When Emanuel Griffin, Esq., leaving the dark little street wherein stood
his warehouse and wherein very much of his life and very little of his
money was spent--which latter fact had, however, no merely local
application but was of a general nature--when, to resume, Emanuel
Griffin, Esq., buttoning up his overcoat and, leaving the dark little
street, turned the next corner among the mountainous stores and looked
vexedly around for a car to bear him to his home across the river, and
rattled his keys in his pocket, and nearly hummed a tune in his
impatience, suddenly, as the car appeared like a new planet, and with
the easy-going motions of a planet in its ascent had nearly reached
him--suddenly a thought of something forgotten flashed through his mind,
and the violence of its reaction turned him completely around and sent
him in a precipitous hurry in the opposite direction, namely, in that
which David Dubbs and his little daughter had pursued but a short time
before.
"Pshaw!" he muttered, and looked as if he would like to add something a
great deal stronger. "That's what I forgot to tell David; but Mrs. G. 'll
never forget it, nor forgive it, either, if I don't attend to it
before I get home." So he turned up his collar, and rubbed his ears, and
hurried on to keep warm.
His destination proved to be a fancy bakery in the neighborhood of David
Dubbs's house. The pavement in front of it at that hour and season,
owing to holiday orders, was sending up warm steam from the oven
beneath, and a fragrant and appetizing smell of hot bread and browning
cakes pervaded the street. It was a large establishment of the kind, and
besides its legitimate line of bread-baking, took charge of the cooking
and preparing of dinners for ladies of limited domestic conveniences in
fashionable life. Heedless of the delicious scents which had attracted
several men with greedy eyes to linger at the window and devour in
fancy--a process which left them hungrier than ever--the heaps of loaves
and cakes on the counter within; heedless of the supplicating looks the
men turned on him, and of the confidential attempts of one or two at a
begging whisper (but his hurry was in nowise chargeable with that
inattention); heedless of everything but finishing his errand and
getting home, Mr. Griffin pushed through the crowd in the store, and,
reaching the counter, beckoned to a light-haired, light-eyed, and
red-cheeked youth, in a blue tie and black waistcoat that, through
constant friction with loaves and flour-barrels, had become of a light
pepper-and-salt pattern, and hurriedly said,--
"I want a turkey, Cuffy, of about fifteen or twenty pounds, cooked and
sent to my house by one o'clock to-morrow."
"Can't do it, Mr. Griffin," said the young man, who knew him and had
bowed as he came up.
"Can't do what?" exclaimed Mr. Griffin, with surprise and dismay.
"Can't send it out," returned the young man, firmly.
"Oh!" said Mr. Griffin, relieved; "I thought you meant that you couldn't
prepare it!"
"No, sir," commenced the young man. "You see, sir, Mr. Griffin, it's so
late in the day that all our teams is ordered fur to-morrow at that
time, and so is our boys, but----"
"Well, I'll soon fix that, Cuffy," said Mr. Griffin, opening his coat
and taking out a card. "There, just pin that on the turkey when it is
ready, and carry it over here to Dubbs's--David Dubbs is my clerk. He
will understand the card, and bring the turkey out to my house. I
shouldn't be so particular about it if Mrs. Griffin had not impressed it
on me this morning. I almost forgot it, too."