A NIGHT ATTACK AND A RECOGNITION.
Dick also celebrated his seventeenth birthday by taking Jennie Nesbitt
to the Empire Theatre to see a famous actress in a favorite play.
“She’s just splendid, don’t you think so?” said Jennie as they came out
of the playhouse after the show.
“Fine,” coincided Dick, enthusiastically. “Do you know, Miss Jennie,
this is the third time in my entire life that I have attended a
theatre?”
“Is it possible?” she answered in a surprised tone.
“That’s right. The first week after I came to New York, Joe took me to
the New Amsterdam Theatre. That was actually the very first time I ever
was in a theatre. On the afternoon of Washington’s Birthday I went over
with Joe to Proctor’s Fifth Avenue house. I’ve lived in the backwood,
as they call it, the greater part of my seventeen years.”
“I’m sure no one would think so by your appearance or your manners,”
said his charming companion. “You are not at all countrified.”
“Thank you for the compliment. I have tried to adapt myself to my
surroundings. Joe helped to break me in, and I am sure I am indebted to
you for the polish.”
“It is very nice of you to say that,” she answered, with a blush. “I am
very glad indeed if I have helped you in any way.”
“You have generously introduced me into your own sphere of society, and
that is a privilege I might otherwise have wished for in vain. It gave
me a chance to associate with well-bred and educated young persons of
my own age, who as a rule have treated me very nicely. It was a great
advantage to me to be under your wing, as it were, and I have improved
it as much as possible. I was a pretty awkward fellow when you first
knew me.”
“Really, I don’t think you ever were what I should call awkward,” she
said, with a smile, “though of course you were not au fait--that’s
French for instructed or expert--in city ways. But dear me! there isn’t
the slightest sign of hayseed about you now,” and she laughed merrily.
“The credit then is all yours, Miss Jennie,” said Dick, gallantly. “I’m
afraid I’ll never be able to repay----”
“Dick Armstrong!” cried the girl, suddenly putting her gloved hand
across his mouth in an imperative sort of way. “You forget what I owe
you--what papa and mamma owe you!”
“But think what your father has done--is doing for me right along, Miss
Jennie. It was the assurance that he was at my back that enabled me to
carry this real estate deal through and put five thousand dollars in my
pocket.”
“But papa did not originate nor engineer the transaction,” persisted
the girl. “Nor did he actually do more for you than any lawyer would
have done, except that he did not charge you anything for investigating
the title.”
“Had the deal failed to go through, I should have lost my thousand
dollars unless he came to my rescue, which I felt sure he would have
done.”
“Now, Dick--I’m going to call you Dick after this,” she said, with a
blush, “that is, between ourselves, you know, and I wish you would call
me simply Jennie--you mustn’t try to make me think you aren’t smart.
I know you are. Papa says so, and whatever papa says I’m accustomed
to believe. He says you are bound to succeed. Now, I think you have
already succeeded pretty well. You’ve never denied what your friend Mr.
Fletcher----”
“You mean Joe?”
“Of course I mean him. What he said about you making eight hundred and
fifty dollars in a month out of nothing just after you left that horrid
Mr. Maslin. Then there’s that water-cooler patent which hasn’t cost you
more than six hundred. Papa says the manufacturer who has taken it in
hand told him it would net you several thousands of dollars in the long
run. Then it wasn’t a month after you had arranged that matter before
you bought the patent rights to a typewriter improvement and sold it in
a week to a manufacturer at a profit of nearly a thousand dollars. Oh,
dear, no; you’re not smart at all--of course not!”
What answer Dick might have made to the young lady’s enthusiastic
commendation of his business abilities was fated to remain unspoken,
for at that moment a thrilling episode occurred that attracted their
startled attention and in the end led up to a most remarkable climax.
They were walking through Forty-first Street from Broadway to Sixth
Avenue to take the elevated train at the Forty-second Street station
and had nearly reached the corner when a tall, fine-appearing gentleman
turned into the street from Sixth Avenue and approached them.
Almost at the identical moment three figures rushed out of the doorway
of the corner building, where they had evidently hidden, and sprang
upon the gentleman.
The attack was so sudden and unexpected that the intended victim was
thrown to the sidewalk and would have been overpowered but for Dick,
who, notwithstanding the fact that he had a young lady to protect,
could not stand tamely by and witness such an outrage.
Confident of his own strength and agility, Dick left Miss Nesbitt’s
side and started for the struggling group.
He felled the foremost assailant with a stunning blow under the
ear--and the boy could hit out mighty hard.
Then he sprang at the second, who he saw was a husky-looking boy with
his cap pulled well down about his eyes.
He had just raised a sand-bag to stun the gentleman, but was forced to
relinquish his cowardly purpose and turn and endeavor to defend himself.
But Dick’s movements were quicker than lightning.
He had taken the attacking party just as much by surprise as they had
taken their victim.
His hard, weather-tanned fist caught the young rascal on the point of
the chin.
The fellow went down beside his dazed comrade, and from that moment he
ceased to take any further interest in the proceedings.
This left only one more to be accounted for--another boy whose face was
streaked with black as a kind of disguise--and the gentleman himself
soon put him out of business.
This brought the affair to a satisfactory conclusion.
“I want to thank you, my brave lad, for coming to my assistance,” said
the stranger, shaking Dick warmly by the hand. “But for you I most
certainly would have been knocked out and robbed.”
“I am glad I was on hand to help you out,” replied the stalwart boy,
wiping specks of blood from his skinned knuckles.
“It was fortunate for me you were. You must come with me to my hotel. I
can’t let you off in this shabby manner.”
“I am afraid you will have to excuse me,” answered the boy, with a
smile, “for I have a young lady yonder waiting for me to take her home.”
“Indeed!” exclaimed the gentleman, in surprise.
“Come, Miss Jennie; the danger is all over,” called Dick. And taking
courage at this, Miss Nesbitt advanced from the shadow of the buildings
a few yards away.
She regarded the three prostrate forms with a little shudder and took
refuge close to her young escort.
“This is Miss Nesbitt,” began Dick. “I beg your pardon, I don’t know
your name, sir.”
“Armstrong,” replied the gentleman, raising his hat politely to the
girl.
“Why, that’s my name!” cried the boy, in surprise.
“Is it possible?” exclaimed the stranger, regarding the boy with a new
and, we may add, intense interest.
“Yes, sir; Richard Armstrong. Let me hand you my card.”
The gentleman took it mechanically without removing his gaze from the
lad’s face.
“Richard Armstrong!” he repeated, showing for the first time intense
emotion.
“Yes, sir; but I see these rascals are beginning to move. I think we
had better get away before they recover their senses.”
“Yes, do come,” urged Jennie Nesbitt, nervously.
“It’s a pity there isn’t a policeman about to take them into custody,”
said Dick.
The boy with the blackened face at this point turned around and looked
at Dick.
He gave a hoarse cry and almost grovelled at the lad’s feet.
“Save me, Dick Armstrong! Save me!” he cried with a frantic eagerness
that was really pitiful. “Don’t you know me? I am Luke Maslin!”
Dick started as though he had trod on a live coal.
Then he seized the disguised boy by the shoulder and peered into his
face.
He saw he was indeed the storekeeper’s son.