I
Old Jerome Warren lived in a hundred-thousand-dollar house at 35 East
Fifty-Soforth Street. He was a downtown broker, so rich that he could
afford to walk--for his health--a few blocks in the direction of his
office every morning, and then call a cab.
He had an adopted son, the son of an old friend named Gilbert--Cyril
Scott could play him nicely--who was becoming a successful painter as
fast as he could squeeze the paint out of his tubes. Another member of
the household was Barbara Ross, a step-niece. Man is born to trouble;
so, as old Jerome had no family of his own, he took up the burdens of
others.
Gilbert and Barbara got along swimmingly. There was a tacit and tactical
understanding all round that the two would stand up under a floral bell
some high noon, and promise the minister to keep old Jerome's money
in a state of high commotion. But at this point complications must be
introduced.
Thirty years before, when old Jerome was young Jerome, there was a
brother of his named Dick. Dick went West to seek his or somebody else's
fortune. Nothing was heard of him until one day old Jerome had a letter
from his brother. It was badly written on ruled paper that smelled
of salt bacon and coffee-grounds. The writing was asthmatic and the
spelling St. Vitusy.
It appeared that instead of Dick having forced Fortune to stand and
deliver, he had been held up himself, and made to give hostages to the
enemy. That is, as his letter disclosed, he was on the point of pegging
out with a complication of disorders that even whiskey had failed to
check. All that his thirty years of prospecting had netted him was one
daughter, nineteen years old, as per invoice, whom he was shipping East,
charges prepaid, for Jerome to clothe, feed, educate, comfort, and
cherish for the rest of her natural life or until matrimony should them
part.
Old Jerome was a board-walk. Everybody knows that the world is supported
by the shoulders of Atlas; and that Atlas stands on a rail-fence; and
that the rail-fence is built on a turtle's back. Now, the turtle has
to stand on something; and that is a board-walk made of men like old
Jerome.
I do not know whether immortality shall accrue to man; but if not so,
I would like to know when men like old Jerome get what is due them?
They met Nevada Warren at the station. She was a little girl, deeply
sunburned and wholesomely good-looking, with a manner that was frankly
unsophisticated, yet one that not even a cigar-drummer would intrude
upon without thinking twice. Looking at her, somehow you would expect
to see her in a short skirt and leather leggings, shooting glass balls
or taming mustangs. But in her plain white waist and black skirt she
sent you guessing again. With an easy exhibition of strength she swung
along a heavy valise, which the uniformed porters tried in vain to wrest
from her.
"I am sure we shall be the best of friends," said Barbara, pecking at
the firm, sunburned cheek.
"I hope so," said Nevada.
"Dear little niece," said old Jerome, "you are as welcome to my home as
if it were your father's own."
"Thanks," said Nevada.
"And I am going to call you 'cousin,'" said Gilbert, with his charming
smile.
"Take the valise, please," said Nevada. "It weighs a million pounds.
It's got samples from six of dad's old mines in it," she explained to
Barbara. "I calculate they'd assay about nine cents to the thousand
tons, but I promised him to bring them along."