how much a wall should cost, as she was ignorant of the two factors
which determined it, namely, the wages of day-laborers and the time
required to build the wall; therefore she requested Mr. Snavely, as a
man of affairs, to make the bargain for her.
It was well that she did so, for Mr. Cadge's ideas on the subject were
as boundless as hers were limited. Day wages, he affirmed, ranged from
two dollars up for common labor, and as building a wall was highly
skilled labor he thought three and a half or four dollars per diem would
be about right, going on the basis of at least six days of eight hours
each.
Mr. Snavely, on the contrary, after looking over the ground declared
that four days' steady work would build a wall running the entire length
of the widow's lot. Furthermore, that a dollar and a quarter a day was
fair wages for such employment, while laborers would scramble for the
job at a dollar and a half. As a concession to Mr. Cadge, he was willing
to allow him to take his own time and agreed to pay six dollars when the
wall should be completed.
Mr. Cadge waxed indignant and very voluble, while Mr. Snavely was a mild
man of few words; but the simple laborer was no match for a man who made
his living by small chaffering. He was forced to give in, and Saturday
morning, bright and early, he appeared on the banks of Catnip Creek
accompanied by Master Cadge, Thomas Cadge, Jr., and Arabella Cadge.
"Daddy's going to give you kids a treat to-day," he announced. "My eye!
wot larks we will 'ave. Nothing to do all day long but play building a
stone fort right on the brook, and Daddy will show you 'ow to build it."
The little Cadges were perfectly charmed at this condescension on the
part of their sire, who seldom acknowledged their presence except with a
cuff in passing. They were eager to begin, and as they had no need to
strip their legs, which were always bare, the work proceeded apace.
Cadge, Sr., ensconced himself in the sunniest nook of the bank, and
directed his offspring what stones to select and where to place them,
and above all, to make haste, since the enemy would soon appear to
attack the fort.
Before their Saturday holiday was over, the children had discovered that
their father was a strenuous playfellow. In vain they suggested fishing,
hunting Injuns, or gathering wild flowers; they had set out to build a
fort on Catnip Creek, and build it they must.
They entertained hopes of sneaking off alone when they should go home
for lunch, but Mr. Cadge had provided for this contingency. His wife
appeared at noon with slices of bread and butter for the Cadgelings, to
which was added a cold beefsteak and a bucket of beer for the support of
their house. Having already lunched at home, she was permitted to lay a
tier of heavier stones along the wall while waiting for her family to
finish the repast.
It was an arduous day for the tribe of Cadge, excepting, of course, its
head. Not until the first star came out and the owls began to hoot along
the Catnip did he declare himself satisfied with the day's work and
proceed homeward to supper. Widow Pipkin's wall was half finished.
Not until Saturday was the patient father able to enlist once more the
services of his offspring, for, "What if they are your own kids!"
retorted Mrs. Cadge from her wash-board. "I've rubbed my 'ands raw to
give 'em the eddication you and me lacks, and to school they go. You
build that wall yourself, or wait until the week's end for your pay."
The former alternative was not to be thought of, and the Widow Pipkin
wondered mildly whether the half finished wall was ever to be completed.
But Saturday at dawn Cadge once more appeared, driving before him three
tear-stained and reluctant Cadgelets. They had inherited part of their
father's disposition in regard to real work, likewise his unwillingness
to be imposed upon. Constructing fortifications along the Catnip was
well enough for one Saturday, but their backs still ached from their
exertions, and they had only disdain for the restricted paternal
imagination which suggested that this time they build stone castles.
Their sire waxed eloquent over the art of castle building and the sport
of imprisoning ogres in them, but was finally compelled to assume the
attitude of an ogre himself, and threatened to skin them alive if they
did not do as they were bid.
It was a long, hard day for the whole Cadge family. The little Cadges
worked like galley-slaves in fear of the lash; their mother, out of pity
for them, laid two tiers of cobbles when she came at noon, and even
Cadge himself was tempted on one or two occasions to descend from his
nook and lend a hand, but restrained himself.
Again the owls hooted along the stream and bullfrogs croaked from the
reedy places. Cadge knocked the dottle out of his pipe and arose,
stretching his short, muscular limbs, which had become cramped from
sitting still so long.
"Run along 'ome, kiddies," he said, "and tell the old woman not to wait
supper for me. There's a man down town as wants to see me about a job.
I'll 'ave a bite with 'im."
The little Cadges disappeared in the twilight and their father presented
himself at the Widow Pipkin's door to receive his hard-earned wages.
"Oh, dear me! I can't pay you to-night," answered Mrs. Pipkin. "I never
keep any money in the house."
Cadge grumbled something about, a check would do. He was pretty sure
that the barkeeper at Spider Grogan's place would cash it.
"Oh, but mine is a savings account, and I will have to go down to the
bank myself and get the money; but, never mind, you shall have it first
thing Monday morning."
The thirsty man could find no solution to this problem and, although he
urged the Widow Pipkin to think of a way, as his "missus needed the
medicine something orful," that kind-hearted old lady could suggest
nothing more to the point than going at once with a mustard poultice to
the sufferer.
Old women are so set in their notions that the anxious husband was a
full half hour dissuading her, and, when he reached home with both hands
in his empty pockets, Mrs. Cadge was washing the dishes.
"Did the man give you a job?" inquired his wife brightly.
"Wot man? Wot job? Where's my supper?" snapped Cadge. Then, as the
ingenious ruse occurred to him, a flood of language rose to his lips and
would not be dammed, though everything else was.
"Gone and hogged all the supper, did you!" he growled. "H'it's a nice
state of affairs, when a man comes 'ome from a 'ard day's work to a
h'empty table."
"But it was such a little steak, Tom," urged his wife, "and the children
were so hungry that I let them finish it."
There was no money in the house, and Snavely, the only credit grocer,
had closed his shop, so Mr. Cadge's supper that night was bread and
cheese without kisses.
Sunday was a long-remembered day of misery for Cadge's wife and
children, who played the scapegoat for Mr. Snavely and whipping-boy for
Mrs. Pipkin.
Monday morning the head of the house arose early and, before Mrs. Pipkin
had finished her beauty sleep, that hard-working man was at the door
demanding his pay. An hour was all the time she required for dressing.
Mr. Cadge wished he had broken his fast before leaving home.
"Really, I don't know whether I ought to pay you," replied Widow Pipkin
when she finally answered his last, desperate ring. "Mr. Snavely made
the bargain, and I should like to have him see the work before settling
with you."
She jingled some silver in her plump chain purse as she spoke.
Aha, the widow had deceived him! It was eight o'clock, the bank would
not open for an hour, she had had the money in the house all the time.
The deceitfulness of women!
Mr. Cadge's blood rose to his head. His little green eyes smouldered.
Fortunately for the widow, Mr. Snavely drove up at that moment on his
delivery wagon, and cheerfully agreed to appraise the work.
"Oh, come now, Cadge, my man, you don't call that a finished job, I
hope? Why, it is three foot short at each end and lacks a tier at the
top. You had better pitch in for an hour or two and make a fair job of
it, and then you'll get your money."
"Wot do you call a fair job, I should like to know?" replied the heated
Cadge; "look at them 'ere boulders, as I fished out of the h'icy water
at peek o' day! Look at all them little stones, h'every one of them as
cost me backache and sweat. H'if that job ain't worth six dollars it
ain't worth six cents."
"Mebbe so, mebbe so, my good man," responded the grocer, genially, "but
whatever it's worth, I don't pay for a job until it's finished."
At this point Cadge's torrent of eloquence swept away all punctuating
pauses and he became slightly incoherent, but the drift of his harangue
was that because he had worked like a slave and finished the wall in two
days they wanted to rob him of his money. "I'll 'ave the six dollars for
my work, or I'll 'ave the lor on you," he concluded.
The amiable but tactless Snavely saw a happy solution of the problem.
"Never mind, Mrs. Pipkin," he said, "there shall be no lawsuit. You pay
me the six dollars, and I will write Cadge a receipt for the seven
dollars he owes me. I lose a dollar that way, to be sure, but then it is
just the same as finding six."
"Ho! that's your game is it?" snarled Cadge, gasping with indignation.
"That's 'ow you two plot against a poor 'ard-workin' man with a family,
to beat him out of 'is pay. H'it's a put-up job, that's wot h'it is! But
you don't get the best of Tom Cadge that way. I'll 'ave a h'orficer 'ere
if I don't get my money, you bloomin' old plotters, you!"
"Yes, you had better call an officer," agreed Mr. Snavely. "I saw one
around the corner as I passed; the same one your brats were pelting from
behind a fence last week."
Mr. Cadge tacked adroitly. "No, I ain't going to spend my money with the
loryers, as'd want twelve dollars to get you back six. I'll tear down
the wall, that's wot I'll do. If I don't get my pay the loidy don't get
her wall, and you can tike your measly job and give it to some poor man
wot needs it."
Mr. Snavely had one foot on the wheel and swung lightly into his cart.
"Have it your own way, Cadge," he responded cheerfully. "You can finish
the wall and get your six dollars cash, or you can leave it as it stands
and take my receipt for seven, or you can tear it down and have your
labor for your pains; but mind, if the police catch you destroying
property, you will get a month in the chain gang."
"I don't care if I get sixty days!" screamed the outraged laborer. "The
city can look after my missus and the kids if their nateral provider is
took from them. That wall is comin' down! I'm h'only a workin'-man, and
I don't mind bein' spit on once in a while, but I won't stand for it
bein' rubbed in."
It was a sultry June day, the first of the summer vacation, and toward
noon Mrs. Cadge set out to take her husband a bite of lunch. The little
Cadges accompanied her, eager to exhibit the noble castle which they had
completed on Catnip Creek. When they came to that charming stream, their
eyes flew open in amazement and their jaws dropped.
"Why, mamma, look at daddy!" they cried in unison. "Daddy's workin'!"
Incredible though it seemed, it was true indeed. Father worked. Mrs.
Cadge wondered whether she, too, was to have a vacation, after her years
of drudgery.
Cadge worked furiously, his rage uncooled by the waters of the Catnip
which flowed through his shoes. He had discarded coat, vest, and hat,
and was hurling rocks with the strength of a maddened giant, clear
across the stream. What splendid muscles he had!
A tier or two of Mrs. Pipkin's wall was already down. The telephone
within her cottage was ringing madly.
Even as the Cadgelings watched their parent sweating at his toil, a
blue-coated figure ran swiftly down the bank, caught the hard-working
man by the collar, and firmly led him away to where steady work awaited
him.
Mrs. Cadge watched him go with mingled feelings. She had seen him depart
thus before, and remembered how much easier it was that month to feed
four mouths instead of five. Besides, the exercise on the rock pile
would do him good, poor man. A night-watchman's position was so
confining.
Mr. Snavely had driven up to the curb, and the Widow Pipkin ran out all
of a flutter. They sympathetically related to Mrs. Cadge the events of
the morning which had led to her husband's arrest.
"And there was only an hour's work to be done on the job," said Mr.
Snavely judicially.
"I would gladly pay six dollars cash to have it just as it was this
morning," added the tremulous Widow Pipkin, "and I'd make it ten if it
were done as Mr. Snavely says."
"And I'd still be willing to write a receipt for the full seven dollars
for six dollars cash," interposed that astute philanthropist.
Mrs. Cadge's shrewd, birdlike eyes were half closed in mental
computation; ten dollars for the wall and one dollar discount on the
grocery bill, that would make eleven dollars clear.
"Come along, kiddies," she said, "you and me will pitch in and finish
that wall to the queen's taste in an hour or two!" And she did.
Eleven dollars clear, and the watchman's pay still going on, Cadge on
the rock pile, hence the biggest mouth of the family fed by the city.
Indeed, indeed, the little Cadges were not the only ones who enjoyed a
vacation when father worked!