During this time Art, Literature, and Music were industriously
engaged in the laudable enterprise of spending the unearned
increment, in the course of which redistribution of wealth, they
found the necessary encouragement from the more expensive sex.
A round of gaiety set in such as the Arcadians had never known.
Visits to restaurants and theaters became mere details of a
daily routine. They gave a dance in the studio and plunged into
the revelry of costume balls, then at its height; while, under
the guidance of Belle Shaler, they made several excursions into
the bohemia of Washington Square and Greenwich Village. In the
inevitable pairing-off process, it transpired that, however they
started forth, they returned home with Myrtle Popper snuggling
close to O’Leary’s protecting bulk (she seemed particularly
sensitive to the cold), Tootles tagging close to Pansy’s provoking
shoulder, and Flick and Belle Shaler, who had quarreled from the
start, walking six feet apart and stabbing each other with final
deadly glances. Millie Brewster came to the parties in the studio,
but seldom ventured forth on the marauding expeditions--not that
she did not envy these rollicking sallies in wig and fancy dress,
only she could not shake off the timidity and shyness which had
grown about her in her months of isolation.
“Boys,” said King O’Leary, one morning, when from his couch he
had watched Tootles’ mental control of Matter carrying him by
successive jerks to the sink--“boys, I have a bit of news to
break to you. I have been counting up, and there is just one more
jamboree in sight.”
Flick awoke by one of those subconscious mental perceptions that
the Society for Psychical Research is at present investigating.
“Broke?”
“King, tell us the worst.”
“Sixty-two dollars and some miserable change,” said O’Leary
cheerfully, “is all that keeps us among the high rollers.”
A fearful suspicion flashed across Tootles’ ducal countenance as it
dawned upon him that, though it was the first week of the month, no
summons to pay the rent had yet appeared.
“King, you paid the rent!”
O’Leary did not deny it.
“How much?” said Flick faintly.
“A year.”
Tootles took this announcement very hard.
“It’s squandering money, that’s what it is,” he said bitterly.
“Why, damn it, man,” said Flick, equally outraged, “anything can
happen--another uncle might die!”
“Well, it’s done,” said King O’Leary, without sign of penitence.
“I’m getting tired of dissipation, anyhow. At least we have a roof
over our heads.”
“We shall starve to death--like Croton water-bugs caught in a
diamond casket,” said Flick, who had a taste for poetical flights.
“But, even then,” said Tootles, “even with that and the parties
and the gorgeous presents, there ought to be three or four hundred
left.” At this moment he caught sight of a guilty look on King
O’Leary’s face. “Literature, I do believe he’s been and done some
low-down, sneaking good action. What is it--paying rent for the
whole floor?”
“Nothing of the sort,” said King O’Leary, but so gruffly that
Tootles was confirmed in the idea that his guess had some
pertinency.
“He’s been buying diamonds for Myrtle,” said Flick suspiciously.
“Well, here it is,” said King O’Leary, depositing a collection of
bills and change upon the table. “What’ll we do with it?”
To his shame, Tootles, who had bourgeois inclinations, suggested
that they should save it against the daily ache of the stomach.
“Never!” said Flick, with a withering look. “We have lived like
dead-game sports, and we must end with a bang and not with a
trickle.”
“Shake!” said King O’Leary.
“Well, what?” said Tootles glumly. “Oh, you fellows can grin; but
I know what’s going to happen to me. That confounded money-eating
little flirt of a Pansy will give me the royal shake the moment
she gets wise.” When Tootles had a grief or a woe, he confided it
to the world. “By Jove, I’ve made a fool enough of myself, running
after her, when all I had to do was to sit quiet and condescend to
let her feed out of my hand! Damn that Portuguese, Drinkwater! It
was bad enough before--but now, O Lord!”
“I shall break my engagement to Belle,” said Flick facetiously.
“Thank Heaven for one thing, _she_ won’t come around any more.”
“We’ve wasted too much time, anyhow,” said King O’Leary, mistaking
the sincerity of these professions. “As for me, I feel like getting
back to doing something. I tell you what we’ll do: We’ll take the
girls out once more, give them the greatest razzle-dazzle blowout
they have ever seen, and then, when their eyes are bulging out
and they are ready to melt in our arms, we’ll say, ‘Ladies, adoo
forever!’”
“Then we’re to tell them we’re bust?” said Flick, to whom the
bravado appealed.
“No,” said Tootles firmly; “let’s put it on high moral grounds.
We must tell them that we have listened to the stern voice of
ambition, that we are artists, and our professions are reclaiming
us.”
“That means work,” said Flick.
“I have an idea for a masterpiece,” said Tootles, who, by the last
speech, had recovered lost ground. “It’s to be called ‘The Ages
Contemplating the Well-Dressed Man.’ It’s to be a monumental work.
Who knows, it may bring another thousand!”
At noon, while they were perfecting their plans (Flick’s suggestion
of dining at the St. Regis having been dismissed on account of King
O’Leary’s hostility to boiled linen and social dog-collars), there
came a timid tap-tap at the door, and, to the amazement of two
members of the firm at least, Millie Brewster arrived with a broom
and a dust-cloth.
“Can’t I be useful?” she said, dreadfully confused at her own
daring. (She had studied over this opening for an hour.) “It’s only
neighborly, isn’t it?”
King O’Leary sprang up rather quickly, and while Tootles’ eyes
watched him with a dawning suspicion, he went to the girl and said
with rough good nature:
“You certainly can--come right in and set to it. Give your orders,
Millie--we’re here.”
But to the surprise of everybody, the girl pushed him away with
determination, saying:
“Not at all. Sit down--please. You’ll only be in the way.”
“So that’s the way the wind blows,” thought Tootles, noticing the
light that came into the childish face as she looked up at the
rugged globe-trotter.
“Why, bless my soul, is this to be a habit, Millie?” said Flick
encouragingly.
“Please--if you’ll let me,” she said eagerly.
Flick gave the permission with the air of one parting with a
string of pearls. The three men, lounging over their morning
pipes, followed with delicious satisfaction the young girl routing
the dust, and such is the soul-delight that such rare feminine
spectacles engender in the masculine mind, that they found her, all
at once, amazingly young, graceful, and romantically pretty.
“There’s lots and lots of dust,” said Millie, shaking her head. “I
can’t get it all out at once.”
“I should like to make a sketch of her bending down like that,”
said Tootles pensively. “Beautiful line--charming!”
“What a cracking idea for a heroine,” said Flick, who was stirred
to creative rashness.
O’Leary, who understood better than the others, leaned back
dreamily, puffing in contentment.
At this moment the door opened, and Belle Shaler slouched in, in a
manner which would have set the hearts of fashionable débutantes
afire with envy, and stopped short, her shocked hair whirling
around her saucy face in amazement at the sight of Millie on a
chair, caressing the dragon’s tail with a dust-cloth.
“For the love of Mike, woman, what’s struck you?” she exclaimed,
though in somewhat stronger terms. “Degrading yourself for this
bunch of loafers and sofa-warmers!”
“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” said Flick sweetly. “No one’s going to
ask you.”
“Well, you certainly have got your nerve,” said Belle, mistaking
the initiative. “If you want a slave, why don’t you get a wife?”
“Miss Brewster has offered to do it out of the kindness of
her heart,” said King O’Leary, seeing Millie overcome with
embarrassment.
“Sit down, Belle; we’re keeping the family mending for you.”
Before Belle could get her breath to retort, Millie broke in:
“Oh, please--I expected--I wanted to do that--really I did!”
The tone in which it was said struck each one. Each felt the
loneliness from which the girl was struggling. Belle gave her a
short look of amazement and then went up and put her arm around her
with abrupt good nature, saying:
“Don’t mind my jawing. I’m a rough nut. Bless your heart, don’t
worry; you shall do it!”
“’Pon my word,” said Flick aggressively, “who’s disposing of things
around here?”
“I am,” said Belle, shrugging her shoulders.
“Angel, you’re wrong,” said Flick suavely. “If you want to know
what makes woman an elevating force and a tender, inspiring ideal
in the life of rough men, sit here and watch Millie.”
Belle Shaler slumped to the table, swung up on it, and lit a
cigarette before she condescended to glance down at Flick.
“Say, I’ll bet that’s what you think,” she said, with her battling
glance.
“A woman like Millie,” said Flick, from the cushions, watching
dreamily the bustling progress of the housecleaning, “could make me
a credit to society.”
“Ha, ha!” said Belle, and flicked away the ash of her cigarette
with a scornful wave. “What you need, bo, is a hell-cat, a raring,
tearing hell-cat with a rotten temper, to stand over you with a
poker and whang you one. Then you’d work.”
“No, Belle; no,” said Flick, putting out his hand as though to ward
her off. “I can _not_ marry you.”
“Dog!” said Belle, and flung at him the nearest object at hand,
which happened to be a saucer.
“I really do believe they’re fond of each other,” said Tootles, the
acute observer.
“Oh, you’re no better,” said Belle, turning on him; “you’re worse.
You’ve got brains and won’t use them. Lord, but I loathe a bunch of
work-dodgers! I see your finish--a lot of sandwich-men beating the
pavements.”
“What the devil does she come around here for?” said Flick,
beginning to grow angry, “just as we were comfy?”
“Haven’t we been keeping you in luxury?” said O’Leary, arousing
himself.
“Well, you’re a good bunch,” said Belle, relaxing a little, “but
what I said goes. You’re a fine lithograph of ambition, you
are--wallowing around like a lot of yellow dogs. Why don’t you get
up and work?”
“Where’s Pansy?” said Tootles, to divert the attack.
“Out cooing with Drinkwater, I guess,” said Belle, who flounced off
with this parting stab. “You don’t think she takes _you_ seriously,
do you? Why, you couldn’t support a canary!”
“Damn women, anyhow!” said Tootles, who winced perceptibly. “That’s
what money does for you. They only come into your life to help you
spend it, and then they make you miserable. Curse every one of
them! Curse them one and all!”
“But curse Belle Shaler first,” said Flick.
“All except Millie,” said O’Leary, smiling.
“Well, except Millie.”
But, to their surprise, the girl, having finished what might be
called her dust-survey, approached them and blurted out:
“Don’t be mad at her, Mr. Wilder. It’s because she cares for you
she goes at you so.”
“Why, Millie, how do you know such things?” said Tootles, opening
his eyes.
“Well, I do.”
“I do believe she agrees with Belle,” said O’Leary, who believed no
such thing. “Come, now, the truth!”
Thus cornered, to their astonishment the girl looked very red and
uncomfortable, but finally announced with a determined shake of her
head:
“Well, yes; I do! I think she is absolutely right. And I think--I
think you ought to be ashamed of yourselves, every one of you!”
When she had rushed away, overcome with her own daring, the three
loungers looked helplessly at each other and then up at the
skylight, as though to discover whence the bomb had fallen.
“I do believe we have touched these maidens’ hearts,” said Tootles,
the first to break the silence.
“Never felt so gorgeously, deliciously happy in my life,” said
Flick, in a melancholy tone. “Everything seemed just lovely with
the world; I was just plain plumb glad to be alive--and then some
one has to break in and shout, ‘Get up and work!’”
“Well, son, they’re right,” said O’Leary, jumping up and stretching
his arms. “Guess millions don’t agree with us.”
“Speak for yourself,” said Flick.
“Flick,” said O’Leary solemnly, “Belle hits hard but she hits
square. Son, you ought to be up and doing!”
“Why me any more than Tootles?”
“You’re older than I am,” said Tootles, who joined O’Leary in a
withering contemplation of the joke-smith. “Besides, who cracks the
jokes you sell?”
“So you’re all picking on me?” said Flick wrathfully. “All right;
I’ll show you. And I won’t have to kill an uncle to do it, either,”
he added, with a vindictive glance at O’Leary as he left the room.
“He’s gone out in search of puns,” said Tootles, who, after a
moment’s whistling, added, “The party still on for to-night?”
“It’s our only salvation.”
“Well, I’ll go down and give the invitations,” said Tootles, who
departed in quest of Pansy.
X
Left alone, King O’Leary began to move restlessly about the studio,
his hands behind his back. The sun was sparkling through the
skylight--the same sun that was shining on distant tranquil seas
and over green islands; and some of the old tugging was at his
heart, for he moved over to the trunk which was always ready for
an instant departure. He was on his knees, searching through old
keepsakes that had about them the scent of other days, when the
voice of Myrtle Popper called:
“Hello there! Anybody in?”
He turned from his knees, to find her looking down suspiciously.
“Say you look as though you were running off?”
King O’Leary laughed guiltily.
“Myrtle, you’ve caught me with the goods! Well, yes; I was getting
restless.” He rose and looked down at her with a shake of his head.
“Lord, wouldn’t I like to be lying on my back, sailing into Hong
Kong harbor, watching the mast scraping against the blue, and the
yards creaking lazily----”
She went to the trunk and shut it with a bang, placing a red-heeled
slipper on it, with a neat flash of blue-silk ankle above.
“Say, how old are you?”
“Myrtle, you’re looking as fresh as the first roses,” said King
O’Leary artfully. “And that’s a lovely bit of ankle, blue as the
blue sky over Hong Kong.”
“How old are you?” repeated the girl sternly, who looked
wonderfully enticing, with her coiled hair and young figure set
off by the lace apron against the black working-dress.
“Thirty-six beautiful years--and one more.”
“Thirty-seven!” said the girl severely. “And what are you--nothing
but a hobo!”
“Hold up!” said O’Leary suspiciously. “Is this a conspiracy? Have
you been talking to Belle?”
“I have been talking to no one,” said Myrtle indignantly. “I
say what I mean; and I mean it’s a crying shame to see a fine,
upstanding man like you, King O’Leary, no further along than you
were twenty years ago.”
“What the devil’s got into this place, anyhow?” said O’Leary,
putting his hand to his forehead and sitting down before the storm.
“Why don’t you settle down?” said Myrtle, in a coaxing voice. “You
can do things--you can handle men--Lord, they’d jump for you!”
“What would you have me do?” said O’Leary, not insensible to the
compliment of being frowned at by a pretty face.
“You can’t go on bumming forever. Get hold of something and stick
to it. You’ve got brains, and you’ve got the push, too. Why, there
are thousands of men making their pile right here in little old New
York that aren’t fit to hold your coat!”
By this time, King O’Leary’s early resentment had passed, and the
Irish fondness for teasing had begun to twinkle in his eyes.
“Well, Myrtle dear, what have you been making up your mind I am to
do?”
“Try a chance with a moving-picture house,” said Myrtle eagerly.
“Honest, King, I mean it. I’ve been thinking of what you might do
for days. I want to see you get ahead. There’s an old fellow called
Pomello that has struck it rich and would do anything for me. Put
some money in with him. Sure, I could arrange it in a minute.”
“My money is already invested,” said King O’Leary, telling a
defensive fib.
“There are a dozen chances passing you every day, if you’ll only
keep your eyes open,” said Myrtle, sitting on the sofa next to
O’Leary, with such excitement in her great green eyes that King
O’Leary was conscious of a pleasant conceit.
“Myrtle, I’m afraid you’re a determined woman,” he said, with a
provoking smile.
“I wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t,” she said. “What would I be to-day
if I couldn’t make up my mind? What you need is some one to push
you on.”
“How would you like to be rolling up the Roo Royale--that’s
in Paris--in a jingling open-front carriage, stretched back
and watching the dukes and duchesses go by?” said King O’Leary
maliciously.
“You’ll never be sensible,” said Myrtle, frowning.
He lay back, propped up against the pillows, watching the fine
figure the girl made sitting there, her eyes sparkling with the
busy schemes she was concocting in the back of her head, of whose
one object he was pleasantly aware.
“What a pity I’m not the marrying kind,” he said slyly. “I believe
you would make an alderman out of me.”
“Quit your kiddin’,” she said, shrugging her shoulders, “and don’t
think, because a girl’s a good-enough pal to want to see you get
on, that she’s throwing herself at your head.”
He laughed hugely.
“Got me that time, all right!”
“Be sensible,” she said, relenting. “It ain’t often we get a
chance to sit down alone. Lord, you don’t know what good it does me
to slump in here for a quiet chat! You’re one of my own kind, King!”
O’Leary yielded to the temptation of the moment far enough to play
with the coiled bracelet which lay against the girl’s wrist.
“Say, I’m rather curious about you,” he said, studying her gravely.
“You see a queer side of life.”
“I can handle it.”
“I know that.”
“There’s one thing I have got,” she said, eager to seize the rare
opportunity to lead him into a serious conversation, “and that’s a
good, hard bump of common sense. Don’t make any mistakes about me
and--and the others. I don’t lose my head, King.”
“Well, that’s a wonder, for you’re pretty enough to make the Pope
himself lose his,” said O’Leary, patting her hand.
“Wish you meant it,” she said, looking at him seriously, “but, what
with your blarney and your jollying, no one knows what you think.
Yes, I like sassiety, but I’m not fooled. You bet I know where to
pin the young fellows who take me out--and the old ones, too.”
“Should think you got into tight places sometimes,” said O’Leary,
looking steadily into her eyes.
“Pooh! Men are like strange dogs,” she said contemptuously. “Walk
right up to them, bold as life, and they’re gentle as ducks.
Say--after all, there’s a lot of bunk about this bold, bad-man
stuff. Honest, outside of a couple of freshies, men has been
awfully decent to me. You know what I think? I think a lot of them
are bored stiff with the women about them and just tickled to death
to take out a girl who appreciates having a good time.”
O’Leary nodded.
“Men are rather decent. They go just about as far as a woman wants
them to.”
“That’s right,” she said frankly, bobbing her head. “You get
from them about what you want. Sure, I like the going out to
the restaurants and the the-ayters, and I dote on dancing;
but--say--that’s not all the game.”
“It isn’t, eh?”
“Not on your life; and little Myrtle knows it, and don’t you forget
it. There’s a long ways to go after the mashers drop off. The main
thing is settlin’ down to something that’s your own; findin’ the
fellow who’s worth helping on, and startin’ to save.”
“Why, Myrtle, I thought you were a social butterfly!” said O’Leary,
surprised and a little apprehensive as he thought he perceived the
drift of these remarks.
“Butterfly nothing! Not when the right man comes up the street!
Nix! Home and kiddies for me. I’m not ashamed to say it. That’s the
real life. I’ve seen all I want of sassiety.”
“Well, Myrtle, you’ve got lots of chances,” he said, little
reckoning how the future would play the cards. “I’ll bet some day
I’ll see you rolling down the avenue in a fine limousine just like
Mrs. Van Astorbilt.”
“Don’t tease me,” she said, so quietly that an embarrassing silence
fell between them. She got up nervously. “I must be getting back to
the job,” she said, glancing at her watch.
“You’re dining with me to-night,” he said, rising.
“Am I?” she said, putting her head back defiantly. “I’ve got an
engagement--had it for a week.”
“You’ll break it, Myrtle darlin’?”
“Oh, will I?” she said impertinently. “You seem very sure of
yourself.”
“I am,” he said, smiling and looking into her eyes so intently that
she turned her glance away.
[Illustration: “Friendship!” she said scornfully, with a quick
breath, “a lot of friendship there was in that!” _Page 109._]
“Just you and me?” she said, in a quieter tone.
“No; it’s the bunch. Oh, you needn’t make a face. We’re dining
at the Waldorf. Sure, I’m not jollying you this time. So get out
your swell duds,” he said, coming nearer and playing with the lace
collar which lay close to her throat, “for I want the girl that’s
on my arm to put it all over the rest of them--savvy?”
“Do you think I can?” she said, with a quick breath, for he was
close to her, and her eyes flashed with a sudden leap as they met
his.
“Sure, Myrtle, if you look at me again like that, you do it at your
own peril,” he said, wild Irish mischief dancing in his glance.
“Don’t you dare!” she said, throwing up her head; and there was
something in her look that made him laugh, and after a little
scuffle, kiss her.
“Mind, though, that was just in friendship,” he said, in pretended
seriousness.
She stood away against the wall, breathless, her cheeks on fire and
her eyes snapping, her head a little light from the fervor of his
embrace.
“Friendship!” she said scornfully, with a quick breath, “A lot of
friendship there was in that!”
When she had gone, King O’Leary stood shaking his head slowly,
his hands in his pockets, whistling to himself as he glanced in
perplexity at the sun which was sparkling through the skylight--the
sun that shone over distant seas and green isles.