear from a man who, but a fortnight ago, was at death's door." " He loved her so !" exclaimed Miss Lardner, pityingly. "Loved her!" repeated the gentleman, with strong emotion. •*•" I never heard such praise of human thing from human lips as his of her. He went from tears to the most vainglorious pride, and from that to sobs again, in speaking of what she had been to him. I was very much affected by it, my dear ; very much." And Mi*. Lardner blew his nose to hide the moisture even then in his eyes. " I've hated her all along," cried Lucy, coloring very warmly at this ; " but now I'm sorry enough for her to beg her pardon for it ! Poor thing ! What a blessing that she has a son to stand by her in this cruel, awful mis- fortune! And yet," added the young lady, cooling as suddenly as she had flamed before, " she deserved some- thing as bad for poisoning Uncle's mind, as she has, against his own sons. Think, Pa, of poor John and Phil- ip, — especially Cousin John. He says that she was at the bottom of that shameful watch-story. I don't know, after all, that I pity her half as much as I do poor L"ncle." "This is not a time to remember her imperfections only," was the paternal answer. " She has certainly been a devoted wife to my brother Philip ; and we may fairly assume that her animosity against John and his brother has had some provocation. Now don't jerk your chin in that way, Lucy ; I am not justifying her in that matter; only giving her the charity due to her present miserable predicament. Judging from the cool assurance — not to call it astounding impudence ! — with which John Aster 324 NEWS IN LARDNEIl PLACE. has treated me, it is barely possible that his conduct toward this unhappy Stepmother has not been calcu- lated to conciliate the good will of a high-spirited wo- man." In his blind self-importance, this man could not perceive that the natural contempt of a proud, intellectual, high- strung nature for such an opinionated parvenu as himself, was very different from the logical resentment of a dis- owned son against the designing woman who had schemed to defeat his every honest effort to turn her husband, his sire, against her. — But what's the use ! " If you have so much charity for people, Pa," rejoined Lucy, coloring again, " I should think you might show a little more for one of your own sex. As I've often tried to convince you, Cousin Jack has undergone enough to make any proud man temporarily irritable. To be made an unwelcome guest in his own father's house was bad enough ; but just think of his being obliged to go around disguised as a near-sighted Spanish marquis, because even those of his own proper home believed that he had picked a pocket !" u My dear," remonstrated Mr. Lardner, smiling at her vehemence, " that is certainly a hard trial, and a very curious riddle ; but you forget the forbearance I have really shown to this dray-driving Spanish marquis of yours. But for your championship of the extraordinary youth, that tumble down-stairs of his, and really insolent public advice respecting the ashes, would have been his last chance to show his irritable pride in my house ! I think that there is a chance now for reconciliation be- tween the father and son, and when I see your Uncle again to-morrow I shall renew the subject, if there is a chance ; but if John comes here on New Year's Day, as NEWS LN LARDNER PLACE. 325 you expect, and cuts up any more ill-mannered capers, I shall certainly show him the door." Thinking, perhaps, that he had said a good thing, and willing to let it rankle silently awhile in the gentle heart it had wounded, the high and mighty dealer in hides abruptly ended the conversation by lifting his newspaper to the proper angle for reading, and directed his whole attention to its columns. Scarcely had he done this, how- ever, when he spoke again : " What's this, Lucy % Listen— 4 The police of the — th precinct report, that, at a very early hour on Christmas morning, an old man, without hat or boots, and present- ing a very wild appearance, entered the Station-house, and demanded that those in charge should take him into custody for some mysterious crime. He followed this strange demand with a furious and unprovoked assault upon an officer in attendance, whom he had choked severely before the astounded spectators could drag him from his prostrate victim. Being finally mastered and incapaci- tated from doing farther harm, he was found to be raving mad, and confined in a cell to await inquiries. At a later hour, persons in search of him arrived at the station, affirm- ing that he had escaped from his bed into the streets in a delirium of fever, and was a well-known inventor of me- chanical toys, named Dapple, — the same whose curious poetical placards have attracted so much popular notice by their odd philosophy. Police-Surgeon Hembold re- ported the poor old gentleman suffering from congestion of the brain, and Alderman MacFinnigan gave an order for Mr. Dapple's return to his alarmed relatives. He was taken home in a state of complete mental and bodily pros- tration.' — There, my daughter, I told you that man wa3 not in his senses." 326 NEWS W LARDNER PLACE. Miss Lardner met her father's inquiring look with one of distressed surprise. " How perfectly awful !" she exclaimed, using a phrase indiscriminately applied by young ladies to a great disas- ter, or the ripping of a glove. u Poor Dollie must be half crazy, herself. Can't we do something for them, Pa?" " If we can help them, I've no objection, my dear. — But don't, you see, Lucy, that this may make some differ- ence in the new watch-story ? Suppose Mr. Dapple has been insane all this while, and only fancied that the watch was not his. He talked so incoherently — so like a man perfectly beside himself with some crazy terror — that I could make but little sense from what he said after I had sent for him." " No, Pa !" cried Lucy, hastily, " there can be no mis- take there. You know what Uncle's nurse, that strange Mrs. Dedley, told me ? Besides, Dollie herself knows that her father did not take his own watch with him when he went out that day, and certainly brought back another just like it." " Ah, well !" sighed Mr. Lardner, after a ruminating pause, " there's a great deal of trouble in this world." Why didn't he prevent it, then ? What did he mean by speaking of it as though he really felt some sorrow for the trouble ? Was the man so besotted in the conceit of his own full fidelity to every possible obligation of Christian duty, that he could not see the hypocritical in- consistency of sitting there at ease in his comfortable chair, and sighing for the troubles of those who had no comfortable chairs to be at ease in — or, if they had, couldn't feel easy in them ? Why didn't he, if his pity was sincere, put all his wealth into a carpet-bag, and go DANFORTII. 327 out into the highways and byways, amongst the lame, halt, and blind, and — But what's the use ! " Yes, indeed," assented Lucy, downcasting her blue eyes in the prettiest possible sadness ; " there's trouble almost everywhere that I look, except in our own home. "We ought to be very thankful, — you and I, Pa," — she added, raising her glance to his face again in thoughtful abstraction, — " we ought to-be thankful that none of these perfectly awful things have happened to us, and do all that we can to help the unfortunate — particularly Cousin Jack. We ought to " " That's very true," struck in Mr. Lardner, with great precipitation, "that's very true, my dear. Now go play the piano, and let me read." Here Patience, descending from the monument erected especially for its accommodation in the little smiling match Avith Grief, closes at once with Lardner, — as an aggravation altogether too much for its affability, — is heavily thrown by him, and expires of exhaustion. XL. DANFOETH. ME. STALKEK'S threatened revenge had, indeed, fallen in a lightning stroke at last upon the head of the Imposing Mrs. Aster. While yet her grief for the poor little baby -boy was in its first unspoken bitter- ness, and her battle with her foes nearest the humiliation of hostile victory, there had come to her a letter from a 328 DA^FOETH. hand which she had believed was long ago withered into dust, telling her that she was not a lawful wife in the luxurious home she ruled, and briefly asking an interview in the name of him to whom her maiden troth had been plighted. In the first agony of such a blasting, merciless, incredible blow as this, a woman not enslaved by the tyranny of a queenly personal appearance, and its imper- ative domestic and social obligations, would have refused to believe in such an astounding disaster, gone into hys- terics at sight of the signature of the dead, and finally fled for protection and vindication to the arms of the last lord of her wifely allegiance. But, as has already been told by one whom it were needless exasperation to name so soon again, the majestic lady of Jenkins Place yielded to none of these privileges of the unimposing of her sex. Awful, overwhelming as the revelation was, Mrs. Aster never doubted for an instant that the letter came from him whose signature ended it ; she uttered no outcry that any human ear could catch ; but, with a countenance like ice, carried the fatal paper to the old man in the pil- lowed chair, and bade him read and believe it ! He, incredulous and livid with heroic wrath at first, gasped her beloved name with the fondest endearments and out- stretched arms ; and, in his frenzy, kneeled to pray that she would not leave him, — that she would let him, weak as he had been, but stronger than a giant as he would be, stand between her and this dishonoring spectre ; that she would despise the world's opinion and fly with him whose love for her was his life, beyond the reach of law — for his sake, for the sake of their dead child ! All was in vain. The tears rolled down her colorless cheeks, and every line of her face was sharpened with agon}'- ; but she would not even permit him to clasp her in his arms. DANF0RTH. 329 "Philip," she said, with a voice which might have sounded from an automatic effigy of misery, " you must not tempt me to forget for one moment what this letter means. I can not stay in this house an hour longer with- out guilt, and I shall not. I must go instantly ! If you love, if you respect me, do not remonstrate farther, Philip. I shall have Theodore's company and protection. Spare me now. I will write." " Would you go to him f gasped the sick man, rising to his feet, for the first time in months, and presenting a ghastly image of horror. " I shall tell him that the law he has made me outrage must right me ; and then see him no more," answered she, shuddering as she spoke, but never quailing. " Don't go — not yet, not yet," he panted, staggering in an effort to clasp his thin hands, and falling heavily back into his chair with a piteous groan. Seeing that he had fainted, she darted to his side, sob- bed once as she kissed his cold damp forehead, and after ringing the bell, went hurriedly to her own room. So it was that, under the name of Mrs. Philips, she stood in a private upper parlor of a retired hotel near the central part of the city, when a servant, whose knock had called her to the door, presented a card on which was written the name " Danforth." Turning from him toward the light of the windows, as though to decipher the signature, she remained motion- less and silent in that position for a moment ; then said, without moving, and in an indifferent tone : a Ask the gentleman to walk up." The door closed again, she threw a quick, frightened look at it over her shoulder, and took one or two hurried steps toward adoor leading apparently into another room ; 330 DANFORTH. but, even while this wrought-up impulse to flight was up- on her, her startled eve caught her own reflection in a broad mirror over a mantle ; and she stopped and drew herself proudly erect on the instant, at that reminder of the queenly woman she was. The door opened once more, and, with head inclined, there entered the husband from the dead — Doctor Canary ! Stopping within a few paces of the lady, he raised his eyes respectfully to meet hers, and they stood looking at each other in a long, unrevealing stare. " Adelaide," he said, questioning and appealing in the one low-spoken word. " I thought you were dead, Gerald Danforth. I hoped you were dead," she answered, in a voice firm and cold as ice. " You have brought me to worse than death, and I have no words for you but words of hatred and de- fiance." " I have expected nothing else, deserved none other, and have come only to put your remedy into your own hands," he said, his face working with strong emotion, but his voice and manner as firm as hers. " My remedy shall be the law," she responded, quickly and harshly. " You shall answer to the law for the crim- inal, cowardly deception 'you have dared to put upon me. I repudiate every claim of yours upon me ; I am here for my own sake, and not in answer to any wish of yours ; and after this hour I will never suffer the degradation of standing under the same roof with vou ao-ain." " I can bear your reproaches and taunts," he returned, looking steadily and calmly at her; "for they could not be severer than the blame self-applied. I have been a failure all my life ; a misfortune to all connected with me, and a greater misfortune to myself. Think harshly DANFOETH. 331 of me as you will for my conduct in the time long past ; but do not esteem me such a villain as to have intentionally brought you into your present unhappy situation. As God is my judge, I never dreamed of such a consequence as this when I threw aside a name I had failed to make honorable, and sank to a life which would have disgraced it the more in men's ears. I never dreamed of such a consequence as this." " You honored it by making it a dead man's name — the name of a creature found starved, or frozen, or drowned, like a houseless vagrant," retorted the woman. " I saw it so honored in print, and, believed, — with thankful heart ! — that I was free from you for ever. — As I will be, Gerald Danforth, from this hour forth !" " You have but to go to a Western city, and tell any Court what I have clone, and it will free you with honor to yourself, and dishonor to me, in a month," said Dan- forth, humbly. " Or you may do the same here in ^"ew York, if you do not fear the voice of gossip. I shall not oppose you, though it blackens my true name, indeed, for all time. To you, however, I shall make this defence : I once gave the coat off my back to a poor, shivering wretch who had come begging into a bar-room on a bitter winter's night. He was found dead in that coat afterwards, I heard, and, from a paper which I had accidently left in the pocket, and which he, himself, probably, never dis- covered, he was taken for me. On learning this, I was glad to have it thought that Gerald Danforth was no more ; and took the name which I now bear, which I shall con- tinue to bear, as a surety of the world's forgetfulness of whom I once was. Until told of the consequence to you by a man you had made your enemy, I did not even know that you lived." 332 DANFORTH. No perceptible change came over the set, white, fierce face of the lady as she listened ; and, in replying, her voice was still harsh with implacable resentment. " You have broken the heart of a man whose shoes yon were never worthy to unloose," she said, with a mingling of bitterness and ineffable contempt ; " you have cast re- proach upon the grave of his dead child ; you have brought the stigma of crime upon the Mother of your own son ; and bowed that son's head with shame for both of us." » " My Son !" echoed Danforth, with the ghastly, quiv- ering look of a man who had been struck in the face. " Your Son," she repeated, pointing in pitiless exulta- tion toward the inner door, — " Theodore Danforth, who is now in that room, and at a call from me, would enter and cast you forth." " Woman !" cried Danforth, clutching his breast, as though he would fain tear open the bleeding heart beneath for her to see, "with all your wrongs, you might have spared me this !" As she marked his sudden agony and the triumph it gave her, there was something in the sight to lash her into a swift passion of vindictive excitement, even as a taste of blood might have frenzied a caged tigress. " I'll spare you nothing !" she said, in a kind of hoarse scream, while her dilated eyes fairly danced with exultant recognition of his fear of her. — " I'll spare you nothing. — Theodore !" In obedience to her call, the door at which she had pointed moved slowly open, and the very ghost of Theo- dore Danforth — so pale, so drawn of face, so broken did he look — entered the parlor and advanced mechanically to his Mother's side. His eyes, at first directed to her only, DANFORTH. 333 now met his father's hungry look ; and the elder man seemed fairly to break and grow still older at the sight. " My son ?" he said, slowly, like one questioning a dream. " Can this be my little Theodore? And not a word for me ? Not a word, after so many years ?" " You have ruined his every prospect in life, spoke the wife of two husbands, in a low, intense, relentless tone. " You have blighted his ambition, destroyed his honora- ble pride in himself, and brought shame upon him through his Mother." "No," said Theodore, "I feel no shame from your un- merited misfortune, Mother; nor is my honorable pride in myself lost. Shame and personal degradation can come to us only through shameful acts of our own." He utter- ed this in a steady, spiritless way, and repressed a sigh as he finished. " Have you no word at all for me f n cried Danforth, heeding him only, and that with all the insatiable yearning of Nature in his face, voice, and attitude. " I see in you, Sir, only the author of my Mother's past wrongs and present misery, " answered Theodore, " and such words as are your due in that capacity should not be spoken by a son to a father." Danforth compressed his twitching lips tightly, breathed heavily through his nostrils, and let the hands which he had held clasped nervously before him, fall nervelessly at his sides. " You should not have been present here," he said, at last. " I came to repair a wrong so far as in me lay, and to bear every reproach that your Mother could heap upon me. I came to forget that I had been sinned against, in confessing humbly that I had sinned. But I see that it has been planned to torture, and goad, and mock me, as 334 DANF0ETH. though I had come to vindicate myself, as this woman's conscience has told her that I might ! and yon, my son, are called in, to make my endurance greater than nature can bear, by adding your taunts to hers." He paused a moment, to repress an excitement which had seemed growing stronger within him at every word, and then added, hurriedly, " I can not speak calmly, as I should, while you are in the room, sir. I can not." " He shall remain here while I do," exclaimed the lady, with imperious passion. " He is my protection, and I bid him stay. He has heard enough for himself already to perceive that I shall need a protector while you see fit to remain." The degrading implication of this last cut called the blood to the brow of the driven man, and a fire of offended manhood to his eyes. Again he clutched his hands before him, and addressed his son. " Theodore, you will never see me again in this world from this day forth. Judging my sins as you choose, is it not still degrading to yourself to stand here and see the author of your being degraded before your eyes in a meeting like this ? It was unwomanly, unnatural to call you to such an interview, and I beg you, for the sake of your future self-respect, for the sake of the last, lingering feeling of filial tenderness which nature may yet inexora- bly demand as the basis of your own claim upon the ten- derness of those calling you Father, to heed me, for this first and last time, and withdraw." He said it with a strange mixture of struggling passion and almost piteous entreaty, and his face darkened when he saw that his request was not to be obeyed. "After the language you have used respecting my Mother in my presence," answered the young man, DANFORTH. 335 avoiding his eye and looking sadly toward lier of whom he spoke, " I can not do what yon ask. This is no inter- view for a son to take part in, as yon say, Sir ; but it is an occasion when a Mother's command mnst prove su- perior to a Father's." " I'll ask you no more !" cried Danforth, no longer repressing the rising torrent of his emotion, but speaking fast and vehemently. " If your judgment of your un- happy Father's sins is to be swayed, and made more degrading to him than it yet has been, by such a scene as this, you shall at least hear him speak for himself. Whatever I was in the past, whatever I may be in this lady's scorn and resentment now, I will not stand in my own son's presence and tamely bear the full brand which, in his absence, I was prepared to endure patiently. — Madam, I pray you bid him leave us !" A contemptuous curl of the bloodless lip, and a haugh- tier drawing up of the Imposing form, were his sole answer. " Then hear me, Theodore Danforth," he continued, with increased vehemence, " hear me, you Son of mine, who saw me for yourself through the eyes of infancy only, and have seen me ever since through Her's alone. I was a weak, poor-tempered, broken husband to your Mother here ; unsuccessful in worldly matters, a poor staff to lean upon, and finally a drunkard ; but I never abused her, even in my cups, never was unfaithful to my marriage vows even in the most reckless hour. My weakness as a visionary in money matters reduced us to poverty just after you were born, and that, aggravated by my subsequent yielding to the snare of the bottle, turned her heart against me. They were enough, I own, for they made me an object of contempt to myself: but, 336 DAXFORTH. mark me, boy, — and this is what no other presence than yours could have wrung from my lips at this time- — I had never sunk to that last degradation of manhood, if the reproaches and taunts of a bitter and tireless tongue had not made my borne a vindictive, maddening echo of my every misfortune outside of it ! I returned to that home one night, after a day of disaster and weakness, and found that it had been stripped bare to the walls by a fugitive wife ! In my frenzy of wrath and despair, augmented by the liquorish demon within me, I hated you, then, as well as her, and asked of the law only the poor property she had taken from my house — not what she had torn from my heart. What more can I say ? I have never troubled either her or you since ; though God knows how soon after the first tempest of rage, I mourned you both in my outcast misery. I let my name die, only because I, myself, could not ; and if an enemy whom your Mother had made for herself — a detective scoundrel named Stalker — " (Theodore started) — "had not sought me out, in revenge against her, and told me of her iden- tity with the proud Mrs. Aster, of whom I had often heard, I should never have made known to you my ex- istence. That I did so then, though only after a contest with myself, was because every moment of my life thenceforth, however far away, must be fraught with peril to her domestic relation and hold her at the mercy of an unscrupulous scoundrel. I made him repair a wrong- he had helped to do, by procuring a duly attested confes- sion from a pickpocket, which you may understand, and which I have had addressed to you ; and I asked this in- terview of your Mother to-day, only that I might assure her of my penitent willingness to leave any appeal of her's against me to the law uncontested, and of my dc- DANFORTK. 337 termination to use a little sum, just bequeathed to me by a deceased uncle, in leaving the country for ever." The effect of this long and indescribably impassioned speech upon the Mother and Son was curious ; he grow- ing more haggard of face and restless of manner as it went on ; and she drawing nearer to him in a kind of fear, which seemed to steal away all her cold hauteur, in its increase, and finally left her head bowed upon his shoulder ! " Do you see this, Father V 9 asked Theodore, in an agitated voice, after a silence of some eloquent moments. He did see it ; looking on with folded arms while the two stood thus before him, and gradually losing all the fire from his eye, and the defiant self-assertion from his bearing as he gazed. u I am glad to see it so ; from the bottom of my heart I am glad to see it so !" he faltered, with such trembling softness of tone and manner as seemed to be that of a different man from him who had spoken before. " I thank my God, Theodore, that you and She love each other so dearly." u My Father ! My Mother !" burst from the young man's tortured lips, in a wail of concentrated agony ; and he hid his face on the head upon his bosom, and cast his arms about the parent to whom he owed the most. "Adelaide — Theodore," sobbed Danforth, " God bless you both ! "We'll meet again — I trust — in Heaven." He whose wondrous master-work is Man, has made naught else so inconsistent to man's judgment ; — so prone to failure and to weakness below the beasts that perish ; so capable of accomplishment and of strength above the angels that endure for ever. 15 §38 THE HALF-BEOTHEES. XLT. THE HALF-BEOTHEES. IT is authentically related of a gentleman moving in business circles, (by the way, why is a man never credited with moving in business Squares ? or why would- n't it be more correct to say dizziness circles in some cases ?) that, in the very crisis of a tedious attack of in- flammatory rheumatism, he was instantaneously cured in this wise : To ease his intolerable pains one night, his excellent wife was rubbing him with a certain patent ex- plosive liniment, which, by the accidental overturning of a lamp beside the bed, took fire upon him. Racked in every bone and accoutred as he was, the blazing husband sprang out of bed with all the agility and splendor of a first-class rocket, and not only extinguished himself with- out serious injury, after a very brief pyrotechnical display, (which threw his infant son in a cradle near by into an ecstacy of delight,) but was also relieved simultaneously and permanently of every vestige of his disease ! Something like this principle of treatment had been illustrated in the case of the elder Aster, upon whom the tremendous shock of his domestic calamity acted like a magical charm. In fact, a remedy of that kind is pretty certain to kill or cure at the very first application ; and, as it did not prove fatal to him, he seemed to realize the alternative with startling quickness. His wife's precipi- tate departure left him fainting, after such an exhibition of strength as had appeared impossible for so sick a man ; and, upon his return to sensibility and a consciousness of THE IIALF-rjROTHEKS. 339 his tremendous misfortune, the latter again agonized every weakened energy within him into frantic strength, and he sprang frenziedly from his pillowed chair, to re- turn to it no more. Back and forth he paced the floor during his half-brother's first and immediate visit of con- dolence ; and when Mr. Lardner speedily called for the second time, the helpless, long-robed " consumptive " of yesterday was clothed as became an active member of society, and had but just dismissed an eminent man of law with whom he had been closeted for nearly two hours. It is to this latter intrusion of the irrepressible egotist of Lardner Place, that the present chapter chiefly refers ; and as Patience, after a miraculous resurrection, is smirk- ing once more from that eternal Monument (commonly supposed to be the "Washington one to the Father of His Country, as the whole nation has had too much patience with that these many years) we must even recur thus soon again to a character ever so exasperating to the higher intellect. In short, at about Four O'clock P. M. on a day very near the end of the Old Year, Mr. Lardner presented himself in Jenkins Place, and was relieved from the chilling dread which had struck cold to his heart from the shutter-closed and desolate outward aspect of the house, by finding his afflicted half-brother standing thoughtfully before the fire in the shaded room formerly used by Mrs. Aster for receptions, and wearing the look of one contemplating anything else than mortuary pre- paration. Haggard and ghastly of face the stricken husband still was ; yet he stood erect as his provokingly healthy visitor, and shook hands with a steadiness of muscle not excelled by the other. 340 THE HALF-BROTHERS. " Well, Philip, my poor brother, what has another day brought forth?" asked the newcomer, drawing a chair toward the grate. " But little, but little," ejaculated Mr. Aster, moving his hands nervously behind him and speaking with sharp irritability. " Not a step can be taken in the accursed mazes of what pettifoggers call Law, without such fool- eries and delays as are enough to drive a man to dis- traction ! Two days must be allowed for this, and a week for that, and a fortnight for heaven-knows- what." a You propose taking legal measures yourself, then, I infer," said Mr. Lardner, making it half a ques- tion. '" Myself ! Why of course 1 do, man ! — have taken one already. A summons was served upon that resur- rected villain, at my instigation, yesterday. What do you mean, Reginald, by such a remark as that ?" rt My dear brother, I only meant that I had thought it possible Mrs. Aster and her son would prefer to take action in law without involving you at all. It had seemed to me that such would be the more delicate course." " Yery well, Sir," returned his brother, turning angrily upon him. " If you and I are to continue friendly rela- tions, you must not talk in that way. No, Sir ! I wish you, and all the w T orld, to distinctly understand, that this lady — who is still my Wife by every right, human, or divine ! — has been most infamously tricked and brought to undeserved sorrow by a brutal rascal ; and that it is my business to see that she is fully righted. If she, her- self, opposes this, I shall not listen to her ! No, Sir, Neither you, nor any man, must dare to speak to me of TIIE HALF-BROTHERS. 341 any other course. My means, and my lawyer, and all that I can personally bring to bear, shall do the work to be done. Sewall has just gone from me to Mrs. Aster, with my peremptory instructions that he shall draw the Complaint immediately, from her dictation, and ask the appointment of a referee by the Court. My wife shall be no more than a witness in the case, Sir !" Here Mr. Aster began pacing the floor, as though his thoughts made rest intolerable to him, and panted like a man who had been running. " Is it likely," inquired Mr. Lardner, after watching him w T ith great commiseration, for a while, " that this — this man will contest the case ?" " Reginald Lardner," exclaimed the half-brother, stop- ping short before him, " do you think that the miscreant would dare to ? — but he will not, Sir. He intends leaving the country at once. There is shame enough left in him for that." " "Then the decree can be obtained, no doubt, upon the report of the referee, and without publicity. That is most fortunate, Philip. By a little good manage- ment, the whole affair, it appears to me, may be kept from the gossips, and pass unknown beyond our two families." " For her sake I am thankful for that ; but, so far as I am concerned, Brother, I should be glad to have it all told in open Court. I would gladly let the whole city see that I, the husband of this cruelly persecuted lady, have the same pride in her now that I have always felt ; that I hold it as great an honor to have my name joined with hers in this her hour of bitter, unmerited humilia- tion, as it ever has been to point to her as mine when the haughtiest of your New York dames envied her queenly 342 THE HALF-BROTHERS. dignity ! O, these puerile, torturing, intolerable delays of shallow Law ! they madden me when I think how long, how long !" Again the tormented husband without a wife paced and panted ; and Mr. Lardner, as he sat eying him, and reflecting upon these evidences of his doting enthral- ment, felt that it might not be wise to mention Mr. Jack Aster's case at all on that occasion. But even while he was cogitating thus, the agitated walker paused abruptly before the very desk from which the Stepmother had once taken money to pay Mr. Stalker, and took from it a folded paper of decidedly legal appearance. " Here, Reginald, read this," he said, tossing it to him, and at once resuming his impatient walk. "An affidavit!" ejaculated Mr. Lardner, in great sur- prise, and silently read as follows : " James Goggle, of the City and County of New York, ' being duly sworn, deposes and says, that he is a news- ' man bj occupation, having residence at '' such a number ' Orange Street, in said City of New York, in aforesaid ' County of New York. That he, deponent, did, on the * Twenty-first day of September, in the year Eighteen ' hundred and Sixty-eight, feloniously abstract and steal ' a gold watch, in Chatham Square, from the pocket of a ' woman unknown to him ; and that, being in immediate ' fear thereafter of discovery and arrest, he, the said James i Goggle, did convey said watch to the pocket of one ' Aster, whose Christian name is unknowm to deponent. ' Furthermore, the said James Goggle deposes and says, ' that lie is informed and believes that said Aster was i wrongfully accused of feloniously appropriating the 6 watch aforesaid, and is still wrongfully subject to pro- ' cess of law for said theft, which James Goggle afore- THE nALF-BROTHERS. 343 " said here confesses having committed in his own proper a person and self. his " James x Goggle. mark. r q -I-, " Subscribed and sworn before me, ) L&eaij thig 24th ^ of j) ecemberj 1868> j- " P. Fowle, Notary Public." The perusal of this edifying moral document threw the reader into a state of mind bordering on consternation, and he stared doubtfully from the paper to the father of " said Aster," as scarcely knowing what style of comment would be appropriate. " This is curious," he said at last. " It proves," said Mr. Aster, stopping at the mantel- piece near his brother, and leaning moodily thereon, " that my son is not quite so bad as we thought him." " We/" thought Mr. Lardner to himself; but, assum- ing an air of natural interest, he asked through whom the extraordinary paper had been received ? " Theodore Danforth brought it with him last evening, when he came to bring me news of his — of my dear Ade- laide," was the slowly given answer. "Well, Philip, what do you think of it?" " That Mrs. Aster and I have been greatly misled," re- turned he, taking a seat for the first time, and speaking more calmly than before. " I have instructed Mr. Sewall to see that my son is at once relieved of the false charge. I believe, Brother," he continued, with a stern settling of his sharpened features, " that you have been amongst those accusing Mrs. Aster of enmity to my scapegrace boys. What shall you say to that, when I tell you, that her son, Theodore Danforth, coming directly from her in 344 THE HALF-BROTHERS. the midst of the greatest affliction a noble-minded woman could bear, brought that paper himself, and actually pled with me to forgive John and Philip for her sake !" " As I sincerely hope you will, Philip, for your own/' exclaimed Mr. Lardner, quickly. "You cannot more thoroughly vindicate the lady against all past unjust de- traction, than by receiving back again the sons of your earlier marriage. I am glad indeed to hear this." " You may tell John when you see him again," added Mr. Aster, in a troubled voice, " that if he chooses to pre- sent himself here in a few days hence, and can return to his old home in a proper spirit, I shall not repulse him. If Philip can be found, the same terms are offered to him. You may tell him, too, that the successful intercessor for him and his brother with me has been their Stepmother." " Philip," cried the half-brother, reaching forward as he arose to take the father's listless hand, " why will you not do as I asked you when here before — make my house your home until this trouble is past, and then commence a happier New Year by being the first to tell poor John that he is no longer fatherless ?" "I appreciate your kindness, Brother," was the quiet reply ; " but this house is dear to me now as no other place in this world ever was before. Here I shall stay, allowing no article to be moved from where She left it, until she can come back to me once more, and, in the same hour, be solemnly wedded to me again. After that, we shall depart at once for Europe, to be gone some years ; taking Theodore with us, and leaving my sons to hold charge of the property here and in Philadelphia dur- ing our absence. Such is my determination, and I shall adhere to it." " Nor is it any man's place to dissuade you, Brother THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IN. 345 Philip," said Mr. Lardner, putting on his gloves. u I fully appreciate your feelings and shall not again question the course they dictate. I shall come here to see you, however." ''Do. And bring your daughter. She is a noble girl." After another brotherly shake of the hand the inter- meddling dealer in hides took bis departure, leaving the Imposing woman's gray-baired Knight to worship her picture, and pledge heart and soul in her cause, like any forlorn young lover. XLII. THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IN. IN blissful ignorance of the retribution which had overtaken her eccentric lover's queenly enemy, and as unwitting of the better days about to dawn upon that young man's romantic path in life, the Toyman's daugh- ter patiently nursed her father back to the world in which he had known so much misery, and was overjoyed to see, that, as the dark night of his unconsciousness lightened to the thin mist of a first perception of objects, — and that to the clear morning of a mind awaking to activity again, — he seemed to have scarcely a recollection of what had brought him to that bed, and only wondered why he was not strong enough to get up and be about as usual. He had been in total darkness for but a single day and night ; he had w T avered in fast dispersing shadows for but anoth- er day ; yet, in that time, all impressions of three months 346 THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IN". of horror had faded from his mind, and now, even in his great weakness, he looked and spoke almost like the Geof- frey Dapple of poorer and happier years. No longer was the feverish glare of cowering hatred and suspicion in his eyes ; no longer did his brow and lips compress under the torturing restraint of fear and deadly cunning ; no longer was his voice harsh and shrill with the suppressed rage of a manhood bound to guilty vassalage ; but there he lay in painless, passive idleness in his own old home, sinking pleasantly into dreamless slumber as his daughter read to him, and waking to smile at her and ask child- like questions when she called him by name. And in the toy-store, Miss Skeggs and the slow-minded young Algernon, finding that the head-clerk returned not after his speechless departure K down town " yesterday morning, did chill lady-customers with freezing indiffer- ence, and astound seekers of small wares with incredible prices, to an extent never before achieved by clerkly ac- quisitions of such tender years. The mother who came in to look at dolls, was made to feel that the few slight civilities necessitated by the etiquette of such an occasion must not be presumed upon as a plea for future recogni- tion in society ; and the heedless boy who asked the price of those small leather balls in the window, was astonished and rendered gloomily thoughtful for the remainder of his life by the prompt information that fifty dollars each was the price they were marked at ; yet mothers, and boys, and men, swarmed in the evergreen groves, and among the poetical placards, and bought toys under ev- ery disadvantage. Staring in at shop-windows is a weakness to which we all succumb more or less : generally more. Certain lofty and superior natures, to be sure, disclaim this vulgar sort TIIE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IN. 347 of thing with a proud smile, and, indeed, would have you understand that no human interests below those of emi- nent social rank and gigantic real estate can at all divert their eyes from the stately delight of walking self-contem- plation, or affect their steps and stoppages in the majes- tic promenade through life ; yet these are the very mor- tals in whose secret hearts rankles the bitterest enyj of him who has the incredible moral courage to stop at a corner-stand in Broadway, and openly buy a pint of pea- nuts, or some hot chestnuts, when he craves them ; and these same elevated creatures, too, will avail themselves of the evening shades and a strange neighborhood to peer much longer over the greasiest of shoulders into the dirti- est of illustrated-newspaper-shop casements, than their Own families could possibly be made to believe. In fact, we all look into shop-windows just as long and often as we dare, to the last days of our lives, and many of us acquire thereby a kind of dreamy, unspeakable acquaintance with those who belong in the shops themselves. A pretty girl's head and bust first and last seen through the iced and raisined window-display of a Fancy Bakery, have often gone through a whole life as a lovely ideal never to be ap- proached by reality ; and an odd-looking man's head and shoulders only visible in the dim distance between inter- vening rows of priced silver watches, boxes of finger rings, and cards of breastpins, have been the shadowy presentment of perfect blessedness to which many an old man in his riches has looked back, down weary years, with a sigh. Bearing all this in mind, it may be understood why the new faces behind the counter in the toy-store of this story had their conjectural effect upon some of the regular fre- quenters of the show-window ; leading one matronly fig- ure, dressed in black and thickly veiled, to look in, and 348 THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IX. turn away, and look in again, as though almost unwilling to believe that it was the same place. At last, after many false starts, this veiled matron could bear it no longer, and, in a momentary interval of custom, she entered the store and walked reverentially to where Miss Skeggs usurped authority. " I have heard," she said, speaking modestly under her veil, " that the Mr. Dapple who kept this store was sick. Does he still live here?" Now Miss Skeggs was a young lady whose brown hair was fearfully and wonderfully dressed, and there rested , upon it a certain brass crescent, or coronet, which to those having crude notions of royalty, made her look very much like a queen indeed. It was a condescension for her to be there at all, as it always is for any lady-clerk to be anywhere, and when it came to answering questions about the family, like a servant-girl out sweeping the walk, things had come to a fine pass. " Inquire at the house-door," said Miss Skeggs ; and was immedietely lost in a dreamy contemplation of the street. " If you would be so obliging as to tell me yourself," persisted the audacious intruder, " I should take it as a favor. I wish to see Miss Dapple particularly." " Algernon !" called Miss Skeggs, languidly. That mild-eyed young gentleman at once shambled for- ward in great haste, and, seeing that one hand of the visitor rested upon an open box of peg-tops, straightway assured her that tops were now selling rapidly (because everybody wanted them) at twenty-live dollars apiece — or a dozen — or a gross — he wasn't certain which. " Don't be stupid, Algernon," murmured Miss Skeggs, with an air of fashionable ennui, " this person wishes to THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES TX. 349 see Dollie Dapple, and you'd better let her know." After saying which the lovely speaker relapsed into freezing dreams on the spot. " This way, if you please, mum," said Mr. Skeggs, go- ing toward the back of the store. " I didn't engage to 'tend door, but seeing you're a woman I'll strain a point. — Some one to see you, Miss Dollie ;" and, having opened the door of the sick-room far enough to make this last announcement, he left the visitor to do as she chose about walking in. This the latter did, though in a slow and hesitating way ; and halted rigidly upon beholding the scene within. Dollie, looking very pale and worn, was reading some book aloud, though in a very low voice ; her elbows rest- ing upon the bedside with the volume between them, and one hand pulling at her dishevelled curls, while the other gently patted the Toyman's nearer arm. He was lying quite still on his back, his eyes closed, and his white face tranquil with untroubled rest. Mr. Skeggs's concise announcement did not cause the good daughter to change her attitude, but she turned from the book just enough to catch sight of the sombre figure entering, and appeared both vexed and surprised. " Did you wish to see me V she asked, with more of rebuke than inquiry in her subdued tone. " I — I — beg your pardon," was the stammered answer. " I am Mrs. Dedley." In response rather to the curiously agitated manner of the speaker than to any peculiar association recalled by the name, Dollie put aside her book and turned fully around toward the door. The sick man, also, opened his eyes, and made an uneasy movement. " Mrs. Dedley V repeated Dollie. 85^ THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IN. " I have been a nurse at — Mr. Aster's," explained the woman, speaking almost inaudibly. Whereat Dollie gave a great start, and instantly re- membered that this was she from whom the watch had been stolen. " Oh-h," she replied, changing color, " I recollect ! You — but my Father is so sick that I don't dare to leave him a moment, — at least, I don't wish to. If you could call in a day or two ?" *' It will be better for me to talk with you now, I think,'' answered Mrs. Dedley, with less embarrassment than be- fore. " I shall not disturb the gentleman." To the consternation of both women, GeofTrey Dapple suddenly struggled up to the support of his elbow at this remark, and stared from the visitor to his daughter with startled wildness. " Who is this \ — who is that woman there ?" he asked, in apparent aff right. " Only Mrs. Dedley, Father, — the nurse at Mr. Aster's," was Dollie's hurried explanation. — " Mrs. Dedley, please take a seat for a moment." The old man still stared incredulously at both for a brief space ; then the eager expression faded slowly from his face, and he sank down again with a long inspiration. Much discomposed by the incident, — for she now re- membered that her father must have heard the name of their visitor before, — Dollie was turning from him to speak again, when, to her great consternation, she found that Mrs. Dedley had drawn a chair close to her own by the bedside, and was evidently about to address her pa- tient. " Mr. Dapple," the ex-nurse did indeed say, in a voice which seemed to be more or less disguised by the heavy THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IX. 351 veil through which it came, — u Mr. Dapple, I should not have intruded here while you were so ill, if I hadn't felt that I could say something to comfort you." Again the Toyman's eyes opened in a wild stare, and he seemed to shudder and grow whiter. " My Father is not fit for the least excitement, as you ought to be able to see for yourself 1" cried Dollie, dis- tressed and angry. " He can't talk to you, Mrs. Dedley." " Have patience with me, my dear young lady. I am sure that what I want to say will do him no harm. It is something that I learned once in a hospital." The sick man opened his mouth, as though to speak ; but, instead of doing so, placed his hands convulsively over his face, and so rested perfectly still. " I was once very sick in Riverside Hospital," began Mrs. Dedley, her voice alone showing that she was affected by this indication of emotion, " and had a bed next to a poor woman who was there with what was taken to be a fracture of the skull. We became acquainted ; and, be- fore her end came, she told me her name and her history. She was the wife — the passionate, undutiful, unworthy wife, she said — of a poor Toyman named Dapple " " Lydia !" cried the sick man — " Lydia !" and shook with the sob choked back by his trembling hands. Dollie, paralyzed by the words and their effect, sat staring aghast at the veiled woman. — " She told me," continued the latter, in an agitated tone, " that, in her self-will, bad temper, jealousy and selfishness, she had been a misery to her poor husband, and a cruel Stepmother to his motherless daughter ; — and that she was penitent for it then — truly, sincerely penitent — and hoped that they would forgive her when she was dead. She told me that, having quarrelled with 352 THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES E*. her husband one day, and wrought him up to frenzy by her abuse of his daughter and of something he was trying to invent, he threw a heavy piece of clock-work at her in his madness !" " Oh, my merciful God !" groaned Geoffrey Dapple, burying his face in the pillow, and clutching at the bed on which he lay, " I did ! I did !" " It only grazed her hair," added the woman hurriedly, " and, striking the wall, fell upon a chair ; but she, in the intensity of her rage, was willing for him to believe that it had struck her, and, screaming that he had mur- dered her, she fell like a log. In his fright and horror, as she told me, he ran frantically from the room to the street ; and, when he had gone, she made haste to drag the shelf-ladder from the store to the room, and was on it, to hide something which he valued in the high curtain, when, by a miss-step, she fell once again ; and knew no more until she found herself in the Hospital, and was told that she had fractured her skull against a chair." " Oh, Father ! Father !" screamed Dollie, throwing her- self upon her knees beside the bed, and bowing her head upon his arm which she grasped,— -" I knew it ! I knew it !" u Lydia ! Lydia !" moaned the Toyman, " they can not bring you back again ; they can not bring you back again !" " The watch once her's was stolen at last from me, to whom she gave it," said Mrs. Dedley, in a shaking voice. " and I heard that it had strangely fallen into your hands, and have come to — " here she fell on her knees beside his daughter, and, casting back bonnet and veil with one convulsive gesture, revealed a face white as his own and THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IN. 353 eyes streaming over with tears — " have come," she sobbed, " to ask my husband's forgiveness !" "Lydia!" shrieked Geoffrey Dapple, wrenching him- self upward, as in a last struggle with death, — But her arms were about his neck before he could say more. — "I am your penitent, unworthy wife, Geoffrey, — com- ing back at last when I heard of your suffering and had guessed its cause. Forgive me, my husband ! and believe that I am a different woman from her who did indeed die to all of her former evil self in that hospital ward !" Then, if never before, Miss Dapple came very near fainting ; for she was weak and worn from long watching. Then, if never before, did the old Toyman laugh and cry like a boy ; for younger days had come back to him from the dead. Lydia Dapple lived ; but, in her resurrection, Mrs. Ded- ley had passed, like a dissipated shadow, from amongst the living. The two women, though occupying adjacent beds in Riverside Hospital, were numbered on the cards at their heads in the order of their arrival ; and these cards having been accidently exchanged by a careless nurse after the House-Physician had written his directions upon them, and before the personalities of the scarcely conscious patients were familiarly known — the dying wo- man became Mrs. Dapple, and Mrs. Dedley she who was destined to recover. When some degree of composure was recovered in that eventful room of the Walking Doll ; when Geoffrey, still scarcely credulous of the Miracle, but perfectly assured of his ability to dress presently, lay looking into his wife's loving eyes and drawing her arm closer about his neck ; when pretty Dollie, after a series of rather hysteri- cal demonstrations, and a fly-out at Algernon Skeggs for 354 THE LAST OF THE THREE COMES IN. asking through the key-hole what the row was, had quieted down to an unbelieving stare at the bonnet and veil on the floor ; — then she told them this : and more. — That, upon hearing the dying woman whispered about as Xydia Dapple, and comprehending that her own hus- band was too ill to come to her ; she, in her remorse and shame for the distempered nature bringing her there, had resolved to let her name rest with the departing sufferer, and commence a new life under the name exchanged. That, believing the Toyman and his daughter would be much the happier for relief from her, she had determined that they should never behold her in this life again ; and, as the likeliest means of keeping beyond their recogni- tion after the pauper burial of the real Mrs. Dedley, had — under that friendless woman's nominal semblance, — asked and secured a p]ace as nurse in the hospital. That, she had, after long and faithful service there, been perse- cuted by the wild young students, and almost brought to disgrace by a servant's familiarity with her false name ; and finally championed to triumph and an honorable place in his mother's household by Theodore Danforth. That, she had learned, from Miss Lardner's conversation, of her husband's strange recovery of the watch stolen from her in the street ; and that later revelations had led her to the hope that she might make some atonement to those who had suffered so much from her in the past, by returning, as from the dead, to them again. " Often and often," she concluded, " before I ever thought of entering, or being known to you as in life, I have passed and repassed the store ; trusting to my veil and altered form for disguise, and sometimes even peer- ing in through the window." And in the great joy and sunshine of the heart, thus don't you see how it was ? 355 coming into her home, where such sorrow and darkness had been, with the Last of the Three lookers-in at the window, Dollie — happy though she was — bowed her head for a moment to the mask of her dimpled hand, and gave one kind, regretful, grateful thought to Doctor Canary. XLIII. don't you see how it was? AT about that hour in the morning of New Year's Day when the most stylish young men issue forth to begin their " Calling,'' the melancholy drayman, equipped in cloak, sombrero, eyeglasses, and black worsted gloves, presented himself at the door of Mrs. Haggle's sitting-room, and bade her take note that he was going out. As a perfect hurricane of rain and sleet was raging out-doors at the moment, and Mr. Aster's countenance wore anything but that carte-de-visite simper of complacency which generally intellectualizes and beautifies the features of him who expects to do several miles of the highest female fashion before dark, the manly landlady heard him with masculine astonishment, and curtly inquired if he was crazy ? " Do my eyes roll, Madam ?" questioned he in re- turn, as he paused like a doubtful ghost in the doorway. a Have I got wisps of straw in my hair ?" " That's you, Aster ! JSTever give a Woman a civil answer if you can help it ; because she, being a member of the weaker sex in law, can't defend herself." 35 G don't you see how it was ? There was some of the old-time Sorosism in this re- mark ; yet, withal, it was delivered with a chastened sad- ness of tone appealing effectively to the bitter young man's softer nature. " Be forbearing with me, Mrs. Haggle," he said, re- garding her with apologetic eyeglasses. a Such is the pressure of misfortune upon my brain and heart, that I look upon the tempest outside as a brother, and almost hesitate to qualify its sympathy with an umbrella. Let the wind howl, the thunder roar, and the lightning flash " " It's January, Aster." " I mean let the avalanche roar and the snow flash," exclaimed he, unabashed, "and they will be nothing to the elemental warfare now raging in this — in this chest." " Then you ought to take some medicine, instead of going out," observed the lady, with maternal as- perity. Turning stony in his stare, at this harrowing miscon- ception, the metaphysical drayman coldly extricated from under his left arm a cotton umbrella, which, from innu- merable wettings and dryings, had assumed the shape of a stout Dutch female, and, slowly unbuttoning the elastic girdle about its frowzy waist, made this reply : " We have seen trouble enough here within a week, Madam, to justify me in language much more figurative ; but you have no imagination, and would perceive colic in the last piteous moanings of supreme despair. I am going to Lardner's." u That's English, and I can understand it," returned Mrs. Haggle, not ill-nataredly. " I feel as badly as you do, after the sad week we've had of it; but I don't see don't you see how it was? 357 the sense of going on about it like a play-actor. Do go, though, if you're going." Greatly refreshed by this conversation, inasmuch as it had made him much more miserable than before, the platonic husband of Misfortune prowled out to the street, with his cotton Dutch female bobbing over him like a guardian ballet angel on one leg. Wrapped in his woes and cloak to the tip of his nose, and crowned with de- spair and his sombrero from thence upward, he presented such a fierce and foreign aspect to the few maniac- " callers" also battling with the stormy humors of the inclement promenade, that they took him alternately for the Spanish Consul, and the Mexican minister, and wondered what could be the matter in Cuba, or Sinaloa ? Quite careless of comment and misapprehension, and as unconcerned by the possibility that an exceptional poetic eye might look upon him and his perverse um- brella as a striking picture of Doctor Faustus struggling to withstand the arch temptations of Mephistophiles, he performed alternate quicksteps and can-cans with the im- petuous Dutch female on corners where the music of the gale waxed most furious ; occasionally chasseing to a lamp-post, and balancing to the side of a house, with a solemn vivacity not to be described. The main wind happening to blow in the direction of Lardner Place, Mr. Aster, finally dragged to the very doorsteps of the Lardner mansion through all the giddy mazes of the intervening ballet, was there making a grand concluding pirouette in supposed saltatorial en- treaty that his umbrella would come down and shut up, when that excited old Dutch girl, after giving him a last whirl against a tree-box, incontinently turned inside out, and became an elongated fan in his feverish grasp. This 358 don't you see how it was? was mortifying ; this was what you might call intolerably dampening ; and when the old Alphonse opened the door, the bone eyeglasses fairly blazed at him with all the luminous properties of intense aggravation. " Take that, and throw it to the dogs!" hissed the in- censed drayman, handing the wreck of cotton and the crash of whalebone to the as usual fascinated footman. " It has played me false, like everything else. I was born to be ruined by its sex !" This last strong expression seemed to give the dazed servitor a vague idea, for an instant, that the eccentric visitor might really have picked up some demoralized old female on the end of a stick ; and, after closing the street-door, he dropped the bedraggled and dislocated skeleton in some confusion. " Lardner's in, I suppose ?" were the words quickly rousing him to reason again. " Ye-yes, Sir. Shall I t-take your cloak, Mr. Aster ?" " No !" said the dripping drayman, hastily. " My — but no matter. Show me in, boy." In the very same Third-parlor where he had first seen Mr. Lardner after the memorable carriage-accident, that gentleman and his daughter were now awaiting his ar- rival, and arose from their chairs with more than usual quickness to greet him as he entered. Lucy, attired in a royal purple velvet, presented a beauty finely heightened by the flush of anticipated excitement, while even her father's countenance expressed unwonted animation. " So, John, you have come, this time," cried Mr. Lard- ner, with a familiarity of manner characteristic of the occasion. " I hope you begin the fresh year with spirits more promising than the weather." " Thank yon. Happy New Years!" was the sentcn- don't you see how it was? 359 tious answer, as, with a stiff bow to Uncle and Cousin, the damp drayman took a seat between them before the fire, and immediately trailed several little rills from his wet cloak to the carpet. "Dear me! Won't you remove your cloak, Cousin Jack 2" was the impulsive first greeting from Lucy. _ " Certainly," added her father, rather dashed by the really lamentable aspecj of the guest. "I must beg that you will not notice my clothes," re- plied Aster, with increasing stiffness. " Judge me by my mind, if you please, and not by my outer garments." " Who said anything about judging you, John ?" asked Mr. Lardner, much ruffied. " It is customary, I believe, to expect of a friendly visitor that he shall not sit down in a parlor with his hat on ; and that wet cloak looks real- ly unfriendly here." "If you force me to explain," retorted the irritable drayman, turning savagely upon him, "I beg leave to remind you, Lardner, that a man with some gentlemanly pride in his soul may have certain good reasons for wish- ing to hide his — I mean, he may not wish ail creation to behold the rents the envious Casca made in — certain arti- cles of his wearing apparel," " Bless my heart !" exclaimed Lardner, with additional heat. "Do as you please about it, John." " Perhaps Mr. Aster can not yet condescend so far as to recognize us as friends," remarked Miss Lardner, with impatient haughtiness. " I have the best of reasons for supposing your father to be a member of the i Society of Friends,' Lucy," re- sponded the embittered man, with elaborate enunciation. " I don't know what you mean." " This," said Aster, pointedly ; " that I notice in him 360 don't you see now it was? the Quaker's custom of addressing comparative strangers by their Christian names." Up sprang Mr. Lardner, fiery in the face, and appear- ing inclined to adopt extreme measures. " I can not stand it !" he ejaculated, meeting the deprecating look of his daughter. " Here have yon and I been doing this young man the kindest offices for months, and you see what in- tolerable airs he still assumes ! Christian names, indeed ! What do you mean, sir, by daring to address me as you do?" To his unparalleled amazement, the exasperated old gentleman found himself forced back into his chair the next moment by several wet folds of Spanish cloak ; for the nervous drayman had risen upon him at the very in- stant of the question, and did not resume his own chair until he was sure that no one else remained stand- ing. " Shall I ring for Alphonze, Pa?" cried Lucy, catching her breath with indignation. " Lucy !" exclaimed Aster, quickly, in a tone of re- proof ; turning to the daughter, though he still held the father down by the knees, " Lucy ! What am I to think of such treatment as this ? Was it for this that Theodore Danforth hinted me into coming here to-day ?" " Who ?" cried Mr. Lardner, forgetting his wrath in his sudden surprise. " Why, Lucy, I thought you were the one who told him to come ?" "Didn't I tell you at the opera, the other evening, that you must come?" asked the young lady, forget ting her indignation, too, at the sound of Theodore's name. Staring from one to the other, the drayman's fierce face gradually acquired the stonily blank expression don't you see how it was % 361 which almost any familiar address seemed capable of giv- ing it, and, sinking rigidly back in his chair, he passion- ately slapped his forehead. " Am I indeed mad ?" he muttered, shaking his head at nothing. " Does this spinning of my mind so frequent- ly, indicate that I have gone mad?" iC Nothing but madness can possibly excuse your as- tounding conduct with us, sir, at any rate !" exclaimed his Uncle, with renewed irritation. " Are we to bespeak a straight-jacket for you ; or can you attain and protract a lucid interval with enough success to understand what I have to tell you respecting the sudden change in your home prospects ?" The mentally tortured young man glared at him a moment with a look of the most petrified and glassy mel- ancholy, and then abruptly extended a wet hand to either of his sorely-tried relatives. " Forgive me," he murmured, dismally. " Trouble has unseated my intellect, and I am not what I was before woman's malignity and scarlet fever robbed me of a fath- er and a son." "A son !" echoed Lucy, turning very pale. " An adopted son, of the name of Goggle." iC Goggle!'' re-echoed Mr. Lardner. " Why that was the name of the fellow who stole the watch which you w T ere arrested for — " "Hay?" Both father and daughter jumped almost out of their chairs as this indescribably sharp exclamation split their ears ; but, after shooting it into the startled air, the wet drayman grew staring and rigid again, though with his mouth wide open. " He's mad — no doubt about it," panted Mr. Lardner, 16 362 don't you see how it was ? with an alarmed glance at his daughter. " He's more fit for a lunatic asylum than for his father's arms." " His morbid pride, Pa," whispered Lucy, flurriedly, — " you spoke so bluntly about that shameful arrest !" " Oh ! I beg his pardon !" said the gentleman, sar- castically. " I forgot what a sensitive flower he -was. Possibly he may be too delicate to hear that his father's house is open to him again. I don't know that I shall be able to put it tenderly enough for his nerves." Snapping his jaws together, and, with eyes still set, leaning toward his uncle, the half-paralyzed drayman brought one of his damp hands down upon the nearer avuncular knee with a stinging slap. " Tell me what you have to tell, or I shall foam at the mouth in another five minutes," he said, with abrupt and ominous calmness. "My mind spins; I would know what is the meaning of this life of mine. You have spoken of my Father. What of him ?" " Yery well then ! but don't slap me again like that, sir!" fumed Lucy's papa, peevishly rubbing his knee. " JSTow stop glaring at nothing, and hear me. Owing to a terrible and shocking discovery in regard to a person named Danforth, supposed to have been dead long ago, Mrs. Aster has been compelled to withdraw from your father's house. In short, her former husband, from whom she had neglected to obtain a divorce because the papers had announced his death, wrote her a letter last week — " " Stop !" interrupted Aster, in frantic haste. " Why, what now, man ?" " Let us retire to another room," said the drayman, speaking precipitately behind his hand ; " this is too im- moral, Lardner, to be told in a woman's presence. Re- member your daughter, Sir, remember your daughter !" don't you see how it was? 363 Up sprang the unreasonable old gentleman to his feet again in a fresh burst of exasperation ; but before he could utter the first of the indignant words that choked him, the parlor door was flung violently open, and Al- phonse, his face colorless and convulsed, darted madly in as though pursued by a phantom, and, after one wild look at Mr. Aster, crouched gibbering behind his master's just vacated chair. ""What under heaven — !" exclaimed Mr. Lardner; and he had advanced a step to pull away the chair, when a shriek from Lucy, and an aerial leap to the rug by the drayman, attracted his attention to another quarter. Entering the door, with sombrero in hand, bone eye- glasses on nose, and wet Spanish cloak floating from man- ly shoulders, was another Jack Aster — the very type and model of him by the fire ! Catching sight of the latter, this astounding apparition stopped suddenly ; a look of grave surprise faded from its face under one of stony amazement, and the sombrero fell to the floor; — while the old Alphonse gibbered afresh, Mr. Lardner reeled panic-stricken to the mantel, and Lucy sat like one petrified. " Hay ?" screamed the apparition, making the very chandelier tingle. "Hay?" shouted the drayman, causing the very win- dows to vibrate. And, with one headlong leap from either way, the Man and His Double were in each other's arms ! " My long-lost Brother !" howled the drayman. " My lost long Brother !" clamored the apparition. "Brother?" ejaculated Mr. Lardner, staring incredu- lously at the interlocked pile of Spanish cloaks, eyeglasses, curly heads, and moustaches. 364: don't you see how it was ? " ~Broth-er /" repeated Lucy, panting for breath. " Burrother ?" gasped Alphonse, peering fearfully over tlie back of the chair. Releasing each other from that first frantic embrace, the handsome twin brothers — for such they were — shook hands as frantically, and then, still hand in hand, faced father and daughter. " In the name of all that is overwhelming, who are you f " asked Mr. Lardner, addressing the apparition. " John Philip Aster, Uncle, — formerly called Philip, but more recently Jack, — of the United States gunboat Chawuppa," was the answer. " And who are you ?" almost shrieked Lucy, walking mechanically at the — other one. " John Francis Aster — formerly of the volunteer army and always called John — now of the Drayman's Protec- tive Union," returned he, beginning to stare around wild- ly again. " Drayman I" echoed Philip, with a start. " Why then yours is the dray they've been bewildering me about !" " Gunboat !" retorted John, with a stare — " why then you must be the - loyal sailor'!" " You came to this house and stayed awhile before you went to the war?" panted Lucy, appealing, with dilated eyes, to the drayman. " No, that was I," said the sailor. " Then you, Philip, — oh dear! — came here that day when — when Dollie was in the closet?" "No ; that was myself," said the drayman. "While the utterly bewildered girl stood motionless, with her hands pressed to her eyes, her scarcely less distracted father approached the equally puzzled brothers. don't you see how it was ? 365 " You" he said, touching the drayman's arm, " saw my daughter at the Opera a few nights ago V 9 " I did, you mean," cried the sailor. " Very well. (If I'm not dreaming !) Then you, Philip, were with Lucy and Mr. Pamunkey at Central Park." "I tell you /was the one!" exclaimed the drayman, showing some irascibility. ! Gaping from one to the other in densest confusion, the overwhelmed Uncle stood stock-still beside his similarly overcome daughter ; and the aged Alphonse, presuming upon his long and faithful service in the family, advanced nervously from his recent covert, and ventured to speak. "It's begging your pardon, Sir," he quavered, to the sailor, " but you're the Mr. Aster, I think, who came to the Ball that night, and went into Mr. Lardner's room ?" "i"was at the Ball, dunce !" snapped the drayman. « And at the Dinner Party, too, Sir, of course ?" " No ! no ! that was myself," corrected the sailor, also exhibiting some impatience, and staring very much in his brother's fashion. As Alphonse fell back, smiling in a dismayed and tru- ly ghastly manner, Mr. Lardner made another desperate effort to convince himself that he was not a victim of night- mare, or some other nocturnal effect of indigestion. He addressed Philip : " Did you, or did you not, carry back that stolen infant of Mrs. Aster's ?" "Lardner, you know /did," growled Jack Aster. " Then you, only," added Lardner, turning confidently to the drayman, — " you, only, have been in your Father's house since you first left him." " I went there once — " began the drayman. u I went there once — " interrupted the sailor. 366 DON'T YOU 8EE HOW IT WAS? " And my Stepmother — " said the drayman, raising his voice. " And my Stepmother — " insisted the sailor, sharply. " Talked me out of house and home," concluded the drayman, desperately. " Talked me out of house and home," shouted the sail- or, simultaneously. Throwing up his hands in despair at this blending of the two in one again, Mr. Lardner sank into a chair, ex- hausted, and Lucy tried once more. " Cousin John," she said, with deprecating tone and look, to the drayman, u didn't you tell me, after being at the table with poor Mr. Kichardson that day, that you must retire instantly because you felt sure he suspected you of — of a c-r-ime ?" "Now Cousiu Lucy," broke in Philip, " you ought to remember that /told you that. I was sure he must have heard about that outrageous watch business of mine." " Hay ?" shouted the drayman, recoiling from his bro- ther, " are you the one who took the watch I've been driven mad about ?" " And are you the one who carried away the babe I've been persecuted for ?" cried the sailor, also recoiling. Here Mr. Lardner resigned his seat to Lucy, and, after desiring the footman to order the carriage, interfered as a peace-maker. " I am beginning to see now," he said, " how all this distracting confusion has come about. You are marve- lously alike in personal aspects, certainly, and your simi- larity of dress, eyeglasses, and tones of voice is enough to make a man doubt his own eyes and ears. Now that you are side by side, there is a slight difference — John, I think, is the least bit taller, and his expression don't you see how it was? 367 of face the more — stern." (He was actually tempted to say " stupid.") " But if you, Philip, will just give us a brief account of yourself for the last three months, we may untangle the knot more readily. — Suppose we all take chairs, though, first." The latter proposition being practically acceded to, — the damp drayman drawing Iris chair toward that of the still overpowered Lucy, and the moist sailor his toward that of his Uncle — Philip told his story. " On the very day of my coming ashore," said he, " I happened to be one of a crowd gathered around the wagon of a tooth-powder mountebank in Chatham Square. While I was listening with the rest to the quack's doggerel address, some one called out a warning against pickpockets, and, in almost the same instant, a strange-looking old man near me missed his watch, and was prompted by some scamp at his elbow to accuse me of the theft ! This he did, and with such nervous vio- lence, that I, to show him all I carried in my pocket, drew out my handkerchief, and, to my unspeakable hor- ror, the watch with it ! How it ever came there, Heaven only knows. Probably the real thief put it there to es- cape detection by a notorious detective in the crowd. At any rate, I was as innocent as innocence itself. Of course I was arrested, taken before a Police Justice — and couldn't clear myself. — How could I ? — What was worse, the notorious detective I have mentioned was pre- sent, and revealed my name. How he found it out I don't know yet ; but he asked me before the justice if it was not mine, and I was too proud to deny it. Seeing myself helpless, as it were, to escape imprisonment for a crime of which I was not guilty, I — well, I d id escape at once ; that's the whole of it. Punning from mistaken 368 don't you see how it was ? justice, I managed to reach a sailor's boarding- house in Water Street ; but had scarcely got indoors when detec- tive Stalker was there, too. Instead of arresting me, however, he mysteriously turned friend, and hinted that, by a little smart disguising, I might elude recapture until something should turn up in my favor. Having a big hat and cloak among my traps, (such as John and I had bought for ourselves just before leaving home and when thinking of going "West,) I asked Stalker how they would do ; and he said. ' Just the things.' He also ad- vised the cheap eyeglasses — which really contain window- glass only — and so I came to be dressed in my present style. At that time I was not aware of my father's resi- dence in this city ; until to-day I have been entirely igno- rant of the whereabouts of my brother ; even of his very existence. I came here to the dinner-party, Uncle ; be- cause I had seen a ' letter ' advertised as remaining in the Post Office for ' John Aster,' and, upon obtaining it, had found, to my unbounded astonishment, that it was an invitation (for me, as I thought,) from Cousin Lucy. I came, and was shocked at your matter-of-fact way of re- ceiving me ; not knowing, of course, that I was taken for one not quite such a stranger. You know how I left the house again that day, Cousin Lucy 1 After that I paid a visit to Dollie at her Father's store ; and, when she had thrown me into a perfectly reckless state of mind by the most bewildering hints about drays, stolen infants, and I don't know what else, Mr. Dapple came suddenly upon us, and I then realized, for the first time, that he was the old man of that name who had lost the watch so strangely found upon me. He was at me at once about it in an as- tonishingly violent manner, and I fairly ran for it again. Subsequently I learned from Stalker where my father don't you see now it was? 369 lived, and went there, and was spurned by my Father, and talked into the street by his wife. I saw Cousin Lucy in a box at the Opera the other evening, introduced myself, and was invited to come here to-day ; but even some of her remarks were so incomprehensible to me that I was fairly frightened away before my time. I may say to you now, Uncle and Cousin both, that the in- justice and bewilderment I have suffered during the last three months should be credited for such signs of demoral- ization as you may have reprobated in my conduct here and elsewhere. Cruelly forced to go about in disguise, rebuffed and hopelessly puzzled at every friendly point, and obliged to live wretchedly in obscure quarters, my old pride has been maddened into a kind of despairing audacity, the latest offence of which, in the opera-box, will be pardoned, I hope, by my Cousin Lucy." This story, throwing satisfactory light as it did on se- veral hitherto perplexing Asterial phenomena, was heard, with many starts and interchanged glances, by listeners deeply interested ; and, at its conclusion, the drayman was caught in the act of attempting a strange guttural sound, which, but for his want of practice, might have passed for a laugh. Then Mr. Larduer told the equally curious story which Philip's arrival had so summarily interrupted. Passing lightly over the preluding diplomacy practiced by Lucy and himself on behalf of their two present guests in one, he briefly described the amazing events recently transpir- ing in Jenkins Place, his own last visit there, the unpre- cedented affidavit of Mr. Goggle, the elder Aster's curi- ous electrification into comparative health by the shock of calamity, and his final consent to a reconciliation with his sons. 16* 370 don't you see how it was? " Expecting to see John, only, here to-day," said Mr. Lardner, " I had determined that, after hearing all this, he should go immediately with me in the carriage to his Father, and commence the New Year by a restoration to the affection and bounty of his natural home. Now that both of you have come together in this astonishing man- ner, it seems to me better that I should precede you by a few minutes, and prepare your Father for your arrival in company. As the carriage is ready, I will go at once, leaving you to follow me thither in half an hour or so." With which concise peroration, and a general wishing of Happy New Year all around, the officious dealer in bides took temporary leave of the twin-brothers and his daughter, and bustled away on his congenial mission. Relieved of his presence, the three young people might have found ample subject for a most vivacious conversa- tion during the alloted half-hour, and Philip and his lovely cousin did indeed discuss the wonders of the situa- tion with marked animation ; but the drayman, though not quite so stony and bolt-upright as before, still main- tained a chilling taciturnity, and occasionally startled the others by hoarsely laughing to himself in a very depress- ing manner. " By the way, Jack," Philip said at last, hoping to per- suade him into something like sociality, " as the murder seems to be out about that incomprehensible watch, I may as well take off these ridiculous eyeglasses for good," and, at the word, he removed those reflective ornaments from his nose. Then was seen the most notable difference between the twi n -brothers ; fur, being thus relieved of their disguise, the ex-sailor's winking black e} T es at once characterized his whole face with an expression much milder than sat don't tou see how it was? 371 enthroned still upon the whole saturnine countenance of the sourer drayman. " I'd take off the cloak, too, Cousin Lucy," added Philip, with an embarrassed laugh ; " but the fact is, my solitary dress-suit has sustained certain humiliating disas- ters since that day of the dinner-party." It may be remarked that, from the moment when the separate identities of the young men were clearly defined, Miss Lardner had regarded John Francis Aster with a certain startled shyness ; which increased to such an ex- tent after John Philip's confession, that, since her father's departure, she had seemed fairly afraid to even look at him. Now, though, that Philip had opened a way for her, she blushed at the stern drayman with what courage she could muster, and asked if he could not take off his eyeglasses, too ? " I can not, Miss Lardner," was his freezing response. " They are part of my natural misfortunes ; and were I to remove them, your face would at once appear to me like a piece of chalk with three holes in it, and my brother's head like a weak cabbage with a black cloth on top of it. 1 pray you two to go on, and not mind me." There was a tone of fresh injury in this, and the com- parison of the "weak cabbage " had a sound of fraternal sarcasm hard to bear ; but Lucy, with a quick and not seriously unpleased discernment of the real inspiration of such crustiness, made haste to change the subject before more could be said in that vein. " Cousin Jack," said she, with a bright air of mock- reproof, " you deserve every bit that you've suffered, for not giving some explanation of yourself that day when poor Dollie Dapple came out of the closet up-stairs. If 372 don't you see how it was? you had never seen her before, how could you dare to — do what you did to her " " Hay ?" exclaimed Philip, starting with electrical sud- denness, and fixing a loot of keen distrust upon his brother. " O, dear ! — I mean — please explain it to him, John !" cried she, in dismay. " Being as much in the dark about everything as your- self, Lucy Lardner," observed the drayman, aggravated by the fact that his brother's exclamation had made him jump in an undignified manner ; " I merely placed a brief kiss upon the young woman's brow." " Kissed my Dollie !" ejaculated Philip, bouncing from his chair. " One small one," said Jack Aster, laconically. " Cousin Lucy," observed the now agitated sailor twin, breathing short, and hurriedly picking his sombrero from the floor, " it occurs to me that I had better see my father a little before the time mentioned by your father, as I have not been expected there like John. I'd better have my scene over first. With your permission I'll take a horse car at once. — Not an instant to lose. — Should have thought of it before. An revoirP And before the dis- concerted girl could remonstrate he was hastening to the street. Lucy, from a brief, distressed look at the door through which he had so abruptly retreated, turned her gaze to the unmoved drayman before the fire, and, after waiting in vain for him to speak first, expressed her own concern for what had happened. " I am so sorry for this !" she disconsolately said. " It was so thoughtless in me." " Don't mind the passionate boy, my girl," muttered don't you see how it was ? 373 Jack Aster, moodily. u Or if you must miud him," he added, with sullen earnestness, " wait until you can do so without tearing another man's heart to pieces !" Lucy inexplicably smiled at this ; even blushed a little ; and drew her chair a short distance farther away from the intense young man. " Now that I know it was he whom we first knew, and who was here to dine, and saw me at the Opera," she said, scarcely knowing what else to say, " I feel almost better acquainted with him than with you." Turning himself, chair and all, to get a better view of her face, the drayman leaned sharply toward her with a dark look upon his own countenance. 6i At dinner and the opera ?" growled he. " Can it be that he has ever dared to exact more than a distant cousin's limited privilege ? Hay, girl ?" " No, Sir ! He has not half of your impudence !" re- plied Lucy, flushing, and drawing still farther away. " The utmost liberty he ever took, Sir, was to squeeze — " « Hay ?" — " Dear me ! — You'll drive me wild — He only squeezed my hand, I say, as he told me of his alarm at what Mr. Richardson had said." 44 That's enough !" thundered the drayman, rising from his chair with fierce precipitation, " that's enough ! It occurs to me that I had better fly to my Father's at once, to see that this stripling does not undermine me there, too. This indeed is bitterness. I go." Yes ! In the fell jealousy and suspicion of a fine na- ture rasped by adversity, he went scowling away through the rain and sleet, leaving the thoroughly discouraged girl to wish she had never been born. Man is a strange being, and it is curious that no author ever remarked it before. 374 LOVE PAYS FOE ALL. XLIY. LOYE PAYS FOR ALL. IF the buckskin horse, " Mercutio," has been kept in obscurity during the latter portions of this history, the sound critic will understand that the historian's pur- pose in such obscuration has been artistic, or devised with a view to the more brilliant farewell appearance of the vivacious steed in question. As the Outcast of in- tense character, who, through four and three-quarter acts of the play, has scuffled, stamped, and muttered in the distance, in shabby attire, suddenly turns-up prancing in the concluding tableau of the Fifth, with such improve- ments of costume and disposition that nothing but cal- cium light can do them justice ; so this buckskin Ham- bletonian, having heretofore deluded everybody but the author into believing him fit only for the dray, now bursts upon the astonished vision in all the glory and dignity of a gentleman's Carriage-horse. A day in the middle of January saw him deporting in a most springy manner, within the dainty shafts of a very glossy, pink-lined coupe, before the familiar door of the house in Dame Street ; a gorgeous silver-mo anted harness frescoing him into such a series of fluted buckskin pan- els as only a silver-handled whip could give the finishing touches to, and a colored coachman, in buff livery with plate buttons, sitting up behind to teach him all the fash- ionable equine dances. Thus beautifully come into his property and rightful rank at last, — though still wearing LOYE PAYS FOR ALL. 375 reduced bandages on two ankles as certificates of speed — this buckskin horse did so aristocratically champ his bit, and clatter an exact imitation of a furious runaway on the cobble stones beneath him, that Mrs. Haggle, glancing out of her parlor window as she stood talking with his master, declared that he looked and acted as though he knew nothing of a dray, save as some coarse, imaginary, hideous sort of thing, used exclusively by the very lowest classes. Two weeks of prosperity had wrought almost as great an external change in Jack Aster himself : for on this day his Spanish cloak was nowhere to be seen ; he wore a but- toned furzy blue coat reaching but a few inches below his hips, and his nether garments of similar material were of a strained tightness to suggest that the wearer was about to undergo bleeding of the feet for some abstruse pedicular disorder. In fact, without the once-inseparable Spanish wrapper, and in this opposite extreme of costume, Mr. Aster certainly had the lank, anatomical effect of a tall fountain with the water cut off; yet the eyeglasses and foreign expression of countenance remained to shed a re- proving gloom upon whomsoever should presume to smile at the remaining transformation, and he held in his right hand the same enormous sombrero which had so long served him in the place, of intellect with all his female acquaintances. u That conceited limb of a horse puts on as many airs as any Saratoga hotel-clerk," observed Mrs. Haggle, u and I suppose that homely dog, too, will be taking himself for a greyhound by the time he's been with you for an- other fortnight." Then was it observable, that a fancy leather thong in the ex-drayman's left hand led to a chain-collar on the 376 LOVE PAYS TOR ALL. neck of a dingy-white cur, whose broad, impassible coun- tenance, and stumpy ears and tail, were marvels of econ- omized expression. "Mercutio is but a horse," returned Aster, with much gloom of sentiment, "and no longer follows straw-beds when oats have become his portion ; this dog is only a bone-setter, and will forget bones when accustomed to ' point ' beefsteak ; but I'm a Man, Madam, — a Man, by heavens ! — and, as I've told you already, can never drop from grateful remembrance the friends of my darker days. I've told you my main purpose in calling here this after- noon — to offer you the position of Housekeeper to Philip and myself while our Father is abroad. In another fort- night the place will be ready for you." " Do I understand, Aster, that the position would im- pose no restrictions upon me on the ground of my sex ?" asked the landlady, clasping her hands behind her, and chewing a wisp of broom; " do I understand that I shall have all the rights of both sexes?" " Every human right compatible with a desire for oc- casional silence and an eternal abjuration of hash on the part of my brother and self," said Mr. Aster, persuad- ingly. " You may shave if you wish to, practice on a velocipede, and sing baritone. I w T ant you with us on any terms, Mrs. Haggle ; for I cannot forget your kind- ness to poor little Goggle. I've ordered a monument for him, — a broken pillar, shaped like a half-burnt segar, with a fire-cap carved on the side." Saying this, the ex-drayman became tremulous in his tone, and, after Mrs. Haggle had promised to consider his proposition, beat a hasty retreat to the street with Daddy, where an assumption of the sombrero gave him a most parasol-like appearance. LOVE PAYS FOR ALL. 377 " To Lardner Place," he said to the coachman ; and, with a tragic farewell wave of the hand toward the par- lor-window, he stepped into the coupe with the dog, and the buckskin horse started off in style. The progress of the equipage across town was like that of some very heavy engine on cog-wiieels ; for " Mercu- tio," like many other new comers into wealth and fashion, rather overdid the style of the period, and alternated each spasmodic little skip forward with such a long in- terval of unprogressive clatter-dancing that the journey bade fair to require about a week. Having noticed that high-mettled prancers of the ton generally strove to con- vey to all observers the impression that they were only re- fraining from running away until they could be sure of tak- ing off nothing but aristocratic wheels in their flight, and so getting brilliantly into the papers, this buckskin parve- nu simulated the most inordinate terror of every earthly sight and sound which had been daily familiar to him for the last quarter of a century, and stopped so often to chatter a panic with his hoofs, that the coupe was like a yacht struggling against a head-gale. As in former times, too, his wall-eye was continually deluding him into the be- lief that the next corner on that side was somewhere about the middle of the nearest brown-stone front ; to which delusion he always yielded at that particular moment when the unhappy coachman fondly supposed that he had concluded to dance in a straight line for at least an- other half-mile. As Mr. Aster aided these high-strung proceedings by shaking his fist at the showy animal out of one side of the carriage, while Daddy, erect on his hind legs, barked incessantly from the other, it may be imagined that the pageant was an unspeakable delight to the populace, many of whose younger members gave au- 378 LOVE PAYS FOE ALL. dible expression to the playful fancy, that if the turn-ont didn't reach the Pound before sunset, the swell inside wouldn't get his fifty cents for his terrier. Such being the harrowing incidents of Mr. Aster's ride to Lardner Place, it was not surprising that, when he finally pulled the bell of the Lardner mansion, it was with the ferocious violence of some aggravated bandit jerking his poniard from the wound in an exasperating traveler's breast. The old footman, who answered the summons as usual, began a deprecatory smile of welcome on catching first sight of the big hat ; but, on beholding the cur still led by the ex-drayman, all his old bewilderment of aspect re- turned, and he could only conduct the scowling guest to the parlor, much as he might have preceded an eccentric ghost to some particular tomb in which it had desired to rest for the night. Lucy, as by apparent preparation for the call, was there to receive her Cousin, in her most becoming attire, and advanced toward the doorway to meet him with a charming fiush of welcome on her cheeks. This last, however, gave way to the momentary pallor of star- tled amazement, when the tightly-dressed young man, after briefly greeting her, let the dog loose in the room. " Good gracious ! what's that ?" she cried, with a fright- ened motion toward stepping upon the sofa. "AVho brought the awful creature here ?" " Don't be alarmed, child," said Aster, smiling grimly at her trepidation. "He will not hurt you. He's per- fectly gentle to everything but cats." " But what made you bring him here ?" exclaimed the young lady, still nervously excited. LOTE PAYS FOR ALL. 379 " Because," returned Mr. Aster, solemnly, — " because he was the father of my adopted son, now no more." At this astonishing explanation, Miss Lardner dropped into a chair and stared with point-blank wonder at both man and dog. " The — the father of — ?" there she stopped. " That dog," resumed the ex-drayman, also taking a chair, " bears the sacred name of Daddy, because he loved and protected my poor street-boy, whose earthly father was the real brute." If this farther elucidation was not quite so perspicuous as it might have been, the young lady understood enough from it to perceive that her Cousin's peculiarity in this instance was influenced by a civilized human feeling, and she at once -decided to be amiable again. Daddy, as though instinctively aware of this change in his favor, thereupon discontinued a minute inspection of each arti- cle of furniture which he had promptly set-about upon entering the parlor; and, establishing himself bolt-up- right upon the hearth-rug immediately before the two cousins, regarded them with a scholastic gravity of visage saying plainly : " I will now hear you your lessons, and hope you may know them." " That dog," pursued Aster, with some bitterness in his tone, " was truer to my poor boy than many an earthly father is to his own offspring. Did he turn against the neglected outcast to please any Stepmother 1 No ! Lucy, can you and I look into our hearts and say that our own earthly fathers have been such parents to us that we have no reason to prefer this dog ?" Detecting in this question a certain vague reflection upon Tier earthly father, Miss Lardner's amiability les- sened for an instant. 380 LOVE PAYS FOR ALL. " Please confine your doggy comparisons to your own family, sir !" she replied, resentfully. But noticing the spiritless gleam of the eyeglasses as they redly reflected the fire in the grate, she resumed her more charitable mood, and added sympathetically : " I'm afraid you have not found your restored home all that it might be, Cousin John?" " It might be worse." "Oh!" " I say it might be worse," reiterated Mr. Aster, obsti- nately ; " for it might have a Stepmother in it. As it is, Philip and I have been received back by our Father like a couple of bad greenbacks, which might seriously com- promise him if any farther attempts were made to pass them singly, and which are now to be padded on both sides with good money and finally got rid of in that way. We have our way in his bank account, and can do what we choose about the house ; but all his thoughts are bent upon the quick driving through of certain legal proceed- ings of a revolting character, and all his hope is to get off to Europe when they shall have been finished. All de- vices are useless to make him take a proper interest even in my conversation, and when I said to him at breakfast yesterday, ' Why do you not strive to forget Adelaide, sir, and concentrate all your affection and means on the two Sons who have at length returned to take charge of you V he betrayed symptoms of making a pass at me with the water-decanter." " You should be forbearing with him," urged Lucy : " you should remember that he has suffered, is suffering, much." " And have not I suffered, too ?" asked he, plaintively, with a deeply injured expression of countenance. " See LOVE PAYS FOR ALL. 381 how my pride has been maddened, my mind made to spin, and my heart lacerated. — But enough of this. You got my letter t" " Yes." And Lucy looked shyly to the floor. "With one rasping scrape over the carpet, his chair was close beside her's, and, with another unceremo- nious movement, he possessed himself of her right hand. " In that letter," continued he, in a kind of pathetic growl, " I confessed to you that I was not yet happy ; that I had not found in my long-sequestrated home all the hot, self-sacrificing affection it was my right, as a restored Son, to expect ; and, that my spirit still felt a gloom calculated to almost drive me forth again as a wanderer." " You wrote all that," assented Lucy, softly. " And I meant it, girl, I meant it. Mine is a nature that must and will have affection ; or, in time, it may be soured against all the world. In the masquerade of the last four or five years, all that kept me reconciled to mankind was the faithful affection of a poor little, red- headed waif from the streets, whom I made my adopted son. He is dead, alas ! and now, with all the change in my condition of life, I am a lonely, neglected, unfortu- nate, motherless man." " I'm sure your brother must love you very dearly," murmured Lucy, still gazing downward. " He loves another," said Aster, shortly. " Another — What do you mean, Cousin John ?" u I mean that he loves another woman," rejoined he, irritably, but squeezing her hand. "Beside, he's an equal, and the love of an equal can never satisfy a heart like mine. I require the affection of one who would look 382 LOVE PAYS FOR ALL. up to me, and do my behests. What I yearn for now, child, is a woman's love." The abrupt declaration brought the rich color to his cousin's lovely face once more, and she even made a fluttering effort to withdraw her hand from his grasp. " Can you not win even that — in time ?" she timidly asked, almost in a whisper. " JSot if I must sacrifice my independence of spirit for it," was the fierce answer ; " not if I must sue like a lovesick boy !" "No true woman would ask that of you," cried Lucy, looking up into his face at last with the heroic boldness of the sentiment ; " no true woman ever does wish to see the man to whom she has given all her nature's best love and reverence humbling himself in any species of abase- ment before her, even to hear her speak that love. Once yielding to him the homage of an untrammelled heart, she sees in him something higher, stronger, nobler than herself. Thenceforth she looks up to him as her Master, her hero, her protector, and would have him assert all the superiority those titles imply." " And what," cried Aster, passionately ; seeming to take fire at her sudden enthusiasm ; — " what if he, in his uncontrollable independence of spirit, avowed to her that he was a ritualist, a homoeopathist, and a democrat ?" " Then," responded the girl, lowering her voice again until it was but a murmur, " she, in her great love, would believe that his beins: them made them right !" As she spoke the last word, Mr. Aster laid his manly head upon her shoulder, and, when she would have started away, bound her to the back of the chair with his furzy blue arms. LOVE PATS FOR ALL. 383 " Be calm ! be calm ! or you'll muss my hair," he said, in hurried accents. " But it isn't proper, Cousin Jack," she pleaded, strug- gling and palpitating. " Will you be quiet !" thundered Aster, greatly dis- turbed by the unnatural motion given to his head. " Oh, suppose Pa should come in !" " The dog would make him wish he had'nt, then !" hissed the ex-drayman, simultaneously kissing her pink ear. — " But cease your clamor and listen to me. I am aware, Lucy, of all that you have done to secure my for- giveness for my well-meaning but misguided father, and am determined that you shall be rewarded as you de- serve. In my letter, and in what I recently said, I was sounding you to find out whether you were calculated to make me happy, and you have stood the test creditably. Can you guess, now, the reward 1 would offer ?" The trembling, blushing blonde made another faint struggle to get away from his head, but attempted no audible answer. " I offer you Myself !" he cried, fairly raising her, chair and all, from the ground, in the impetuousness of his crushing embrace. " Yes, Lucy ! I have loved you ever since that night when I came here to pay Lardner for the scratched carriage ; and now repay all your noble championship of me in my adversity by giving Myself to you at last. Oh, my darling ! my darling ! I thought when I entered this room to-day that this dog before us was dearer to me than aught else on earth, but You are dearer to me even than he." For an instant she caught her breath and turned awful- ly pale; then allowed her head to sink upon his, and sighed, like a weary child at rest. 384: LOVE PAYS FOR ALL. " Speak !" he said, impatiently ; " Yes, or No." What answer she made, and how stringently she qualified it with the contingency of Pa's assent, or dissent, may be inferred from the fact that Mr. Aster, taking her head be- tween his hands as though it were an awkward pitcher, at once applied her rosy mouth to his and drank deep and frequently. Finally, after the wildest of these intoxicating draughts were over, and the generous ex-drayman, with an arm about her w r aist, drew Lucy so closely to him that the farther legs of her chair were in the air, the former spoke again : " Lucy, the mouth is a blessed feature, as I have just proved to you ; but I have found far more virtue in an- other portion of the face for helping a man through life." " And that is— ?" Jack Aster solemnly raised his disengaged hand, and si- lently pointed with the forefinger thereof to his — Cheek. Thus, sitting lovingly together, in the full glow of the firelight, with the dog gazing gravely at them over his tongue, and the buckskin horse shivering outside in terror of the approaching Lardner, these lovers and their sur- roundings fade from us into the spectral ranks of millions thus wooing and won before, and are but shadows of those who will w r oo and be won again. AND DOWN COMES THE CURTAIN. 385 XLV. AND DOWN COMES THE CURTAIN. THE toy-store, denuded of its holiday evergreens and replenished in stock, wore the staid aspect of regu- lar yearly business once more ; and, although the old faces were generally supplanted by those of the Skeggs family, the name on the sign and the poetical fame of the concern still attracted a custom given to no other place of the kind on that side of town. It may be remarked, indeed, that the freezing manner of Miss Skeggs shortly became a very powerful commendation of the store to the very sex against whose would-be familiarity as purchasers her most icy hauteur was directed ; for the ladies (as this proved) can never be treated affably themselves by a female clerk, without an immediate instinctive suspicion that she must be " a bold, forward thing " to all masculine customers, and reserve their heartiest approval for those extremely chilly clerkesses of the millinery, cloak-bazaar, fancy bak- ery, etc., who humor their custom with the least-disguised contempt. Consequently, the contemptuous Miss Skeggs, after pledging the clerkly services of herself and brother to the house of Dapple for a year, became a profitable at- traction for the business, which she literally sneered into unbounded womanly favor. It is not with the store, however, that we have to do on this occasion, but with the room of the Walking Doll ; where, on the same afternoon celebrated in the last Chap- ter, the Dapples entertained a guest who, since New 17 386 AND DOWN COMES THE CURTAIN. Year's Day, had been quite familiar there. Four they were altogether : the Toyman, very wiiite and gaunt still, but placid of countenance and manner, in an easy Boston- rocker near the stove; Mrs. Dapple, housewifely and assiduous, in a sewing-chair close beside him ; Dollie, just pale enough to show a blush brilliantly, on the other side of her father ; and their guest, Philip Aster, standing to face the three. A few moments before, the young man and the maiden had come in together from another room, which, of late, had been used as the family parlor ; and Miss Dapple's pretty alternation of cheek-born rose and lily, as she met the Toyman's paternal scrutiny, and her step- mother's smiling glance, indicated that some shy and del- icate subject for comment had entered with them. " But what will your father think of this, Mr. Philip ?" asked Geoffrey, softly patting his daughter's hand as it rested on the arm of his chair, but addressing his look to the young lover. " I have told him our story — Dollie's and mine," re- plied Philip, with the least shade of embarrassment in his manner, " and he — did not object. In fact, Mr. Dapple, my father is so intent upon another matter, that we, his sons, have but little more than passive attention from him. He will object to nothing we may do for ourselves, provided it be but honest and reputable ; but for anything more demonstrative than tacit assent, we must wait until time, and the restoration of her whom he certainly loves beyond all the world, have brought back something of his old self. Then, I am sure, he will be proud of such a daughter, as I, with the consent of yourself and Mrs. Dap- ple, hope to secure for him to-day." Now that the former double and aggravation of Jack Aster no longer wore big hat, eyeglasses, and cloak, lie AND DOWN COMES THE CUETAIN. 387 seemed a handsome, pleasant-looking young fellow enough, and talked and acted like any other American Christian. "And you, Dollie," said the old man, turning again to her,—" you are willing to leave your father for the sake of this gentleman V* " Not if you want me to stay," whispered Dollie, rais- ing her hand to his shoulder, and bowing her curly head upon it in a pretty, bashful way. " Now that Geoffrey has me to take care of him," said Mrs. Dapple, smiling tenderly at her husband, " he can afford to be generous. If he could not, I should have good reason to charge myself with being no worthier as a wife, nor kinder as a stepmother, than before the right- eous penalty of my own unworthiness taught me how much I had forfeited, and made me a humble, wiser, and, I hope, a better woman." " Say no more of that, my dear Lydia," answered the Toyman, quickly. " The old time has passed away with the mistakes we both committed ; and in the new, we have reason for congratulation and thankfulness, only. I cam, afford to be generous, Mr. Philip ; and so give my assent and blessing to the choice my daughter's heart has made." "And it is a generosity of which neither you nor Dollie shall ever find me wilfully unworthy," cried the lover, grasping his extended hand. " From my past con- duct as a son you may be able to derive but little confi- dence in such promises as I might offer at this time ; but what your daughter has been to you shall serve as a guar- antee of the good work her precious love may achieve in me. Now let me make a confession to you, Sir, regard- ing that window curtain yonder." The Toyman stared at him in mute, almost fearful sur- 388 AND DOWN COMES THE CURTAIN. prise ; Dollie kept her head down, as before, and Mrs. Dapple turned pale and breathless. " Before I went to the war," continued Philip, " and while yet I was known to Dollie as John Aster, I came here on a stealthy visit to her one day, during your tem- porary absence, Sir, and entrusted to her care a Will made by my Father before his second marriage, and which I had, in my boyish folly brought with me in my flight from home, as a means of ultimately contesting such mercenary schemes as I believed that my Stepmother was insidiously plotting." " I never heard of this before," said the Toyman, gravely. u You did not ; because I implored Dollie to tell no living soul of the trust ; assuring her that its discovery might, under Mrs. Aster's influence, prove my destruc- tion. I am now sincerely ashamed of my action, have asked the pardon of my afflicted father for it, and shall return the document to him after regaining it from the curious hiding place in which Dollie left it — that window- curtain." With an excitement of manner which forbade further immediate speech from anybody, Mrs. Dapple, at this se- cond mention of the curtain, went hurriedly to the door leading into the store, and requested Algernon Skeggs to bring in the old shelf-ladder, and place it in the window. This done, and the wondering clerk dismissed to his counter again, the agitated woman spoke thus : " I have not moved that curtain before, Geoffrey ; bo- cause, in doing so, I must reveal what I, too, hid within it. I have been putting it off from day to day, from hour to hour ; but now the memento of my own miserable follv must be brought to light at last." AND DOWN COMES THE CURTAE*. 389 She was ascending the ladder, as she concluded ; and, disregarding the amazed Philip's hesitating proffer of help, had her hand upon the red and dusty roll of cur- tain in a moment. Slowly untwining the twisted and festooned masses of faded drapery, from which, at almost the first movement, a folded paper fell, she gradually relieved the sustaining rod, of its burden ; and, descending the ladder, as the curtain unrolled toward the floor to her handling, suddenly stepped from the last rung with the long- lost original clock-work of the Walking Doll in her hand ! " It was while hiding This, Geoffrey," she said, " that I fell and was so nearlv killed." As the old Toyman received it from her trembling hold, his shaggy brows contracted, as with pain, for an instant ; then relaxed into such a look of exultation as his face had not known before for years. " Why, here's the quicksilver balance working as it should again !" he exclaimed, in a strong, joyous voice. " What has ailed me, all this while ? Here's the true bal- ance ! I shall make the doll Walk, yet !" Dollie, standing behind his chair as on the night when he brought home the watch, smoothed his forehead, too, as then, with her lulling hands. " Will you finish it now. Father ?" she asked softly ; the while her lover, with the recovered Will hidden in his coat, passed an arm about her waist. u I shall try, I shall try," was the answer. " All has been a dream with me since I held this before. A strange, wild, awful dream." " In that dream, Father, there was one who wronged you ; whom you hated as an enemy : who strove to atone 390 AND DOWN COMES THE CURTAIN. for the wrong, and was our friend at last. Now that you dream no longer, dear Father, can you forgive him ?" Rising and turning in the chair until he could see her face, Geoffrey Dapple gazed at her intently, with a sobering memory coming in thoughtful shadow over his own countenance. " Did he forgive me T\ he asked. " He was tender with your dreaming to the last," said Dollie, " and left us with a wisli that, in your waking, you should forgive him." " Then," cried the Toyman, earnestly, " he is not the Enemy I saw in my dream, and shall be remembered only as my own accusing Conscience ! " In overhauling the standing-desk upon which so many poetical placards had been written, Algernon Skeggs one day found this rhymed effusion — evidently intended to advertise a line of jumping-jacks : — Ere on the Toy-store, friends, you turn your backs, Give one last moment to the Jumping-Jacks, And say if ever words of mouth, or pen, Described such puppet-parodies of men. Mark how extravagant their forms and hues ; See how their motions mind the strings you use ; And how, with arms uplift, or kicking legs, One Half defies you, and the other begs ! Not all through Fancy's wildest realm you'll find Such strange, distorted burlesques of Mankind ; Yet human nature, pruned and stript to core, Is oft a Jumping- Jack, and nothing more ! | Behold the strutting, self-conceited gull, Whose Pride's the string for ev'ry knave to pull : AND DOWN COMES THE CURTAIN. 391 Behold tho sleek, self-righteous, Godly-wise, Who lures and spurns you with the self-same cries : Behold the swag' ring Fool, or Sage, of chance, By mere string-pulling made to preach, or dance. None need go far on such extremes to fall, For each contains some essence of them all. And if from each his mere Pretence were torn, And only his true character were worn,— In all that's odd, extravagant, grotesque ; In all that gives true instinct to burlesque ; In all that, save in outward hues, is dull, And does but answer to the string you pull, — He e'en might prove, compared with this you scan, That Man's the Jumping-Jack, and Jack the Man ! THE END. 14 DAY USE RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED LOAN DEPT. This book is due on the last date stamped below, or on the date to which renewed. Renewals only: Tel. No. 642-3405 Renewals may be made 4 days prior to date due. Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. DAVIS IN- T ERUBRARY LOAN MAR 7 7 1372 APR 1 8 1996 2n -0- — i rnoii