HEZEKIAH HAS A SOLUTION
Mr. Jones had finished transcribing Obadiah Dale's morning dictation and
awaited a fitting moment to place the letters before the manufacturer to
receive his signature. Meanwhile, he smoked a cigarette and, with his
face sadly distorted on account of the smoke, manicured his nails with
his pocket knife.
This important part of a gentleman's toilet would gladly have been left
by Mr. Jones to a professional manicurist, because of the more skilled
attention and the valuable social privileges attached to such services,
had not the chronically depleted condition of his purse demanded the
exercise of rigorous economy.
In the glare of the pendant bulb, Kelly was engaged artistically in the
preparation of a crude but libelous cartoon of the stenographer.
A moment of rest and mental relaxation had descended upon the personal
staff of Obadiah. His hive of commercial industry had, for the moment,
ceased to buzz. Suddenly, the hall door was thrown open. Mr. Jones
suffered a severe laceration from the point of his own blade. Even
the artistic soul of Kelly was shaken by the abrupt intrusion.
Hezekiah Wilkins entered. His manner was hurried. Not as a messenger
bearing joyous news of great triumphs, but rather as an emissary charged
with intelligence of bitter flavor, who desires to get rid of it, that
he may turn to happier matters.
Having been courteously advised by the bleeding outer guard that the
manufacturer was not engaged at the moment, Hezekiah entered the inner
citadel. Obadiah was reading a voluminous mass of typewritten pages
which he laid aside at the coming of his attorney. Waving the lawyer to a
chair, he intimated that he awaited the further pleasure of his legal
adviser.
Seating himself, Hezekiah shoved both of his feet as far in front of him
as his short legs would permit. He studied the aspect of his shoes thus
presented, as if he had never before appreciated their beauty.
"Well?" Obadiah spoke curtly.
"I wish to discuss the matter of that young man in the hospital. Curtis
is his name--I think."
"All right," Obadiah agreed.
Hezekiah placed his palms together and gazed upwards as if in pious
meditation upon the words which he was about to utter.
Obadiah viewed the attitude of his adviser with disapprobation. "Go
ahead," he urged roughly. "Don't take all day."
The lawyer gave his employer a look of reproof. "It is very important,"
he announced with great calmness, "that legal matters be accurately
presented so that the facts deduced shall afford a sound basis for
correct judgment when appearing in court." Hezekiah explained with
dignity. "I have found that a moment given to the correct logical
presentation of facts tends to expedite a just solution of perplexing
questions." As he ceased speaking, he appeared to drift away into a
condition of deep cogitation under the very eyes of his employer.
Before this display of profound thought, Obadiah was helpless. Properly
chastened, he awaited in patience the outcome of the mental processes of
his learned subordinate.
After a period in which no sound was heard but the ticking of the clock,
Hezekiah recovered from his abstraction with a start, and announced,
"This young Curtis refuses to accept your check."
"Bigger fool he," Obadiah responded with indifference.
Hezekiah turned sharply upon the mill owner, "I don't agree with you
at all," he rapped.
Obadiah had great confidence in the judgment of his legal adviser. There
had been times when failing to follow it had cost him money. He became
uneasy. "Do you think that he has a case against me?"
"I would rather have his chances before a jury than yours."
"Is he going to bring suit?" Obadiah's uneasiness increased. He did
not care to be at the mercy of a South Ridgefield jury. He usually was
stuck.
"Yes, it's my opinion that he intends to bring an action against you.
He displayed marked animus."
"He displayed what?"
"Animus--unfriendliness," Hezekiah interpreted.
Obadiah's uneasiness affected his temper. "Why don't you speak
English?" he demanded, the pitch of his voice getting higher.
For an instant there was a flash in Hezekiah's eyes but when he spoke
he was perfectly calm. "I beg pardon, I failed to make allowances
for--your understanding."
Obadiah regarded his attorney angrily but made no reply. Years of
experience had warned him against verbal combat with this man. Usually he
did not awaken to the danger until he rankled under one of Hezekiah's
darts.
Disregarding the exchange of compliments, the lawyer went on, perfectly
unruffled, "Is there a reason for this young man to entertain ill will
against you?"
"I never heard of the fellow before," protested Obadiah.
"Is he acquainted with your daughter?"
"No." Obadiah hesitated after his denial and modified it. "She helped
to take him to the hospital and she has visited him since, I understand."
"Ah!" Comprehension lighted Hezekiah's face. "You told me," he
suggested, "that your daughter considered herself to be to blame for
the accident."
"Yes," Obadiah agreed with reluctance. "Virginia has a silly idea that
she was at fault. She felt very badly over the matter."
"And went to the hospital to express her regret and conceded
responsibility for the accident to the injured man. He told me that he
could rely on your daughter as a witness in his behalf."
"I'll be hanged," cried Obadiah, the tone of his voice reminding one
of Hennie's likening of him to a mosquito.
"You'll be stung with a fat verdict if he gets you into court with your
own daughter testifying against you. That's what will happen to you.
Probably she admitted responsibility in the presence of witnesses,"
Hezekiah pointed out with deepest pessimism.
"I won't have my daughter dragged into court as a witness against me,"
groaned Obadiah.
"How are you going to stop it? Ship her out of the state?" Hezekiah
suggested with a promptness which displayed unethical resourcefulness
in the suppression of embarrassing witnesses.
"Can't you arrange a compromise?" begged Obadiah.
"Not after this mistake." Hezekiah returned the check for twenty-five
dollars. "I'm as popular as a mouse in a pantry with that young fellow
after attempting to pass that on him." He gave the mill owner a glance
of curiosity. "How far would you let me go now?"
"Use your own judgment, only keep Virginia out of court."
Both men were silent for a time and then the lawyer spoke. "I tried to
sound young Curtis. I endeavored to discover if he had any settlement
in mind. All I found was a pronounced hostility to you personally and,"
Hezekiah smiled reminiscently, "to me as your representative."
"That's your imagination," exclaimed Obadiah and then, after the
custom of a malefactor of great wealth, went on, "How can we get at
him? He must be got at."
"I might suggest something--," Hezekiah appeared doubtful, lacking in
his usual assurance.
It irritated Obadiah to have this man upon whose judgment he had staked
his fortune display indecision in this trivial affair. "Out with it!
What's the matter with you? Have you got cold feet?" he stormed.
Hezekiah chuckled. "This case is complicated. The other side is most
unfriendly. It's pretty hard to keep out of court when the other fellow
wants to put you there," he argued, "I believe that I see a way if you
will give me full authority to make such settlement as I deem advisable
and," Hezekiah shifted uneasily, "allow me the assistance of counsel."
"Hezekiah Wilkins, have you gone crazy? Do you mean to ask me to hire
another lawyer to help you in this insignificant automobile case?"
groaned Obadiah.
"I haven't asked you to employ a lawyer. I asked for counsel."
"For the love of Mike, whose counsel do you require in this tempest in
a teapot?" shouted the exasperated mill owner.
"I wish, with your permission, to ask your daughter Virginia to be of
counsel."
"Thunderation," bawled Obadiah, shrilly, exploding with pent up
aggravation. "Have you gone out of your wits?" He surveyed the lawyer
as if he really believed his legal mentality to be addled. "Can't
I get it into your head--" he cast a look of utter contempt at the
massive cranium of the lawyer--"that my interest in this case is to
keep my daughter out of court? If it wasn't for her, I'd let that
brittle shanked motorcycling ass sue until they grow bananas in Canada."
"Your verbal pyrotechnics are interesting but hardly germane to the
subject," Hezekiah reproved his employer. "I have no intention of
dragging your daughter into court in the guise of a Portia, although
her beauty would----"
Obadiah's temper was on edge. "Come to the point, sir," he demanded.
"Cut out the hot air. My time is worth money."
For a moment Hezekiah gazed thoughtfully out of a window making strange
gestures with his glasses. Then, turning to the mill owner he smilingly
agreed. "As much valuable time has been utilized by you in prolix
descriptions, possibly amusing, assuredly slanderous and not tending in
the slightest degree to shed light upon our problem, I admit a necessity
for expedition."
Obadiah viewed his attorney with wrathful eyes but remained silent.
Even under the angry eyes of his employer a benignant look lighted the
countenance of the lawyer and his voice was very gentle as he resumed,
"It's an old adage--'Youth will be served.' In its arrogance,
youth defies the wisdom of age and the judgment of the ages. In its
careless irresponsibility, it knows not danger. In its assurance and
self-confidence it knows not fear. Clad in the armor of health, it
basks in the sunshine of its strength and blatantly rejoices in its
hopes."
"Hezekiah Wilkins, are you sick, or what in the devil is the matter with
you?" inquired the overwrought manufacturer.
"No, not sick, Obadiah," Hezekiah explained placidly, "not sick,
but happy--happy in that thought--a distinctly attractive one, and
exceptionally well-developed for your benefit. I regret," the lawyer
lamented, "that a stenographer was not present to preserve it. It is a
pity that the world should lose it--that it should be lost to those who
would understand and appreciate it--even love it."
Obadiah sank deep into his chair, encircled by gloom, as, appreciating
his inability to direct the train of his legal adviser's thought, he
allowed that worthy to pursue his own course.
"Youth calls to youth," the sentimental Hezekiah continued. "Youth
understands youth. Youth can persuade youth." Suddenly the attorney
seemed to thrust aside the gentle atmosphere in which he had been
immersed, and, fixing a most crafty look upon Obadiah, he snapped,
"You and I can't handle that fellow, but your daughter can. It's going
to cost you some money, though." He suffered a relapse. "Youth knows
neither the value of time nor money."
Obadiah was filled with relief. "By gum, you've hit it," he shouted.
"But why couldn't you get that off your chest without throwing a fit?"
he complained, ill-humoredly.
Once more Hezekiah reverted to sentiment. "The language of youth is
song, and its thought poetry," he sighed, after which he arose and
faced the manufacturer across his desk. "I am authorized to proceed in
accordance with my plan?" he asked--"to make the best settlement which
in my judgment can be made in the premises, through," he chuckled,
"the extraordinary channels to which I have recourse?"
"Go the limit, only keep it out of court," grumbled Obadiah. "Give
such instructions as you wish to Virginia and let her understand that
I am only interested in an amicable adjustment and do not care to be
bothered with details."
As Hezekiah departed through the outer office, he interrupted a
conversation between Mr. Jones and Kelly.
The stenographer met the intrusion with characteristic activity. Rushing
to his desk, he seized the recently typed letters and bore them into
Obadiah's presence. His haste, if noted by the attorney, should have
indicated that prolonged presence in the throne room had resulted in
marked delay to the normal performance of imperial functions.
Apparently Hezekiah's mind was engrossed by lighter matters. He moved
spryly, whistling a cheery melody not at present in vogue but much in
favor in his youth.
Mr. Jones came out of Obadiah's room hurriedly. The sound of stern
reproof came also, until it was shut off by the closing of the door. It
seemed as if the spirit of the stenographer expanded in relief, in the
familiar atmosphere of his own domain; as one who, having accomplished
a hazardous journey, returns to the peace of his own fireside.
He entered Kelly's room with great dignity. Taking a position in the
center, he raised his arms horizontally, inhaled a deep breath, bowed
deeply, straightened up, exhaled, rose on his toes, descended, and
dropped his arms.
The massive Kelly viewed this athletic exhibition with interest.
"What's that exercise for?" he demanded.
Mr. Jones yawned. "It gives me relaxation from the strain," he answered.
"What strain? Where did you strain yourself?" asked Kelly with kindly
interest in his friend's welfare.
"The office responsibility," explained the stenographer. "It knocks
the sap out of a fellow." He lighted a cigarette.
"Oh, is that it?" Kelly gave a cruel laugh. "I thought you had sprung
something. If you do that exercise often, young fellow, you'll bust a
lung. Let's see you do it again," urged the bookkeeper, as if desirous
of witnessing the fulfillment of his prophecy.
Without fear, Mr. Jones laid aside his cigarette with care, and gulped
such a deep draught of air that he became red in the face and gave other
evidences of being about to burst from undue pneumatic pressure.
Kelly viewed with undisguised amusement the undeveloped protuberance
thrust forward in pride by the stenographer. "You haven't the chest
expansion of a lizard," he told him.
Mr. Jones received this deadly insult in the midst of deep bowing. He
exploded, and, leaning against a desk, breathed rapidly while the injured
look in his eyes attempted to carry that reproof which his speechlessness
otherwise forbade.
"If you do that exercise much," Kelly gloomily predicted, "you are
going to relax in a wooden box. Who gave you that stuff? You must have
been getting your ideas from the gymnasium of a bug house."
For obvious reasons Mr. Jones failed to reply.
"There is no sense in the thing. What you need is--" Kelly descended
from his perch and seizing him, only that instant recovered from
speechlessness, in his strong grasp, made exploratory investigations
with his fingers throughout the panting one's anatomy.
"Ouch," wailed the pained Mr. Jones.
"Shut up. Do you want the old man out here? I'm not going to hurt you.
I want to find out what ails you."
"Leggo, you are nearly killing me."
Mr. Jones rubbed himself ruefully when Kelly loosed him. "You big stiff,
ain't you got no sense, gouging around in a fellow's insides that way?
You are liable to put a man out of business," he protested.
Utterly indifferent to these complaints, Kelly was judging the
stenographer coldly and dispassionately. "You've got no bone.
You've got no muscle. You've got no fat." Kelly forgot that pride and
dignity are intangible assets. "You'd better take correct breathing
exercises or you'll get T. B.," he told him. "I shouldn't be
surprised if you've got it now."
Naturally, Mr. Jones was greatly alarmed and showed it.
"Here's the way to take a breathing exercise." Kelly slowly inhaled
a mighty volume of air until his chest arched forth in all of its
magnificent development. He held it so for a moment and beat upon it
resoundingly in accordance with the supposed custom of the orang-outang
in moments of victory. "No tuberculosis there," he boasted, after
exhaling with the rush of a gale of wind.
"That's some expansion, Kelly," the stenographer admitted, and he
continued as in excuse for his own physical deficiencies, "I should
take more exercise. My work is confining, and the strain is heavy. I'm
all run down. The old man must have noticed it, too, because the other
day he says to me, 'Mr. Jones, you're working too hard--it's telling
on you--I'd give you a good rest if I could manage to get along without
you.'"
Kelly burst into a roar of laughter. "If you wait for the old man to
give you a rest, my son, you are going to get tired, believe me. Cut
out the bluff for a minute. I want to talk seriously to you. You're
in rotten physical condition and you owe it to yourself to keep from
playing leading man at a funeral."
Mr. Jones's countenance registered horror.
Kelly went on. "I happen to know a darn sight more about physical
training than I do about book-keeping. I ought to--I spent enough time
around a college gymnasium when I should have been some place else."
Even Mr. Jones's alarm faded before this astounding information.
"College," he remarked in surprise.
"Sure," Kelly grinned, "I spent a couple of years in college. I'm
proud of them. I nearly flunked out before I learned that I leaned to
muscle instead of to literature." He returned to the subject under
discussion. "I can give you a bunch of exercises which will do you a
lot of good in six months if you are faithful. I'll give you gentle
exercises at first, darn gentle," he laughed, "otherwise you'll
snap something. I believe that I'll make a man out of you, young
grasshopper." He shook his head wearily. "Gosh, but it's going to take
a lot of work."
Mr. Jones flushed hotly. "Say," he said, "it's not necessary to
insult me, is it?"
"Yes, you've got to use a harpoon to get anything through that
rhinoceros' hide of egotism of yours." He fastened a stern and
foreboding eye upon Mr. Jones. "Do you want to die?" he inquired.
Mr. Jones sought the motive behind the startling question. "What's
going to kill me?" he demanded.
"Lack of air." Kelly's answer was obscure. It was too general. He
thought it necessary to restate it with modifying amendments. "The lack
of good fresh air," he concluded.
"Oh," said Mr. Jones, apparently much relieved at the distinction made.
"You want to get out into the air and breathe," Kelly explained as if
the stenographer were carelessly given to omit this function.
"I don't have the time." Mr. Jones visualized a dignified stroll over
a golf links.
Kelly gave thought to the difficulty. "A motorcycle would be the
thing," he decided.
The effect upon Mr. Jones would have been no different if Kelly had
prescribed an aeroplane or a submarine. "I can't ride a motorcycle,
and even if I could, where can I get one?" he objected.
"That's the point." Kelly was as enthusiastic as a life insurance
agent. "I have a friend who has one. He nearly killed himself on it and
now he is in the hospital. I'll bet that he is tired of it and will
sell it cheap."
"What do I want with the thing if it nearly killed him?" Mr. Jones
protested logically.
"Don't be a fool. The motorcycle never hurt him. He ran into an
automobile and hurt himself."
Mr. Jones believed the difference to be immaterial. "I won't ride a
motorcycle," he declared obstinately.
Kelly clung to his scheme with constructive pride. "It's up to you, my
friend," he argued. "You are going to die unless you get out into the
air. I suggest the way to do it."
"Yes, and I'll get killed on the blamed old motorcycle," predicted
Mr. Jones mournfully.
"Take your choice!" the generous Kelly invited. "I am going up to the
hospital to see that fellow after office hours. Why don't you come along
and meet him and then you can decide about the machine."
Mr. Jones, fearful that he might overlook an important engagement,
consulted a note-book with care. After concluding his investigation of
the records, he said, "Well, as I don't happen to have anything on,
I don't mind going up there with you, but you can write it in your
hat that I'm not strong for any motorcycle business."
Within a few moments after the prescribed closing hour, Obadiah's
official staff appeared upon the streets of South Ridgefield. Their
steps lead them towards the hospital and on the way they passed Mr.
Vivian's cool oasis of refreshment amidst the burning sands of the
town's business section.
Here, the confectioner and his assistants arrayed in pure white moved
gracefully about, serving the guests with cooling drink or, from time
to time, gave attention to the adjustment of the mechanical piano which
furnished melody for the lovers of music.
Mr. Jones feasted his eyes upon this scene of innocent revelry and good
fellowship. "Come on," he said to Kelly, "have a drink?"
Kelly received the invitation with insulting words. "That's your
trouble," he exclaimed in a voice which carried far. "That's what
makes your complexion so fierce."
The sensitive soul of Mr. Jones rebelled at this public outcry of his
physical defects. "Say, you big chump," he burst out, "don't you know
any better than to bawl a fellow out that way in a place where everybody
can hear you? That's a dickens of a thing to do."
"Come on. Nobody was listening." Kelly looked about as if disappointed
at failing to find an audience awaiting other personal allusions. "It's
the truth," he maintained vigorously.
Mr. Jones hesitated, torn as many another good man, between his vanity
and his appetite. Before his eyes flowed a tantalizing stream of those
delicacies so dear to his palate. In his pocket reposed two dimes, his
wealth until pay day on the morrow would replenish his purse. Why should
not a good fellow entertain his friends even though they resort to
personal comments? Rent by conflicting desires, he jingled the coins.
As he fingered them, there flashed the remembrance of the war tax. He
turned to Kelly and his voice was very sad, as he murmured, "I guess
that you're right, old man. We'll cut out the sweet stuff."
They had no difficulty in locating Joe Curtis. His sunny characteristics
had won him already wide spread friendships among the hospital staff,
so that the way to his bed was indicated as the path to a neighbor's
door.
Kelly grinned amiably at Miss Knight, and inquired, "May I speak to Joe
Curtis?"
The nurse looked at the big fellow with the appraising eye of a
connoisseur of men. "Sure," she retorted, "if you can talk and he
will give you a chance to."
The participants in this repartee were much pleased with its cleverness.
They laughed loudly.
Mr. Jones, considering the remarks frivolous, did not deign to unbend
from a stately poise assumed by him when in the presence of ladies.
Miss Knight was evidently a person of ordinary origin, lacking in
discrimination. She had failed to notice the stenographer, confining
her attentions, including her smiles, to the husky Kelly.
"Here's another friend, Joe," the nurse told the injured motorcyclist
when they arrived at his bedside. She failed to take account of Mr.
Jones who had progressed down the aisle with mien of great distinction.
His entrance was marred only by a remark of a vulgar patient who in a
coarse whisper desired to be advised, "Who let Charlie Chaplin in?"
much to the amusement of other low fellows.
"Hello, Joe, how's business?" asked Kelly.
"Fine, Mike, fine. Never better," responded the patient.
"Meet my friend, Mr. Percy Jones." The introduction was impaired as the
stenographer's attention was devoted to frowning down masculine giggles
reminiscent of the reference to the illustrious movie star.
That the social exigencies of the moment might not be overlooked, Kelly
dug a finger into the stenographer's side.
Mr. Jones undulated as to a measure of the Hula Hula. "Wough," he
yelled. "Wot cher doin'?"
Happy laughter arose from nearby beds.
Miss Knight swept her recumbent charges with a glance of stern
reproof. "Where's your manners?" she demanded. "Cut out this rough
stuff or--" she paused for effect and then launched this terrifying
threat--"you'll get no ice cream on Wednesday." The male surgical
cases quailed before this menace of cruel and unusual punishment.
Peace reigned.
"Gentlemen, be seated," invited Joe, in the rich and mellow tones of
an interlocutor.
Miss Knight departed. Mr. Jones sat down in the only chair and Kelly made
preparations to rest his huge form on the bed of the injured one.
Joe viewed this arrangement with alarm. "Don't you sit on my broken
leg, you hippopotamus," he protested.
Kelly withdrew so hastily that he nearly knocked Mr. Jones off his chair.
"Mike, go over there and get that other chair. Don't try to rob a
little fellow like Jonesy," Joe told him.
Pain swathed the features of Mr. Jones. To be publicly addressed as
"Jonesy" was bad enough, but when coupled with an insulting reference
to his size, it was too much.
Kelly finally seated himself by the invalid's head and remarked with
a smile of pleasure, "Joe, they tell me you're about dead. Is there
anything in it?"
"Listen to words of warning," suggested the injured man. "Even with my
game leg, it would take a bigger man than you to put me out of business."
Kelly disregarded the challenge. "Is there any truth in the report that
landing on your head is all that saved you?"
Joe grunted in disdain and Mr. Jones openly yawned at such commonplace
humor.
Regardless of popular displeasure, Kelly went on. "I understand that
your head ruined the truck?"
"Mike, you are a heavy kidder." Joe smiled affectionately at his big
friend. "Your conversation is usually agreeable, sometimes interesting,
but never reliable. You guessed wrong about a truck. I ran into a seven
passenger touring car."
"Ha, a chariot of the awful rich. In the excitement did you
surreptitiously abstract any diamonds, tires, gasoline or other
valuables shaken loose by your dome?"
"No such luck, Mike. There was only a girl in the car."
"The priceless jewel of the Isle of Swat and you did not kidnap it?"
exclaimed Kelly.
Mr. Jones displayed a superior interest. "Was she beautiful?" he
inquired.
"Was she beautiful?" mimicked Kelly. "She must have been. That's why
Joe tried to make a hit." He leaned over the motorcyclist. "For once I
am proud of you, young man. You used your head."
Mr. Jones displayed extreme animation. "By Jove," he laughed.
"Possibly the lady thought that Mr. Curtis was butting in."
Kelly inspected the stenographer with great intentness. "Good morning,
old top. When did you wake up?"
"Your kidding is contagious, Mike. Jonesy has caught it," chuckled Joe.
"No, you don't understand the nature of the brute. It's not me--it's
the ladies. Jones awakens at a reference to them and blossoms beneath
their smiles," explained Kelly.
A gentle look spread over Joe's face. "The girl I ran into happened
to be the right sort. She stuck by me when I was hurt and helped to bring
me here--" He paused for a moment and then continued, "Let's not talk
about her in this room full of men."
"Sure," boomed Kelly. "You're right as usual, Joe. Never stopped
to think myself." He turned and pointed to the stenographer. "My old
friend Jones is on the edge of a decline." The bookkeeper disregarded
the presence of the private secretary as if he were deaf. "If he starts
to slide he hasn't far to go to land in a cemetery."
Mr. Jones displayed no marked pleasure in the conversation. He maintained
a dignified aloofness.
"I have decided to train him," Kelly explained. "It's going to be
a hard job. He's got no bone. He's got no muscle. He's got no fat.
He's got nothin'."
Again Kelly overlooked the proud and sensitive spirit which protested
against this public dissection of physical defects.
The eyes of Kelly and Joe viewed the puny figure of the stenographer in
the manner of disgusted farmers examining a runt which resists their
efforts to fatten it.
"To get flesh and muscle and bone on him I must give him plenty of
exercise and get him out into the air. That will make him eat," Kelly
went on.
"His present diet is mostly cigarettes, isn't it?" Joe inquired.
"He eats them by the bale," confessed Kelly.
Apparently Joe deemed himself invited into the case as a consulting
specialist. "Make him cut them out," he prescribed. "Take the little
fellow out for a run every night and give him a good sweat out. Give him
a bath and a rub down and get him in bed by ten o'clock. Watch your
distances at first. Jonesy is full of dope. Look at his eyes."
Mr. Jones quailed under this keen scrutiny of experts.
"He'll fall dead if he runs a block," predicted Joe. "He'll be
able to cover some ground, though, after a couple of weeks of plugging.
You can speed him up, then." He studied the stenographer with impersonal
interest. "Make a feather weight boxer of him, Mike, if he isn't
yellow. Get him in shape for the fall meet of the Athletic Club. If he
can't box, make him run. He's built like a jack rabbit."
The course of treatment outlined by the consulting specialist filled
Mr. Jones with undisguised alarm. His mind and body alike protested
against the indignities which threatened him. To him came recognition
that immediate resistance was necessary to prevent the advent of a
gruelling course of physical training, repugnant to his flesh and
revolting to his soul. "S-s-s-say," he stammered in the intenseness of
his opposition, "I don't want----"
"Look here," Joe interrupted with fierceness, "you asked Mike to train
you, didn't you?"
Mr. Jones's mental anguish did not make for quick thinking. He worked
his lips but emitted no sound.
To Joe this silence acquiesced in his assumption and he went on, "You
begged him to train you and he finally consented. You have shown judgment
in selecting him--you couldn't find a better man. But, remember this,
my friend. Training is hard work. You are in for a rough time of it,
Jonesy, and don't you forget it. Remember this--it's not what you
want--it's what Mike wants that is going to count. He has undertaken the
devil's own job to make a man out of a shrimp like you. Do you get me?"
he concluded ferociously.
Before the sheer brute masculinity of the attack, the gentle courage of
Mr. Jones gave way. "Yes, sir," he agreed meekly.
"Now, that's all settled, Mike," Joe indicated with satisfaction.
"Jonesy knows where he gets off. How about the grub?"
"No trouble there," Kelly explained. "We board at the same place. The
food is plain enough and I can eat his dessert and make him fill up on
solid stuff. I wanted to ask about your motorcycle."
"You are welcome to use it, Mike. It will be fine to chase Jonesy on
or to get ahead of him if you want to time him. The machine was badly
smashed in my crash. There is a repair bill of seven dollars against it.
If you will pay that, you can use it until I need it again. Put Jones
up on it, too, if you like."
There was a rustling of skirts and the sound of soft footsteps. Virginia
came towards the young men. Mr. Jones and Kelly instantly recognized
their employer's daughter. They came to their feet as kitchen police
in the presence of the Commanding General, which is with the speed of
the lightning.
Virginia smiled sweetly at the invalid. "I am sorry to intrude," she
explained, "but the hospital closes to visitors in ten minutes; so I
had to come now or not see Joe today."
"It is fine of you to come even for a minute." Joe smiled happily and
then attempted to present Kelly and Mr. Jones to her.
She gave them a friendly smile. "I know you both. I have seen you in
my father's office so often that we are really old acquaintances."
Kelly looked her squarely in the eyes and beamed, "Thanks, I like that."
Mr. Jones assumed a manner containing all that was best from the several
books upon social usages he had perused. Often had he longed for an
opportunity to show the manufacturer's daughter that at least her
father's private secretary was well versed in such matters. His chance
had come and he must make the most of it. He bowed profoundly, "I am
honored, indeed," he murmured gently. "Permit me to express the extreme
pleasure Miss Dale's presence gives me." Apparently, at this point,
Mr. Jones expected Virginia to extend her lily white hand to be kissed.
She, being a young thing, a mere chit as it were, was unversed in this
procedure. She looked at the low-bowed Mr. Jones and then at Joe and
Kelly with a somewhat puzzled expression.
The athletes, being men of vulgar minds, burst into a roar of laughter
which shocked Mr. Jones exceedingly. Finding nothing better to do, he was
forced to join in amusement at his own expense.
"Gee, I'm going to miss my supper," cried Kelly, and, with a breezy
"Good bye" to Virginia and Joe, and a hurried "Come on" to Mr. Jones,
he rushed away.
Mr. Jones was astounded at this exhibition of haste and ill-breeding,
before this lady of position. However, he found himself torn between
conflicting desires. He would have gladly spent some hours in the company
of Miss Dale engaged in elegant conversation, but, at the moment, for
the life of him, he could recall no subject of sufficient gentility for
discussion.
"Come on, Jones," came Kelly's voice from the hall.
Virginia had taken Kelly's chair and, leaning over the bed, was
engrossed in conversation with the injured man.
The presence of Mr. Jones was being overlooked. He deemed it better to
depart with Kelly. Immediate action was essential. He arose and again
bowed deeply. "Allow me," he pleaded, in dulcet tones, "to express my
delight and joy in meeting Miss Dale and to inform her that circumstances
beyond my individual control require my withdrawal from her company."
"Blow, Jonesy, before your beans get cold," suggested Joe.
At this low remark, Mr. Jones straightened up to his full height very
suddenly and stepped backwards with dignity. Unhappily, his heel hooked
against the leg of his chair and twisted the piece of furniture beneath
him so that, tripping, he lost his balance upon the waxed floor.
Simultaneously, Mr. Jones lost his dignity and waved his arms wildly in
a frantic endeavor to recover himself.
"Come on," Kelly urged again.
Mr. Jones obeyed the words of his trainer literally. Coming on over the
chair, he landed with a crash between the beds on the other side of the
aisle.
"Bring the ambulance up here," suggested a facetious patient.
Sore in mind and body, Mr. Jones was assisted to his feet by the helpful
Miss Knight. "I stumbled," he explained to her in excuse.
"It's a darn good thing you didn't fall," replied the nurse with
ill-concealed sarcasm.
Virginia had watched Mr. Jones's acrobatic performances with mixed
emotions. She glanced at her wrist watch and, rising, leaned over to
bid Joe farewell.
He caught her hand and held it. For a moment the black eyes were gazing
squarely into the depths of the blue ones, and no word passed between
the two, yet they were filled with a new, strange joyousness.
"I must go," she whispered gently, and pulled her hand from Joe's as
she turned towards the stricken Mr. Jones. "I hope you are not hurt,"
she told him and left the ward with a nod at Kelly at the door.
Seizing his hat, Mr. Jones limped slowly after her.
"You'll get better control of your muscles after Mike handles you a
bit," Joe called after him.
"Didn't I tell you fellows that was Charlie Chaplin?" came a voice
from one of the beds. Amidst the merriment aroused by this sally Mr.
Jones joined Kelly and took his departure.