THE PARTNERSHIP DISSOLVED
JOSHUA, worn out from loss of sleep the night before, curled up beside
the fire on the ground. He resented The Whimperer’s matter-of-fact
assumption of jockership over him, but he was too tired to protest. If
the John Yegg was willing to stay awake and watch for the coming of the
freight Joshua was content, for the present, to allow him to general
his Western flight.
He fell asleep almost immediately. Then for a long time the strange man
who had forced his companionship upon the boy sat watching him with
his inscrutable eyes. Finally, deciding that his charge actually was
asleep, he rose softly and shuffled off through the willows into the
night.
He fell into a sandy path and followed it for some distance. Then he
halted, and a soft whistle, repeated several times, came from his
pitted lips.
Presently there was an answer, and before long a shadow fell across an
open space in the trees, and the guarded question came:
“Is dat youse, Whimp?”
“Yeah,” replied The Whimperer. “Don’t make no noise. He’s sleepin’.”
Felix Wolfgang, the youth who now slipped to the side of the old tramp,
was the name of the boy known to Joshua Cole in the House of Refuge as
Number Twenty-three forty-four. Wolfgang had reached his twenty-first
birthday while Joshua was still studying astronomy under Beaver Clegg,
and had been released. He was of Norwegian descent, and had gone to
the institution from the slums of Joshua’s birthplace.
He had proved one of the most incorrigible inmates of the school, and
had been released only because it was not allowed to keep a boy beyond
the age of maturity. Felix had returned to his old haunts, had become
a gang leader, and had hoboed all over the United States before Joshua
came out. Many times he had been arrested, and once the penitentiary
had threatened to take him within its gray walls.
He was tall and lean, with sandy hair, and as freckled as a painter’s
ladder. His expression of face was that of the swaggering gangster,
cruel and insolent. He used the argot of gangs and thieves and tramps,
and was all in all a tough young rascal on the eve of becoming a
conscienceless criminal.
“Well, wot’s doin’?” he asked The Whimperer in a husky whisper. This
huskiness of voice was habitually assumed for effect, but now it was
huskier still for the sake of secrecy.
“Well, I pretty near snared um,” was The Whimperer’s reply. “Anyway, I
got um in camp in de jungles, an’ he’s poundin’ his ear. I’ll get um
away on de t’rough freight to-night, an’ den I guess I c’n swing um.
But it’ll cost some jack, ol’-timer. I’ll hafta be punglin’ up to de
shacks so’s we c’n ride safe in boxcars. I gotta do dat to keep from
gettin’ separated from um. Youse better come acrost wid sumpin, hadn’t
youse?”
“How much d’youse want?” asked Wolfgang, not seeming to relish the
suggestion.
“Slip me ten bones.”
“I’ll give youse five.”
“Nuttin’ doin’! Five won’t put us--”
“Here--take it and shut up! Dere’s more w’ere dis come from, an’
youse’ll get it w’en youse need it. I know youse, Whimp--if youse get
yer glommers on too much coin youse’ll get lit an’ let de kid slip
away. Five’s enough f’r now.”
Grumblingly the John Yegg accepted the tendered bill and hid it in his
pocket. “Well, wot’s to do?”
“Jes’ stick to um, dat’s all youse’ve gotta do.”
“But wot’s it all about, Slim? Youse only tol’ me dat youse follied dis
plug from Hathaway, lookin’ fer some experienced tramp to put on his
trail. Well, youse was lucky in findin’ one, Jack, an’ I’ll do pretty
near anyt’ing to get me gloms on a piece o’ kale. But wot do I do, an’
w’y do I do it?”
“Youse don’ need to know any more dan I already tol’ youse,” husked
Wolfgang. “Youse do wot I say an’ I’ll pay your expenses, an’ w’en de
proper time comes I’ll slip youse de biggest piece o’ jack youse ever
had yer mitts on. Ain’t dat enough?”
“But, Slim--”
“Dat’s all from me. Take it or leave it.”
“But w’ere’ll youse be w’en it comes time to hand me dis big money?”
“I’m travelin’ right along wid youse, ol’-timer. Youse won’t have no
trouble findin’ me w’en de time comes. Now go on back to de fire,
an’ be ready to make dat freight w’en she rambles in. I’ll ketch ’er
too--don’t worry about me. Get de kid in a boxcar, an’ I’ll ride
outside an’ be ready to square de shack if it looks like he’s gonta
ditch youse guys. An’ if youse get ditched an’ get another train, keep
headin’ West. Dat’s all--leave de rest to me.”
“I don’t like it,” said The Whimperer.
“But youse’re gonta do it jes’ de same, ain’t youse?” sneered Wolfgang,
and went his way through the sand of the river bottom.
Mumbling to himself, The Whimperer returned to the fire to find Joshua
still peacefully sleeping. There he sat himself down and fell to
dreaming, his piggish black eyes fixed unseeingly on the blaze.
“Dere’s wot youse might call a dark plot on foot,” he muttered softly.
“Dat Slim Wolfgang’s a bad acter, fer a kid, an’ I’m wonderin’--jes’
wonderin’. Who is dis here telescope guy, anyway? Dat’s wot I’m
wonderin’.”
He continued his wondering for an hour or more, half dozing at times,
but too old a hand on the road to allow himself full sleep when a
train that he wished to catch was nearly due. And when there came to
his half-hearing ears the distant long shriek of a locomotive he was
instantly alert and bending over Joshua.
“C’mon, kid!” he warned, shaking the boy awake. “Come out of it an’ get
yer look-see. She’s ramblin’ to us.”
Through the night Joshua stumbled along after him, his telescope, as
inseparable as Christian’s burden, over his shoulder. They left the
river bottom and crawled through a fence. They climbed the fill of the
railroad grade, and the big bright eye of the coming locomotive gleamed
at them from up the track, showering the rails at their feet with
brilliancy.
“Dat’s her, all right,” avowed The Whimperer. “She’ll stop to take
woter at dis boig, an’ de tank’s on de udder side o’ de deepo. Dat’ll
bring de middle o’ de train somew’eres about here, an’ we c’n glom her
easy. Le’s get down de fill an’ lay hid in de grass till we see wot’s
doin’.”
The train acted according to the tramp’s wishes, and soon was at a
standstill, with a string of dark boxcars looming above the expectant
watchers. The Whimperer raised himself lizard-like from their hiding
place and looked toward the rear end and the head end.
“Jake,” he presently announced. “Everyt’ing’s clear. C’mon!”
They walked along beside the train, The Whimperer investigating every
car for an unsealed door, which indicated an empty. In the course
of time he found one, cautiously slid it open, and, after carefully
looking up and down the track, scrambled in and reached down a hand
to his companion. When both were aboard the veteran closed the door
as softly as possible, and then they stood in silence and awaited the
dictates of chance.
No “shack” came to rout them out, and before long the short _toot-toot_
of the locomotive whistle announced that the train was “out of town,”
and then the wheels began to creak.
“Not bad,” The Whimperer praised himself, and sat down on the floor,
with his ever-weary back against one of the boxcar’s walls. “Hit de
hay, kid,” he invited. “Dere’ll be lots o’ time to sleep if youse
travel wid De Whimperer fer yer jocker. He’s de plug dat’ll put youse
t’rough. No foolin’!”
They made a big jump that night, and morning found them well into the
misnamed Middle West. They were routed out by an irate brakeman about
ten o’clock, to discover that they were in a fair-sized town and to
be chased from railroad property by one of the company’s detectives.
The Whimperer thought the town too large for a scientific lecture, and
advised walking to a near-by village.
It was only three miles distant, and they reached it well before noon.
Often, as they walked, The Whimperer looked back along the track at a
figure following them, then watched his companion to see if he had been
observed. When they reached the village The Whimperer protested against
a restaurant, and they bought meat and vegetables and “cooked up” in
the jungles. Here they rested until night, then went into the town,
where Joshua once more set up his telescope and invited the populace to
view the moon. The Whimperer stood by, listening to the lecture, but
seeming to realize that anything he could contribute to the proceedings
might result in failure because of his suspicious looks.
Joshua’s earnings were frugal that night, and The Whimperer growled his
disapproval, as a good jocker should, over his road-kid’s failure to
make good. In the middle of the night they caught another freight, were
thrown off, caught a second, and were far from their starting point
when morning came.
* * * * *
To follow in detail the fortunes of the boy who later became Cole of
Spyglass Mountain doubtless would make interesting reading; but that is
not the purpose of this narrative. To tell how he was led westward like
a dancing monkey on a chain by that errant vagabond, The Whimperer,
would be to chronicle a series of strange adventures, the like of which
never took place before in Trampdom. Joshua saw all the degradation of
tramp life, met famous hobos and infamous hobos; slept in sand-houses,
Salvation Army rooming houses, in coal bunkers, stretched out along
the backs of several sheep bleating in a stock car, in cars of grain,
beneath piles of lumber, and in many a well-known “jungle” camp.
He saw all of the inner workings of the itinerant life which is so
peculiarly an American institution, worked at many things, fought many
battles--some won, some lost. Reduced to bitter hunger countless times,
he almost lost his courage and began to believe himself nothing but a
pawn of Fate. There is a strange lure about the life of the tramp that
pleads with the most circumspect to renounce the ways of honest men and
live the life of shiftlessness and freedom, and Joshua Cole did not
escape it.
Time and again, in the beginning, he tried to lose himself from The
Whimperer, but failed repeatedly. He did not know that, when he
contrived to steal away and catch a train alone, a shadow followed him
and watched his movements, then wired his whereabouts to his jocker,
who overtook him by paying his fare on a first-class train. When the
tramp caught up with him, however, he dared not resort to the common
practice among men of this type of beating his road-kid. It was
doubtful if the stiff old youth-drained yegg could have handled the boy
just budding into manhood, so he resorted to wheedling pleas and worked
on Joshua’s sympathy, at which The Whimperer was an adept.
They had been on the road together nearly a year, and the misfortunes
of tramp life had whipped them here and there, north and south and east
and west, which left Joshua far from the goal he sought, before The
Whimperer learned of the value of the telescope. Joshua’s many efforts
to evade the yegg had in great measure brought about this zigzag
course; for his jocker knew that he was headed west, so Joshua had
ridden north- and south-bound trains in the effort to deceive him. Now
they were in Kansas, after having crossed that state several times, and
settled in a “jungle” camp for the night.
The Whimperer lolled on one side of the campfire, and on the other side
sat Joshua, in a begged suit of clothes much too large for him, looking
up at his friends, the stars, and vaguely wondering what the future
held in store for him.
“Rig up de ole look-see,” suggested The Whimperer, “an’ give us a slant
at de eternal heavens.”
To the weird old panhandler the telescope was ever a thing to be
wondered at, but, strange to say, he had talked very little with
Joshua about it. In his twisted mind was the realization that this
young man lived in a world apart from his, and he was not a little awed
by Joshua’s knowledge. But to-night the stars were soft and radiant,
and their spell fell upon the man. Then as Joshua began adjusting the
refractor on its tripod, the yeggman asked:
“Say, wot does one o’ dem t’ings cost, kid?”
“This one,” said Joshua, “is worth five hundred dollars.”
The glory faded out of the stars. With a bound the tramp was on his
feet. “Wot!” he gasped.
“Five hundred dollars,” Joshua repeated.
The Whimperer drew in a long breath and allowed the wind to burst from
his lungs. “Kid,” he asked in a trembling tone, “d’ye mean to slip it
to me dat youse’n’me’s been cold an’ hungry an’ wet an’ wid no place to
flop a million times, w’ile youse was packin’ five hundred bones over
yer shoulder?”
“You wouldn’t pack it,” Joshua placidly reminded him.
“W’y, dat’s simply--simply--” Words failed the awestruck Whimperer.
“Dat’s simply scand’lous!” he barked out finally. “Kid, we coulda
peddled dat t’ing, an’-- Well, wot couldn’t we ’a’ done!”
“Peddled this refractor!”
“Sure peddle ’er, Jack. W’y youse’re a bigger fool dan I t’o’t youse
was. Gawd A’mighty, kid! T’ink of it!”
A low laugh came from Joshua’s lips. “Forget that,” he said. “Nothing
could make me part with my telescope. Here it is. Come on.”
“I don’t wanta look now, kid,” said The Whimperer. “I--I kinda lost me
appetite fer de udder universes. Five hundred smackers! Gawd A’mighty!”
For the remainder of that night, while they waited for a train, The
Whimperer sat lost in thought. They caught a freight bound west at
midnight, and next morning Joshua was rudely shaken to a realization of
the stern realities of life by a dark-browed brakeman.
He sprang erect, ready to defend himself against this common enemy
of tramps, and found that he had no companion to aid him. At some
stop during the night while Joshua slept The Whimperer had left the
train--and the telescope had gone with him.