The next afternoon, about four o'clock, Herbert stood gloomily at the
main entrance of Atwater & Rooter's Newspaper Building awaiting his
partner. The other entrances were not only nailed fast but massively
barricaded; and this one (consisting of the ancient carriage-house
doors, opening upon a driveway through the yard) had recently been made
effective for exclusion. A long and heavy plank leaned against the wall,
near by, ready to be set in hook-shaped iron supports fastened to the
inner sides of the doors; and when the doors were closed, with this
great plank in place, a person inside the building might seem entitled
to count upon the enjoyment of privacy, except in case of earthquake,
tornado, or fire. In fact, the size of the plank and the substantial
quality of the iron fastenings could be looked upon, from a certain
viewpoint, as a real compliment to the energy and persistence of
Florence Atwater.
Herbert had been in no complimentary frame of mind, however, when he
devised the obstructions, nor was he now in such a frame of mind. He was
pessimistic in regard to his future, and also embarrassed in
anticipation of some explanations it would be necessary to make to his
partner. He strongly hoped that Henry's regular after-school appearance
at the Newspaper Building would precede Florence's, because these
explanations required both deliberation and tact, and he was convinced
that it would be almost impossible to make them at all if Florence got
there first.
He understood that he was unfortunately within her power; and he saw
that it would be dangerous to place in operation for her exclusion from
the Building this new mechanism contrived with such hopeful care, and at
a cost of two dollars and twenty-five cents taken from the _Oriole's_
treasury. What he wished Henry to believe was that for some good reason,
which Herbert had not yet been able to invent, it would be better to
show Florence a little politeness. He had a desperate hope that he might
find some diplomatic way to prevail on Henry to be as subservient to
Florence as she had seemed to demand, and he was determined to touch any
extremity of unveracity, rather than permit the details of his answer
in "Truth" to come to his partner's knowledge. Henry Rooter was not
Wallie Torbin; but in possession of material such as this he could
easily make himself intolerable.
Therefore, it was in a flurried state of mind that Herbert waited; and
when his friend appeared, over the fence, his perturbation was not
decreased. He even failed to notice the unusual gravity of Henry's
manner.
"Hello, Henry! I thought I wouldn't start in working till you got here.
I didn't want to haf to come all the way downstairs again to open the
door and hi'st our good ole plank up again."
"I see," said Henry, glancing nervously at their good ole plank. "Well,
I guess Florence'll never get in _this_ good ole door--that is, she
won't if we don't let her, or something."
This final clause would have astonished Herbert if he had been less
preoccupied with his troubles. "You bet she won't!" he said
mechanically. "She couldn't ever get in here again--if the _family_
didn't go intafering around and give me the dickens and everything,
because they think--they _say_ they do, anyhow--they say they
think--they think----"
He paused, disguising a little choke as a cough of scorn for the
family's thinking.
"What did you say your family think?" Henry asked absently.
"Well, they say we ought to let her have a share in our newspaper."
Again he paused, afraid to continue lest his hypocrisy appear so
bare-faced as to invite suspicion. "Well, maybe we _ought_," he said
finally, his eyes guiltily upon his toe, which slowly scuffed the
ground. "I don't say we ought, and I don't say we oughtn't."
He expected at the least a sharp protest from his partner, who, on the
contrary, surprised him. "Well, that's the way _I_ look at it," Henry
said. "I don't say we ought and I don't say we oughtn't."
And he, likewise, stared at the toe of a shoe that scuffed the ground.
Herbert felt a little better; this particular subdivision of his
difficulties seemed to be working out with unexpected ease.
"I don't say we will and I don't say we won't," Henry added. "That's the
way I look at it. My father and mother are always talkin' to me: how I
got to be polite and everything, and I guess maybe it's time I began to
pay some 'tention to what they say. You don't have your father and
mother for always, you know, Herbert."
Herbert's mood at once chimed with this unprecedented filial
melancholy. "No, you don't, Henry. That's what I often think about,
myself. No, sir, a fellow doesn't have his father and mother to advise
him our whole life, and you ought to do a good deal what they say while
they're still alive."
"That's what I say," Henry agreed gloomily; and then, without any
alteration of his tone, or of the dejected thoughtfulness of his
attitude, he changed the subject in a way that painfully startled his
companion. "Have you seen Wallie Torbin to-day, Herbert?"
"What!"
"Have you seen Wallie Torbin to-day?"
Herbert swallowed. "Why, what makes--what makes you ask me that, Henry?"
he said.
"Oh, nothin'." Henry still kept his eyes upon his gloomily scuffing toe.
"I just wondered, because I didn't happen to see him in school this
afternoon when I happened to look in the door of the Eight-A when it was
open. I didn't want to know on account of anything particular. I just
happened to say that about him because I didn't have anything else to
think about just then, so I just happened to think about him, the way you
do when you haven't got anything much on your mind and might get to
thinkin' about you can't tell what. That's all the way it was; I just
happened to kind of wonder if he was around anywhere maybe."
Henry's tone was obviously, even elaborately, sincere; and Herbert was
reassured. "Well, I didn't see him," he responded. "Maybe he's sick."
"No, he isn't," his friend said. "Florence said she saw him chasin' his
dog down the street about noon."
At this Herbert's uneasiness was uncomfortably renewed. "_Florence_ did?
Where'd you see Florence?"
Mr. Rooter swallowed. "A little while ago," he said, and again
swallowed. "On the way home from school."
"Look--look here!" Herbert was flurried to the point of panic.
"Henry--did Florence--did she go and tell you--did she tell you----?"
"_I_ didn't hardly notice what she was talkin' about," Henry said
doggedly. "She didn't have anything to say that _I'd_ ever care two
cents about. She came up behind me and walked along with me a ways, but
I got too many things on my mind to hardly pay the least attention to
anything _she_ ever talks about. She's a girl what I think about her
the less people pay any 'tention to what she says the better off they
are."
"That's the way with me, Henry," his partner assured him earnestly. "I
never pay any notice to what _she_ says. The way I figure it out about
_her_, Henry, everybody'd be a good deal better off if nobody ever paid
the least notice to anything she says. I never even notice what she
says, myself."
"I don't either," said Henry. "All _I_ think about is what my father and
mother say, because I'm not goin' to have their advice all the rest o'
my life, after they're dead. If they want me to be polite, why, I'll do
it and that's all there is about it."
"It's the same way with me, Henry. If she comes flappin' around here
blattin' and blubbin' how she's goin' to have somep'n to do with our
newspaper, why, the only reason _I'd_ ever let her would be because my
_family_ say I ought to show more politeness to her than up to now. I
wouldn't do it on any other account, Henry."
"Neither would I. That's just the same way _I_ look at it, Herbert. If I
ever begin to treat her any better, she's got my father and mother to
thank, not me. That's the only reason _I'd_ be willing to say we better
leave the plank down and let her in, if she comes around here like she's
liable to."
"Well," said Herbert. "_I'm_ willing. I don't want to get in trouble
with the family."
And they mounted the stairs to their editorial, reportorial, and
printing rooms; and began to work in a manner not only preoccupied but
apprehensive. At intervals they would give each other a furtive glance,
and then seem to reflect upon their fathers' and mothers' wishes and the
troublous state of the times. Florence did not keep them waiting long,
however.
She might have been easier to bear had her manner of arrival been less
assured. She romped up the stairs, came skipping across the old floor,
swinging her hat by a ribbon, flung open the gate in the sacred railing,
and, flouncing into the principal chair, immodestly placed her feet on
the table in front of that chair. Additionally, such was her lively
humour, she affected to light and smoke the stub of a lead pencil.
"Well, men," she said heartily, "I don't want to see any loafin' around
here, men. I expect I'll have a pretty good newspaper this week; yes,
sir, a pretty good newspaper, and I guess you men got to jump around a
good deal to do everything I think of, or else maybe I guess I'll have
to turn you off. I don't want to haf to do that, men."
The blackmailed partners made no reply, on account of an inability that
was perfect for the moment. They stared at her helplessly, though not
kindly; for in their expressions the conflict between desire and policy
was almost staringly vivid. And such was their preoccupation, each with
the bitterness of his own case, that neither wondered at the other's
strange complaisance.
Florence made it clear to them that henceforth she was the editor of
_The North End Daily Oriole_. (She said she had decided not to change
the name.) She informed them that they were to be her printers; she did
not care to get all inky and nasty herself, she said. She would,
however, do all the writing for her newspaper, and had with her a new
poem. Also, she would furnish all the news and it would be printed just
as she wrote it, and printed _nicely_, too, or else----She left the
sentence unfinished.
Thus did this cool hand take possession of an established industry, and
in much the same fashion did she continue to manage it. There were
unsuppressible protests; there was covert anguish; there was even a
strike--but it was a short one. When the printers remained away from
their late Newspaper Building, on Wednesday afternoon, Florence had an
interview with Herbert after dinner at his own door. He explained coldly
that Henry and he had grown tired of the printing-press and had decided
to put in all their spare time building a theatre in Henry's attic; but
Florence gave him to understand that the theatre could not be; she
preferred the _Oriole_.
Henry and Herbert had both stopped "speaking" to Patty Fairchild, for
each believed her treacherous to himself; but Florence now informed
Herbert that far from depending on mere hearsay, she had in her own
possession the confession of his knowledge that he had ocular beauty;
that she had discovered the paper where Patty had lost it; and that it
was now in a secure place, and in an envelope, upon the outside of which
was already written, "For Wallie Torbin. Kindness of Florence A."
Herbert surrendered.
So did Henry Rooter, a little later that evening, after a telephoned
conversation with the slave-driver.
Therefore, the two miserable printers were back in their places the next
afternoon. They told each other that the theatre they had planned wasn't
so much after all; and anyhow your father and mother didn't last all
your life, and it was better to do what they wanted, and be polite while
they were alive.
And on Saturday the new _Oriole_, now in every jot and item the inspired
organ of feminism, made its undeniably sensational appearance.
A copy, neatly folded, was placed in the hand of Noble Dill, as he set
forth for his place of business, after lunching at home with his mother.
Florence was the person who placed it there; she came hurriedly from
somewhere in the neighbourhood, out of what yard or alley he did not
notice, and slipped the little oblong sheet into his lax fingers.
"There!" she said breathlessly. "There's a good deal about you in it
this week, Mr. Dill, and I guess--I guess----"
"What, Florence?"
"I guess maybe you'll----" She looked up at him shyly; then, with no
more to say, turned and ran back in the direction whence she had come.
Noble walked on, not at once examining her little gift, but carrying it
absently in fingers still lax at the end of a dangling arm. There was no
life in him for anything. Julia was away.
Away! And yet the dazzling creature looked at him from sky, from earth,
from air; looked at him with the most poignant kindness, yet always
shook her head! She had answered his first letter by a kind little note,
his second by a kinder and littler one, and his third, fourth, fifth,
and sixth by no note at all; but by the kindest message (through one of
her aunts) that she was thinking about him a great deal. And even this
was three weeks ago. Since then from Julia--nothing at all!
But yesterday something a little stimulating had happened. On the
street, downtown, he had come face to face, momentarily, with Julia's
father; and for the first time in Noble's life Mr. Atwater nodded to him
pleasantly. Noble went on his way, elated. Was there not something
almost fatherly in this strange greeting?
An event so singular might be interpreted in the happiest way: What had
Julia written her father, to change him so toward Noble? And Noble was
still dreamily interpreting as he walked down the street with _The North
End Daily Oriole_ idle in an idle hand.
He found a use for that hand presently, and, having sighed, lifted it to
press it upon his brow, but did not complete the gesture. As his hand
came within the scope of his gaze, levelled on the unfathomable
distance, he observed that the fingers held a sheet of printed paper;
and he remembered Florence. Instead of pressing his brow he unfolded the
journal she had thrust upon him. As he began to read, his eye was
lustreless, his gait slack and dreary; but soon his whole demeanour
changed, it cannot be said for the better.