A THEATRE PARTY.
Again Tom remembered that it was necessary his mother should be
informed of the long-expected visitor’s arrival, and he said
impatiently:--
“Come on, let’s go to the house now, or the folks will think you ain’t
comin’.”
Bill Foss was obliged to attend to his regular business, and left the
party as they started up town.
While the boys walked hurriedly on in the direction of Baker’s Court,
Josiah was suddenly reminded of a very important duty, and exclaimed as
he halted in a convenient door-way:--
“Well, there! I most forgot I had some things in this valise for you
fellers!”
The curiosity of the boys was aroused, and Tom asked excitedly:--
“What did you bring? Let’s look at ’em now, ’cause it’ll be a good
while before we get home.”
Master Shindle saw no impropriety in unpacking his baggage thus
publicly, and, without further urging, opened the huge valise.
“Here’s what I brought you,” he said, handing Tom a package wrapped in
newspaper, and tied securely with several strings.
Tom unrolled the bulky parcel, removing layer after layer of paper
until he brought to view a small but very lively mud turtle, which
protruded its head and legs in the most engaging manner.
“Now, that’s the kind of a feller what’ll foller you ’round the
streets,” Josiah said as he held up the shell that his companions might
observe more closely the reptile’s beautiful proportions. “Tame him
right, an’ I guess he’ll be most as good as a dog, though he can’t go
very fast.”
As Tom took the pet, Josiah again plunged his hand into the valise,
this time bringing forth a small wooden box, which he gave to Bob as he
said:--
“I was goin’ to fetch two; but didn’t dare to put em together, an’
there wasn’t room enough in the valise for another box.”
[Illustration]
Opening the lid Bob saw a small green snake, which lifted its head and
gazed around inquiringly, as if asking why it had been thus suddenly
transported from its home to a place where there was no opportunity of
hiding.
Bob thanked his friend for the gift, but looked so longingly toward the
turtle that Master Shindle hastened to say:--
“If you’d rather have one of them I can catch more’n a thousand when I
get home agin; but seein’s how they’re apt to bite babies, an’ you’ve
got the twins an’ Jimmy ’round, I didn’t know as it would do to fetch
two.”
“If you’ll send ’em down, I’ll pay the freight,” Bob replied; and
Josiah promised that on the day following his return home he would
capture as many turtles as his friends might desire.
Then he displayed the gifts intended for the twins and Jimmy,--two
last-year’s bird’s nests, a large supply of horse-hair as materials for
rings and chains, and a collection of hedge-hog quills which his mother
had dyed in various colors.
After these had been inspected and duly admired, the boys continued on
their way to the court, walking very slowly because of Josiah’s desire
to stop and look at everything around him.
More than once his exclamations of surprise attracted a crowd of
newsboys and boot-blacks; but Tom and Bob were careful to prevent him
from being annoyed by these young gentlemen, who considered a stranger
from the country a fair target for their supposed wit, and Josiah
continued slowly on, ignorant of the fact that he was affording others
quite as much amusement as he received from the novel scenes.
Under ordinary circumstances, Tom and Bob could have walked from
Chatham Square to their home in ten minutes; but on this day it was
fully an hour before they arrived at the court, although both hurried
Josiah as much as possible by promising to show him all these things
and many more, later in the day.
On entering the court Master Shindle looked about him in dismay; and
Bob, quick to note the change in the expression of his friend’s face,
said with a laugh:--
“Doesn’t seem much like the farm, eh? I told you one week in a place
like this would be enough. If you had always lived here, it wouldn’t
look so dirty; but you’d be as wild as we were to see the country.”
“Oh, this is nice,” Josiah said quickly, fearing lest his friends might
think he was making invidious comparisons; and just then the twins and
Jimmy came running up to greet their host of the previous summer, thus
bringing to a speedy conclusion what might have been a very awkward
conversation.
The dilapidated houses, and the clothes hanging on lines from one side
of the court to the other, as if to shut out the light of the sun, gave
to Josiah a feeling of homesickness similar to that which he had felt
when catching a last glimpse of Towser.
To remain on the principal streets where he could look in the shop
windows, or on the waterfront and gaze at the vessels, would have been
pleasant; but there was such a wide difference between the buildings of
Baker’s Court and the Shindle farm-house, that he would have been quite
contented had he known his father was coming after him that same day.
Mrs. Bartlett and Mrs. Green received him cordially, and yet he was far
from being comfortable in mind.
The small, stuffy kitchen was not like his mother’s, and he could
hardly believe food coming from it would taste as sweet.
The room which he was to share with Bob and Tom was far from being as
inviting as his own; and the air, although it was late in the season,
seemed oppressively warm.
Very likely Tom and Bob would have made almost the same comparisons in
favor of the farm; but Josiah tried earnestly to prevent any show of
discontent, and, after doing full justice to the lunch hastily prepared
by Mrs. Bartlett, the boys went into the street once more, leaving
behind the twins and Jimmy to play with the hedgehog quills at imminent
risk of injuring their eyes, or making painful punctures in their skin.
Once in the business portion of the city again, there was so much to
attract Josiah’s attention that he entirely forgot the disagreeable
impressions of the court; and the three flitted about from window
to window to the delight of Master Shindle and the perplexity of
his hosts, who found it extremely difficult to keep at a respectful
distance the numerous acquaintances who followed in the hope of having
some sport at the expense of the boy from the country.
“That is great!” he said when Tom and Bob gave in detail the programme
they had arranged for his entertainment.
The party was to visit Coney Island, the park, and, as a rare treat, it
had been decided to spend that very evening at the theatre, to which
end three gallery tickets had already been purchased.
This last announcement excited Josiah for the moment so that he lost
all interest in the novel sights around him.
He had heard of the theatre; for Sam Perry knew a boy living about
seven miles from Berry’s Corner who had really been inside such
a place, and Josiah was willing to confess that no other form of
entertainment could afford him so many pleasurable anticipations.
The sight-seeing, and the promise of the delightful excitement which
was yet to come, did not prevent Josiah from remembering the first
friend he had made in the city, and he asked anxiously:--
“Is Sadie goin’ with us?”
“Of course not. We don’t want a girl taggin’ ’round, an’ I reckon she
wouldn’t care to go very much.”
“Oh, yes she would, ’cause she thought it was awful nice at the circus.”
“Circus!” Bob repeated in surprise. “Where have you seen one?”
“She an’ I went the evenin’ I was tryin’ to find you. It’s down a
little ways from where she sells matches.”
“Oh, that’s the dime museum, an’ don’t ’mount to much longside of one
up on the Bowery. We can go to them kind of places any day;” and Master
Green spoke as if half the marvels of the earth were gathered at this
particular place, but yet were hardly worth the attention of himself
and his friends.
“But I’d like to see her again. She was mighty good to me.”
“There’ll be plenty of chances for that when we have nothin’ else to
do. We’ll skin up ’round Broadway, an’ then go home, for it’ll be
pretty near supper time when we get there.”
“Well, I don’t want to make any mistake about seein’ her agin, ’cause I
ain’t really squared up for the way she treated me; an’, besides, I’d
like to be certain she’s havin’ as good a time as I am, for, ’cordin’
to the looks of things, she gets it pretty tough.”
“That’s a fact,” Bob replied. “It must come kinder hard on anybody what
has to live with Mother Hunter; but I reckon she’s got used to it.
Anyhow, you shall see her to-morrow if that’ll do any good.”
“An’ will you take her with us to some of the places if I pay the
bills?”
“Yes,” Bob replied slowly, but in a tone of indecision, “I s’pose we
can fix it somehow;” and with this rather unwilling promise the subject
was dropped for the time being.
It was so difficult to tear Master Shindle away from the shop windows
that the evening meal had been ready nearly an hour when they finally
arrived at Baker’s Court.
In the stuffy little kitchen, which also served as a dining-room,
Josiah had once more an opportunity of comparing his home with this,
and for at least the tenth time decided that life in the city was
entirely different from what it had been pictured by some of his
acquaintances at Berry’s Corner.
Instead of an accompaniment to the meal by a bird orchestra, they
had the rumble and clatter of carts in the street; in lieu of the
perfume of flowers which swept through his mother’s quaint kitchen,
was an unpleasant odor from the court, and he ceased to wonder that
the beneficiaries of the Fresh Air Fund found the farm such a pleasant
abiding place.
There was but little opportunity for reflection on this subject,
however. The meal was eaten hurriedly that they might arrive at the
place of entertainment before the doors were opened, in order to make
certain of obtaining front seats, therefore not a moment was wasted.
Josiah’s remembrance of this visit is not altogether pleasant.
During fully three-quarters of an hour he stood with a large number of
boys in the narrow hall-way, pushed here and there until it seemed as
if he must be literally flattened like a wafer.
When the doors were finally opened he was borne by very press
of numbers up three flights of dimly-lighted stairs into a not
over-cleanly place, which was considerably warmer than the carrot patch
in July; then down a steep incline until it seemed as if he would
surely be pitched from the railing to the vast pit, the bottom of which
appeared to be paved with human heads.
The theatre party from Baker’s Court was in the front row, with nothing
to obstruct the view of a gaudily-painted piece of canvas, which
covered--Josiah knew not what.
He did not speculate as to the possible wonders which might be behind
it; for the noisy throng, the heated air, the odor of gas, and the loud
buzz of conversation bewildered him to such an extent that he began to
fear he should not be able to get away alive.
On one side Tom was telling of the wonderful things which would be
revealed when the curtain was raised; and on the other Bob praised
the scenery, or the daring of the hero whose brave deeds were to be
portrayed, while Josiah listened without understanding a single word.
Then, after much stamping of feet, whistling and cat-calls, came a
burst of music, and the visitor from the country began to feel more at
his ease.
With elbows resting on the wooden railing, and both hands held behind
his ears that not a single note from the noisy orchestra should escape,
he gave himself up wholly to what he supposed was the performance,
wondering not a little why Tom and Bob had said so much about
hair-breadth escapes, when he could see nothing more dangerous than the
brass instrument which a musician lengthened and shortened until there
seemed every fear he would decapitate his neighbor.
“Is he goin’ to kill the man next to him with that brass thing?” Josiah
asked in a hoarse whisper.
“Of course not,” Bob replied scornfully; “that is only one of the
orchestry, an’ don’t ’mount to anything. Wait ’till the curtain goes
up, an’ then your eyes’ll stick out!”
Josiah waited simply because he was forced to do so; and when the
performance began, exclamations of surprise and astonishment burst
from his lips, as what appeared to be a veritable forest was suddenly
unfolded to view.
During the three hours which followed he remained in a daze of wonder,
fear, and bewilderment.
He could not understand why at one time there was a forest behind the
curtain, and at another the interior of a house, therefore this sudden
change confused him.
It was impossible to hear every word spoken on the stage, and,
consequently, he failed to comprehend why people ran around discharging
fire-arms so frequently.
Owing to these drawbacks the performance was not as pleasing as it
might have been, while the heat, lack of ventilation, and the general
excitement, gave him a most severe headache.
Therefore, instead of regretting that the evening’s entertainment had
come to an end, as did Tom and Bob, he was only too well satisfied to
be in the comparatively fresh air once more.
“To-morrow mornin’ we’ll go up to the park,” Tom said as they walked
rapidly toward Baker’s Court; for he fancied, because of his friend’s
silence, that the boy from the country was having another attack of
homesickness.
This supposition was correct; and when Josiah was in the tiny chamber
he would have been perfectly willing to bring his visit to an immediate
close, if by such a means he could be transported instantly to his own
room, where his mother would be within call.