CHAPTER IV.
“Vell,” sighed the shoemaker, taking up the heavily-spiked shoes, and preparing to mend them, “now, vouldn’t dem shoes pe awful to stamp on anoder feller’s corns? It’s going to pe awful lonesome, but I pe glat dot Dora vill haf a goot husband, like de Bennie. I guess ve fix it mit a pigger place. I’ll vistle or sing till dey comes pack.”
Saying those philosophical words, Morris began to whistle, but the effort brought tears to his eyes. Then he tried to sing, but the words became a husky rattle, and, with a rueful face, he said:
“Vell, ve haf vork und dot is petter as medicine for a sick heart.”
Scarcely had he uttered these words when the doorway was darkened by a form, and a big man, who looked still larger in his full cowboy costume, came clattering down the steps to the little shop. The shoemaker looked at him in dumb wonder. The cowboy costume was onehe had never seen before, and he looked at it, from the wide, flapping sombrero to the spurred boots, not missing the hairy “chaps,” or leggins, and belt which, to Morris’ excited eyes, seemed stuck full of pistols and knives, although, really, the only two pistols were carried in the man’s hands. Plainly, the man was intoxicated and at a dangerous stage. He fired a shot into one corner and then another in rapid succession, while he shouted:
“Ee—you—Ee—you! I’m a wild and woolly catamount. Ee—you! I’m a bald eagle and I’m flying high. Ee—you! Hip! Hip! I’m lookin’ for blood, and I’m thirsty. Whoop-ee, whoop-ee!”
The frightened shoemaker, if he thought anything, imagined that this was some new kind of Cossack sent to massacre, as in Russia, and he fell backward over his bench, nearly fainting, yet managed to say:
“De slaughter-house, dot’s ofer in Jersey, de odder site of de river.”
The man, who would have been handsome had it not been for the marks of dissipation on his face, came on, saying loudly:
“I’m the hungry wolf of the plains, and this is my night to howl—ee—you! I’m the rip-snortin’ sure-shot from Dead Man’s Gulch!”
“I gif you my vort, you got in de wrong place. Dere’s a shootin’-gallery on de corner. Two shoots for a cent.”
“Ee—zip! Ee—zip! You’re a shoemaker, ain’t you?”
“I am if I live. Vat you vant, Mister? Dake de place. I don’t vant it. De rent is too high, anyvay, und I look for anoder place—you can haf it.”
“I don’t want your place. I’m lookin’ for the coyote who deserted my sister.”
“Coyotes? I don’t keep ’em. Go down to Somolus Levinsky’s. He’s got his life insured.”
“My name is ‘Cactus Bill,’ and I’m all over ‘stickers,’ and I want a shoemaker to peg ’em in.”
“Dot’s a good fellow,” pleaded Morris; “go on to de next place. I got de locomotor-attacks me, und I can’t use de hammer.”
“Well, we’ll let it go at that. This Bowery booze is chain-lightning. I can drink a gallon of our Western booze, but this Bowery fire is burnin’ me up. I’m a stranger in a strange land. I’m a poor lost yearlin’ and I haven’t got a brand. I’m a ring-tailed broncho an’ I’m runnin’ away. Clear the range, pardner, for it’s my time to buck.”
As he said this, the wild-looking cowboy firedanother shot, which was harmless, save for a small piece of plaster knocked from the wall. The shoemaker began to tremble again, and begged him not to be so free with his shooting or the police would be down on them. Indeed, it was strange that the officers had not already made their appearance. So he begged the stranger not to be so free.
“I’m not free. I’m tough, I am. You’ve got to be tough in the West. If ever you go there, trim yourself up with a beltful of guns and be as tough as the next one, or they’ll eat you alive. Whoop-ee! I’m goin’ out to find a graveyard. I’ve got to have a place to bury my dead.”
Then the man turned and staggered toward the steps, firing two shots as he went. The shoemaker at first thought he would run and hide, but he ducked down behind his bench.
“Nein, nein,” he muttered, “but I am tired.”
The shoemaker still cowered behind the protecting bench when Dora and Loney returned, laughing happily. Dora saw her father’s pale face and asked:
“Hello, papa. Was anyone here?”
“Vas anyone here? You ought to haf seen that crowd. You’d t’ink it vos an auction sale and dey vant to buy out my place. Vy you ask me such foolish questions, Dora?”
“Why, I did not know that was a foolish question. Was it foolish?”
“No, mein chilt. It vos idiotics.”
“Why, what is the matter, papa?”
“I got it, vot you call dot tired feelings.”
“Can I do anything for you?”
“Yes, mein chilt. Go by de top of de steps und see if dere is a Vild Vest parade comin’ down de street.”
“Why, papa, what is wrong? Are you out of your head?”
“Out of mine headt! Come und touch it, dat I shall pe sure I haf von yet.”
“Papa, papa!” said Dora, really alarmed. “What is the matter? Oh, are you sick?”
“I t’ink I am deat, put I don’t know.”
“Whatisthe matter? What is wrong?”
“Nodings wrong. He vas all right.”
Here the shoemaker jumped to his feet, shouting in a wavering voice: “Ee—you! I’m de ring-tailed broncho and it’s my time to buck. Ee—you!”
“Run, Loney,” said the distracted Dora, “run and get the doctor. Papa has gone crazy.”
“Neffer mind, Loney. I’m all right now. Dere vos a feller here py de name of ‘Cactus,’ and he haf stickers on, and he vanted me to peg dem in.”
“Worse and worse! Run, Loney, for the doctor. Run quick!”
“No, no, Dora. It is all right now. I vos nervous, dot’s all. Vere is de Bennie?”
“Waiting at Lyons’ for you. He insists that you shall come there and have supper with him.”
“All right, Dora, I vill go. I need a little air, und I vill drink von or a couple of glasses of beer. Keep de shop. Good-bye. I vill soon come back. Good-bye, childrens.”
Saying this, the nerve-shaken shoemaker put on his hat, and left his apron, and went up the steps to the street.
Dora was so happy that it seemed as though she could not contain her joy. To her simple heart, marriage and motherhood were the sum and substance of a woman’s earthly joy. No longings after a “career” troubled her heart. She had her dear father, her little Loney, and, above all, her Bennie. Was ever a girl so blessed before? Could human heart ask more? Her cup was full to overflowing. Dora seized Loney and began to dance about the dark, little shop.
“Oh, Loney! what a happy world this is, after all! This is only an old cellar, but I am just as happy as if it were a palace of gold.”
“I knew the happy days would come to thecellar,” said Loney, with a vague, far-away look in his blue eyes, “because I have prayed and prayed, because you and your father were so good to me.”
While these words were still on the lips of the child, the doorway was again darkened and the burly form of “Cactus Bill” appeared. He shouted:
“Ee—you! Where is he? I’m loaded for bear. I want a pipeful of his whiskers.”
Dora slipped her arm around Loney and drew him into the shadow, just as John Pierson and Dopey Mack came softly down the steps. “Cactus Bill” was so unsteady on his feet and so overcome by the vile liquor he had been drinking that he neither heard nor saw the two men. Scarcely had they reached the level of the floor than Pierson leveled his pistol at “Bill,” who stood with his back to the door, and fired, the ball striking the drunken man in the back.
With the instinct of self-defence, “Bill” drew his pistol and tried to aim at his adversary, but fell nerveless to the floor, where he lay inert.
Pierson, with his pistol still in his hand, stepped forward, saying:
“It was your life or mine! You have searched the Bowery from end to end for me to-night, to kill me—and I drew first; that’s all.”
The prostrate giant gave no sign of life, and after a moment Pierson said:
“He is dead!”
“Yes,” said Dopey, in an ugly whisper, “and dese kids is witness to de deed.”
Loney tried to slip out unobserved, to find Mr. Goldberg, but Dopey, saying “Naw, you don’t,” struck the child a heavy blow on the head with a murderous “billy.” The child gave a gasp and fell into Dopey’s arms. Dopey dragged him to the inner door and out of sight.
Dora stood white and speechless with terror until John Pierson turned to her, saying:
“Don’t be afraid. I won’t harm you. You are too young and beautiful to die just yet.”
Dopey returned alone and whispered to Pierson:
“I didn’t mean to do it, but de crack on de nut croaked de kid!”
“I’m glad of it. His lips are sealed forever.”
Dopey went to Dora and, with an evil look on his opium-defaced visage, said hoarsely:
“Now den, my pretty bird, it’s your turn. You’ll never live to tell of dis!”
“Let her alone!” said John, angrily. “I’m not going to harm her. We’ve got to get away from New York as quick as the devil will let us—and I’m going to take her with me.”
With a gasp of horror and a futile effort to call her father and Bennie, Dora fainted and would have fallen, had not John caught her.
“Come on; help me get her away. Some one may come,” whispered Pierson to Dopey.
While they stood over Dora, Loney came creeping softly from the hallway where Dopey had left him, supposing him to be dead; and, unnoticed, he crept to the bench and crouched behind it unobserved, and silently wiped the blood that flowed from the wound in his head.
Pierson started with Dora toward the cellar-steps, but Dopey checked him, saying:
“Not that way, cull. De street is full of people. I know dis place like a book. Go out that door”—pointing to the door leading into the little stairway and hall. “You’ll find a gratin’ openin’ into an alley-way. I’ll go ’round and meet you dere wid Red Mike and his cab. Mike’s me pal, he is. Dere’s only one way to do a t’ing, an’ dat’s de right way. See?”
“Then, hurry! hurry!”
John then staggered out the way Dopey had indicated, with the insensible Dora in his arms, while Dopey sneaked cautiously up the cellar-steps to the street.
A few moments of silence passed in that little shop, then Loney sobbed once with the painin his head and the knowledge that Dora had been carried off by that bad man, and he was powerless to save her. Then his senses left him and he sank back unconscious.
With a glad and resonant voice the happy shoemaker shouted down the steps as he made his appearance then:
“Dora, Dora, I have de nice present for you—from de Bennie. Your ring of betrothal. I tellet him I wouldn’t let you vear it now, and it is all fixet. Now, you get merrit on your eighteenth birthday, eh? Vot you say! Vy, vot is dot? De man mit de ‘stickers’! Yust deat drunk! Dot Bowery booze vos too much for him—efen him. Vake up, Mister; vake up! You can’t sleep here. Vat’s dot—ploot! Mein Gott! he is hurted!”
While the shoemaker was shaking and talking to “Bill,” the latter raised on his elbow, saying:
“My friend, I’m hurt to the death. Shot in the back by the Mexican who wronged my sister. I played fox until he had gone. I’m going over the range fast—fast, pardner, and the night is coming on. I can hardly see.”
“Poor man! kan I do anydings for you?”
“Nothin’, pardner; only look in my side-pocket—there’san old paper there. Can you find it?”
Morris put his hand into the pocket designated, and drew therefrom a folded paper, saying:
“Is it here? Is dis it?”
“That’s yours, pardner. If it ever amounts to anything, it proves the ownership to a claim out West in the gold fields. Keep it. I haven’t a relative on earth but a sister, maybe, if she isn’t dead. But if she is living, and you can find her, and the claim pans out, give her half, will you?”
“I vill—yust de same as if it vos mein own sister.”
“That’s bully, pard! Gimme your hand. So long. The sun has set, and I can see my mother up there, with a big gold nugget around her head. So long.”
These last words ended in a rattling gasp, and a sudden straightening of the limbs, and then a relaxation of the whole, strong body. “Cactus Bill” was dead “with his boots on.”
The dazed shoemaker stood up and looked wonderingly about him. So many things had happened in this one day that it is no wonder he was dazed by it all. Suddenly the weak voice of Loney called:
“Dora! Dora!”
“No, no; don’t call her. I don’t vant her to see dot,” said Morris, pointing to “Bill.” Loney staggered from behind the bench, sobbing:
“Oh, Mr. Goldberg! Dora’s stolen! She’s gone!”
“Gone! Gone! Mein Dora gone! Vere?”
“Yes; two men shothim, and took Dora!”
The bereaved father sank down to the bench, sobbing: “Mein Gott! Mein Gott!”
“What are you going to do?” asked Loney, after a while. “Mr. Goldberg, Mr. Goldberg! What are we going to do?”
“I vill search de vorld ofer to find mein chilt.”
Then, as he tried to take his handkerchief from his pocket, the tiny baby-shoe fell from it. This brought a flood of tears and, as he kissed the little shoe over and over again, he sobbed:
“Mein little Dora! Mein little Dora!”
Loney crept to the heartbroken man and passed his thin little arm around the shoemaker’s neck while they mingled their tears.