WHEN HALLAM WAS RUNG UP
It ain't often Mr. Robert starts something he can't finish. When he
does, though, he's shifty at passin' it on. Yes, I'll say he is. For in
such cases I'm apt to be the one that's handiest, and you know what that
means. It's a matter of Torchy being joshed into tacklin' any old
proposition that may be batted up, with Mr. Robert standin' by ready to
spring the grin.
Take this little go of his with the Hallam Beans--excuse me, the F.
Hallam Beans. Doesn't that sound arty? Well, that's what they were, this
pair. Nothing but. I forget where it was they drifted in from, but of
course they couldn't have found each other anywhere but in Greenwich
Village. And in course of time they mated up there. It was the logical,
almost the brilliant thing to do. Instead of owing rent for two skylight
studios they pyramided on one; besides, after that each one could borrow
the makin's off the other when the cigarettes ran out, and if there came
pea-green moments when they doubted whether they were real geniuses or
not one could always buck up the other.
If they had stuck to the Village I expect we'd never heard anything
about them, but it seems along early last spring F. Hallam had a stroke
of luck. He ran across an old maid art student from Mobile who was up
for the summer and was dyin' to get right into the arty atmosphere. Also
she had $300 that her grip wasn't any too tight on, and before she knew
it F. Hallam had sub-let the loft to her until Sept. 15, payable in
advance. Two days later the Beans, with more'n half of the loot left,
were out on Long Island prospectin' around in our locality and talking
vague about taking a furnished bungalow. They were shown some neat ones,
too, runnin' from eight to fifteen hundred for three months, but none of
'em seemed to be just right. But when they discovered this partly
tumbled down shack out on a back lane beyond Mr. Robert Ellinses' big
place they went wild over it. Years ago some guy who thought he was
goin' to get rich runnin' a squab farm had put it up, but he'd quit the
game and the property had been bought up by Muller, our profiteerin'
provision dealer. And Muller didn't do a thing but soak 'em $30 a month
rent for the shack, that has all the conveniences of a cow shed in it.
But the Beans rented some second-hand furniture, bought some oil lamps
and a two-burner kerosene stove, and settled down as happy and contented
as if they'd leased a marble villa at Newport. From then on you'd be
liable to run across 'em most anywhere, squattin' in a field or along
the back roads with their easels and paint brushes, daubin' away
industrious.
You might know it would be either Mrs. Robert or Vee who would pick 'em
up and find out the whole story. As a matter of fact it was both, for
they were drivin' out after ferns or something when they saw the Beans
perched on a stone wall tryin' to unbutton a can of sardines with a
palette knife and not having much success. You know the kind of people
who either lose the key to a sardine can or break off the tab and then
gaze at it helpless! That was them to the life.
And when Mrs. Robert finds how they're livin' chiefly on dry groceries
and condensed milk, so's to have more to blow in on dinky little tubes
of Chinese white and Prussian blue and canvas, of course she has to get
busy slippin' 'em little trifles like a dozen fresh eggs, a mess of
green peas and a pint of cream now and them. She follows that up by
havin' 'em come over for dinner frequent. Vee has to do her share too,
chippin' in a roast chicken or a cherry pie or a pan of doughnuts, so
between the two the Hallam Beans were doin' fairly well. Hallam, he
comes back generous by wishin' on each of 'em one of his masterpieces.
The thing he gives us Vee hangs up over the livin' room mantelpiece,
right while he's there.
"Isn't that perfectly stunning, Torchy?" she demands.
"I expect it is," says I, squintin' at it professional, "but--but just
what is it supposed lo be?" And I turns inquirin' to F. Hallam.
"Why," says he, "it is a study of afternoon light on a group of willows.
We are not Futurists, you see; Revertists, rather. Our methods--at least
mine--are frankly after the Barbizon school."
"Yeauh!" says I, noddin' wise. "I knew one once who could do swell
designs on mirrors with a piece of soap."
"I beg pardon," says Hallam. "One what?"
"A barber's son," says I. "I got him a job as window decorator, too."
But somehow after that Hallam sort of shies talkin' art with me. A
touchy party, F. Hallam. The least little thing would give him the
sulks. And even when he was feelin' chipper his face was long enough. As
a floorwalker in a mournin' goods shop he'd be a perfect fit. But you
couldn't suggest anything that sounded like real work to Hallam. He
claims that he was livin' for his art. Maybe so, but I'll be hanged if
he was livin' on it. I got to admit, though, that he dressed the part
fairly well; for in that gray flannel shirt and the old velvet coat and
the flowin' black tie, and with all that stringy, mud-colored hair
fallin' around his ears, he couldn't be mistaken for anything else. Even
a movie audience would have spotted him as an artist without a leader to
that effect.
Mrs. Hallam Bean was a good runnin' mate for him, for she has her hair
boxed and wears paint-smeared smocks. Only she's a shy actin', quiet
little thing, and real modest. There's no doubt whatever but that she
has decided that F. Hallam is going to be a great painter some day. When
she ain't sayin' as much she's lookin' it; and Hallam, I suspect, is
always ready to make the vote unanimous.
I judged from a few remarks of Mr. Robert's that he wasn't quite as
strong for the Hallams as Mrs. Robert was, but seein' 'em around so much
he couldn't help gettin' more or less interested in the business end of
their career.
"Yes," says he, "they seem to be doing fairly well this summer; but how
about next winter, when they go back to town? You know they can't
possibly sell any of those things. How are they going to keep from
starving?"
Mrs. Robert didn't know. She said she'd mention the matter to F. Hallam.
And she found he wasn't worrying a bit. His plans were vague enough. He
was doing a head of Myrtle--that being Mrs. Bean--which he thought he
might let some magazine have as a cover picture. And then, other things
were bound to turn up. They always had, you know.
But toward the end of the season the Beans got shabbier than ever.
Myrtle's smocks were torn and stained, with a few cigarette burns here
and there, and her one pair of walking boots were run over at the heel
and leaky in the sole. As for Hallam, that velvet coat had so many
grease spots on it that it was hardly fit to wear outside of a stable,
and his rubber-soled shoes gave his toes plenty of air. The Beans
admitted that their finances were down to the zero point and they had to
be asked in for dinner at least three times a week to keep 'em from
bein' blue in the gills.
"Hang it all!" says Mr. Robert, "the fellow ought to have a regular job
of some kind. I suppose he can draw after a fashion. I'll see what I can
do."
And by rustlin' around among his friends he finds one who runs a big
advertisin' agency and can place another man in the art department.
You'd 'most thought F. Hallam would have been tickled four ways at the
prospect of draggin' down a pay envelope reg'lar and being able to look
the rent agent in the face. But say, what does he do but scrape his foot
and wriggle around like he'd been asked to swallow a non-skid headache
tablet. At last he gets out this bleat about how he'd always held his
art to be too sacred a thing for him to commercialize and he really
didn't know whether he could bring himself to drawin' ad. pictures or
not. He'd have to have time to think it over.
"Very well," says Mr. Robert, restrainin' himself from blowin' a fuse as
well as he could. "Let me know tomorrow night. If you decide to take the
place, come over about 6:30; if you find that your views as to the
sacredness of your art are too strong, you needn't bother to arrive
until 8:30--after dinner."
I expect it was some struggle, but Art must have gone down for the full
count. Anyway the Beans were on hand when the tomato bisque was served
next evenin', and in less'n a week F. Hallam was turnin' out a perfectly
good freehand study of a lovely lady standin' graceful beside a
Never-smoke oil stove--no-wicks, automatic feed, send for our
catalogue--and other lively compositions along that line. More'n that,
he made good and the boss promised him that maybe in a month or so he'd
turn him loose with his oil paints on something big, a full page in
color, maybe, for a leadin' breakfast food concern. Then the Beans moved
back to town and we heard hardly anything more about 'em.
I understand, though, that they sort of lost caste with their old crowd
in Greenwich Village. Hallam tried to keep up the bluff for a while that
he wasn't workin' reg'lar, but his friends began to suspect. They
noticed little things, like the half pint of cream that was left every
morning for the Beans, the fact that Hallam was puttin' on weight and
gettin' reckless with clean collars. And finally, after being caught
coming from the butcher's with two whole pounds of lamb chops, Myrtle
broke down and confessed. They say after that F. Hallam was a changed
man. He had his hair trimmed, took to wearin' short bow ties, and when
he dined at the Purple Pup, sneaked in and sat at a side table like any
tourist from the upper West Side.
Course, on Sundays and holidays he put on the old velvet coat, and set
up his easel and splashed away with his paints. But mostly he did heads
of Myrtle, and figure stuff. It was even hinted that he hired models.
It must have been on one of his days home that this Countess Zecchi
person discovered him in his old rig. She'd been towed down there on a
slummin' party by a club friend of Mr. Robert's who'd heard of Hallam
and had the address. You remember hearin' about the Countess, maybe? She
was Miss Mae Collins, of Kansas City, originally, and Zecchi was either
the second or third of her hubbies, or hobbies, whichever you'd care to
call 'em. A lively, flighty female, Countess Zecchi, who lives in a
specially decorated suite at the Plutoria, sports a tiger cub as a pet,
and indulges in other whims that get her more or less into the
spotlight.
Her particular hunch on this occasion was that she must have her
portrait done by a real Bohemian artist, and offhand she gives F. Hallam
the job.
"You must paint me as Psyche," says she. "I've always wanted to be done
as Psyche. Can't we have a sitting tomorrow?"
Hallam was almost too thrilled for words, but he managed to gasp out
that she could. So he reports sick to his boss, blows in all his spare
cash buyin' a big mirror and draperies to fix up a Psyche pool in the
studio, and decides that at last luck has turned. For three days the
Countess Zecchi shows up reg'lar, drapes herself in pink tulle, and
Hallam paints away enthusiastic.
Then she don't come any more. For a week she stalls him off and finally
tells him flat that posing as Psyche bores her. Besides, she's just
starting south on a yachting party. The portrait? Oh, she doesn't care
about that. She hadn't really given him a commission, just told him he
might paint her. And he mustn't bother her by calling up again.
Positively.
So Hallam hits the earth with a dull thud. He reports back on the
advertisin' job and groans every time he thinks how much he spent on the
mirror and big canvas. He'd been let in, that's all. But he finishes up
the Psyche picture durin' odd times. He even succeeded in unloadin' it
on some dealer who supplies the department stores, so he quits about
square.
Then an odd thing happens. At the advertisin' agency there's a call from
a big customer for a picture to go with a Morning Glory soap ad. It's a
rush order, to be done in six colors. Hallam has a bright little
thought. Why wouldn't his Psyche picture fit in? The boss thinks it's
worth lookin' up, and an hour later he comes back from the dealer's with
the trade all made. And inside of three weeks no less than two dozen
magazines was bindin' in a full page in colors showin' the fair form of
the Countess Zecchi bendin' over a limpid pool tryin' to fish out a cake
of Morning Glory soap. It was a big winner, that ad. The soap firm
ordered a hundred thousand copies struck off on heavy plate paper, and
if you sent in five wrappers with a two-cent stamp you'd be mailed a
copy to tack up in the parlor.
Whether or not the general public would have recognized the Countess
Zecchi as the girl in the soap ad. if she'd kept still about it is a
question. Most likely it wouldn't. But the Countess didn't keep still.
That wasn't her way. She proceeds to put up a holler. The very day she
discovers the picture, through kind friends who almost swamped her with
cut-out copies and telegrams, she rushes back to New York and calls up
the reporters. All one afternoon she throws cat fits for their benefit
up at her Plutoria apartment. She tells 'em what a wicked outrage has
been sprung on her by a wretched shrimp of humanity who flags under the
name of Bean and pretends to be a portrait painter. She goes into
details about the mental anguish that has almost prostrated her since
she discovered the fiendish assault on her privacy, and she announces
how she has begun action for criminal libel and started suit for damages
to the tune of half a million dollars.
Well, you've seen what the papers did to that bit of news. They sure did
play it up, eh? The Psyche picture, with all its sketchy draperies, was
printed side by side with half tones of the Countess Zecchi. And of
course they didn't neglect F. Hallam Bean. He has to be photographed and
interviewed, too. Also, Hallam wasn't dodgin' either a note-book or a
camera. As a result he is mentioned as "the well-known portrait painter
of Greenwich Village," and so on. One headline I remember was like this:
"Founder of American Revertist School Sued for Half Million."
I expect I kidded Mr. Robert more or less about his artist friend. He
don't know quite how to take it, Mr. Robert. In one way he feels kind of
responsible for Hallam, but of course he ain't worried much about the
damage suit. The Countess might get a judgment, but she'd have a swell
time collectin' anything over a dollar forty-nine, all of which she must
have known as well as anybody. But she was gettin' front page space. So
was F. Hallam. And the soap firm was runnin' double shifts fillin' new
orders.
Then here one afternoon, as Mr. Robert and me are puttin' the finishin'
touches to a quarterly report, who should drift into the Corrugated
general offices but F. Hallam Bean, all dolled up in an outfit that he
must have collected at some costumers. Anyway, I ain't seen one of them
black cape coats for years, and the wide-brimmed black felt hat is a
curio. Also he's gone back to the flowin' necktie and is lettin' his
hair grow wild again.
"Well, well!" says I. "Right off the boulevard, eh?"
"Why the masquerade?" demands Mr. Robert.
He don't seem a bit disturbed at our josh, but just smiles sort of
satisfied and superior. "I suppose it is different," says he, "but
then, so am I. I've just been having some new photos taken. They're to
be used with an article I'm contributing to a Sunday paper. It is to be
entitled, 'What is a Revertist?' They are paying me $100 for it. Not
bad, eh!"
"Pretty soft, I'll say," says I. "Soak 'em while the soakin's good."
"Still getting on well with your job?" asked Mr. Robert.
"Oh, I've chucked that," says Hallam airy. "No more of that degrading
grind for me. I've arrived, you know."
"Eh?" gasps Mr. Robert. "Where?"
"Why," says F. Hallam, "don't you understand what has happened during
these last two weeks? Fame has found me out. I am known as the founder
of a new school of art--the original Revertist. My name has become a
household word. And before this absurd libel suit is finished I shall be
painting the portraits of all the leading society people. They are
already asking about me, and as soon as I find a suitable studio--I'm
considering one on West 59th Street, facing Central Park--I shall be
overwhelmed with orders. It's bound to come."
"You're quite sure this is fame, are you?" asks Mr. Robert.
F. Hallam smiles and shrugs his shoulders. "Quite," says he.
And Mr. Robert can't tell him it's anything else. Hasn't he got his
pockets full of newspaper clippings to prove it? Don't people turn and
stare after him in the street and nudge each other in the subway cars?
Aren't his artist friends giving him a banquet at the Purple Pup? So why
should he work for wages any more, or save up any of the easy money
that's coming his way? And he sails out indignant, with his cape
overcoat swayin' grand from his narrow shoulders.
"I give him up, Torchy," says Mr. Robert. "That is, unless you can
suggest some way of making him see what an ass he is. Come, now!"
"All right," says I, gettin a sudden hunch. "I don't know as it will
work in his case, for he's got it bad, but suppose we tow him out for a
look at Private Ben Riggs?"
"By George!" says Mr. Robert, slappin' his knee. "The very thing.
Sunday, eh?"
It was easy enough stagin' the affair. All he had to do was to ask the
Beans out for the week-end, and then after Sunday dinner load 'em into
the tourin' car, collect me, and drive off about 20 miles or so to the
south shore of Long Island.
Maybe, though, you don't remember about Private Ben Riggs? Oh, of course
the name still sticks. It's that kind of a name. But just what was it he
did? Uh-huh! Scratchin' your head, ain't you? And yet it was less than
two years ago that he was figurin' more prominent in the headlines than
anybody else you could name, not barrin' Wilson or Von Hindenburg.
One of our first war heroes, Ben Riggs was, and for nearly two weeks
there he had the great American people shoutin' themselves hoarse in his
honor, as you might say. There was editorials, comparin' his stunt to
what Dewey did at Manila Bay, or Hobson at Santiago, and showin' how
Private Ben had a shade the best of it, after all. The Sunday
illustrated sections had enlarged snapshots of him, of his boyhood home
in Whositville; of his dear old mother who made that classic remark,
"Now, wasn't that just like Ben"; and of his girlish sweetheart, who was
cashier at the Acme Lunch and who admitted that "she always had known
Ben was going to be a great man some day."
Then when the governor of Ben's state worked his pull and got Ben sent
home right in the midst of it all there was another grand
hooray--parades, banquets and so on. And they raised that testimonial
fund for him to buy a home with, and presented him with a gold medal.
Next, some rapid firin' publishin' firm rushed out a book: "Private Ben
Rigg's Own Story," which he was supposed to have written. And then, too,
he went on in a vaudeville sketch and found time to sign a movie
contract with a firm that was preparin' to screen his big act, "True To
Life."
It was along about that stage that Private Ben, with more money in the
bank than he'd ever dreamed came from all the mints, got this great
scheme in his nut that a noble plute like him ought to have a big
estate somewhere and build a castle on it. So he comes out here on the
south shore, lets a real estate shark get hold of him, and the next
thing he knows he owns about a hundred acres of maybe the most worthless
land on the whole island. His next move is to call in an architect, and
inside of a month a young army of laborers was layin' the foundations
for what looked like a city hall, but was really meant to be Riggsmere
Manor, with 78 rooms, 23 baths, four towers, and a dinin' room 65 feet
long and a ceiling 16 feet in the clear.
Then the slump came. I forget whether it was a new hero, or another
submarine raid. Anyway, the doings of Private Ben Riggs ceased to be
reported in the daily press. He dropped out of sight, like a nickel that
rolls down a sewer openin'. They didn't want him any more in vaudeville.
The movie producer welched on his proposition. The book sales fell off
sudden. The people that wanted to name cigars or safety razors after
him, or write songs about him, seemed to forget.
For a few days Private Ben couldn't seem to understand what had
happened. He went around in a kind of a daze. But he had sense enough
left to stop work on the Manor, countermand orders for materials, and
pull out with what he could. It wasn't such a great pile. There was a
construction shed on the property, fairly well built, and by running up
a chimney and having a well sunk, he had what passed for a home. There
in the builder's shack Private Ben has been living ever since. He has
stuck up a real estate sign and spends most of his time layin' out his
acres of sand and marsh into impossible buildin' lots. As he's way off
on a back road, few people ever come by, but he never misses a chance of
tacklin' those that do and tryin' to wish a buildin' plot on 'em. That's
how we happen to know him so well, and to have kept up with his career.
On the way out we sort of revived F. Hallam Bean's memories of Private
Ben Riggs. First off he thought Ben had something to do with the Barbara
Freitchie stunt, or was he the one who jumped off Brooklyn Bridge? But
at last he got it straight. Yes, he remembered having had a picture of
Private Ben tacked up in his studio, only last year. Then we tried him
on Jack Binns, and Sergeant York and Lieutenant Blue and Dr. Cook. He
knew they'd all done something or other to make the first page, but his
guesses were kind of wide.
"I would like to see Private Ben, though," says F. Hallam. "Must be an
interesting chap."
"He is," says Mr. Robert. "His scrap books are interesting, too. He has
ten of them."
"By Jove!" says Hallam. "Good idea. I must tell Myrtle about that."
But after we'd been hailed by this lonesome lookin' party in baggy pants
and the faded blue yachtin' cap, and we'd let him lead us past the stone
foundations where a fine crop of weeds was coming up, and he'd herded
us into his shack and was tryin' to spring a blueprint prospectus on us,
F. Hallam sort of put his foot in his mouth by remarkin':
"So you are Private Ben Riggs, are you?"
"I was--once," says he. "Now I'm just Sand-Lot Riggs. Who are you?"
"Oh, pardon me," puts in Mr. Robert. "I thought you would know. This is
Mr. Hallam Bean, the celebrated founder of the Revertist school of art."
"Oh, yes!" said Riggs. "The one who painted the corset picture ad."
"Soap picture," I corrects hasty, "featurin' the Countess Zecchi."
"That's so, it was soap," admits Riggs. "And I was noticin' in the
mornin' paper how the Countess had decided to drop them suits."
"What?" says Hallam, starin' at him. "Where was that? On the front
page?"
"No," says Riggs. "It was a little item on the inside mixed up with the
obituary notes. That's always the way. They start you on the front page,
and then----" Private Ben shrugs his shoulders. But he proceeds to add
hasty, with a shrewd squint at Hallam: "Course, it's different with you.
Say, how about buyin' the estate here? I'd be willin' to let it go
cheap."
"No, thank you," says F. Hallam, crisp.
"Part of it then," insists Riggs. "I'd been meanin' to write you about
it. I generally do write 'em while--while they're on the front."
"No," says Hallam, and edges toward the door.
He seemed to get the idea. Before he starts back for town that night he
asks Mr. Robert if he could say a word for him at the advertisin'
agency, as he thought it might be just as well if he hung onto the job.
It wasn't such a poor thought, for Hallam fades out of public view a
good deal quicker than he came in.
"Maybe it wasn't Fame that rung him up, after all," I suggests to Mr.
Robert.
He nods. "It might have been her step-sister, Notoriety," says he.
"Just what's the difference?" says I.
Mr. Robert rubs his chin. "Some old boy whose name I've forgotten, put
it very well once," says he. "Let's see, he said that Fame was the
perfume distilled from the perfect flowering of a wise and good life;
while Notoriety was--er----"
"Check!" says I. "It's what you get when you fry onions, eh?"
Mr. Robert grins. "Some day, Torchy," says he, "I think I shall ask you
to translate Emerson's Essays for me."
It's all josh, all right. But that's what you get when you're a private
sec. de luxe.