CHAPTER VIII
Did you shut the hall door? That's right. There's no tellin' what's liable to float in here any time. Say, if they don't quit it, I'll get to be one of these nervous prostraters, that think themselves sick abed without half tryin'. Sure, I'm just convalescin' from the last shock.
How? Now make a guess. Well, it was this way: I was sittin' right here in the front office, readin' the sportin' dope and takin' me reg'lar mornin' sunbath, when the door-buzzer goes off, and in drifts about a hundred and ninety pounds of surprise package.
There was a foreign label on it, all right; but I didn't know until later that it read "Made in Austria." He was a beefy sort of gent, with not much neck to speak of, and enough curly black hair to shingle a French poodle. He was well colored, too. Beats the cars, don't it, the good health that's wasted on some of these foreigners?
But what takes my eye most was his trousseau. Say! he was dressed to the minute, from the pink in his buttonhole, to the mother-of-pearl gloves; and the back of his frock coat had an in-curve such as your forty-fat sisters dream about. Why, as far as lines went, he had Jimmy Hackett and RobertMantell on the back shelf. Oh, he was a crusher, sure!
"I have the purpose of finding Prof-fes-seur McCabby," says he, reading it off'n a card.
"If you mean McCabe," says I, "I'm discovered."
"Is it you that are also by the name of Shortee?" says he.
"Shorty for short," says I, "and P. C. D. on the end to lengthen it out—Physical Culture Director, that stands for. Now do you want my thumb-print, and a snap-shot of my family-tree?"
That seemed to stun him a little; but he revived after a minute, threw out his chest, lifted his silk lid, and says, solemn as a new notary public takin' the oath of office: "I am Baron Patchouli."
"You look it," says I. "Have a chair."
"I am," says he, gettin' a fresh start, "Baron Patchouli, of Hamstadt and Düsseldorf."
"All right," says I, "take the settee. How are all the folks at home?"
But say, there wa'n't any use tryin' to jolly him into makin' a short cut of it. He'd got his route of parade all planned out and he meant to stick by it.
"Professeur McCabby—" says he.
"Don't," says I. "You make me feel like I'd been transplanted into French and was runnin' a hack-line. Call it McCabe—a-b-e, abe."
"One thousand pardons," says he, and tries again. This time he gets it—almost, and I lets him spiel away. Oh, mama! but I wish I could say it the way he did! It would let me on the Proctor circuit, if I could. But boiled down and skimmed, it was all about how I was a kind of safety-deposit vault for everything he had to live for.
"My hopes, my fortune, my happiness, the very breath of my living, it is all with you," says he as a windup, hittin' a Caruso pose, arms out, toes in, and his breath comin' hard.
How was that for news from home? I did some swift surmisin', and then I says, soothin' like: "Yes, I know; but don't take on about it so. They're all right, just as you handed 'em over; only I asked me friend the Sarge to lock 'em up till you called. We'll walk around and see the Sarge right away."
"Ah!" says he, battin' his noble brow, "you do not comprehend. You make to laugh. And me, I come to you from the adorable Sadie."
"Sadie?" says I. "Sadie Sullivan that was?"
He bows and grins.
"If you've got credentials from Sadie," says I, "it's all right. Now, what's doing? Does she want me to match samples, or show you the sights along the White Lane?"
"Ah, the adorable Sadie!" says he, rollin' his eyes, and puffin' out his cheeks like he was tryin' the lung-tester. "I drive with her, I walk with her, I sit by her side—one day, two day, a week. Well, what happens? I am charm, I am fascinate, I am become her slave. I make to resist. I say to myself: 'You! You are of the noble Austrian blood; the second-cousin of your mother is a grand duke; you must not forget.' Then again I see Sadie. Pouff! I have no longer pride; but only I luff. It is enough. I ask of her: 'Madam Deepworth, where is the father of you?' She say he is not. 'Then the uncle of you?' I demand. She say: 'I'm shy on uncles.' 'But to who, then,' I ask, 'must I declare my honorable passion?' 'Oh,' she say, 'tell it to Shorty McCabe.' Ha! I leap, I bound! I go to M. Pinckney. 'Tell me,' I say, 'where is to be found one Shorty McCabe?' And he sends me to you. I am come."
On the level, now, it went like that. Maybe I've left out some of the frills, but that was the groundwork of his remarks.
"Yes," says I, "you're a regular come-on. I guess the adorable Sadie has handed you a josh. She's equal to it."
But that got by him. He just stood there, teeterin' up and down on his patent leathers, and grinnin' like a monkey.
"I say," says I, "she's run you on a sidin', dropped you down a coal-hole. Do you get wise?"
Did he? Not so you would notice it. He goes on grinnin' and teeterin', like he was on exhibition in a museum and I was the audience. Then he gets a view of himself in the glass over the safe there, and begins to pat down his astrakhan thatch, and punch up his puff tie, and dust off his collar. Ever see one of these peroxide cloak models doin' a march past the show windows on her day off? Well, the Baron had all those motions and a few of his own. He was ornamental, all right, and it wa'n't any news to him either.
About then, though, I begins to wonder if I hadn't been a little too sure about Sadie. There's no tellin', when it comes to women, you know; and when it hit me that perhaps, after all, she'd made up her mind to tag this one from Austria, you could have fried an egg on me anywhere.
"Look here, Patchouli," says I. "Is this straight about you and Sadie? Are you the winner?"
"Ah, the adorable Sadie!" says he, comin' back to earth and slappin' his solar plexus with one hand.
"We've covered that ground," says I. "What I want to know is, does she cotton to you?"
"Cot-ton? Cot-ton?" says he, humpin' his eyebrows like a French ballad singer.
"Are you the fromage?" says I. "Is she as stuck on you as you are on yourself? Have you made good?"
He must have got a glimmer from that; for he rolls his eyes some more, breathes once like an air-brake bein' cut out, and says: "Our luff is like twin stars in the sky—each for the other shines."
"It's as bad as all that, is it?" says I. "Well, all I've got to say is that I'd never thought it of Sadie; and if she sent you down here on approval, you can tell her I'm satisfied if she is."
I figured that would jar him some, but it didn't. He looked as pleased as though I'd told him he was the ripest berry in the box, and before I knew what was comin' he had the long-lost-brother tackle on me, and was almost weepin' on my neck, splutterin' joy in seven different kinds of language. Just then Swifty Joe bobs his head in through the gym. door, springs that gorilla grin of his, and ducks back.
"Break away!" says I. "I don't want to spoil the looks of anythin' that Sadie's picked out to frame, but this thing has gone about far enough. If you're glad, and she's glad, then I ain't got any kick comin'. Only don't rub it in."
He had the long-lost-brother tackle on me.He had the long-lost-brother tackle on me.
Say, it was like talkin' to a deaf man, sayin' things to the Baron.
"She's mine, yes?" says he. "I have your permission, Professeur McCabe?"
"Sure," says I. "If she'll have you, take her and welcome."
Now you'd thought that would have satisfied him, wouldn't you? But he acted like he'd got a half-arm jolt on the wind. He backed off and cooled down as if I'd chucked a pail of water over him.
"Well," says I, "you don't want it in writin', do you? I'm just out of permit blanks, and me secretary's laid up with a bad case of McGrawitis. If I was you, I'd skip back and keep my eye on Sadie. She might change her mind."
The Baron thought he'd seen a red flag, though. He put in a worry period that lasted while you could count fifty. Then he forks out his trouble.
"It is not possible that I have mistake, is it?" says he. "I am learn that Madam Deepworth is—what you call—one heiress? No?"
See? I'd been sort of lookin' for that; and there it was, as plain as a real-estate map of Gates of Paradise, Long Island. Me bein' so free and easy with tellin' him to help himself had thrown up a horrible suspicion to him. Was it true that Sadie's roll was real money, the kind you couldspend at the store? And say, long's it was up to me to write her prospectus, I thought I might as well make it a good one.
"Do you see that movin'-van out there?" says I.
The Baron saw it.
"And have you been introduced to these?" I says, flashin' a big, wrist-size wad of tens and fives.
Oh, he was acquainted all right.
"Well," says I, "Sadie's got enough of these put away to fill two carts like that."
Fetch him? Why, his fingers almost burnt a hole through his gloves.
"Ah-h-h!" says he, and takes a little time out to picture himself dippin' into the family pocket-book.
Course, it wa'n't any of my funeral, but when I thinks of a sure-enough live one, like Sadie, that I'd always supposed had a head like a billiard table, gettin' daffy about any such overstuffed frankfurter as this specimen, I felt like someone had shoved a blue quarter on me. Worst of it was, I'd held the step-ladder for her to climb up where such things grow.
I was gettin' rawer to the touch every minute, and was tryin' to make up my mind whether to give the Baron a quick run down the stairs, or gooff an' leave him to dislocate his neck tryin' to see the small of his back in the mirror; when in comes Pinckney, with that little sparkle in his eyes that I've come to know means any kind of sport you're a mind to name.
"Hello!" says he, givin' the Baron a hand. "You found him, eh? Hello, Shorty. Got it all fixed, have you?"
"Say," says I, pullin' Pinckney over by the window, "did you put this up on me?"
He said he didn't, honest.
"Then take your fat friend by the hand," says I, "and lead him off where things ain't liable to happen to him."
"Why, what's up, Shorty?" says he. "Haven't you given him your blessing, and told him to go in and win?"
"Switch off!" says I. "I've heard enough of that from the Baron to last me a year. What's it all about, anyway? Suppose he has laid his plans to Miznerize Sadie; what's he want to come hollerin' about it to me for? I'm no matrimonial referee, am I?"
I knew somethin' was ticklin' Pinckney inside; but he put up a front like a Special Sessions judge. "Baron," says he, callin' over to Patchouli, "I forgot to mention that our friend, the professor, doesn't understand the European system of conductingsuch affairs as this. If you'll pardon me, I'll make it clear to him."
Well, he did and a lot more. It seems that the Baron was a ringer in the set where Sadie and Pinckney had been doing the weekend house-party act. He'd been travelin' on that handle of his, makin' some broad jumps and quick shifts, until he'd worked himself up, from a visitor's card at a second-rate down-town club, to the kind of folks that quit New York at Easter and don't come back until the snow flies again. They don't squint too close at a title in that crowd, you know.
First thing the Baron hears, of course, is about the Drowsy Drop dollars and the girl that's got 'em. He don't lose any time after that in makin' up to Sadie. He freezes to her like a Park Row wuxtree boy does to a turkey drumstick at a newsies' Christmas dinner, and for Pinckney and the rest of 'em it was as good as a play.
"Huh!" says I. "You're easy pleased, ain't you? But I want to tell you that it grouches me a lot to think that Sadie'd fall for any such wad-huntin' party as that."
"What ho!" says Pinckney. "Here's a complication that we hadn't suspected."
"Meanin' which?" says I.
"Perhaps it would be better to postpone thatexplanation," says he; "but I sympathize with your state of mind, Shorty. However, what's done is done, and meanwhile the Baron is waiting."
"It wouldn't surprise me none," says I, "to hear that that's his trade. But say, what kind of a steer is it that brings him to me? I ain't got that straight yet."
Pinckney goes on to say as how the foreign style of negotiatin' for a girl is more or less of a business proposition; and that Sadie, not havin' any old folks handy to make the deal, and maybe not havin' the game clear in her own mind, shoves him my way, just off-hand.
"To be sure," says Pinckney, "whatever arrangements you may happen to make will not be binding, but they will satisfy the Baron. So just act as if you had full authority, and we'll see if there are any little details that he wants to mention."
Sure enough, there was. He handed 'em to me easy; oh, nice and easy! He didn't want much for a starter—just a trifle put within easy reach before the knot was tied, a mere matter of ten million francs.
"No Jims nor Joes?" says I.
"The Baron is accustomed to reckoning in francs," says Pinckney. "He means two million dollars."
"Two million cases?" says I, catchin' my breath. Well, say! I had to take another look at him. If I could think as well of myself as that I wouldn't ask no better.
"Patchouli," says I, "you're too modest. You shouldn't put yourself on the bargain counter like that."
The Baron looks like I'd said somethin' to him in Chinese.
"The professor thinks that demand is quite reasonable, considering all things," says Pinckney.
And that went with the Baron. Then he has to shake hands all round, same's if we'd signed terms for a championship go, and him and Pinckney gets under way for some private high-ball factory over on the avenue. I wa'n't sorry to lose 'em. Somehow I wanted to get my mind on something else.
Well, I put in a busy mornin', tryin' to teach blocks and jabs to a couple of youngsters that thinks boxin' is a kind of wrist exercise, like piano-playin', and I'd got a pound or so off a nice plump old Bishop, who comes here for hand-ball and stunts like that. I was still feelin' a bit ugly and wishin' there was somethin' sizable around to take it out on, when in comes Curly Locks and Pinckney again.
"Has he made up his mind that he wants my wad, too?" says I to Pinckney.
"No," says he. "The Baron has discovered that up where Sadie is staying the law requires a prospective bridegroom to equip himself with a marriage license. He thinks he will get one in town and take it back with him. Now, as you know all about such things, Shorty, and as I have an appointment at twelve-thirty, I'll leave the Baron with you. So long!" and he gives me the wink as he slides out.
Say, I had my cue this trip, all right. I couldn't see just why it was, but the Baron had been passed up to me. He was mine for keeps. I could hang him out for a sign, or wire a pan to him. And he was as innocent, the Baron was, as a new boy sent to the harness shop after strap oil. He'd got his eyes fixed on the Drowsy Drops bank-account, and he couldn't see anything else. He must have sized me up as a sort of Santa Claus that didn't have anything to do between seasons but to be good to his kind.
"So you want to take out a license, do you?" says I, comin' a Mr. Smooth play.
"If the professeur would be so oblige," says he.
"Oh, sure," says I. "That's my steady job. A marriage license, eh?"
I had a nineteenth-story view of the scheme he'dbuilt up. He means to go back heeled with the permit from me, with the little matter of the two million ready all cinched, and the weddin'-papers in his inside pocket. Then he does the whirlwind rush at Sadie, and as he dopes it out to himself, figurin' on what a crusher he is, he don't see how he can lose. And I suppose he thinks he can buy a marriage license most anywhere, same's you can a money-order.
With that I had a stroke of thought. They don't hit me very often, but when they do, they come hard. I had to go over to the water cooler and grin into the tumbler. Then I walks up to the Baron and taps him on the chest.
"Patchouli," says I, "you come with me. I'll get you a Romeo outfit that'll astonish the natives."
It took me about two hours, chasin' him down to the Bureau of Licenses, and huntin' up me old side partner, Jimmy Fitzpatrick, that's the main guy there. But I didn't grudge the time. Jimmy helped me out a lot. He's a keen one, Jimmy is, and when he'd got next, he threw in a lot of flourishes just where they was needed most. He never cracked a smile, either, when the Baron tipped him a dime.
I didn't let loose of Patchouli until I'd seen him stow away that sealed envelope, and had put him aboard the right train at the Grand Central. ThenI went back to the Studio lookin' so contented that Swifty struck me for a raise.
That was on a Monday. Long about Thursday I thought I might get word from Pinckney, or some of 'em; but there was nothin' doin'.
"Somebody's put Curly Locks wise," thinks I, "or else he's sneaked away to jump off the dock."
I didn't have anyone on that afternoon; so I was just workin' off a little steam on a punchin'-bag, doing the long roll and a few other stunts. I was getting nicely warmed up, and hittin' the balloon at the rate of about a hundred and fifty raps a minute, when I hears somebody break past Swifty and roar out:
"Where he iss? Let me to him!"
It was the Baron, his mustache bristlin' out like a bottle-cleaner, and blood in his eye. "Ha-r-r-r!" says he in real heavy-villain style. "You make me a joke, you?"
"G'wan!" says I over me shoulder. "You was born a joke. Sit down and cool off; for it's your next," and with that I goes at the bag again.
Say, it ain't much of a trick to fight the bag, y'know. Most any Y. M. C. A. kid can get the knack of catchin' it on his elbows and collarbone, makin' it drum out a tune like the finish of a Dutch opera. And that's about all I was doin', only chuckin' a few extra pounds into it maybe.But if you don't know how easy it is, it looks like a curtain-raiser for manslaughter. And I reckon the Baron hadn't any idea I'd strip as bunchy as I do.
Course, there's no tellin' just what went on in his mind while he stood there. Swifty says his mouth come open gradual, like a bridge draw that's being swung for a tug; and his eyes began to bug out, and the noble Austrian assault-and-battery blood faded out of his face same's the red does in one of Belasco's sunsets. And pretty soon, when I thought my little grandstand play'd had a chance to sink in, I throws a good stiff one into the bag, ducks from under, and turns around to sing out "Next!" to the Baron.
But he wa'n't in sight. Pinckney was there though, and Sadie behind him, both lookin' wild.
"Hello!" says I. "Where's Patchouli? He was anxious to see me a minute ago."
"He seemed anxious not to, when he passed us on the stairs just now," says Pinckney.
"Did he leave any word?" says I.
"He just said 'Bah!' and jumped into a cab," says Pinckney.
"He didn't hurt you, did he?" says Sadie.
"What, him?" says I. "Not that I know about. But I've got this to tell you, Mrs. Dipworthy: if you put any high value on your newsteady, you'd better chase him off this reservation."
"Why, Shorty McCabe!" says she, takin' me by the shoulders and turnin' them blue eyes of hers straight at me. "My new steady? That—that woolly-haired freak?"
Say, you could have slipped me into the penny slot of a gum machine. Oh, fudge! Piffle! Splash! It's a wonder when I walk I don't make a noise like a sponge—I take some things in so easy. Is it curious my head never aches?
Pinckney sees how bad I was feelin', and he cuts in to tell me how things had worked out. And say, do you know what that Patchouli had done?
After I left him he goes back tickled to death, and waits for an openin'. Then, one night when they was havin' a big hunt ball, or some kind of swell jinks, he tolls Sadie into the palm-room, drops to the mat on his knees, and fires off that twin-star-luff speech, beggin' her to fly with him and be his'n. As a capper he digs up that envelop, to show her there needn't be any hitch in the program.
"What's this?" says Sadie, making a sudden grab and gettin' the goods. With that she lets go a string of giggles and streaks it out into the ball-room.
"It is the document of our marriage," says the Baron, makin' a bold bluff.
"Oh, is it?" says she, openin' the thing up, and reading it off. "Why, Baron, this doesn't give you leave to marry anyone," says Sadie; "this is a peddler's license, and here's the badge, too. If you wear this you can stand on the corner and sell shoe-laces and collar-buttons. I'd advise you to go do it."
It was while the crowd was howlin' and pinnin' the fakir's tag on him that he began to froth at the mouth and tell how he was comin' down to make mincemeat of me.
"That's why we followed him," says Pinckney—"to avert bloodshed."
"If he had so much as touched you, Shorty," says Sadie, "I would have spent my pile to have had him sent up for life."
"Oh, it wouldn't have cost that much," says I. "With me thinkin' the way I did then, maybe there wouldn't have been a whole lot left to send."
Ah, look away! I ain't tellin' what Sadie did next. But say, she's a hummin'-bird, Sadie is.
CHAPTER IX
How about him, eh?—the two-spot of clubs in billiard cloth and buttons at the door. There's no tellin' what the Studio'll have next—maybe a sidewalk canopy and a carriage caller. Swifty Joe's gettin' ambitious. Me gettin' mixed up with that Newport push has gone to Swifty's head like a four-line notice does to the pompadour of a second row chorus girl. First off he says it's a shame I don't have a valet.
"Say," says I, "don't it keep me busy enough remindin' you that I'm still able to wear my own clothes, without puttin' on an extra hand?"
But after this last stunt he broke out again; so we compromised on Congo. I thought Swifty'd had him made to order, uniform and all; but he says he found him, just as he stands, doin' the stray act over on Sixth-ave. He'd come up from New Orleans with a fortune-tellin' gent that had got himself pinched for doing a little voudoo turn on the side, and as Congo didn't have much left but his appetite, I put him on the pay-roll at two per and found. And say, I'm stung, at that. To look at him you'd think a ham sandwich would run him over; but he's got a capacity like a shop-lifter's pocket. For three days Itried to feed him up on the retail plan, and then I let out the contract to a free-lunch supply concern.
Sure, it gives the joint kind of a swell look, havin' him on the door, and if it didn't act the same on Swifty's head I wouldn't kick.
On the dead now, I don't care so much about loomin' up in the picture. There's them that it suits down to the ground, and that shows up well in front; and then again, there's a lot of people gets the spot light on 'em continual who'd be better off in the shade. I'm a top-gallery boy, by rights, and that's where you'll find me most of the time; but now and then I get dragged down into the wings with a note. Yes, yes, I'm just back after one of them excursions.
You see, after we'd shunted Sadie's Baron back on to the goulash circuit, where he belonged, and Sadie and Pinckney had got over their merry fit and skipped off to wake up another crowd of time assassinators, at Rockywold, or some such place as that, I says to myself, "Shorty," says I, "you stick to the physical-culture game and whittle out the by-plays."
That's just what I was doin', too, when an A. D. T. shows up with a prepaid josh from Pinckney, givin' me a special invite to run out and help 'em celebrate.
"Any come-back?" says the boy.
"No, sonny," says I; "you can cut the wire."
Say, Pinckney means all right, and he's done me some good turns; but that don't put me in his class, does it? Nay, nay, says I. Here's one dinner party that I ducks. And with that I gets busy on one of my reg'lars who's bein' trained to go against two months of foreign cookin'. I hadn't more'n finished with him, though, when there comes another yellow envelop. This one was from Sadie, and it was a hurry call. She didn't say much; but I could see heel-prints of trouble all over it.
"Me for Rockywold," says I, chuckin' a collar in a suit-case and grabbin' a time-table off the rack.
Yes, that was different. Maybe I'm a jay to cast myself for any such part; but since Sadie an' me had that little reunion, I've kind of felt that sooner or later she might be let in for a mix-up where I'd come in handy, and when it was pulled off I wanted to be within hail.
Course, I wasn't layin' out no hero act; like showin' up with a can of gasolene just as the tank ran dry, or battin' the block off'm a villyun in a dress suit. I was just willin' to hang around on the edges and make myself useful generally. Not that I'm followin' the she-male protectin' business regular. But with Sadie it's another thing. Weused to play in the same alley, you know; and she don't forget it, even if she has come into a bunch of green money as big as a haystack.
She was on hand when I dropped off the smoker, sittin' in the Rockywold station rig and lookin' for me with both eyes. And say, what a difference it makes to clothes who wears 'em!
"It's bully of you to come, Shorty," says she.
"Oh, I don't know," says I. "I guess good judges wouldn't call it a medal play. What's loose?"
"Buddy," says she.
For a minute I was lost, until she asks if I don't remember the youngster. "Oh, sure!" says I. "That kid brother of yours, with the eighteen-karat ringlets and a girly kind of face? The Sisters used to dress him up in a Fauntleroy suit for the parochial school fair, and make him look like a picture on an Easter card. Nice, cute little chap, eh?"
"He was cute once—ten or twelve years ago," says Sadie. "He isn't as cute as he was. He doesn't wear ringlets now—he likes rings better. And that's why I had to send for you, Shorty. I couldn't tell anyone else. Oh, the little wretch! If it wasn't for mother I'd cure him of a lot of things."
Well, we had some family history on the wayout, beginnin' with the way Buddy'd been spoiled at home, takin' in a few of the scrapes Sadie had helped him out of, and endin' with his blowin' in at Rockywold without waitin' for a bid from anyone. Seems he'd separated himself from the last stake Sadie had handed out—nothin' new, same old fool games—and now he wanted a refill, just as a loan, until he could play a tip he'd got from a gent he'd met in a beanery.
"And I just wouldn't stand for that," says Sadie. "Those bookmakers are nothing but swindlers, anyway. I know, because I bet ten dollars on a race once, and didn't win."
Say, I had a lithograph of Buddy and his beanery tip goin' up against an argument like that. Of course it wa'n't more'n two minutes before Sadie'd got her Sullivan up. She offered Buddy his choice between a railroad ticket home to mother, or nothing at all. Buddy wouldn't arbitrate on those lines. He said he was a desperate man, and that she'd be sorry before night. Sadie'd heard that before; so she just laughed and said the steam-car ticket offer would be held open until night.
She didn't see anything more of Buddy for a couple of hours, and then she caught him as he came up from the billiard-room. Bein' an expert on such symptoms, she knew why he talked likehis mouth was full of cotton, but she couldn't account for the wad of bills he shook at her. Buddy could. He'd run across a young Englishman down there who thought he could handle a cue. Buddy had bet hot air against real money, and trimmed his man.
"That wasn't the worst of it, though," said Sadie. "After I had got him up to my rooms he pulled out the money again, to count it over, and out came a three-inch marquise ring—an opal set with diamonds—that I knew the minute I put my eyes on it. There were her initials on the inside, too. Oh, no one but Mrs. Purdy Pell."
"Tut, tut!" says I. "You can easy square it with her."
"But that's just what I can't do," says Sadie. "She loves me about as much as a tramp likes work. She tells folks that I make fools of her boys. Her boys, mind you! She claims every stray man under twenty-five, and when I came here she had three of them on the string. Goodness knows, I didn't want them! They're only imitation men, anyway. And it was her ring that Buddy had in his pocket."
"Maybe he hadn't lifted it," says I.
Sadie swallowed a bit hard at that; but she raps out the straight goods. "Yes, he did," says she. "He must have sneaked it out of her roomas he went down stairs. Think of it! Stealing! He's done a lot of foolish things before; but I didn't think he would turn out a crook. The Lord knows where he gets that kind of blood from—not from the Sullivans, or the Scannells, either. But I can't have him put away. There's mother. And he won't mind a thing I say. Now what shall I do, Shorty?"
"Where's Buddy now?" says I.
"Locked in my clothes-closet, with his hands tied and a gag in his mouth," says she. "Oh, I can handle him that way, big as he is; and I wasn't going to take any more chances. But it's likely that Mrs. Pell has missed her ring by this time and is raising a howl about it. What's to be done?"
Say, there was a proposition for you! And me just a plain, every-day mitt juggler that don't take thinkin' exercises reg'lar. "Guess you've pushed the wrong button this time, Sadie," says I. "But I'll stay in your corner till the lights go out. Is anyone else on?"
"Not a soul," says Sadie.
"That's some help," says I. "First we'll have a little talk with Buddy."
I couldn't see what good that would do, but it was up to me to make some kind of a move.
When they'd landed us under the porte cochere—yes,you'd call it stoppin' at the horse-block—I sails in like I'd come alone, and hunts up Pinckney.
"What's all this about me bein' needed up here?" says I. "Goin' to make me Queen of the May?"
"By Jove, Shorty!" says he, "that's a clever idea. We'll do it."
"Yes, you will—not," says I. "You'll cut it out. I ain't no wine agent, and I left me rag doll to home; so if there's any funny stunts expected, you tell 'em I've put on a sub. Oh, sure, I'll stay to dinner, but as for leadin' any cotillions, change the card."
He gave his word they wouldn't spring anything like that on me, and then he called up a waiter in knee pants, and had him show me up to my quarters so I could get me gas-light clothes on before they unlocked the dinin'-room doors. After I'd made a quick shift I slid over into the next wing, followin' directions, and found Sadie.
"Mrs. Pell's on the war-path already," says she. "She's having it out with her maid now. Come in."
She'd dug Buddy out of the wardrobe and had him propped up in a corner.
"Better unstopper him and take off the bandages," says I.
And say, he had a lot of language corked upinside of him. It wasn't very sisterly, either, and most of it would have sounded better at a race-track; but I shut the transom and motioned to Sadie to let him spiel away, never chippin' in a word, only standing one side and lookin' him over.
So far as the outside went he was a credit to the family—one of these slim clean-cut youngsters, with a lot of curly red hair, pinky-white cheeks, and a pair of blue eyes that had nine kinds of deviltry in 'em. I could figure out how mother might be able not to see anything but good in Buddy. Hanged if I could get very sore on him myself, and knowin' how he'd been cuttin' up, at that.
"Well," says I, when he'd got out of breath some, "feel any better, do you?"
"Huh!" says he, givin' me a squint sideways. "Some cheap skate of a private detective, eh! You can't throw a scare into me that way, sis. Chase him out."
"Buddy," says I, "give up the rings."
"How'd you know there was more than one?" says he.
"Give up," says I, holdin' out me hand.
He did it, like a little man. There was two besides the marquise; one an emerald as big as a lima bean, and the other a solitaire spark thatcould have been shoved up for three or four hundred. You see, a woman like Mrs. Purdy Pell generally has a collection of those things lyin' around on her dressin'-table, and; knew if Buddy'd got any, he'd made a haul.
"I'm ashamed of you, Buddy," says I.
"You needn't be," says he. "I guess you'd do the same if you had a sister that wanted to see you starve in the streets. Oh, you needn't screw up your eyebrows, Sadie. It's so. And if you don't cough up a thousand and let me go, I'll swipe anything in sight. I can stand being pinched if you can afford to have me."
Sadie threw up her hands at that, and began walkin' up and down the room. "Do you hear that?" says she. "That's the kind of a brother I've got."
"It's something awful," says I. "Just hearin' him talk makes me feel shivery. It beats the band how wicked some of these cigarette desperados do get. Don't, Buddy, or I'll faint. I wouldn't dare stay in the room if your sister wa'n't handy to tie you up again in case you started to cut loose."
"I've got a good notion to push in your face," says he.
"Don't pay any attention to him, Shorty," says Sadie.
"I won't," says I; "but I'm scared stiff."
Just about then, though, Buddy seemed to have got a bulletin over a special wire. He was gazin' at me with his mouth open and a pucker between his eyes. "What Shorty?" says he. "Say, you ain't Shorty McCabe, are you?"
"Not to you," says I. "I got to draw the line somewhere, and with bad men I stands on my dignity. I'm Professor McCabe, sonny."
"Holy cats!" says he. "Honest, professor, I didn't mean a word of it. I take it all back. Why say, I saw you put out the Kangaroo in two rounds."
"Then you've had a liberal education," says I.
"Gee!" says he, lettin' off some more surprise, and bracin' himself back in the chair like he was afraid of falling off.
Well say, I've been rode to my dressin'-room on shoulders, and welcomed home from fights by mobs with brass bands; but for a gen-u-ine ovation I guess Buddy's little stunt came as near bein' the real thing as any. Dewey comin' back from the Philippines, or Mr. Get-There Hadley landin' in St. Louis with the Standard Oil scalps, wa'n't in it with me bein' discovered by Buddy Sullivan. I couldn't get the key to it then, but I've mapped it out now. Most of his enthusiasm was owin' to the fact that eversince he was fifteen Buddy'd based his claim to bein' a real sport on my havin' come from the same block as he did.
Anyway, it was a lightnin' change. From being a holy terror, Buddy calmed down to as peaceful a young gent as you'd want to meet. If I'd just shake hands with him once and call it square, he'd follow any program I'd a mind to plan out.
"Only don't let her send me home to maw," says he. "Say, they get up at six in the morning there, and if I don't crawl down by seven maw lugs up toast and eggs, and talks to me like I was a kid."
"Well, where'd you like to be shipped?" says I.
"Aw, come now, professor," says he. "You don't have to be told that. There ain't but one place where a fellow like me can really live. You get sis to put me back on Broadway with a few hundred in my clothes, and I'll kiss the Book that she won't hear from me for a year."
"But how about this jewelry-collectin' fad of yours?" says I.
"Ah, I wasn't going to carry it off," says he. "I let her see I had it, on purpose. I'll be good."
Well, Sadie was willin' to let it go at that, and we was just gettin' this part of the mix-up straightenedout lovely, when there came a rap at the door.
"Quick," says Sadie. "They mustn't see Buddy or you either, Shorty!"
So Buddy was pushed into the closet again, and I dodges behind a tall dressin'-mirror in the corner. It was a red-eyed girl with lumps in her throat. She said she was Mrs. Purdy Pell's maid.
"Mrs. Pell's missed some rings," says she, "and we've been havin' words over it. I told her there was a suspicious-looking young man in the house that I'd seen comin' out of your rooms awhile ago, and I didn't know but what you'd missed some things, too, ma'am."
"Ask Mrs. Pell to step over here for a minute," says Sadie.
"What's doing?" says I, after the maid had left.
"I don't know," says Sadie. "I've got to give that jewelry back to the silly thing first; then we'll see."
So I handed the trinkets over, and it wasn't long before Mrs. Pell shows up. And say, the minute them two came together the mercury dropped about thirty degrees. Bein' behind the glass, I couldn't see; but I could hear, and that was enough.
"Here are your lost rings," says Sadie.
That's her, every tick of the watch. If she wastackled by a gyasticutus, she'd grab it by the horns.
"Oh!" says Mrs, Pell, gatherin' 'em in; "And how does it happen that you have them?"
"I'll tell you to-morrow," says Sadie.
"I'd rather not wait that long," says Mrs. Pell. "I prefer to know now."
"You ought to be satisfied to get them back," says Sadie.
"Perhaps," says Mrs. Pell; "but I'm just a little curious to know how they got away. My maid thinks the person who took them is still in the house."
"If I listened to all the things my maid says—" begins Sadie.
"There are maids and maids," says Mrs. Pell. "I can trust mine. She saw the man. More than that, Mrs. Dipworthy, she thinks he is hidden in your rooms."
"She must have seen my brother," says Sadie, "or Professor McCabe."
"It's quite possible," says Mrs. Pell; "but I shall insist on having the officers sent for."
"Why," says Sadie, "I might have taken them myself, just as a joke."
"Indeed!" says Mrs. Pell in a polite assault-and-battery tone. "Then perhaps you will confess as much to the other guests? Will you?"
And that was a facer for Sadie. She'd been keeping a stiff lip up to this, but she came to the scratch wabbly in her voice. "You wouldn't want me to do that, would you?" says she.
"In justice to my maid, I must," says Mrs. Pell.
"Well," says Sadie, "if you're mean enough for that, I suppose I—"
But, say, I couldn't stay under cover any longer, with her bein' pushed down the chute in that style. I was wise to her game all right. She meant to stand up and take all that was coming, even if it put her down and out, just to keep the hooks off that kid brother of hers. And me loafin' back of the ropes with me hands in me pockets! I'd been a welcher, wouldn't I?
"Did I hear my cue?" says I, steppin' out into the lime-light.
It was a tableau, for fair. Me and Mrs. Purdy Pell didn't do anything but swap looks for a minute or so. I can't say just how pleased she was, but I've had better views. She wasn't any dainty, lily-of-the-valley sort. She was a good deal of a cabbage rose, I should say, and carried more or less weight for age. She had an arm on her like a fore-quarter of beef. I don't wonder that Purdy Pell skipped to Europe and didn't put in any answer when the proceedin's came up.
"Are you the one?" says she.
"No, he isn't," says Sadie, speakin' up brisk.
"That's right," says I; "but it was me brought your finger sparks back to light, ma'am."
"And where did you find them?" says Mrs. Pell, turnin' the third-degree stare on me.
"That's a professional secret," says I, "which I can't give up just yet."
"Oh, you can't!" says she. "This is interesting."
And with that she begins to size us up, one after the other. Oh, she had us tied to the post, with nothin' to do but chuck the knives at us. For a gallery play, it was the punkiest I ever put up. Here I'd come splashin' in with both feet, like an amateur life-saver goin' to the rescue, and I hadn't done anything but raise the tide.
Sadie didn't have a word to say. She was just bitin' her lip, and gettin' white about the mouth from the mad in her. And say, maybe Her Stoutness didn't enjoy watchin' us squirm. She was gettin' even for every look one of her Willie boys had ever wasted on Sadie.
"We'll see if you two can be induced to confide your precious secret to the police," says she. "I mean to find out who stole my rings."
She hadn't more than sent in that shot before the closet door opens, and Buddy comes out, blinkin' like a bat.
"It's all over, ain't it?" says he.
"It is now," says I, and looks to see Mrs. Purdy Pell begin to holler: "Stop thief!"
But it was a case of being off the alley again. Say, I'm glad I wasn't backin' my guesses with good money that night, or I'd come home with my pockets wrong side out. Ever see a hundred-and-eighty-pound fairy with a double chin turn kittenish? That was her.
"Why, Mr. Sullivan!" she gurgles, throwin' him a Julia Marlowe goo-goo glance.
"Hello, Dimples!" says Buddy. "Oh, they were your rings, were they? Then it's all right. I just borrowed 'em to scare sister into a cat fit and make her open up—just for a josh, you know."
"Why, why!" says Mrs. Pell, lookin' twisted, "is Mrs. Dipworthy your sister?"
"Sure," says Buddy. "But say, Dimples, you're the very girl I was wanting to see most. I've got another sure thing, good as a title guarantee, for the Croton stakes, and if you'll back it for me we'll make a killing. How about it, eh?"
"Oh, you reckless boy," says Mrs. Pell, tapping him on the cheek. "But you did give me such a lovely tip at the Aqueduct, and—and we'll see. Come, I want to talk to you," and she put out a wing for him to take.
As they drifted down towards the terrace Buddyturns and gives us the sassy wink over his shoulder.
"Looks like we'd lost our job, Sadie," says I.
"The silly old moss-agate!" says Sadie.
Then I goes down and reports to Pinckney, and puts in the rest of the evenin' bein' introduced as the gent that set the Baron Patchouli up in the shoe-string business. I felt like I'd opened up a jack-pot on a four-flush, but Pinckney and the rest seemed to be having a good time, so I stuck it out. In the morning Buddy goes along back to town with me.
"Say, professor," says he, pattin' a roll of twenties in his trousers pocket, "I wouldn't pass this along to anyone else, but if you want to connect with a hatful of easy coin, just plunge on Candy Boy."
"That's your beanery tip, is it?" says I. "Much obliged, Buddy, but I guess after the bookies get all you and Mrs. Pell are goin' to throw at 'em they won't need mine."
See? It was up to me to push home a great moral lesson, and I done my best. But what's the use? Next mornin' I takes up the paper and reads how Candy Boy wins, heads apart.