CHAPTER IV.
OUR HERO MEETS HIS DESTINY.
"Well, itischarity," said Ben to himself, "but it is acceptable for all that." He then strolled up the gaslit street,—for it had been dark for some little time—and repeatedly asked himself what would be the next move in the campaign he had undertaken.
The "prodigal" had spoken of riding; how was it to be done? Should he enter a train, take a seat and wait until the conductor put him off? He knew that that manner of proceeding would gain him but a short ride. Perhaps he might tell the conductor a pathetic tale that would so work upon that individual's generosity that he would allow him to continue on the train. Alas, he knew the craft too well to attempt so futile an undertaking. Not that conductors are a hard-hearted class of persons, but their orders are strict, and permitting a free ride would subject them to a peremptory discharge. In fact Ben was lost. At a distance the simple matter of going from place to place looked easy enough of accomplishment, but now that he was brought face to face with the problem its solution became a difficult (indeed he was about thinking an impossible) task. What to do or where to go he knew not. For a time he gazed listlessly into the shop windows, and mechanically strolled along. If he could only meet a tramp, he thought, he would ask him how to proceed; and he kept a sharp lookout for one of the fraternity, but none presented themselves. It soon grew late, and the streets lonely. The pedestrians became fewer and fewer, and the shops, one by one, put up their shutters. Ben thought he had never felt so lonesome in all his life; and he was right. There is no situation in life more lonely, than to be alone in a great city at night fall. In the woods a man has Nature to listen to and commune with. On the prairies there are the stars and the night breeze for companions. But in a metropolis, a stranger among our fellow men, such a wretched, helpless feeling comes over the traveller that his loneliness seats itself, not only on his mind, but on his heart. This feeling was creeping with a dull, heavy tread upon Ben, and he had already commenced to anxiously question himself where he should pass the night that was now surrounding him, when his attention was suddenly aroused by a youthful voice, in a dark side street, close by, crying out:
"Let me alone! Let me alone, I say!" and then a gentle female voice entreating:
"Do not strike the boy, Arthur. Do not beat him. He did not mean to; I am sure he did not!"
"I'll teach you to pick a pocket, you young scoundrel!" exclaimed an angry man; and there followed a blow, and a cry of pain.
By this time Ben, who had accelerated his step, reached the scene of disturbance, and discovered by the dim light that crept from a street lamp, half a block away, a large man grasping a boy by the arm, and holding an uplifted cane, that a young lady was striving to prevent again descending upon the captive. The face of the latter being concealed by an old slouch hat jammed down over his eyes.
In Ben's nature was a strong love of justice. He had ever been a champion of the weak, and an injury inflicted by a strong arm on one incapable of resistance was an outrage on his own sensitiveness, that had involved him in many a rough-and-tumble while a boy at school and college. As the man shook off his fair companion's hand and the cane was about descending again on the shrinking person of the boy, he interposed his arm and caught the blow upon it.
"Don't strike the boy, sir. Please do not hit him. Even if he has done wrong a beating will not improve him." As he thus expostulated with the man he became conscious of a pair of great, glorious, grey eyes, that fairly glowed in the dark, looking gratefully upon him from out the folds of a snowy nubia, and a very melodious voice seconding his own entreaties, with:
"I'm sure you are mistaken, Arthur. This gentleman is right. Pray do not strike the boy again."
But Ben's observations reached no farther, for the man gave him a stinging blow across the face with the cane, exclaiming fiercely:
"Confound your impudence, who asked you to interfere!" The next moment the man lay at length in the gutter, having been sent there by a powerful and well directed blow with which, in the heat of the moment, Ben had resented the indignity received by him.
The next instant he repented such an act in the presence of a lady and turned to apologize, when a warning voice cried, "Look out! He is armed!" and he saw that his opponent had regained his feet and was drawing a weapon from his pocket. What the result might have been, had the man been allowed to use his revolver, is not difficult to surmise. A shot at such close quarters would probably have suddenly terminated Ben's tramp, had not the boy who gave the warning struck the man on the head with a stone before he had an opportunity to use the weapon he was uncovering. The blow was a severe one, and felled him senseless to the pavement.
"Come, come!" cried the boy, "Let us get away from here!"
But Ben would not leave his fallen enemy without ascertaining the extent of his injuries, and he immediately offered his assistance to the young lady, who now stood beside her senseless escort, wringing her hands, and vainly imploring him to arise. He had been only stunned, however, and as Ben stooped over him showed signs of returning consciousness. Attempting to rise to his feet, he found himself still too dazed from the effects of the blow, and would have fallen had not Cleveland supported him.
"I am very sorry this should have occurred, Miss, but realty this gentleman is alone responsible for it," said Ben apologetically.
"Yes," she replied graciously. "No doubt you are right, sir. I do not think the boy intended any wrong, but—but Arthur was ill tempered on account of other matters, and—allowed his anger to vent itself on the first object it came across."
And Ben thought he noticed, that, though nervous from the excitement, she did not appear to evince much sympathy for her companion. The latter soon recovered his senses sufficiently to keep his feet, and supporting himself by the young lady's arm prepared to leave. As he was moving off he turned upon Ben and said, with a malevolent scowl: "I will remember you, sir."
"I trust, miss, you will pardon me for my rudeness," said our hero, addressing the young lady and ignoring her companion. "I am very sorry for what has occurred. Here is his pistol. I hope the next time he draws it, it will be in defence of a more manly action than striking one too small to defend himself." And he handed the revolver to the young lady, who received it with a simple "thank you, sir." Ben lifted his hat courteously, and the fair one returned a smile and an inclination of her head; and the three separated.
Our friend stood watching the retreating figures of the lady and her escort, until they were lost in the darkness, and then, instead of resuming his walk, he leaned against a neighboring wall, while his thoughts continued to follow the owner of the great, glorious, gray eyes in the nubia.
Unconscious of his surroundings, his mind basked in the light of the bewildering glances, and his ears danced to the music of the voice that had proceeded from out the folds of the snowy nubia. Ben had a large circle of young lady acquaintances, and, being a fellow of culture and good looks, was a favorite with the fair sex. Among them might have been numbered many attractive andpolishedmisses, some of whom had treated our hero more than cordially. But for all he retained the same simple feeling of friendship,—and, nothing deeper. There was a latent feeling in the young man's composition that had never been touched until that evening. A wonderful change had now come over him. He felt that she of the nubia was a fragment (and a pretty large one) of his own existence. And it is singular, yet true, should he never again have set eyes upon her, there would have remained for life a tender memory in his heart that nothing could have displaced.
There is many a heart, going about this world to-day, with just such an uncompleted vision, locked up as a sacred secret within.
"Pshaw!" he said to himself, "we probably will never meet again." At the same time there was a small voice, aiding and abetting a sanguine hope, which kept saying: "Yes you will, Ben. Depend upon it, you will, my boy!"
Happening to look up from his musings, he discovered the cause of the recent encounter standing a few feet away, attentively observing him. The lad, finding his presence noticed, approached closer and said in a singularly soft, pleasant voice:
"I thank you ever so much. I chanced to run against that man in the dark, and he called me a thief. I called him a liar. Then he struck me. I'm nothief!"
"Do you know the man?" asked Ben.
There was considerable hesitancy in the boy's manner as he answered: "No—no—I don't know him. But Iwill, if I see him again, and I won't forget that he struck me, either."
"I wish you knew him," said Ben.
"Why?" asked the other in surprise.
Ben blushed all to himself in the dark, but, reasoning that it was "only a boy," boldly answered:
"I should like to know whom his lady companion is."
"Oh! Isthatit!" and the way he said it sounded singular to Ben. "Well, I suppose you live here and will have a chance to find out."
"No, I do not live here. I live in New York."
"Going home to-night?" inquired the lad.
"No," laughed Ben. "I'm going to St. Louis before I go home again."
"To St. Louis! I declare! There is where I'm going myself."
"Perhaps we may travel together," suggested Ben, laughing.
"No fear of that," replied the other. "I guess my way of travelling wouldn't suit you. I go in a Pullman Palace box car," and the boy laughed merrily.
"A what car?"
"A Pullman Palace Box!" returned the boy. "I'm going to beat my way."
At last, thought Ben, I see a way out of the woods!
"Are you indeed! That is identically the way I am going to travel. Do you think you can get to St. Louis?"
"Get there!" exclaimed the patron of the palace box disdainfully. "Get there! Well, I should say, I have just made it from Boston here, and I made it from Montreal to Boston. I know all the ropes, now;—sure as you live, I do. And are you broke too?"
"Yes," replied Cleveland; "and that is not the worst of it. I never was broke before, and, to tell the truth, I'm a novice at beating my way, and do not know just how to do it."
"Why, so far as that goes, beating one's way is like any other kind of work.It is work.To be sure it's not quite so pleasant aspayingyour way, and you have to put up with a good bit, but if you have the nerve you may rest assured that you will get to your destination all right. As we are going the same way, suppose we go together?"
"Agreed!" said Ben, glad to have fallen in with some one posted in the vagabond life he was about entering upon.
"Then we're pards. Here's my hand on it!" and Ben grasped a warm, soft hand in his and the compact was duly signed and sealed.
"Now, partner," said the boy, "as you say you are new to the business, let me have the direction of affairs until you get your hand in. We will have to stay here for to-night, because the yards and tracks are watched so close that it is next to impossible to jump a train going out of here. But to-morrow we will foot it down to Elizabeth, and make some side track below that town, and jump a train in the evening. To-morrow night, by this time, we can make Philadelphia. That will be a good time to jump some coal flats and get out on the Central road."
"You speak as though you had been over the route," said Ben in admiration of the practical manner in which his new acquaintance handled the subject. He felt a great relief in having found a companion who could tell him something about travelling in the new style, not at that time being aware of the fact that had he followed the railroad he could have picked up a score of free-riders going in any direction his fancy may have desired.
The boy, however, denied having ever been over the road before.
"No, no," he said, "when you are on a tramp you learn to post yourself on these matters. It's easy done;—see here! Here's the public and employee's time-tables of all the roads that come into New York City." And he showed Ben a pocket-full of railroad time-tables. "With these you can keep posted just how the trains run, where there are good jumping places, tanks, switches, and so on. All the bums carry them. They are theirwar maps. At the next convention the tramps ought to vote a set of thanks to the railroad companies for printing these things for them. But now let's go to bed. Have you any wealth?"
"I have just twenty-five cents," replied Ben acknowledging the quarter given him by the teamster.
"Good enough. Keep your money for tobacco. Are you hungry?"
"No."
"All right then. We will get some breakfast before we start in the morning. Now let us go to bed. I've got the boss hangup. It's a shed in a lumber-yard. There's lots of nice clean boards in it. You must go quiet, or the watchman will see us getting in, though, after you get in the shed he never comes by that way. Come on."
Ben followed the boy to a lumber-yard, and having scaled a padlocked gate, they were about to make for the shed, which was dimly discernible in the distance, when the quick ear of the lad detected footsteps. Quietly he led Ben into a recess, made by projecting piles of lumber, and then the two crouched down, awaiting the appearance of the person approaching. That individual shortly came up in the shape of a man—and a very ragged one—as seen through the starlight. Behind him limped a comrade carrying a small bundle. They were outside of the fence, and halted when they arrived at the gate.
"Let's get in here, Billy," said the foremost in a low voice.
"Oh, thunder, Peters! My foot's too sore to climb that there fence, and if a dog got after us on the other side, I'd be gone up. Let's go to the Station-house and have a good-night's rest."
"I tell you I aint agoing to the police station, like a slouch," replied he addressed as Peters.
"Oh, you're so durned high toned!" muttered 'Billy.' "There's as good men goes to the station as you be, and if you get over into that yard somebody may catch you and hand you over, and then you'd go up for a vag for sixty days, mebbe. I wish we'd a camped out in the country and not come in town to-night."
"Wehadto come in to get some snipes. You said you was a dying for a smoke. Come now, and shin over." And 'Peters' commenced scaling the gate, when Ben's companion called out:
"Get away from this yard, you scoundrels, or I'll give you over!"
A sudden fall from the gate, was followed by a hasty shuffling of feet, and the boy said to Ben:
"All right, now. We have got rid of them. This is my hangup, for I discovered it, and I don't want any more lodgers. Come on."
When they were safely stowed away on the planks under the shed, Ben asked:
"Were those tramps?"
"Yes," replied the other; "peach-plucks, I s'pose. The country's full of them."
"What are 'peach-plucks'?"
"Fellows that tramp up and down Delaware and Jersey during the peach season. They get work at from fifty cents to a dollar a day, picking peaches. Sleep out on the ground and live on corn-dodgers and sow-belly. It's a star time with the bums, and I suppose there's five thousand or more of them ramble through the peach country. You see work aint heavy and they can have all the peaches to eat they want."
"But I should think that even at those small wages they might earn enough to keep them until they found better employment," said Ben.
"They're not after employment; they're out for an airing, and only work two or three days at a time. After the peaches play out, lots of 'em strike off through the country for the Wisconsin hop yards, where men and women pick in the fields together, and dance all night. It is the life they like. Money's no object. Let us go to sleep so that we can get up early." And he lay down at full length on the boards as though they were a bed of down. Ben followed his example; but the strangeness of his new position kept him long awake, thinking thoughts that had never before visited his mind. Once he gave his companion a gentle push, and asked:
"Boy, what is your name?"
"Tommy."
"Tommy, what are 'snipes'?"
"Cigar butts!" and Tommy laughed a sleepy little laugh, and was soon thereafter snoring.
Then came the sweet angel Sleep, and wrapped his arms around city and woodland, palace and hovel, police station and lumber pile, and took his weary devotees off on a tour through dreamland.
About two o'clock in the morning, Ben awoke shivering with cold. The damp night air, warm enough in the early evening, had chilled and aroused him. His restlessness startled Tommy who enquired what the matter was.
"Ah, you were not tired enough to sleep sound." And then Tommy showed him how to make a blanket of his coat and vest, by covering up his head with the coat and rolling the other up on the breezy side of him, and in a few moments Ben felt himself quite warm, and again dozed off.
That trick of making a blanket out of his coat and covering up his head so as to retain all the heat of respiration was a valuable one that he often thereafter made use of.