A YOUNG MAN ENTERS
It was early Sunday morning. "Since we are to have your little friend,
Nell Wiggin, to dinner today," Gloria remarked as the three sat at
breakfast, "suppose we also invite Miss Selenski. It will be a nice
change for her."
"Good!" Bobs agreed. "That's a splendid suggestion. Now what is the
program for the day?"
"Lena May has consented to tell Bible stories to the very little children
each Sunday morning at the Settlement House," Gloria said, "and I have
asked a group of the older girls who are in one of my clubs to come over
here this afternoon for tea and a quiet hour around the fireplace. I
thought it would be a pleasant change for them, and I want you girls to
become acquainted with them so when I mention their names you will be
able to picture them. They really are such bright, attractive girls! The
Settlement House is giving them the only chance that life has to offer
them." Then, smiling lovingly at the youngest, Gloria concluded: "Lena
May has consented to pour, and you, Bobs, I shall expect to provide much
of the entertainment."
Roberta laughed. "Me?" she asked. "What am I to do?"
"O, just be natural." Gloria rose and began to clear the table as she
added: "Now, Bobs, since you have to go after your friend, Miss Wiggin,
Lena May and I will prepare the dinner. We have it planned, but we're
going to surprise you with our menu."
It was nine o'clock when Roberta left the Pensinger mansion. It was the
first Sunday that the girls had spent on the East Side, and what a
different sight met the eyes of Bobs when she started down the nearly
deserted street, on one side of which were the wide docks.
Derricks were silent and the men who lived on the barges were dressed in
whatever holiday attire they possessed. They were seated, some on
gunwales, others on rolls of tarred rope, smoking and talking, and save
for an occasional steamer loaded with folk from the city who were sailing
away for a day's outing, peace reigned on the waterfront, for even the
noise of the factory was stilled.
Turning the corner at Seventy-eighth Street, Roberta was surprised to
find that the boys' playground was nearly deserted. She had supposed that
at this hour it would be thronged. Just as she was puzzling about it, a
lad with whom she had a speaking acquaintance emerged from a doorway and
she hailed him:
"You're all dressed up, Antovich, aren't you? Just like a regular little
gentleman. Are you going to Sunday school?"
"Oh, no, ma'am; that is, I donno as 'tis. Mr. Hardinian doesn't go to
call it that. He calls it a boys' club by Treasure Seekers. There's a
clubhouse over to Seventy-fifth Street. I say, Miss Bobs, I wish for you
to come and see it. I sure wish for you to."
Roberta assured the eager lad that she might look in a little later, then
bidding him good-bye, she turned in to the model tenement house to ask
Miss Selenski to a one o'clock dinner.
"Oh, how lovely and sunny and sweet smelling your little home is," Bobs
said three minutes later when she had been admitted to the small
apartment, the front windows of which overlooked the glistening blue
river.
"I like it," was the bright reply of the slender dark-eyed girl who lived
there.
Bobs continued: "How I wish the rich folk who built this would influence
others to do the same. Take that rookery across the street, for instance.
It looks as though a clap of thunder would crash it to the ground, and it
surely is a fire trap."
"It is indeed that," Miss Selenski said, "and though I have reported it
time and again, the very rich man who owns it finds it such excellent
income property that he manages to evade an injunction to have the place
torn down. Some day we'll have a terrible tragedy of some kind over
there, and then perhaps--" she paused and sighed. "But, since we can't
help, let's talk of pleasanter things."
Bobs then informed Miss Selenski that she had come to invite her to
dinner that day, and the little agent of the model apartments indeed was
pleased, and replied: "Some time soon I shall invite you girls over here
and give you just Hungarian dishes." Then Bobs departed, and as she
walked down Fourth Avenue she glanced with rather an amused expression up
at the windows of the Detective Agency of which, for so brief a time, she
had been an employee. She wondered what that good-looking young man,
James Jewett, had thought of her, for, surely, her recent employer would
have at once telephoned that as a detective she had been "no good." Then
she decided that she probably never would learn, as she most certainly
would not again return to the agency. But little do we know what fate
holds in store for us.
Nell Wiggin was ready and waiting, and she looked very sweet indeed, with
her corn yellow hair fluffed beneath her neat blue hat, her eyes eager,
her cheeks, usually pale, flushed with this unusual excitement. Her suit
was neat and trim, though made of cheap material.
"You're right on time to the very minute, aren't you, Miss Dolittle?" she
said happily, as she opened the door to admit her new friend.
"I sure am," was the bright reply. "I'm the original on the dot man, or
young lady, I should say." But while Bobs was speaking there was
misgivings in her heart. She had forgotten to ask Gloria what she ought
to do about her name. Should they all be Dolittles or Vandergrifts? She
decided to take Nell into her confidence and tell her the story of the
assumed name.
The listener did not seem at all surprised. "Lots of girls who go out to
work change their names," she said. "It's just as honest as writing
stories under a different name, I should think."
"That's so," Roberta agreed, much relieved. "A nom-de-plume isn't much
different."
"And so you are a detective?" Nell looked at her friend with a little
more awe, perhaps.
"Heavens no! Not now!" Bobs was quick to protest. "I merely tried it, and
failed."
"Well, as it turned out, a detective wasn't needed on that particular
case." Nell was giving Bob the very information she was eager to receive,
but for which she did not wish to ask. "The next day the stolen book came
back by mail." Roberta knew that she ought to register astonishment, but
instead, she laughed. "What did Mr. Queerwitz say?" she inquired.
"Oh, they all put it down to conscience. That does happen, you know. You
read about conscience money being returned every now and then in the
newspapers, but the strangest part was, that that very afternoon Mr. Van
Loon came in and said that he had been able to obtain the first volume
and wished to purchase the second. Mr. Queerwitz was out at the time, and
so Miss Peerwinkle sold it to him for five hundred dollars."
Bobs wanted to laugh again. It amused her to think that she had driven
the better bargain, but she thought it unwise to appear too interested in
the transaction, and so she changed the subject, and together they walked
up Third Avenue.
"How different it all is on Sunday," Nell Wiggin smiled happily at her
new friend. She had indeed spoken truly. The vendors' carts were
conspicuous by their absence and the stores, if they were open, seemed to
be more for the social gathering of foreign folk dressed in their gay
best, than for active business. Even the elevated trains thundered
overhead with much longer intervals in between, and sometimes, for as
long as fifteen minutes, the peace of Sunday seemed to pervade that
unlovely East Side.
Bobs, noting a Seventy-fifth Street sign, stopped and gazed down toward
the river, and sure enough she saw a long, low building labeled Boys'
Club House.
"Let's go through this way to Second," Bobs suggested. In front of the
clubhouse there was a group of boys with faces so clean that they shone,
and one of these, leaving the others, raced up to the girls, and taking
his friend by the hand, he said: "Oh, Miss Bobs, you did for to come,
didn't you? Please stop in by the clubhouse. It will to please Mr.
Hardinian."
Roberta's smile seemed to convey consent, and she found herself being
rapidly led toward a wide-open door. Nell willingly followed. The sound
of band practice came from within, but, when the lad appeared with the
smiling guest, a young man, who had been playing upon a flute, arose and
at once advanced toward them. What dark, beautiful eyes he had! "Why,"
Roberta exclaimed in surprise. "We saw Mr. Hardinian the very first day
we came in this neighborhood to live. He was helping a poor sick woman
who had fallen, and--" But she could say no more, for the small boy was
eagerly telling the clubmaster that this was his "lady friend" and that
her name was Miss Bobs. The young man smiled and said that he was always
glad to have visitors. "What a musical voice!" was Bobs' thought.
Then, turning to the girl who had remained by the open door, she held out
a hand. "This is my friend, Nell Wiggin. I am sure that we will both be
interested in knowing of your work, Mr. Hardinian, if you have time to
spare."
"Indeed I have, always, for those who are interested." Then the young man
told them of his many clubs for boys.
Roberta looked about with interest. "Why are there so many wide shelves
all around the walls, Mr. Hardinian?" she asked at last.
The young man smiled. "If you will come some night at ten o'clock you
will find a little street urchin, some homeless little fellow, tucked up
in blankets asleep on each of those shelves, as you call their bunks.
Maybe you do not know, but even in the bitterest winter weather many
small boys sleep out in the streets or creep into doorways and huddle
together to keep warm. That is, they used to before I came. Now they are
all welcome in here."
Roberta wished she might ask this wonderful young man where he came from,
but that would not do on so slight an acquaintance, and so thanking him
and bidding him good morning, with Nell and Antovich, she again started
for home.
Though Roberta little dreamed it, the wonderful young man had come into
the drama of their lives, and was to play a very important part.