During the afternoon King O’Leary performed wonders. Healy’s,
through the mediation of that friend of struggling artists, Pat
(blessed be his memory along with Abou Ben Adhem and the Good
Samaritan!) had agreed to hold the check and even to advance a
hundred dollars cash in consideration of the magnificent order
for the evening. Tootles, who was left in charge of the studio
as the Committee on Decorations, beheld in successive stages
of amazement the arrival of a Christmas tree, followed by two
urchins staggering under wreaths with trailing red ribbons and
green garlands sufficient to decorate a theater, an immense clump
of mistletoe, which he immediately suspended to the snout of the
Chinese dragon; and while he was yet in the throes of apprehension
that King O’Leary’s thousand dollars had been dissipated, a brigade
of waiters arrived, who built up, as though by magic, a table
capable of seating a score. On top of this followed two florists
(one evidently having proven incapable of filling King O’Leary’s
desires), who further transformed the studio with potted flowers
and palms and left a moist, tissue-filled box redolent with
_boutonnières_.
By five o’clock acceptances had come in from every one except
Drinkwater and Inga Sonderson--and also Dangerfield, who,
however, had probably not yet moved in. At six, Flick and King
O’Leary, returning laden with presents, stopped at the door with
exclamations of wonder at the miracle they themselves had wrought.
The studio had disappeared under the verdant arbor, while a
wonderful spangled tree rose like a fairy dream, in one corner.
In the center the snowy white spread of the table, sparkling with
silver and the glass that snuggled among the green decorations,
seemed prepared for a ducal banquet in some sylvan hunting-lodge.
At seven o’clock the guests arrived: Mr. and Mrs. Teagan, who
had been especially and strategically invited--Mr. Teagan very
dignified and stiff in dinner coat and fat black tie; Mrs.
Teagan, rustling good naturedly and beaming forth from a gorgeous
pink-satin ball gown with black stomacher--Millie Brewster in
blue frock cut properly high and loaded with flounce on flounce
of ancient lace; the baron in the evening suit which he wore to
Delmonico’s, blue-velvet collar and brass-buttoned vest, with a cut
of black-satin ribbon across the frilled shirt; Miss Quirley in a
marvelous black-lace gown over a pink silk foundation, with dainty
wristlets; Schneibel in green-velvet smoking-jacket and red tie
of a totally different hue from his hair; Belle Shaler and Pansy
Hartmann in evening gowns, popular editions of the latest styles,
presented to them by illustrators in search of heroines of high
society; while Tootles, who did the honors, moved among them like
a dancing master, more English than ever in a snug dinner coat,
with his chin reposing on a high white stockade. Flick had dressed
for the evening by the simple expedient of adding a _boutonnière_
to his faithful (the expression is his) ruddy chestnut suit,
eclipsing King O’Leary, who remained the roving democrat that he
was. Finally, Myrtle Popper arrived the last, on a calculated
entrance, towering in mauve, loaded with brooches and sparklers and
distilling perfume.
Once gathered, a certain unease unaccountably fell over the party.
Mr. and Mrs. Teagan stood alone, clinging to each other, as
Schneibel roamed about, admiring the back drops which he believed
the work of Tootles. Miss Quirley looked so frightened when the
baron tried to open a conversation, while Myrtle Popper and Millie
Brewster looked each other over with such visible amazement that
King O’Leary, fearing the party was going on the rocks, cried,
“Every one find his place at the table.”
A moment later each guest was gazing in wonder, first at a large
portion of caviar ingeniously reposing among clusters of chopped
onions, eggs, and lemons, and, second, at the following menu:
FIRST ANNUAL DINNER
MENU
Caviar Celery Olives Salted Almonds
Turtle Soup
Oysters on the Half-Shell
Vermont Turkey with Cranberry Sauce
Roast Pig with Fried Apples
Baked Sweet Potatoes Mashed Potatoes Succotash
Lobster Salad
Plum Pudding Pistache Ice-cream Angel Cake
Demi-tasse
Schneibel and Millie were visibly alarmed at the spectacle of
the caviar, while the rest of the party, before the magnitude of
the task before them, seemed struck dumb, perceiving which, King
O’Leary rose and spoke as follows:
“Friends: You have noticed, I suppose, at the head of the menu,
that this is the first annual feed. Now, I’m not much on a speech,
and this ain’t a speech. We’re here to get together. That’s my
motto: If you’ve got a gold mine or a tooth-ache--get together! Let
some one else share it. Sort of struck me that we had as much right
to a Christmas of our own as some one else--this is the answer. If
any one doesn’t like anything here, or anything goes wrong--blame
me. As for me, I hope you’ll like me, as I have made up my mind to
like you. And after seeing a lot of this old world, I reckon one of
us is just as good as another, and if I brought you together, why--”
Here he stopped suddenly, fidgeted, and sat down, amid immense
applause.
In ten minutes the party was off at top speed, every one laughing
and rattling on in a high voice, utterly regardless of whether any
one was listening or not, as though each had been released from
solitary confinement and had to talk for the month of repression
endured. The first shyness wore off. They gazed gratefully at King
O’Leary and then at each other, wondering why they had kept apart
so long, so utterly happy that, at times, they stopped and caught
their breaths. To attempt to give an adequate idea of this mixed
conflict is impossible. The room rang with such remarks as these:
“I’m going to eat that lobster salad if I die for it.”
“Tootles, where did you find him--he’s wonderful!”
“Waiter--hist, waiter--a little more of that there pig, and a bit
of the bark!”
“Teagan, you’re all right--here’s to you!”
“Get out of my plate, you dog! Oh, you wanted to help me to some
succotash? Well, why didn’t you say so?”
“Whache think o’ the swell that’s movin’ in at the corner? Didche
ask him to the party?”
“Say, I’ll tell you one thing.”
“What?”
“He’s got a real fur coat--real fur.”
“Did you ask him?”
“Sorry he’s not moved in yet.”
“Sure he is. Didn’t Pansy get a squint in his studio? He came in
to-day,” said Belle.
“Who else didn’t come?” said Myrtle Popper (who had vowed to eat
lobster), looking at King O’Leary from her smiling green eyes.
“Drinkwater and the girl at the end.”
“Oh, _her_!”
“Lady Vere de Vere.”
“Sonderson’s all right,” said Belle Shaler loudly. “What’s wrong?
Couldn’t she see you?”
Tootles, who had placed himself next to Pansy, who looked unusually
fragrant, indignantly defended himself amid shouts of laughter. And
they had just risen joyously, when the door opened and Drinkwater’s
high face and roving eyes appeared.
“Sorry, most sorry. Didn’t get your invitation until just now,” he
said, sliding in. He spoke just above a whisper, every fifth word
interrupted by a nervous blowing out of the breath through his
nose, which he tweaked constantly. “Am I too late?”
“Not at all; you’re welcome, Drinkwater. This is open house
to-night,” said King O’Leary, with outstretched hand. “My name’s
O’Leary. Come on and meet the bunch.”
The new arrival cast a momentary chill on the group, a new element
difficult to assimilate, while several remarked that he came in as
the thirteenth--a coincidence which many later recalled. There was
something too eager, too effusive in his greeting as he made the
rounds. When he came to the baron, the latter barely acknowledged
his salute with the slightest of nods, a reception which Drinkwater
did not appear to notice in the least. When the introductions were
over, he went directly to the side of Pansy, to the evident and
rising amazement of Tootles.
However, the tree was waiting, and amid the shock of surprise at
the unexpected appearance of presents, neatly done up and addressed
to each, they momentarily forgot the unwelcome element. In default
of the usual bazaars O’Leary had returned with the spoils of half a
dozen pawn-shops. There was an old black-lace fan with carved ivory
sticks for Miss Quirley, which so exactly matched her gown that she
sat down and cried, quietly confessing, in a burst of confidence,
that it replaced one she had been forced to sell a dozen years
before. There were brooches and bracelets for the other ladies, not
imitations but real silver and gold with genuine stones--which left
them enraptured and stupefied. The baron, Drinkwater, and Schneibel
received stick-pins, while Tootles and Flick were themselves amazed
to receive each a real-gold watch. To escape the torrent of thanks,
King O’Leary, blushing and happy, bolted to the piano; the colored
orchestra, which had just arrived, struck up, and in a moment the
whole company was whirling around the studio, from which the tables
had disappeared.
In the midst of the second dance, Madame Probasco, the medium
directly below, rushed up in stormy protest, followed by a Mr.
Dean, a pale young man who was studying to be a veterinary surgeon.
Madame Probasco was a fat, rolly lady, dressed in Gypsy shawls and
glittering ear-rings, whose yellow corkscrew curls, streaked with
gray, came straggling over her washed-out features so that she
looked more like a wild spirit herself than one who was supposed
to tame them and call them forth. At the sight of Mrs. Teagan
revolving in the arms of Flick, and the landlord himself capering
with Belle Shaler in a step absolutely his own, her anger vanished
in open-mouthed amazement, and before she could recover, King
O’Leary had her about the waist and spinning among the others,
while the pale young man who had been craning over her shoulder,
fled bashfully.
Sassafras now came in for an exhibition of double shuffling and
a visit to the punch-bowl. Mr. and Mrs. Teagan, already in
uproarious spirits, followed with an Irish jig, whereupon Schneibel
volunteered to give an exhibition of yodeling.
By this time, several facts were apparent to all: first, that
Myrtle Popper and Minnie Brewster had eyes only for King O’Leary,
of which he seemed quite unconscious, and second, that the
introduction of Drinkwater into the group was destined to have
disagreeable consequences. Tootles, who was good humor itself, was
in a thundering rage at the lawyer’s continued attentions to Pansy,
who, strange to say, seemed rather to relish them.
“Damn him! Why doesn’t he keep his eyes quiet?” he said to Belle
Shaler, who was trying to pacify him. “What’s he trying to discover
around here, anyhow? He’d better be careful what he does. Why--the
cheeky blackguard!”
This exclamation was drawn from him by the sight of Drinkwater,
who had maneuvered Pansy under the mistletoe (which every one
seemed to have neglected up to the present), availing himself of
this undeniable privilege. Tootles started forward angrily, and
there is no telling what might have happened had not King O’Leary,
who had noticed his fury, saved the day by catching Miss Quirley
in the same predicament amid shrieks of laughter. Tootles, in the
general scramble that now took place, was forced to relinquish his
grouch, while King O’Leary, profiting by a favorable moment, caught
Drinkwater’s arm not too gently and swung him around.
“Look out--you hurt!” said the latter, with an exclamation of pain.
“Sorry,” said King O’Leary, squeezing the harder, “but a word to
you. Go easy--you’re trespassing--do you get me?”
To any other, Drinkwater might have returned an impudent
answer--one indeed was on his lips; but he looked a second time
at King O’Leary’s steady eyes, scowled, and turned away, for a
while at least devoting himself elsewhere. Mr. Cornelius, who had
witnessed the episode, came to King O’Leary and offered his hand
with dignity.
“Thanks, Meester O’Leary. If you had not do it, I should have! The
man is _canaille_!”
To the surprise of every one, Flick volunteered to sing a comic
song, at the conclusion of which it was voted, on Tootles’ motion,
that it was the sentiment of the assemblage that he should never
be permitted a second transgression. Millie Brewster, to offset
Flick’s offending, was prevailed upon to sing, and chose to render
“The Lass o’ Bonnie Dundee,” which she sang in such a sweet if
slight voice that a sudden gloom fell about the room, as though
through the fragile illusion of jollity they had so courageously
built up, the hard, lonely facts of their lives had suddenly struck
in. Mr. Cornelius was tugging at his mustache; Tootles, whose cup
was overflowing anyhow, was staring glumly ahead, while through the
heavy silence could be heard the sniffle of Miss Quirley and the
throaty sob of Madame Probasco, who had become more and more human.
“I, too, will sing a sentimental ballad,” said Schneibel, his
red-bobbed head glowing with redder enthusiasm.
“No, you won’t,” said King O’Leary resolutely. “I know the kind of
stuff you love--moonbeams and gravestones! Nothing but yodeling for
you, old friend Schneibel! Here, we’ve got to break this up! Every
one on the floor, and all tune up. Who knows ‘We’ll all go down to
Casey’s’?--Good! Come on now, knock the blues higher than a kite.
One--two--three!”
“We’ll all go down to Casey’s
And we’ll have a little gin,
And we’ll sit upon the sand
Till the tide comes in,
Till the tide comes in;
And we’ll sit upon the sand
Till the tide comes in.”
“Right over again and faster,” said King O’Leary. “That’s the way,
Miss Quirley; you’re a sport. That’s right--thump the floor; beat
time anyhow!”
They were chanting this memory-haunting snatch for the third time,
clapping hands in rhythm and struggling amid laughter to get their
breaths, when the door was flung violently open and Dangerfield
appeared, top-hat, fur coat and the gleam of a white tie.
The chorus died down immediately. Every one was struck by the
strangeness of his entrance. He looked bigger and rougher than he
was, muffled up in the great coat, with a flurry of snow on the
shoulders, over which could be seen the white of two other faces
peering curiously in. He took off his hat slowly, as he saw the
company, but in a dazed way, and stood there blinking at them,
for all the world like a great bear wandering into the glare of a
camp-fire. There was indeed something restless and shaggy about
him that struck them all as he stood there, staring into the room.
The head was full and round with an abundance of curly black hair,
grizzled at the temples, with one white lock that rose from the
forehead like a white flame. The face was wide-spaced and rather
flat, the yellow-green eyes were deep set with distended pupils,
very animal-like--eyes that glowed and set in sudden fixed stares.
Evidently the party had startled him--perhaps it was the presence
of women, which he had not foreseen, for after a moment he seemed
to recover himself with an effort and said a few words which caused
his companions to scuttle away and took a step into the room,
smiling courteously, without a trace of the former wild, almost
unbalanced stare.
“I am afraid I owe you an apology,” he said quietly. “My friends
mistook this for my studio. I hope you will forgive the rudeness of
my intrusion.”
During the moments which had followed the flying open of the
door, the entire company had remained hushed under the spell of
the brusque incident. Every one had the same feeling--there was
something out of place with the man, dressed as he was, here
in the Arcade alone on Christmas night--something indefinably
wrong, though what it was each would have been hard put to it to
express. In this short moment, where each man felt that he was
in trouble, there was something about him, a certain weakness or
a certain childlike wildness, that went to the heart of every
woman present--a quality the man had of being lovable (for it was
unconscious) despite all his faults. He had bowed and started to
withdraw, before King O’Leary came to.
“Hold up, friend--you must be Dangerfield, aren’t you?”
“Dangerfield?” said the new arrival, stopping. “Yes, that’s my
name.”
“Then you’ve fallen in right. There’s an invitation waiting for you
in your room for this same shebang.”
“An invitation?” said Dangerfield slowly, and he passed his hand
over his brow, which was splendid and open. Many noticed the effort
which he seemed to put into his words. “I was out, probably. If I
had been there, I assure you I would have come with the greatest
of pleasure. It’s my loss,” he added, with a smile that seemed to
appeal for their friendship.
“Never too late, neighbor. This is a get-together party. Drop your
duds and join us.”
“May I? Thank you,” he said, but he continued to stand there
without a move to shed his overcoat, until Flick, who had been
watching him narrowly, approached, saying:
“Let me give you a hand. Wilder’s my name. Glad to know you.”
He seemed to recall himself, and slipped from the heavy coat.
A curious thing among the many curious things of this night was
that immediately all the others came up to be introduced to
Dangerfield, with an instinctive tribute, or the feeling that
the man was in deep trouble. Drinkwater was among the first, his
nervous, prying little eyes fairly fastened on the other in his
excitement. Dangerfield shook each hand cordially, with a smile
that seemed to transform his whole expression into one of democracy
and kindliness, giving to his greeting of each woman present a
touch of exquisite deference.
Then a strange thing happened.
“Mr. Cornelius,” said King O’Leary. “There’s a string of names I
wouldn’t dare tackle. We call him ‘the baron.’”
“Mr. Cornelius, I am very--” said Dangerfield, and then raised
his head and stopped short. The baron, too, was staring at him as
though he had seen a vision of the past, mumbling over and over as
though dissatisfied, “Meester Dangerfeel--Dangerfeel----”
It was only a moment, but every one perceived it, while
Drinkwater’s face was fairly quivering with interest. Each
caught himself up and bowed, but for a moment across the face of
Dangerfield had come again that sudden, startled, bearlike stare
which seemed the frightened uprising of another nature struggling
within him.
What happened after that came so suddenly that few could remember
it clearly. The orchestra had broken into a rattling two-step, and
the studio was shaking with the shuffling of feet; Dangerfield had
not moved from his original position, and remained thus staring for
so long a while that most had forgotten him, when all of a sudden
there was a warning shout from Tootles, a scream from Pansy, and
the next moment Dangerfield had reeled and fallen with a crash to
the floor.
There was a babel of cries--some one calling to the orchestra to
stop, Miss Quirley sobbing, and the baron calling for a glass of
water, while Mr. Teagan rushed to and fro volubly, doing nothing
at all--when in the midst of this turmoil, without any one knowing
how she had gotten there, or indeed, noticing anything strange in
her appearance, Inga Sonderson was seen kneeling at the side of the
fallen man, examining him quietly and in a businesslike manner.
“He must be carried into his own room,” she said, after a quick
examination. “When he comes to, there must be quiet--absolute
quiet. He must be gotten there now.” Her eyes fell on King O’Leary.
“You’re strong; can you carry him?”
For answer he stooped and lifted the senseless body, but not
without an effort, for the man was powerfully built. Every
one seemed at once to turn to Inga, as though recognizing a
providential authority.
“Is he alive?”
“What was it--heart-stroke?”
“Apoplexy?”
“But is his studio ready?”
“His studio is ready,” said Inga quietly. She nodded to O’Leary.
“Carry him in now. The rest stay here.” She glanced around. “I
think the party had better end. There must be quiet. Belle, I shall
want cold cloths; and Mr. Teagan, you had better send for a doctor.
Baker is over on Sixty-seventh Street. Better telephone.”
[Illustration: It never occurred to King O’Leary to ask what she
intended to do. _Page 69._]
Leaving the crowd, flustered and frightened, to disperse
into whispering groups, she went down the hall to the corner
studio, which was piled with packing-cases in an indescribable
confusion. In one corner, very black and white in the glare of
the center-light, was a four-poster bed, and on it the sprawling
figure of Dangerfield. She went to it straight and silent, knelt
again, felt the pulse, lifted the eyelids, while King O’Leary
waited.
“Well,” he said, as she arose. “D.T.’s, isn’t it?”
“Only a part of it--I think,” she said, looking down at the
powerful figure that looked more like a stricken animal than ever.
The curious thing is that it never occurred to King O’Leary to
ask what she intended to do. He seemed to accept her as a fact,
just as naturally as she had assumed control. She stood a moment
silent, her finger on her lips, looking down, and then drew herself
together with a sort of shudder, looked at King O’Leary, who was
watching her, and said:
“Undress him and get him into bed. Then call me.”