MASTER’S BROTHER-BOYS
Living out here in the country as we do, I see a great many poor
people, either coming here to beg, tramping by on the high road, or
sitting on the rustic benches that master has had placed all along the
sidewalks that bound his property.
I am amazed at the topsy-turviness of their ideas. Now, rich people
are not perfect, but on the whole, they seem to have more common sense
than the idle poor. These shabbily dressed persons perch round on the
benches, stare at master’s big white house showing among the trees,
and these are their sentiments: “I wish I had been born rich--I wish
some one would die, and leave me some money--I wish I didn’t have to
work”--one man only, in the whole course of my eavesdropping under
hedges, have I heard say, “That’s a wise guy in that big house. He’s
slaved for what he got. Let him keep it.”
However, this kind of lazy talk does not affect master and Mr.
Bonstone. I have heard them say again and again, that there are
frightful inequalities in the human lot, that every man does not get a
living wage, and there should be more brotherhood and sympathy between
class and class. Perhaps that is why they never get disgusted or
offended or suspicious. Some of the rich people about here say that
they are bothered to death with squealing, envious poor persons, who
hang round them, begging for money for this scheme and that scheme,
which has always at bottom the everlasting endeavour to get something
for nothing.
Master and Mr. Bonstone smile, and never worry, nor argue, nor
fuss--they just keep on helping everybody that applies to them.
One day, the first summer we came out here, I was up on the balcony
outside master’s bed-room with him. He had come home from the city very
hot and tired, and he was having a lovely time lounging in a big chair
with a glass of lemonade at his elbow.
The parlour-maid came up and said that a young man wished to see him.
Master got up patiently, put on his coat, and went down-stairs with me
at his heels.
An unprepossessing looking young fellow awaited him in the hall. He had
a loose mouth, and he talked out of one side of it, and his jaw was
undershot and one-sided, like that of a badly put together dog.
Master sat down on the monks’ bench beside him. “What can I do for you,
sir?”
The lad twisted his rag of a cap in his hands. “I thought you might
give me some money.”
“What do you want money for?” asked master.
“To get a job.”
Master smiled. “You don’t wish money to get a job--you wish a job to
get money.”
“I had work,” the fellow said with a twist of his mouth, as if he
tasted something bad, “but it didn’t bring me in enough to keep body
and soul together.”
“Now, what kind of a job do you want?” asked master.
“Somethin’ easy that will bring in lots of coin,” he said audaciously.
“Come, now--you know easy things don’t bring in lots of coin,” said
master.
The young fellow swept his eyes about the handsome entrance hall, and
said, “I bet you got this easy.”
Master shook his head, and stifled a yawn. It was a hot day, and he
does not believe in arguing. However, he said shortly, “I did work for
it.”
“Go on,” said the fellow jeeringly, “I don’t swallow that.”
“Poor chap,” said master kindly, “no power of digestion. Not your own
fault, likely.”
“What are you givin’ me,” said the young man wonderingly.
Master looked him all over. I knew what he was thinking, “Poor
weak-backed, gutter-boy, fished out of the troubled waters of New York,
and sent here to be reformed”--but it was master’s duty to undertake
the job. Likely he’d fail, but it was up to him to try.
“Come on, boy,” he said suddenly, clapping the lad’s greasy shoulder.
“Let’s go look for something for you.”
The lad put his old weed of a cap on his head, but master strolled out
bareheaded. The sun was getting low, and it was not as hot as it had
been.
First he went to the gardens, and tried them on the lad. Roses and
cabbages did not appeal to him, and he surveyed them with a dull eye.
He didn’t care to dig in the ground.
Master took him to the garage. No, motor-cars did not strike his fancy,
either. He hadn’t courage, nor skill enough to manage any kind of a
machine.
The tiny stable was the next place to visit. Here lived Moonstone, a
Shetland pony, nominally George Washington’s, but he was too young to
ride it yet, and young Egbert had the sole use of it.
Neither did the pony appeal to the poor city boy. I could have told
master he didn’t care for animals, for he had successively passed by
me, Amarilla, King Harry, and Cannie, without a word for one of us.
“Let’s stroll down to the village,” said master. “Perhaps we’ll find
something there.” So down we went along the high road, then fragrant
with flowering rosebushes.
First, there were cottages and villas standing back from the road in
gardens and on lawns. The boy was not interested in them. When we
got to the stores, his eye brightened. Master, who was watching him
shrewdly, saw his hungry gaze go toward the grocer’s.
It was a store with a fine display. Behind big windows--for the village
women had a health association and would allow no food to be displayed
on the street--were stacks of fruit and vegetables, and everything a
first-class grocer should keep. All the neighbourhood patronised the
man, and it enabled him to keep an excellent stock.
“Would you like to stand behind a counter?” asked master.
“I might,” said the lad.
“You think it would be an easy job?” said master slyly. Then he smiled.
The lad grinned. He had some sense of humour.
“Mr. Washburn!” exclaimed my master, “may I speak to you?”
The grocer came running from his office where he was making up his
accounts.
“Will you take a friend of mine for a few days’ trial?” asked master.
The grocer was immaculately clean, and his eye ran over the
greasy-looking boy.
“We’ll have to fix him up a bit,” said master.
“I’ll take him,” said Mr. Washburn, “on your recommendation.”
“Don’t work him too hard at first,” said master. “You’re a hustler, I
know.”
The lad opened his dull eyes, and looked so dismayed, that the two men
burst out laughing. Finally the young fellow laughed too. He felt that
he would not be imposed on.
Master then took him to the village shoemaker whose wife kept a
boarding-house for young men. Here were a number of city lads who were
working in Mr. Bonstone’s automobile school. It was now close on six
o’clock, and they were all sitting on the front veranda, with their
feet on the railing. Master introduced the newcomer, and asked one of
the lads to take him to the dry goods store, and buy a ready-made suit,
and have it charged to him; also to take him to Neighbourhood Hall,
and introduce him, and give him a good time.
The newcomer, whose name was Walt Dixon, took everything as a matter
of course. He showed neither surprise nor gratitude. Master nodded his
head slightly to the lad who was to take him in charge. That meant,
“Watch him--find out what his morals are. If there’s anything that
would endanger village life, let me know, and I’ll ship him elsewhere.”
Now all this happened some time ago, and as Gringo says, “It’s up to
Walt Dixon to make good.” But he can’t. He’s merely a putty sort of
lad. He does his work spasmodically, he tries the grocer’s patience, he
has always to be watched and guarded. Nobody likes him, nobody dislikes
him. He’s not immoral, and not strictly moral. He’s a kind of grown-up
baby, master says, but he’s supporting himself, and he’s out of New
York, where he loafed and lived off the earnings of his mother and
sister.
The only good thing about him is that he is faintly grateful, and
slightly attached to my master, and I should not wonder if some day he
would be brought to our house to work in some capacity or other.
The most of master’s “brother-boys,” as he calls them, are bright,
smart lads who have gone wrong, usually through no fault of their own,
and when their feet are set on a right track, they run like hounds
toward a definite goal.
They have brains. Walt Dixon is almost foolish. Master dreads mentally
defective lads and degenerate ones, but he never hesitates to tackle
them. Nor does Mr. Bonstone. He had what might have been a very serious
case of a defective lad in this neighbourhood a fortnight ago.
Gringo told me about it. He came over one morning in great haste, and
flopped down beside me, as I stood on the kitchen veranda, lapping my
bread and milk breakfast.
“Well, old boy,” I said, “what’s up with you?”
“Come on out under the grapevine,” he said.
We walked over to a little arbour where cook sits to prepare vegetables
for dinner, and lay down in the shade.
“It’s that McGrailey brat,” said Gringo.
The McGrailey brat is a half foolish boy, the only son of a very
respectable, Scotch-American gardener down in the village.
“He tried to burn us up,” said Gringo.
“Good gracious! tell me about it,” I said.
The old boy licked his lips and began. “Last night at twelve, I got up
to lap a little water from my basin in my boss’s bath-room. I was just
saying to myself, says I, ‘If I’m dry out here, the Bowery dogs must be
on fire,’ when I heard six yelps from that imp Yeggie.”
[Illustration: “I HEARD SIX YELPS FROM THAT IMP YEGGIE”]
“Six yelps,” I repeated, “that means trouble in the hen-houses.”
“Sure,” continued Gringo. “They were pretty sharp yelps, so up I goes
to master’s bed, and nips his foot sticking out for coolness.”
“He’s always alive, so out he tumbled, and said, ‘Go ahead, pup.’”
“You like to have him call you pup,” I interjected. “It makes you feel
young.”
Gringo’s fine eyes grew soft. “It makes me hark back to the west, and
lively days when we both acted like kids.”
“How old are you, Gringo?” I asked curiously.
“Never you mind that, young dog,” he said. “I’m as old as I look, and I
look younger than I am, so let me go on with my story. You’re an awful
interrupter. The boss and I tumbled over each other to get to young Yeg
who was waiting out on the gravel. He pointed for the hen-houses, and
there was the grand Sir Walter sparring, dodging, pushing and barking
at foolish young Willie who had a box of matches in his hand. The young
rap had set fire to every dry patch of grass in the orchard, and neat
little blazes were leaping up to greet us--too friendly by a long shot.”
“Dear me!” I said, “this is thrilling--and everything so dry from the
hot weather--what did you do?”
“I brushed Sir Walter and his eticut aside.”
“It’s etiquette, Gringo,” I reminded him.
“It wasn’t anything when I butted in,” said the old dog stubbornly.
“Little Willie struck my fancy as a naughty bull, and I pinned him to
mother earth. Mister put his two fingers in his mouth and let a whistle
screech that brought the men and other dogs rolling out over and over,
and in two minutes they’d stamped out the blazes.”
“What about Willie,” I asked.
Gringo burst into a hearty dog laugh. “I let him rise to the occasion,
and he trotted to master, and held out his box of matches, and said:
‘Little Willie couldn’t sleep, so he thought he’d come and burn the bad
weeds out of Mr. Bonstone’s orchard, ’cause Mr. Bonstone is a kind man
to Willie.’”
I laughed too. “That sounds like Yeggie’s talk.”
“The boy has just about as much sense as Yeg,” said Gringo. “Mister
threw a bag over Sir Walter, who was smoking and smelt to heaven, for
he too had been set on fire by the thoughtful Willie. Then he takes
Master Willie by his shirt collar--he was in a long-tailed garment that
looked as if his mother had brought it from the old country, and down
to the village, he marches the boy.”
“Didn’t Mr. Bonstone dress?” I inquired, in what, I suppose, was rather
a shocked voice, for Gringo said disdainfully, “What’d he dress for? He
had on a pair of decent pajamas--best outfit for a hot night, and no
one was abroad but the moon. However, if you must know, Thomas brought
him a cloak, and he threw it on when we went to the village.
“At first, Willie didn’t want to go home. You know what a time we have
to keep him off our place. Only by telling him that we were going down
to the ballroom, which is his name for Neighbourhood Hall, could we get
him started. We trundled down to McGrailey’s house, and mister pounded
on the door.”
I made an exclamation of pity, and Gringo said, “My heart was sore
for them too. They’ve good Scotch heads, and the boy’s an awful drag
on their peace of mind. They stood in the doorway after my boss had
pounded a while--white-faced, and with eyebrows up.
“Mister was cool but firm as a rock--he’s often told them the boy would
do some damage. He walked the boy before him into the stuffy parlour,
and sat down on one side of the big family Bible, and the McGraileys
sat on the other.
“‘How soon can you get your lad out of this?’ asked mister in his short
way.
“Mrs. McGrailey began to cry, and old man McGrailey looked black.
“‘Sir,’ said the woman presently lifting her head. ‘S’pose ’twas your
boy.’
“Father McGrailey took up the cry. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘s’pose ’twas your
boy. Would you take him out of his warm bed, where you can look at him
every night, and send him where he’d be beaten, and driven and scared
and he--oh! great heavens--an idiot boy.’
“‘He isn’t an idiot,’ said mister. ‘I’ve told you dozens of times he’s
a moron. He comes first in the class of mental defectives. Imbeciles
and idiots are below him--and he does not stay in his warm bed.’
“‘I couldn’t send him away,’ wailed Mrs. McGrailey with her arms round
Willie. ‘I couldn’t give him up. He’s all I have.’
“‘I told you,’ said mister striking his hand on the table, ‘that
there’s a good institution up state, and I saw boys in your Willie’s
class, and their faces were fine. They were feeding lads weaker than
themselves. He’d be taught a trade too. I’m speaking for his good. He’s
a plague to this neighbourhood.’
“Father McGrailey looked madder. ‘I’ve heard you, sir, a hundred
times, say you didn’t believe in no herding of people or animals
together--that you wouldn’t even bring up a pup in kennels, if you
could find a home for him.’
“‘That’s so,’ said my boss coolly, ‘but I make one exception. Persons
whose minds are affected cut the very bottom out of society. They’re
our criminals. I’d doctor them. What are you doing for your boy; come
now.’
“The man and the woman looked at each other with quite cunning faces.
The boss had finished strong, I was lying beside his chair, and thinks
I to myself, ‘What’ll they do now?’ I knew they’d win out, for I tell
you, Boy, a pair of parents at bay is a worse team than a pair of
tigers.”
“Stop, Gringo, a minute,” I said. “Let me get my wits to work. Two good
citizens with a dangerous fool of a boy have got the richest man in the
community cornered at midnight. He’s got a good heart. They’ll overcome
him, but how?--I give it up.”
“So did I,” said Gringo triumphantly, “but they didn’t. ‘Sir,’ said
McGrailey in a voice that made my skin creep--it had the Scotch
burr, and an awful agony twisted up with it--‘may you never know the
heart-scald that we’ve known. I tell you, sir, I’ve visited the police
courts in New York--I’ve seen young men and women that were nothing but
grown-up babies judged as if they were you or me--God pity the weak in
brain--and I vowed a vow that I’d kill my son before I’d trust him to
the stone heart of the unfeeling public!’
“This was pretty stiff, and mister began to waver.
“The woman came back with her old cry--‘S’pose it was your boy--s’pose
it was your boy.’
“My boss’s face softened. I knew his thoughts ran back to the room
where young John lay in his baby sleep, so soft, so happy, so coddled.
Could anything tear that boy from his arms?--not the whole world.
“‘My friends,’ he said softly, ‘I’m pleading for your boy. You don’t
understand. You’re doing him an injustice to keep him here. There are
institutions, I tell you, where he will be treated kindly.’
“Mrs. McGrailey began to cry so horribly at this, that mister said in
a hurry, ‘Well, then, in the name of common sense, suggest a way out.
Your boy is not going to run loose about this place. That’s the very
way to tear him from you.’
“‘Mr. Bonstone,’ said McGrailey, ‘you own two hundred acres of wild
land out Torbellon way.’
“Yes, mister said he did.
“‘Start a cottage colony, sir. Give me the post of head gardener.
I’ll build a house with my savings, and I’ll give you the names of a
score of persons like myself who have children that are not like other
children. They’ll put some money in--but they won’t send their boys and
girls to a big institution.’
“‘I think you’re wrong,’ said mister shaking his head. ‘Your boy would
be better away from you--and you’d have to hire experts to train him
and others like him.’
“‘Hire them,’ said McGrailey commandingly.
“‘Look here,’ said my boss, ‘you fellows rate my bank account too
high. I’m sailing close to the wind just now.’
“‘Trust you to raise money,’ said the man almost contemptuously.
‘Haven’t you and Rudolph Granton got the name for good sense in
business, and wisdom in philanthropy--ask your fellow rich men. They’d
give you funds, when they’d turn a deaf ear to the likes of me.’
“My boss got up. ‘Then I’m to start a private institution for Willie?’
“‘That’s it, sir,’ said McGrailey grimly. ‘You’ll do that, and more too
for a neighbour.’
“‘Maybe I’m a fool,’ said mister calmly, ‘but I’ll think it over.
Meanwhile, keep the boy close.’
“‘That we’ll do, sir,’ said the man respectfully, then he broke down,
for he was all cut up. The boy had nearly killed him and his wife. He
cried, and she cried; and they caught the boss’s hand, and God-blessed
him; and he fled, and left his cloak with them; and he’s coming up this
evening to talk the affair over with your boss.”
“Don’t those two men beat the Dutch for doing good?” I exclaimed. “They
even get up in the night to do it.”