REX GOES TO TOWN
“I’m very sorry, indeed, this came out now. It seems unfeeling to talk
about it while that poor old man’s body is above ground, and then the
amount of the fortune he possessed may be grossly exaggerated.”
This was Mrs. Pell’s summary of the matter, delivered several times
during that afternoon. The girls took the thing very quietly.
“I am so glad on Syd’s account,” Eva said though more than once. “He
has always worked so hard for us.”
Jess seemed dazed by the possibility of the new order of things, while
Roy was disinclined to talk about it at all. Rex, however, made up for
the apparent apathy of the others.
At lunch he wanted to know when they were going to move.
“Of course we don’t want to go on staying in a bandbox of a place like
this, when mother is a millionaire,” he said.
“Only half a one,” Jess corrected him with a smile.
“Well, no matter about that. I’ve been figuring up on the income that
we could get without touching the principal, and I make it $25,000 a
year.”
“Oh, Reggie, Reggie, I am afraid you are incorrigible,” groaned his
mother.
“Why, I don’t see anything out of the way in doing a little calculating
here in the privacy of our home. I don’t go up and proclaim it from the
housetops.”
“But you may be reckoning without your host, my dear brub,” interposed
Jess. “What if Mr. Tyler had only a thousand in bank instead of five
hundred thousand?”
“Yes; we can’t know anything certain till Syd comes home to-night,”
added Roy.
“I can’t wait for that,” muttered Rex, under his breath.
He subsided for the rest of his meal, however, but as soon as he had
finished went up to his room and proceeded to go through all the
pockets of his different suits.
“Short by a quarter,” he murmured as he finally sat down on the edge of
the bed and jingled the small change he had collected, “I’ll have to go
to mother after all.”
He glanced up at a time-table stuck in the mirror, hurriedly changed
his knockabout suit for his best one, and then rushed down to the
dining room where Mrs. Pell was helping Eva shell peas for dinner.
He went straight up to her and put his arm affectionately about her
neck.
“Moms,” he said in his winning way, “I want to run up to the city for
this afternoon. I’m a quarter short to buy my ticket. Won’t you please
let me have it? I can pay you back out of my allowance.”
“What do you want to go to the city for, Rex?”
“Oh, I can’t stay here in uncertainty. I want to see Syd to know for
sure about things. Besides, it will keep me from shocking you here if I
go.”
“But Sydney is sure to be very busy. You will bother him by going to
the office.”
“No, I won’t. He never lets me bother him. Besides, I only want to see
him for a minute. You know I haven’t been in town since school closed.
The train goes in twenty minutes, and I’ll come back with Syd. Please,
moms.”
“All right, Rex, you may go, but remember I trust you not to annoy
Sydney. You will find my purse in my top bureau drawer, left hand
corner.”
“You are the best mother a boy ever had.” With a hasty kiss Rex was
off, secured his quarter, and then with a wave of his hand toward the
family, struck out across the pasture for the path that led up over the
hill in a short cut to the station.
There was nobody so easy to get along with as Rex—as long as you
allowed him to have his own way.
“That is a crazy notion of his, wanting to go in to town just because
he can’t wait till Syd comes out,” remarked Roy when he heard of it. At
the same time he felt a sensation of relief to think that his impulsive
brother was out of Marley and away from the temptation to disquiet the
family by telling his fellow townsmen what he meant to do with their
money when they came into it.
Rex meanwhile was enjoying himself hugely. He saw nobody he knew at
this unusual hour of going to town, but he lay back in his seat while
the breeze, created by the swift motion of the cars, rushed
refreshingly past him, and built air castles of the most luxurious
description.
“It must be so,” he told himself, whenever the doubts suggested by Jess
arose in his mind to trouble him. “Dr. Martin congratulated Roy.
Everybody has known that Mr. Tyler had lots of money somewhere.”
When the train reached Philadelphia, Rex hurried off to the law office
where Syd had his desk. It was some distance from the station, but
having spent all his money for his excursion ticket, he had none left
for car fare.
“This will be the last time I’ll be so short,” he mused, a smile which
he could not repress playing about the corners of his mouth.
Buoyed up by this reflection he did not so much mind the distance, nor
the heat, which he found much more oppressive here in the city than it
was in Marley. He reached Syd’s place at last only to find that his
brother was out and that the boy was not just sure when he would be
back.
“But he’ll be here before he goes to the train, won’t he?” asked Rex.
“Oh yes, sure,” was the reply. “His satchel is here with the books he
always takes.”
“I’ll come back again then.” Rex went out, thinking that now there was
no danger of his ever having to step into the shoes of this office boy.
Syd had remarked once or twice that he thought he could get him a
position in a law office when he was through school.
Rex wandered along the street aimlessly for a while. If it hadn’t been
midsummer he might have gone over to Spruce and Walnut and called on
some of his friends, but they were either at their summer homes in
Marley or off traveling.
He was therefore reduced to walking to kill time, choosing the shady
side and watching for any incident of city life that might divert his
mind. He came to a bicycle emporium presently and stood for some time
in front of it, trying to decide which wheel he should select when he
came to purchase as he hoped to do very shortly now.
“That’s the dandy kind,” remarked a voice over his shoulder. “The
Wizard motor. You can ride over all sorts of roads with it.”
Rex turned and saw a fellow about a year older than himself. He had a
red face and wore an outing shirt that was not as fresh as it might
have been.
Rex, who was rather fastidious as to his friends, simply said “Yes,”
and moved on.
The fellow noticed the look which accompanied the word.
“The dude!” he muttered. “Thinks he’s too good to talk with the likes
o’ me. I’ll get even with him.”
He waited an instant and then followed Rex at a distance. Presently
something that he espied ahead caused him to scan the sidewalk and the
street next it closely.
Then he stepped out into the roadway and picked up a piece of coal that
had dropped from a passing cart. He quickened his steps and nearly
caught up with Rex just as the latter was passing a Chinese laundry.
“Run for your life! Runaway team behind you!” he exclaimed suddenly,
darting forward and calling out the words almost in Rex’s ear. At the
same instant he flung the piece of coal he had picked up straight into
the window of the Chinese laundry.
There was a crash of glass and Rex, connecting the sound with the
warning he had received, immediately took to his heels.
“There he goes!” called out the red faced youth to the Chinaman who
promptly appeared in the door of his shop.
The Celestial’s almond eyes caught sight of Rex’s fleeing figure. It
was enough. He dropped his iron and rushed after Rex, the
conscienceless hoodlum joining in the chase.
Rex, hearing no further sound to tell him that a dangerous runaway was
close upon him, had just decided to slacken his pace and turn around to
investigate, when he felt a hand laid on his shoulder.
“Me got you,” crowed a wheezy voice in his ear. “Now for pleecy man.”
Rex was horrified to find himself in the grasp of a Chinese laundryman.
“Let go of me! What do you want?” he cried, struggling to get free.
“You breakee glass. You go to jailee. Here pleecyman now.”
True enough, among the crowd that had hastily collected, was a
blue-coated officer.
“Make him let me go,” exclaimed Rex, appealing to the representative of
the law. “I didn’t do anything to him.”
“Yes, he did,” called out a bystander, whose sympathies had been
awakened for the much suffering heathen. “I saw him running for all he
was worth. That’s pretty strong evidence, isn’t it?”
The policeman appeared to think so, for he came up and caught Rex by
the arm.