and tired, was hungry and gladly climbed up on one of the high stools
that flanked the lunch counter, while her uncle gathered a sandwich,
two enormous doughnuts, and a quarter of a mince pie on one plate and
pushed it toward her saying: "Tea or coffee? You'd better fill up snug,
for we won't be home until well after dinnertime," then John O'More
proceeded to cool his own coffee by pouring it from cup to saucer and
back again with much noise and slopping.
"Please, I'd rather have milk," answered Bird, rescuing the sandwich
from under the pie and making a great effort not to stare at her uncle,
who had begun by stuffing half a doughnut into his mouth and pouring the
larger part of a cup of coffee after it before he swallowed, so that
his cheeks bulged, his eyes seemed about to pop from their sockets,
and beads of sweat stood on his forehead, while the next moment he was
shovelling up great mouthsful of baked beans and ramming them down with
cucumber pickles, very much as she had seen Lammy charging his father's
old muzzle-loading shot-gun when going to hunt woodchucks.
Though sometimes the food at home had not been any too plentiful, Bird's
parents had always been particular about her manners at table. She had
had their example before her and was naturally dainty in her own ways,
so that her uncle's gorging gave her another shock, and unconsciously
she began to pick at her food like a veritable feathered bird.
"The country ain't what it's cracked up to be," remarked O'More, when he
was able to speak. "I thought country girls was always fat and rosy and
ate hearty. Just wait until you get to New York and see my kids stoke in
the vittles; it'll learn you what it means to eat right."
"Express train for New York, stopping at Bridgeport and Stamford only,"
called a man through the open door.
"Come along," shouted O'More, wedging in another doughnut, throwing
the pay to the waiter and seizing a handful of toothpicks from a glass
on the counter, and before Bird had but half finished the sandwich and
milk, she found herself on the train again.
The second part of the journey passed more cheerfully, for all along
at the east side of the road were beautiful glimpses of the Sound and
silvery creeks and inlets came up to the track itself.
Bird had never before seen the sea, or any river greater than the mill
stream, and she exclaimed in delight.
"Like the looks of salt water, do you? Then you're going to an A 1 place
to see it. New York's an island, and you only have to go to the edge
anywhere to see water all round, not forsaken lookin' empty water like
this either, but full of ships and boats and push. Down at the far end
of the town is Battery Park, smash on to the water, and there's sea air
and seats in it and music summer nights, along with a building full of
live swimmin' fishes that little Billy's crazed over goin' to see. Oh,
you'll find sport in the city for sure."
"Who is little Billy?" asked Bird, feeling that she was called upon to
say something, and now realizing that she knew nothing about the cousins
she was to meet.
"Little Billy? Oh, he's the youngest of the four boys. Tom, he's the
eldest, and a wild hawk; he's got a rovin' job, and he seldom turns
up lest he's in trouble, but for all that his mother's crazed after
him. Jack, he's next, seventeen, and fine and sleek and smart with the
tongue, and keeps the clean coat of a gentleman; he's in a clerking job,
but he goes to night school, and he'll be somebody. Larry's fifteen,
and he's just quit school and got a place helping a trainer on the
race-track; he's minded to make money quick, and thinks that's the road,
which I don't. Then little Billy,--he's turning six, and he's worth
more'n the whole lot together to me, if he is only a four-year size and
hops with a crutch. Ah, but he's got the head for thinkin', and he's
every way off from the rest of us, pale and yellow-haired, while the
others are coloured like sloes and crows' wings in the eyes and hair."
As O'More spoke his whole face softened and lightened up, and it was
plain to see that little Billy filled the soft spot that is in every
heart if people only have the eyes to see it.
"Until little Billy was turned three he was as pretty as an angel,"
he continued, "and sturdy as any other child. Then come a terrible
hot summer,--oh, I tell you it was fierce; you couldn't draw a breath
in the rooms, and so the missis she fixed a bed for Billy out on the
fire-escape and used to take him there to sleep."
Bird was just about to ask what sort of a place a fire-escape was, for
this was the second time her uncle had mentioned it that day having said
that if she had a dog, it would likely fall from it, but he talked so
quickly that she forgot again.
"As luck had it, one night the wind come up cool, and, the woman bein'
dead tired, never woke up to notice it, and in the morning little Billy
set up a terrible cry, for when he tried to get up he couldn't, for the
wind had checked the sweat and stiffened his left leg, as it were.
Of course we had a big time and had in full a dozen doctors, and some
said one thing and some another, but they all give it the one name 'the
infant paralysis.'
"The doctors they wanted him to go to the 'ospital and have the leg shut
into a frame and all that, but I said 'twas a shame to torment him, and
I'd have him let be till he could say for himself.
"The woman takes him awful hard, though, as if he was a reproach to her
for not wakin' up, which is no sense, for what be's to be, be's--that's
all," which shiftless argument Bird afterward found was her uncle's
answer to many things that could have been bettered.
"I hope Billy will like me," said Bird, half to herself after a few
minutes' silence; "somehow I think I like him already."
"If you do that and act well by him, I buy you a hat with the longest
feather on Broadway for your Christmas," said O'More, grasping her
slender fingers and almost crushing them in his burst of enthusiasm.
"But whist a minute, girl, for we're most home now. If the woman,--I
mean my missis, your Aunt Rosy,--is offish just at the start, don't get
down-hearted, for you see as she don't expect I'm bringing you, she may
be--well--a trifle startled like. She'll soon settle down and take what
be's to be straight enough," and with this rather discouraging remark
the train crossed the Harlem River and entered the long tunnel that is
apt to cast a gloom over every one's first entrance to New York, even
when they are bent on pleasure and not sad and lonely.
"We're in now," said O'More in a few minutes, as the echo of the close
walls ceased and the train slid across a maze of tracks into an immense
building with a glass roof like a greenhouse.
"Grand Central Station--all out," called a brakeman, and Bird found
herself part of a crowd of men, women, children, and red-capped porters
moving toward a paved street, full of carriages, wagons, trucks,
electric cars, besides many sort of vehicles that she had never seen
before, coming, going, dashing here and there in confusion, while on
every side there was a wall of houses, and below the earth was upturned
and trenched, not a bit of grass or tree to be seen anywhere, and the
sky, oh, so far away and small. Bird almost fell as she stumbled blindly
along toward a trolley car after the uncle, for what could seem more
unreal to this little wild thrush from the country lane, with song
in her throat, and love of beauty and colour born in her heart, than
Forty-second Street in the middle of the first warm summer afternoon?
* * * * *
The car they boarded went through another short tunnel, and on every
side could be heard the noise of hammers or drilling in the rock.
"Is this a stone quarry?" asked Bird, innocently, not understanding, and
wondering why the near-by passengers smiled as her uncle replied: "Lord
bless yer! no; it's the subway, a road below ground they're building
to let out folks from where they work to where there's room to live;
there's such push here below town there's little room for sitting, let
alone sleeping. Oh, but it's a fine city is New York, all the same."
Next a broad avenue with a jumble of old, low shops and fine new
buildings side by side; still Bird looked anxiously out for some place
where it seemed possible that people might live and found none.
"Here's 2--th Street where we land," said O'More, presently looking
up, and when the car had stopped, Bird found herself walking along a
sidewalk between another wall of buildings without gardens, while the
heat of the first warm day rising from the pavement made her dizzy, and
she asked, "Is it far from here to where you live, Uncle John?"
"No, right close by, only a few steps farther. We're facing east now and
down yonder half a dozen blocks is the river, the same as we crossed
coming in saving a turn in it.
"Getting tired, ain't yer? Well, it's been a long day for us, and I'm
mighty glad to be gettin' to a homelike place myself."
"Do you live right by the water, and is there any garden?" Bird
continued, a feeling of nameless dread creeping over her as she saw
nothing but buildings still closing in on all sides; even a blacksmith's
shop, from which a spirited pair of horses were coming with newly shod
polished hoofs, seemed strange and out of place. Then there were more
poor looking buildings, and a great stable with many men standing about
and horses being constantly driven in and out to show the people who
waited on the curbstone.
"By the river, and do I have a garden," he echoed, laughing heartily.
"Do you think I'm one o' the millionnaires you read about in the papers,
my girl? Do I keep an automobile and eat at the Waldorf-Astoria?" and
then, seeing that Bird could not understand the comparison, he patted
her good-naturedly on the shoulder.
As they passed the stable quite a number of the men spoke to her uncle,
but instead of resenting it as she expected, he joked and laughed and
seemed very glad to see them.
"It's called the 'Horse's Head,' and it's out of there my job is," he
said to Bird, pointing over his shoulder at the stable, "for half the
time I'm over the country from Kentucky to Canada picking up horses, and
the other half of the time I'm helping to sell them out again, so I live
as near by as may be for convenience."
At this Bird's heart sunk still farther, for in the prim New England
town where she was born and bred a Puritan, a horse-dealer meant either
some oversharp farmer who could outwit his neighbours or a roving
fellow, half gypsy, half tramp, of very ill repute, who went about from
town to town buying and selling animals who mostly had something the
matter with them that had to be concealed by lying.
John O'More, striding on ahead, did not notice her expression, nor would
he have understood if he had read her thoughts, for he was perfectly
satisfied with himself and everything else in his surroundings, except
the fact of little Billy's lameness, and for a man of his class he was
roughly honest and good-hearted.
"Here's where!" he said at last, turning into the doorway of a tall
building with one door and many windows. The square vestibule was
dusty and had a ragged mat in the centre, while on one side were ten
letter-boxes in a double row, with a bell knob and speaking-tube, as
O'More explained, over each.
"Is this your house? It seems pretty big," said Bird, wearily.
"One floor of it is," he answered, laughing again; "it's what's called
'a flat house,' because each tenant lives flat on one floor, with
conveniences at hand and no water to carry, which beats the country all
out," he added slyly. "See, I'll but touch the bell and the door 'll
open itself."
And he suited the action to the word, the door opening to reveal a
narrow, dark hall with a flight of steep stairs covered with a shabby
red carpet.
As Bird groped her way up, one, two, three flights, fairly gasping for
breath in the close, hot place, she stumbled against groups of children
who were sitting or playing school on the stairs.
"It's lighter near the top; that's why I choose it," called her uncle,
himself puffing and blowing as he climbed. "Here we are," and he pushed
open a door into an inner hall, and then another into a sort of sitting
room where a tall, red-haired woman, clad in a collarless calico sack
was sewing on a machine, while a pile of showy summer silks and muslins
was lying on a chair beside her.
"Hello, Rosie, old woman; here's Bird O'More, Terry's orphan, that I
brought back to stop a bit until we see where we're at," and he gave his
wife a knowing wink as much as to say, "I know it's sudden on you, but
let her down as easy as you can."
The "old woman," who was perhaps forty, or at most forty-five, glanced
up, and then, either not understanding or pretending not to, her face
flushed as she jerked out, her eyes flashing, "Well, if you ain't the
aggravatment of men, John O'More, to bring company just when I've got
Mame Callahan's trou-sew to finish, and she gettin' married next week,
and Billy bein' that cantankerous with cryin' to go over to the park or
down to see them fishes that my head's ready to split," she whimpered.
With all his will the man cowered before her tongue, and in spite of her
own pain Bird's womanly little heart pitied him. She saw the piled-up
garments and knew at once that her aunt was a dressmaker, and her
gentle breeding led her to say the one thing that could have averted an
explosion.
"Aunt Rose, I could take Billy to see the fish or something if you'll
tell me the way."
"That's what I figured on when I brought her," said O'More, greatly
relieved, and quickly following the lead; "I knew you'd often spoke of
gettin' a girl from the Sisters, and that's why I brought Bird instead
of leavin' her to slave fer strangers," he stammered.
"Humph," answered Mrs. O'More, at least somewhat pacified, "Billy's
fastened in his chair on the fire-escape; she'd better go there and sit
with him a while until it's supper-time. It's too late for them to go
traipsing around the streets to-night. Can you do anything useful?" she
said, fixing her sharp, greenish eyes on Bird, who tried to gather her
wits together as she answered, "I can make coffee, and toast, and little
biscuits, and two kinds of cake, and--" then she hesitated and stopped,
for she was going to say "do fractions, write, read French a little, and
draw and paint," but she felt as if these last items would count against
her.
"Humph," said her aunt again, this time more emphatically, "I guess
you done well to bring her, Johnny. Turned thirteen, you say. Of
course she'll have to make a show of goin' to school for another year
on account of the law, but they can't ask it before the fall term. I
suppose she'll have to sleep on this parlour lounge, though; there's no
other place."
John O'More was now beaming as he led Bird through a couple of dark
bedrooms toward the kitchen, where the mysterious "fire-escape" seemed
to be located.
Going to an open back window he looked out, motioning Bird to follow.
What she saw was a small platform, about three feet wide and ten feet
long, surrounded by an iron railing; one end was heaped with a litter
of boxes and broken flowerpots that partly hid a trap door from which
a ladder led to the balcony belonging to the floor below. At the other
end, fastened in a baby's chair by the tray in front, sat a dear little
fellow with great blue eyes and a curved, sensitive mouth, while tears
were making rivers of mud on his pale cheeks as he sobbed softly to
himself, "I want to go; oh, I want to get out and see the fishes."
"So you shall," said O'More, undoing the barrier and lifting the child
on his strong arm while he tried awkwardly to wipe his face.
"Let me," said Bird, wetting her handkerchief at the kitchen sink and
gently bathing eyes, nose, and mouth carefully, as Mrs. Lane had bathed
hers--only a day ago, was it? It seemed a lifetime.
"Who are you?" said Billy, gazing at Bird over his father's shoulder,
as he wound his little arms around the thick neck.
"She's your cousin Bird, come from the country to play with Billy and
take him to see the fishes. Go out there on the platform with him a
spell till the heat dies down; the doctor says he's to get plenty of air
you see."
"Where do you get the air here?" asked Bird, wonderingly, looking at the
paved yards filled with rubbish, the tall clothes poles, and the backs
of the other buildings where more fire-escapes clung like dusty cobwebs.
"Air? Oh, out here and down in the street mostly if there's no time fer
going across to any o' the parks. Get a bit acquainted now, youngsters,
for I've got to report at the stable before supper," said O'More,
putting Billy back into his chair and preparing to leave, wiping the
sweat from his face as if he had thus put the whole matter of Bird from
him.
For a few minutes the pair were silent. "Is your name Bird?" asked
Billy, eying her solemnly, and, upon her nodding "Yes," he rambled on,
"There's a yellow bird in a cage downstairs at Mrs. Callahan's--it's
name is Canary and it can sing. Can you sing?"
"Yes; that is, I used to last week," she said uncertainly, the tears
running between her fingers that she held before her face, for in the
past ten minutes her last hope had fled. No room where she could work
alone, not even a back-yard garden or a leaf to pick, and the bars of
the fire-escape seemed to be closing in like a cage.
"Now you're crying, too," said Billy, prying open her hands with his
thin fingers, while his lip quivered; "do you want to get out and see
the fishes too?"
"Yes, Billy, I do; but we can't go just now, so we must play we are
birds in a cage like the one downstairs," smiling through her tears.
"I'll sing for you," and she began in a low voice a song that Terry had
taught her:--
"When little birdie bye-bye goes,
Silent as mice in churches,
He puts his head where no one knows
And on one leg he perches."
When she finished, the little arms stole around her neck also, and
Billy, his face all smiles, said, "That bird's me, cause I've only got
one good leg, and I'm going to have you for my canary, only," looking
at her gown and hair, "you're more black than yellow," and giving her a
feeble squeeze, "and some day you'll get me out to see the fishes, won't
you?"
At his baby caress Love lit a new lamp in her dark path and Hope stole
back and led the way as she hugged Billy close and said, "Yes, some day
we'll surely get out of the cage together and fly far away."
V
MRS. LANE PLAYS DETECTIVE
For several weeks after the reading of Aunt Jimmy's will, it was the
talk of the neighbourhood, the alternate topic of conversation being
the death of Terence O'More and the sudden disappearance of Bird. For
Bird's Uncle John had come and gone so suddenly that few knew of his
flying visit, and those who did turned it into an interesting mystery.
Some said that he was a very rich relation from the west, others that
he was not an uncle at all, but the agent of the State Orphan Asylum to
which the Lanes, afraid of being expected to care for Bird, had hurried
her off. It is needless to say that it was Mrs. Slocum, piqued at not
securing Bird as a maid of all work and no pay, who concocted this tale.
In due time Probate Judge Ricker appointed Joshua Lane administrator, to
take charge of the furniture and few effects that O'More had left and
settle up his debts as far as possible. There was a little money left of
what his wife had inherited, in the Northboro Bank, but only enough to
pay his debts, it was feared, without so much as leaving a single dollar
for Bird.
Since the homestead and Mill Farm property that belonged to Mrs. O'More
had been forfeited through some defect in the drawing up of a mortgage
coupled with O'More's slackness in attending to the matter, Joshua Lane
had felt there was something wrong and that a little good legal advice,
combined with common sense, might have at least saved something if not
the entire property.
When, a year later, the mill had slipped into Abiram Slocum's hands,
Joshua's suspicions were again aroused, for Slocum's transactions in
real estate were usually adroit and to the cruel disadvantage of some
one, if not absolutely dishonest according to the letter of the law; but
when Joshua had spoken to O'More about the matter, he, feeling hopeful
about his painting, had put him off with a promise to "some day" show
him the "letters and papers" that bore upon the unfortunate business.
The day had never come, and now that Joshua had the right he determined
to sift the affair thoroughly, but the papers were nowhere to be found.
The envelope containing O'More's bank-book held nothing else but the
certificate of his marriage with Sarah Turner, and some letters from
his mother in the old country.
Joshua, though slow, was not without shrewdness, and he had not only
kept the old house where the O'Mores had lived securely locked by day,
until when, upon the selling of the furniture, it should again return to
the Slocums from whom it was rented, but at Mrs. Lane's suggestion he
had Nellis, his oldest son, sleep there at night, as she said, "To keep
folks whom I'll not name from prowlin'."
Joshua looked to the sale of the furniture to at least pay the last
quarter's rent due. By a strange happening the afternoon before the
vendue was to take place, as he was about to drive up to the old house
at the cross-roads to make a final thorough search in closets, drawers,
and the old-time chimney nooks for the missing papers, a passer-by,
hurrying in the same direction, called out to him: "There's a fire
up cemetery hill way; smoke's comin' over the hickory woods. Maybe
Dr. Jedd's big hay barn or Slocum's old farm, both bein' in a plum
line from here." When, sharply whipping up the old mare, much to her
astonishment, he hurried to the place, he not only found that it was
the old farm-house hopelessly ablaze from roof to cellar, but Abiram
Slocum appearing a few moments later by the road that ran north of the
place, flew into either a real or well-acted rage, shaking his fist and
calling: "It's that there hulking boy, Nellis, o' yourn, that has done
me this mischief. Must 'a' smoked his pipe in bed or left his candle
lighted until it burned down, for it's plain to be seen by the way the
roof's ketched, the fire started upstairs and smouldered around all day
until it bust out everywheres to onct."
"I reckon yer insured," said Joshua, dryly, taking little account of
what he said, as he began to realize that the fire had put an end
forever to the discovery of the papers that might have brought good luck
to Bird, as well as destroyed a part of the slender property.
"A trifle--a mere trifle--not the cost of the wood in the house, let
alone the labour at present rates. I could hev rented the place tew
teachers for a summer cottage for twenty a month, and I intended buyin'
in the furniture so to do. If"--and he drew his mean features together,
and then spread them out again in a spasm of indignation--"law was just,
you'd ought to make it up to me, Joshua Lane,--that you had."
But when he found that the few neighbours who had gathered were not
sympathetic, and only seemed to regret the fire on account of the O'More
furniture, he disappeared, and, strangely enough, later on no one could
tell in which direction he went or if he had gone afoot, on horseback,
or in the yellow buckboard in which he was wont to drive about to harry
his tenants and surprise his farm hands if they but paused to straighten
their backs.
When Joshua told of the fire at the supper-table, Mrs. Lane fairly
snorted with indignation, saying, "Firstly, Nellis didn't smoke last
night, bein' out o' tobacco and leavin' his pipe on the chimneypiece,
where it is now, and secondly he asked me for a candle; and then, the
Lockwood boys comin' along, and offerin' to walk up with him, he went
off while I was lookin' for the store-closet key which had fallen off
its nail, and clean through the bottom of the clock"--(the inside of the
long body of the tall clock being the place where the Lane family's keys
lived, each on its own nail).
"This morning when he came down home to breakfast he mentioned it, and
said it didn't matter because the moon was so bright he undressed by
light of it, Bill Lockwood stopping up there with him for company's
sake.
"A trifle of insurance indeed! and all hope of Bird bein' righted gone!
Joshua Lane, do you know what I think and believe?" And Lauretta Ann
jumped up so suddenly that her ample proportions struck the tea-tray
edge and an avalanche of cups and saucers covered the floor.