THE BEST SISTER IN THE WORLD.
MYLES stood for a moment motionless in front of Mr. Haxall’s desk
like one who is dazed. Gradually the full meaning of the words, “Hand
the key of your desk to Mr. Brown,” dawned upon him. He was dismissed
from the paper; dismissed for drunkenness and neglect of duty while
under orders. He, Myles Manning, the son of a gentleman, and who had
always considered himself one, had been drunk, and, because of it, the
position which he had been so proud of, so confident of retaining, was
no longer his. It was terrible; but, alas! it was true.
Without a word he turned away and went to his own desk. His own desk?
No; it was his no longer. Some other fellow, who could keep sober
and perform his duty faithfully, would have it now. Mechanically he
unlocked the drawer and began to take from it the treasures that had
accumulated there: a rough copy of the first thing he ever wrote for
the paper, the unfinished manuscript of a special article that he had
hoped would win him a name in journalism, a few precious home letters.
While he was thus engaged one of the office-boys laid some mail matter
before him. He glanced it over. A loving letter from his mother, full
of anxiety as to where he was and what he was doing. They had not heard
from him in so long. Kate and his father sent dearest love. They were
having a hard struggle with poverty; but they were so proud of him, he
was doing so splendidly, that thinking and talking of him kept them
cheerful.
Myles thrust this letter into his pocket with a groan. There was a long
letter from Van Cleef, full of what he was doing, enlivened by gay bits
of description of life at summer resorts. He would be back next week.
A note from his old gentleman friend of the Oxygen, asking his dear
proxy to dine at the club with him that evening. It was dated that very
morning. Then a telegram. It was from Billings, and read:
“Operator says some mistake. Never loaned you any money. Tried to, but
you refused. B. W. in town. Furious against you. Do not know what for.
Shall I thrash him in your name? Answer.
“BILLINGS.”
This message diverted Myles’ gloomy thoughts for a moment. If the
telegraph operator had not loaned him the money, who had? Here was
a mystery. Well, whoever it was would claim his own fast enough. He
would have to wait, though. As well try to extract blood from a stone
as money from him now. He was not only penniless, but hopeless of ever
earning another cent.
Now a couple of reporters came in. They had read the morning’s papers
and were full of enthusiasm over the brave deed of one of their number.
Seeing Myles at his desk they rushed up to congratulate him. This was
more than the poor fellow could bear, and, hastily gathering up his
papers, he hurried from the office, laying his key on Mr. Brown’s desk
as he passed it.
The two reporters stared after him amazed and indignant.
“It is curious how stuck up some folks can get with a little
notoriety,” said one.
“Yes,” replied the other, “too stuck up to accept congratulations
from ordinary every-day chaps like us. Well, the next time he may
congratulate himself, but you can safely depend upon it that I won’t
run the risk of another such snub from him.”
As Myles went down stairs he thought he might as well collect his
week’s salary, and stepped into the cashier’s office to do so. The
usual little brown envelope was handed to him, and he put it into his
pocket without stopping to open it there.
Arrived at his own room he locked the door and gave way to his grief,
mortification, and anger. Nobody ever had such hard luck as he; nobody
was ever so shamefully treated. Mr. Haxall was a monument of injustice
and tyranny. How he hated him! How he hated everybody! Thus he raved to
himself as he paced furiously up and down the narrow limits of his room.
Thus an hour was passed, and still the tumult raged. He was desperate.
He knew not which way to turn, and could see no hope in any direction.
Should he go home? Should he stay in the city and try for other work,
or should he fly to some distant part of the country where he was
unknown, and begin all over again? Each of these plans was rejected
as soon as thought of. He could not go home and change their hope and
pride in him to shame and sorrow. No; he loved them too dearly for
that. There was no use in trying for a position on any other city
paper. The story of his disgrace would bar every office door. He could
not go to a distant city and start anew because he had no money with
which to travel. He had his week’s pay, to be sure; but how far would
such a pitiful sum take him? Hardly thinking of what he did he opened
the little brown envelope. A slip of paper fluttered to the floor. It
was the order on the cashier for the money he had drawn to pay his
expenses on his recent trip. As he had rendered no account of these
expenses, and as the sum thus drawn was far in excess of his week’s
salary, the cashier was obliged to charge the full amount to him and
withhold the salary as partial payment.
This last blow was too much. Myles flung himself on his bed and buried
his face in the pillows. How long he lay there, utterly forsaken,
prostrated, and hopeless, he never knew; but he was finally aroused by
a knock at his door.
He felt that he could not see anybody then, and did not answer it. He
hoped whoever it was would believe him to be out and go away; but the
knock was repeated.
“Who is it?” he called, in a gruff tone.
“It is I, Myles; your Sister Kate. Why don’t you open the door?”
Kate in the city! Kate there at his door! He couldn’t see her. He could
not let her see him in his present condition. No, he could not bear it.
He was about to tell her so and beg her to go away. Then the thought
that she might as well know the worst now as later caused him to change
his mind. He unlocked the door, and Kate Manning, happy-looking, and
flushed with exercise, entered.
“Oh, I’m so glad,” she began, and then, with a sudden change of tone
and in a shocked voice, “Why, Myles Manning, what is the matter? I
never saw any one look so dreadfully in all my life.”
“Probably you never met anybody who had such cause for feeling
dreadfully as I have,” replied Myles, as he placed a chair for his
sister and leaned gloomily against the mantel-shelf that nearly filled
one side of the little room.
[Illustration: HE LEANED GLOOMILY AGAINST THE MANTEL SHELF THAT NEARLY
FILLED ONE SIDE OF THE ROOM. (_Page 248._)]
“What do you mean, Myles? Sit down there on the bed and tell me all
about it at once,” commanded Kate, nervously pulling off her gloves as
she spoke.
Then Myles sat down and told her the whole miserable story, beginning
with the day he went to Mountain Junction and ending with the moment of
his present disgrace and wretchedness.
“You poor, poor, dear boy!” exclaimed Kate, as he finished, and with
her eyes full of sympathetic tears. “I never in my life heard of so
much trouble coming to one person all at once. There is one splendid
thing about it all, though.”
“Is there?” asked Myles, doubtfully. “What is that?”
“Why, after such a terrible experience you never, never, so long as you
live, will touch another drop of liquor; will you, dear?”
“I don’t think I’m likely to.”
“But promise me you won’t!”
“All right, Kate, I promise.”
“There! Now I am really glad it has all happened. But how splendidly
you saved that train! Why didn’t you tell Mr. Haxall about it? If you
had he couldn’t possibly have done more than to reprimand you. He
would never have dismissed you in the world.”
“He knew all about it,” replied Myles. “It’s all in the paper. Haven’t
you read the _Phonograph_ this morning?”
“No, I haven’t had a moment’s time to look at the papers to-day. Do you
mean that what you did is in the paper, with your name and all?”
For answer Myles handed her his copy of the _Phonograph_, and she read
eagerly at the place he pointed out. Her cheeks flushed as she read,
and when she finished she sprang up, and, throwing her arms about her
brother’s neck, exclaimed:
“It is simply wonderful, Myles! wonderful! And I should think you’d be
the proudest boy in New York City at this minute. Why, just because I
am your sister I am the proudest girl in it.”
“I suppose I was just a little proud before I went to the office this
morning,” said Myles, gently disengaging himself from his sister’s
embrace; “but I guess it was the sort of pride that goeth before a
fall. At any rate, I got my fall, and a pretty serious one it was too.”
“Oh, nonsense!” cried Kate, “What’s one fall? A man ought not to mind
such a thing as that. Do as you did when you were a little boy, pick
yourself up and run on again.”
“That’s easy enough to say, but hard to do. To begin with, I am
disgraced and penniless.”
“Penniless!” echoed Kate, ignoring the other word. “Well, I can remedy
that. It’s just what I came to tell you about. I went to the office
first, and they said you had gone home. So I came up here. There, sir;
now you are not penniless.”
While she spoke she had been unlocking a ridiculous little bag that
hung from her arm, and now, taking from it a roll of bills, she thrust
them into her brother’s hand.
“Why, Kate, what is this? Where did you get hold of so much money?”
exclaimed Myles.
“Earned it, sir!”
“Earned it! You earned it?”
“Yes. I have been trying for it all summer long. I’ve sent drawing
after drawing to every illustrated paper and magazine in the country,
and they have all been returned, until last week, when I had one
accepted at W—— ’s.”
“At W—— ’s!” interrupted Myles, to whom such a piece of good fortune
seemed almost incredible.
“Yes, sir, at W—— ’s. The very place of all others in which I most
wished to succeed, and where I had the least hope of doing so. They
sent a note saying that it was accepted, and I came in town this
morning to get the money for it. Twenty-five dollars they gave me. What
do you think of that? And it’s all yours, you dear old fellow you!
every cent of it. Oh, I’m so proud and glad that it came just at this
time, when you needed it so much! And they praised the drawing and gave
me an order for another. It is to illustrate a short story, and I’ve
got the manuscript here to take home and read and get an inspiration
from. Oh, Myles, why can’t you write stories and let me illustrate
them? It would be the most splendid thing in the world.
“So it would, but there is one important draw-back to such a scheme.”
“What?”
“My inability to write stories. You have proved that you are able to do
your part of such a work, and I have proved myself unable to do mine.
From what has happened to-day it is evident that I am not even fit for
a reporter’s position, and that is only the first stepping-stone in
literary work.”
“Myles Manning, you mustn’t talk so about yourself! You know you have
done splendidly ever since you began on the _Phonograph_, and if that
horrid Mr. Haxall wasn’t a perfect stupid, he’d know that he had done
a very foolish thing in letting you go. He will wish he had you back,
and try to get you too, some day; see if he don’t. Then what a triumph
it will be to be able to say: ‘No, I thank you, sir, I have found
something better to do.’”
“It is impossible to fancy myself saying any such thing,” answered
Myles, with a smile—the first that his face had worn in hours. “But,
Kate, it is you who have done splendidly, and it is I who ought to be
proud of having such a sister. I am proud, too, just as proud as I can
be, of you, but I can’t take your money, dear.”
“Oh, Myles, what shall I do with the hateful money if you don’t take
it? That is the one thing that makes money worth having—the power,
I mean, that it gives us to help those we love. Don’t take away this
great pleasure from me. Don’t, there’s a good boy.”
So these generous young souls struggled with each other, the one to
give, and the other against receiving the gift, until finally they
reached a compromise. Myles agreed to take ten dollars from his sister
as a loan, while she declared she should put the rest aside for his
use, and should not touch it so long as there was the slightest chance
of his needing it. Then they discussed plans for the future, and Kate
said:
“Why not be your own city editor, Myles, and give yourself interesting
assignments to work up? I’m sure there are lots of things people want
to know about, and if you would only write them up some of the papers
would be certain to take your articles—and pay you well for them too.”
“The trouble is there are so many fellows doing that very thing,”
answered Myles.
“Well, that is the trouble with every thing. There are quantities of
people doing the same thing in every kind of business. If you can only
do the same thing a little better than any one else though, or even as
well as half of them, you are sure to succeed.”
“A most wise and level-headed speech, sister of mine,” said Myles,
laughing, for his spirits were rapidly reviving under the influence
of Kate’s cheerfulness and loving sympathy. “I will think seriously of
your plan, and if nothing better turns up, why, perhaps I will make a
try at it.”
Then Myles told Kate of the note he had received that morning from his
“nice old Oxygen gentleman,” as they called him among themselves, and
said that he didn’t know but what he ought to accept the invitation for
that evening. “My friends are becoming so few that I must do some extra
cultivating of those who are left, you know,” he added, with an attempt
at cheerfulness.
“Aren’t you ashamed to say that your friends are becoming few, when
only yesterday you made a thousand new ones all at once?” replied Kate,
indignantly. “At the same time, I do think you ought to dine with your
Oxygen gentleman; who knows but what he may prove a fairy godfather
in disguise, and your future may turn from this very evening! Yes,
decidedly, you must go and dine with him, and you can come out home on
the midnight train. In the meantime I shall have told father and mother
all about you, so that they may be prepared to receive you with due
honor.”
“Be sure you tell them every thing,” said Myles, “for if you don’t
I shall. I am not going to row this race under any but my own true
colors.”
“Yes, of course, I shall have to mention the one little neglect of duty
that Mr. Haxall, hateful man! has made such a mountain of; but I think
it would be just as well, dear, not to say any thing about the other
cause of your being dismissed. It would only make them feel badly; and,
as such a thing can never possibly happen again, why, what is the use?”
Then sunny-faced Kate had to hurry away to catch her train, but she
left Myles so much happier and more hopeful than he was when she
knocked at his door that he could hardly realize how wretched he had
been.
“I tell you what,” he said to himself as he dressed for dinner, “a good
sister is one of the best things a fellow can have in this world.”
Myles reached the Oxygen some time before the hour set for dinner, and
was in the reading-room when his friend entered.
“My dear boy, I am very glad you were able to come,” said the old
gentleman, advancing toward him with outstretched hand and beaming
face. “I wanted to meet you this evening on purpose to congratulate
you. There, not a word! I know what your modesty prompts you to say;
but I read the whole story in the morning paper, and have felt proud
of my proxy all day. I hope the _Phonograph_ people have rated you a
handsome increase of salary in view of the glory you have shed upon
them.”
“On the contrary,” said Myles, “they have dismissed me from the paper.”
“Dismissed you? Impossible!”
“They did not find it so,” replied Myles; “but, to tell the truth, I
was not dismissed for what I did, but rather for what I did not do.”
“I am extremely sorry to hear it,” said the old gentleman; “extremely
sorry; but let us have dinner first, and talk it all over afterward;
things always look so much brighter after dinner than they do before
it.”
At the dinner-table Myles was in the very act of raising a glass of
wine to his lips when his promise to Kate darted into his mind. With a
flushed face he set the glass quickly down, saying, in answer to his
companion’s inquiring look, “I took a pledge to-day, sir, never again
to touch a drop of wine, and so you will please excuse me for not
breaking it.”
“Excuse you for not breaking it! My dear boy, I would never excuse you
if you did. It was a fine thing to do, and may you have the strength
to stick to that pledge through life! No young man can have a better
recommendation, when seeking to make his way in the world, than that he
is strictly temperate. I even place it ahead of a character for honesty
among my employés.”
“Do you, then, employ many men, sir?” asked Myles, with a vague hope
that something might come to him through this interview.
“Well, yes, a thousand or two, more or less,” replied the other,
laughing, “but not exactly in your line of business.”
“I don’t know that I have any line of business just at present,” said
Myles; and this brought them back to the subject of his dismissal from
the paper. The old gentleman asked such shrewd questions, and expressed
such genuine interest and sympathy, that, before he knew it, Myles was
telling him the whole story exactly as he had told it to Kate.
“The city editor was perfectly right,” said the old gentleman, when
Myles had finished; “and I should have done exactly as he did under
the circumstances. He could not have acted otherwise, in justice to
the paper or the other workers on it. Still, there were extenuating
circumstances. You have profited by your lesson and have done nobly
since. It seems to me that the paper will make a mistake if it loses
you. Suppose I go to see this city editor and talk the matter over with
him? Should you have any objections?”
“Certainly not,” answered Myles; “but I can tell you beforehand that it
won’t do the least bit of good. Mr. Haxall never allows himself to be
influenced by outsiders.”
“I shall try it, at any rate, and will let you know the result on
Monday,” said the kindly old gentleman. Then Myles was obliged to bid
him good-night and hurry off to catch the midnight train.