The organest was seated at his organ in a church,
In some beautiful woods of maple and birch,
He was very weary while he played upon the keys,
But he was a great organest and always played with ease,
When the soul is weary,
And the wind is dreary,
I would like to be an organest seated all day at the organ,
Whether my name might be Fairchild or Morgan,
I would play music like a vast amen,
The way it sounds in a church of men.
Florence read her poem seven or eight times, the deepening pleasure of
her expression being evidence that repetition failed to denature this
work, but on the contrary, enhanced an appreciative surprise at its
singular merit. Finally she folded the sheet of paper with a delicate
carefulness unusual to her, and placed it in her skirt pocket; then she
went downstairs and out into the back yard. Her next action was
straightforward and anything but prudish; she climbed the high wooden
fences, one after the other, until she came to a pause at the top of
that whereon the two journalists had lately made themselves so odiously
impressive.
Before her, if she had but taken note of them, were a lesson in history
and the markings of a profound transition in human evolution. Beside the
old frame stable was a little brick garage, obviously put to the daily
use intended by its designer. Quite as obviously the stable was
obsolete; anybody would have known from its outside that there was no
horse within it. There, visible, was the end of the pastoral age.
All this was lost upon Florence. She sat upon the fence, her gaze
unfavourably though wistfully fixed upon a sign of no special aesthetic
merit above the stable door.
THE NORTH END DAILY ORIOLE
ATWATER & ROOTER OWNERS &
PROPREITORS SUBSCRIBE NOW 25 CENTS
The inconsistency of the word "daily" did not trouble Florence;
moreover, she had found no fault with "Oriole" until the Owners &
Propreitors had explained to her in the plainest terms known to their
vocabularies that she was excluded from the enterprise. Then, indeed,
she had been reciprocally explicit in regard not only to them and
certain personal characteristics of theirs, which she pointed out as
fundamental, but in regard to any newspaper which should deliberately
call itself an "Oriole." The partners remained superior in manner,
though unable to conceal a natural resentment; they had adopted "Oriole"
not out of a sentiment for the city of Baltimore, nor, indeed, on
account of any ornithologic interest of theirs, but as a relic left over
from an abandoned club or secret society, which they had previously
contemplated forming, its members to be called "The Orioles" for no
reason whatever. The two friends had talked of this plan at many
meetings throughout the summer, and when Mr. Joseph Atwater made his
great-nephew the unexpected present of a printing-press, and a newspaper
consequently took the place of the club, Herbert and Henry still
entertained an affection for their former scheme and decided to
perpetuate the name. They were the more sensitive to attack upon it by
an ignorant outsider and girl like Florence, and her chance of
ingratiating herself with them, if that could be now her intention, was
not a promising one.
She descended from the fence with pronounced inelegance, and,
approaching the old double doors of the "carriage-house," which were
open, paused to listen. Sounds from above assured her that the editors
were editing--or at least that they could be found at their place of
business. Therefore, she ascended the cobwebby stairway, emerged from it
into the former hay loft, and thus made her appearance in the
printing-room of _The North End Daily Oriole_.
Herbert, frowning with the burden of composition, sat at a table beyond
the official railing, and his partner was engaged at the press,
earnestly setting type. This latter person (whom Florence so seldom
named otherwise than as "that nasty little Henry Rooter") was of a pure,
smooth, fair-haired appearance, and strangely clean for his age and
occupation. His profile was of a symmetry he had not yet himself begun
to appreciate; his dress was scrupulous and modish; and though he was
short, nothing outward about him confirmed the more sinister of
Florence's two adjectives. Nevertheless, her poor opinion of him was
plain in her expression as she made her present intrusion upon his
working hours. He seemed to reciprocate.
"Listen! Didn't I and Herbert tell you to keep out o' here?" he said.
"Look at her, Herbert! She's back again!"
"You get out o' here, Florence," said Herbert, abandoning his task with
a look of pain. "How often we got to tell you we don't want you around
here when we're in our office like this?"
"For Heaven's sake!" Henry Rooter thought fit to add. "Can't you quit
runnin' up and down our office stairs once in a while, long enough for
us to get our newspaper work done? Can't you give us a little _peace_?"
The pinkiness of Florence's altering complexion was justified; she had
not been within a thousand miles of their old office for four days. With
some heat she stated this to be the fact, adding, "And I only came then
because I knew somebody ought to see that this stable isn't ruined. It's
my own uncle and aunt's stable, I guess, isn't it? Answer me that, if
you'll kindly please to do so!"
"It's my father and mother's stable," Herbert asserted. "Haven't I got a
right to say who's allowed in my own father and mother's stable?"
"You have not," the prompt Florence replied. "It's my own uncle and
aunt's stable, and I got as much right here as anybody."
"You have not!" Henry Rooter protested hotly. "This isn't either your
ole aunt and uncle's stable."
"_It isn't_?"
"No, it is not! This isn't anybody's stable. It's my and Herbert's
Newspaper Building, and I guess you haven't got the face to stand there
and claim you got a right to go in a Newspaper Building and say you got
a right there when everybody tells you to stay outside of it, I guess!"
"Oh, haven't I?"
"No, you 'haven't--I'!" Mr. Rooter maintained bitterly. "You just walk
down town and go in any Newspaper Buildings down there and tell 'em you
got a right to stay there all day long when they tell you to get out o'
there! Just try it! That's all I ask!"
Florence uttered a cry of derision. "And pray, whoever told you I was
bound to do everything you ask me to, Mister Henry Rooter?" And she
concluded by reverting to that hostile impulse, so ancient, which, in
despair of touching an antagonist effectively, reflects upon his
ancestors. "If you got anything you want to ask, you go ask your
grandmother!"
"Here!" Herbert sprang to his feet. "You try and behave like a lady!"
"Who'll make me?" she inquired.
"You got to behave like a lady as long as you're in our Newspaper
Building, anyway," Herbert said ominously. "If you expect to come up
here after you been told five dozen times to keep out----"
"For Heaven's sakes!" his partner interposed. "When we goin' to get our
newspaper _work_ done? She's _your_ cousin; I should think you could get
her out!"
"Well, I'm goin' to, ain't I?" Herbert protested plaintively. "I expect
to get her out, don't I?"
"Oh, do you?" Miss Atwater inquired, with severe mockery. "Pray, how
would you expect to accomplish it, pray?"
Herbert looked desperate, but was unable to form a reply consistent with
a few new rules of etiquette and gallantry that he had begun to observe
during the past year or so. "Now, see here, Florence," he said. "You're
old enough to know when people tell you to keep out of a place, why, it
means they want you to stay away from there."
Florence remained cold to this reasoning. "Oh, Poot!" she said.
"Now, look here!" her cousin remonstrated, and went on with his
argument. "We got our newspaper work to do, and you ought to have sense
enough to know newspaper work like this newspaper work we got on _our_
hands here isn't--well, it ain't any child's play."
His partner appeared to approve of the expression, for he nodded
severely and then used it himself. "No, you _bet_ it isn't any child's
play!" he said.
"No, sir," Herbert continued. "This newspaper work we got on our hands
here isn't any child's play."
"No, sir," Henry Rooter again agreed. "Newspaper work like this isn't
any child's play at _all_!"
"It isn't any child's play, Florence," said Herbert. "It ain't any
child's play at all, Florence. If it was just child's play or something
like that, why, it wouldn't matter so much your always pokin' up here,
and----"
"Well," his partner interrupted judicially;--"we wouldn't want her
around, even if it _was_ child's play."
"No, we wouldn't; that's so," Herbert agreed. "We wouldn't want you
around, anyhow, Florence." Here his tone became more plaintive. "So, for
mercy's sakes can't you go on home and give us a little rest? What you
want, anyhow?"
"Well, I guess it's about time you was askin' me that," she said, not
unreasonably. "If you'd asked me that in the first place, instead of
actin' like you'd never been taught anything, and was only fit to
associate with hoodlums, perhaps my time is of _some_ value, myself!"
Here the lack of rhetorical cohesion was largely counteracted by the
strong expressiveness of her tone and manner, which made clear her
position as a person of worth, dealing with the lowest of her inferiors.
She went on, not pausing:
"I thought being as I was related to you, and all the family and
everybody else is goin' to haf to read your ole newspaper, anyway it'd
be a good thing if what was printed in it wasn't _all_ a disgrace to the
family, because the name of our family's got mixed up with this
newspaper;--so here!"
Thus speaking, she took the poem from her pocket and with dignity held
it forth to her cousin.
"What's that?" Herbert inquired, not moving a hand. He was but an
amateur, yet already enough of an editor to be suspicious.
"It's a poem," Florence said. "I don't know whether I exackly ought to
have it in your ole newspaper or not, but on account of the family's
sake I guess I better. Here, take it."
Herbert at once withdrew a few steps, placing his hands behind him.
"Listen here," he said;--"you think we got time to read a lot o' nothin'
in your ole hand-writin' that nobody can read anyhow, and then go and
toil and moil to print it on our printin'-press? I guess we got work
enough printin' what we write for our newspaper our own selves! My
goodness, Florence, I _told_ you this isn't any child's play!"
For the moment, Florence appeared to be somewhat baffled. "Well," she
said. "Well, you better put this poem in your ole newspaper if you want
to have anyhow one thing in it that won't make everybody sick that reads
it."
"_I_ won't do it!" Herbert said decisively.
"What you take us for?" his partner added.
"All right, then," Florence responded. "I'll go and tell Uncle Joseph
and he'll take this printing-press back."
"He will not take it back. I already did tell him how you kept pokin'
around, tryin' to _run_ everything, and how we just worried our lives
out tryin' to keep you away. He said he bet it was a hard job; that's
what Uncle Joseph said! So go on, tell him anything you want to. You
don't get your ole poem in _our_ newspaper!"
"Not if she lived to be two hunderd years old!" Henry Rooter added.
Then he had an afterthought. "Not unless she pays for it."
"How do you mean?" Herbert asked, puzzled by this codicil.
Now Henry's brow had become corrugated with no little professional
impressiveness. "You know what we were talkin' about this morning?" he
said. "How the right way to run our newspaper, we ought to have some
advertisements in it and everything? Well, we want money, don't we? We
could put this poem in our newspaper like an advertisement;--that is, if
Florence has got any money, we could."
Herbert frowned. "If her ole poem isn't too long I guess we could. Here,
let's see it, Florence." And, taking the sheet of paper in his hand, he
studied the dimensions of the poem, without paining himself to read it.
"Well, I guess, maybe we can do it," he said. "How much ought we to
charge her?"
This question sent Henry Rooter into a state of calculation, while
Florence observed him with veiled anxiety; but after a time he looked
up, his brow showing continued strain. "Do you keep a bank,
Florence--for nickels and dimes and maybe quarters, you know?" he
inquired.
It was her cousin who impulsively replied for her. "No, she don't," he
said.
"Not since I was about seven years old!" And Florence added sharply,
though with dignity: "Do you still make mud pies in your back yard,
pray?"
"Now, see here!" Henry objected. "Try and be a lady anyway for a few
minutes, can't you? I got to figure out how much we got to charge you
for your ole poem, don't I?"
"Well, then," Florence returned, "you better ask _me_ somep'n about
that, hadn't you?"
"Well," said Henry Rooter, "have you got any money at home?"
"No, I haven't."
"Have you got any money with you?"
"Yes, I have."
"How much is it?"
"I won't tell you."
Henry frowned. "I guess we ought to make her pay about two dollars and a
half," he said, turning to his partner.
Herbert became deferential; it seemed to him that he had formed a
business association with a genius, and for a moment he was dazzled;
then he remembered Florence's financial capacities, always well known
to him, and he looked depressed. Florence, herself, looked indignant.
"Two dollars and a half!" she cried. "Why, I could buy this whole place
for two dollars and a half, printing-press, railing, and all--yes, and
you thrown in, Mister Henry Rooter!"
"See here, Florence," Henry said earnestly. "Haven't you got two dollars
and a half?"
"Of course she hasn't!" his partner assured him. "She never had two
dollars and a half in her life!"
"Well, then," said Henry gloomily, "what we goin' to do about it? How
much _you_ think we ought to charge her?"
Herbert's expression became noncommittal. "Just let me think a minute,"
he said, and with his hand to his brow he stepped behind the
unsuspicious Florence.
"I got to think," he murmured; then with the straightforwardness of his
age, he suddenly seized his damsel cousin from the rear and held her in
a tight but far from affectionate embrace, pinioning her arms. She
shrieked, "Murder!" and "Let me go!" and "Help! Hay-yulp!"
"Look in her pocket," Herbert shouted. "She keeps her money in her skirt
pocket when she's got any. It's on the left side of her. Don't let her
kick you! Look out!"
"I got it!" said the dexterous Henry, retreating and exhibiting coins.
"It's one dime and two nickels--twenty cents. Has she got any more
pockets?"
"No, I haven't!" Florence fiercely informed him, as Herbert released
her. "And I guess you better hand that money back if you don't want to
be arrested for stealing!"
But Henry was unmoved. "Twenty cents," he said calculatingly. "Well, all
right; it isn't much, but you can have your poem in our newspaper for
twenty cents, Florence. If you don't want to pay that much, why, take
your ole twenty cents and go on away."
"Yes," said Herbert. "That's as cheap as we'll do it, Florence. Take it
or leave it."
"Take it or leave it," Henry Rooter agreed. "That's the way to talk to
her; take it or leave it, Florence. If you don't take it you got to
leave it."
Florence was indignant, but she decided to take it. "All right," she
said coldly. "I wouldn't pay another cent if I died for it."
"Well, you haven't got another cent, so that's all right," Mr. Rooter
remarked; and he honourably extended an open palm toward his partner.
"Here, Herbert; you can have the dime, or the two nickels, whichever you
rather. It makes no difference to me; I'd as soon have one as the
other."
Herbert took the two nickels, and turned to Florence. "See here,
Florence," he said, in a tone of strong complaint. "This business is all
done and paid for now. What you want to hang around here any _more_
for?"
"Yes, Florence," his partner faithfully seconded him, at once. "We
haven't got any more time to waste around here to-day, and so what you
want to stand around in the way and everything for? You ought to know
yourself we don't want you."
"I'm not in the way," said Florence hotly. "Whose way am I in?"
"Well, anyhow, if you don't go," Herbert informed her, "we'll carry you
downstairs and lock you out."
"I'd just like to see you!" she returned, her eyes flashing. "Just you
dare to lay a finger on me again!" And she added, "Anyway, if you did,
those ole doors haven't got any lock on 'em: I'll come right back in and
walk right straight up the stairs again!"
Herbert advanced toward her. "Now you pay attention, to me," he said.
"You've paid for your ole poem, and we got to have some peace around
here. I'm goin' straight over to your mother and ask her to come and get
you."
Florence gave up. "What difference would _that_ make, Mister
Taddletale?" she inquired mockingly. "_I_ wouldn't be here when she
came, would I? I'll thank you to notice there's some value to my time,
myself; and I'll just politely ask you to excuse me, pray!"