Lou Slingsby swung themselves up to it, turned a few somersaults and
then were quiet. They were only meant to give effect to the scene in
their gauzy dresses and spangles. Then South came forward and told the
audience what we meant to do. It was a feat, he said, which had never
been produced before in any theatre, and in which failure was death. No
one but that most daring of all acrobats, Balacchi, would attempt it.
Now I knew South so well that I saw under all his confident, bragging
tone he was more anxious and doubtful than he had ever been. He
hesitated a moment, and then requested that after we took our places the
audience should preserve absolute silence, and refrain from even the
slightest movement until the feat was over. The merest trifle might
distract the attention of the performers and render their eyes and hold
unsteady, he said. He left the stage, and the music began.
I went round to take my place in the gallery. George had not yet left
his room. As I passed I tapped at the door and called, "Good luck, old
fellow!"
"That's certain now, Zack," he answered, with a joyous laugh. He was so
exultant, you see, that Susy had come.
But the shadow of death seemed to have crept over me. When I took my
stand in the lofty gallery, and looked down at the brilliant lights and
the great mass of people, who followed my every motion as one man, and
the two glittering, half-naked girls swinging in the distance, and heard
the music rolling up thunders of sound, it was all ghastly and horrible
to me, sir. Some men have such presentiments, they say: I never had
before or since. South remained on the stage perfectly motionless, in
order, I think, to maintain his control over the audience.
The trumpets sounded a call, and in the middle of a burst of triumphant
music George came on the stage. There was a deafening outbreak of
applause and then a dead silence, but I think every man and woman felt a
thrill of admiration of the noble figure Poor George! the new,
tight-fitting dress of purple velvet that he had bought for this night
set off his white skin, and his fine head was bare, with no covering but
the short curls that Susy liked.
It was for Susy! He gave one quick glance up at her, and a bright,
boyish smile, as if telling her not to be afraid, which all the audience
understood, and answered by an involuntary, long-drawn breath. I looked
at Susy. The girl's colorless face was turned to George, and her hands
were clasped as though she saw him already dead before her; but she
could be trusted, I saw. _She_ would utter no sound. I had only time to
glance at her, and then turned to my work. George and I dared not take
our eyes from each other.
There was a single bugle note, and then George swung himself up to the
trapeze. The silence was like death as he steadied himself and slowly
turned so as to front me. As he turned he faced the stage-box for the
first time. He had reached the level of the posture-girls, who fluttered
on either side, and stood on the swaying rod poised on one foot, his
arms folded, when in the breathless stillness there came a sudden cry
and the words, "Oh, Charley! Charley!"
Even at the distance where I stood I saw George start and a shiver pass
over his body. He looked wildly about him.
"To me! to me!" I shouted.
He fixed his eye on mine and steadied himself. There was a terrible
silent excitement in the people, in the very air.
There was the mistake. We should have stopped then, shaken as he was,
but South, bewildered and terrified, lost control of himself: he gave
the word.
I held the rope loose--held George with my eyes--One!
I saw his lips move: he was counting with me.
Two!
His eye wandered, turned to the stage-box.
Three!
Like a flash, I saw the white upturned faces below me, the
posture-girls' gestures of horror, the dark springing figure through the
air, that wavered--and fell a shapeless mass on the floor.
There was a moment of deathlike silence, and then a wild outcry--women
fainting, men cursing and crying out in that senseless, helpless way
they have when there is sudden danger. By the time I had reached the
floor they had straightened out his shattered limbs, and two or three
doctors were fighting their way through the great crowd that was surging
about him.
Well, sir, at that minute what did I hear but George's voice above all
the rest, choked and hollow as it was, like a man calling out of the
grave: "The women! Good God! don't you see the women?" he gasped.
Looking up then, I saw those miserable Slingsbys hanging on to the
trapeze for life. What with the scare and shock, they'd lost what little
sense they had, and there they hung helpless as limp rags high over our
heads.
"Damn the Slingsbys!" said I. God forgive me! But I saw this battered
wreck at my feet that had been George. Nobody seemed to have any mind
left. Even South stared stupidly up at them and then back at George. The
doctors were making ready to lift him, and half of the crowd were gaping
in horror, and the rest yelling for ladders or ropes, and scrambling
over each other, and there hung the poor flimsy wretches, their eyes
starting out of their heads from horror, and their lean fingers loosing
their hold every minute. But, sir--I couldn't help it--I turned from
them to watch George as the doctors lifted him.
"It's hardly worth while," whispered one.
But they raised him and, sir--the body went one way and the legs
another.
I thought he was dead. I couldn't see that he breathed, when he opened
his eyes and looked up for the Slingsbys. "Put me down," he said, and
the doctors obeyed him. There was that in his voice that they had to
obey him, though it wasn't but a whisper.
"Ladders are of no use," he said. "Loper!"
"Yes, George"
"You can swing yourself up. Do it."
I went. I remember the queer stunned feeling I had: my joints moved like
a machine.
When I had reached the trapeze, he said, as cool as if he were calling
the figures for a Virginia reel, "Support them, you--Loper. Now, lower
the trapeze, men--carefully!"
It was the only way their lives could be saved, and he was the only man
to see it. He watched us until the girls touched the floor more dead
than alive, and then his head fell back and the life seemed to go
suddenly out of him like the flame out of a candle, leaving only the
dead wick.
As they were carrying him out I noticed for the first time that a woman
was holding his hand. It was that frail little wisp of a Susy, that used
to blush and tremble if you spoke to her suddenly, and here she was
quite quiet and steady in the midst of this great crowd.
"His sister, I suppose" one of the doctors said to her.
"No, sir. If he lives I will be his wife." The old gentleman was very
respectful to her after that, I noticed.
Now, the rest of my story is very muddled, you'll say, and confused. But
the truth is, I don't understand it myself. I ran on ahead to Mrs.
Peters's to prepare his bed for him, but they did not bring him to
Peters's. After I waited an hour or two I found George had been taken to
the principal hotel in the place, and a bedroom and every comfort that
money could buy were there for him. Susy came home sobbing late in the
night, but she told me nothing, except that those who had a right to
have charge of him had taken him. I found afterward the poor girl was
driven from the door of his room, where she was waiting like a faithful
dog. I went myself, but I fared no better. What with surgeons and
professional nurses, and the gentlemen that crowded about with their
solemn looks of authority, I dared not ask to see him. Yet I believe
still George would rather have had old Loper by him in his extremity
than any of them. Once, when the door was opened, I thought I saw Mrs.
Lloyd stooping over the bed between the lace curtains, and just then her
husband came out talking to one of the surgeons.
He said: "It is certain there were here the finest elements of manhood.
And I will do my part to rescue him from the abyss into which he has
fallen."
"Will you tell me how George is, sir?" I asked, pushing up. "Balacchi?
My partner?"
Mr. Lloyd turned away directly, but the surgeon told me civilly enough
that if George's life could be saved, it must be with the loss of one or
perhaps both of his legs.
"He'll never mount a trapeze again, then," I said, and I suppose I
groaned; for to think of George helpless--
"God forbid!" cried Mr. Lloyd, sharply. "Now look here, my good man: you
can be of no possible use to Mr.--Balacchi as you call him. He is in the
hands of his own people, and he will feel, as they do, that the kindest
thing you can do is to let him alone."
There was nothing to be done after that but to touch my hat and go out,
but as I went I heard him talking of "inexplicable madness and years of
wasted opportunities."
Well, sir, I never went again: the words hurt like the cut of a whip,
though 'twan't George that spoke them. But I quit business, and hung
around the town till I heard he was going to live, and I broke up my
contract with South. I never went on a trapeze again. I felt as if the
infernal thing was always dripping with his blood after that day.
Anyhow, all the heart went out of the business for me with George. So I
came back here and settled down to the milling, and by degrees I learned
to think of George as a rich and fortunate man.
I've nearly done now--only a word or two more. About six years afterward
there was a circus came to town, and I took the wife and children and
went. I always did when I had the chance. It was the old Adam in me yet,
likely.
Well, sir, among the attractions of the circus was the great and
unrivalled Hercules, who could play with cannon-balls as other men would
with dice. I don't know what made me restless and excited when I read
about this man. It seemed as though the old spirit was coming back to me
again. I could hardly keep still when the time drew near for him to
appear. I don't know what I expected, but when he came out from behind
the curtain I shouted out like a madman, "Balacchi! George! George!"
He stopped short, looked about, and catching sight of me tossed up his
cap with his old boyish shout; then he remembered himself and went on
with his performance.
He was lame--yes, in one leg. The other was gone altogether. He walked
on crutches. Whether the strength had gone into his chest and arms, I
don't know; but there he stood tossing about the cannon-balls as I might
marbles. So full of hearty good-humor too, joking with his audience, and
so delighted when they gave him a round of applause.
After the performance I hurried around the tent, and you may be sure
there was rejoicing that made the manager and other fellows laugh.
George haled me off with him down the street. He cleared the ground with
that crutch and wooden leg like a steam-engine. "Come! come along!" he
cried; "I've something to show you, Loper."
He took me to a quiet boarding-house, and there, in a cosey room, was
Susy with a four-year-old girl.
"We were married as soon as I could hobble about," he said, "and she
goes with me and makes a home wherever I am."
Susy nodded and blushed and laughed. "Baby and I," she said. "Do you see
Baby? She has her father's eyes, do you see?"
"She _is_ her mother, Loper," said George--"just as innocent and pure
and foolish--just as sure of the Father in heaven taking care of her.
They've made a different man of me in some ways--a different man,"
bending his head reverently.
After a while I began, "You did not stay with--?" But Balacchi
frowned. "I knew where _I_ belonged," he said.
Well, he's young yet. He's the best Hercules in the profession, and has
laid up a snug sum. Why doesn't he invest it and retire? I doubt if
he'll ever do that, sir. He may do it, but I doubt it. He can't change
his blood, and there's that in Balacchi that makes me suspect he will
die with the velvet and gilt on, and in the height of good-humor and fun
with his audience.
AN OPERATION IN MONEY.
BY ALBERT WEBSTER.
I.
In an elegant and lofty bank-parlor there sat in council, on an autumn
morning, fourteen millionaires. They reposed in deep arm-chairs, and
their venerable faces were filled with profound gravity. Before them,
upon a broad mahogany table, were piles of books, sheaves of paper in
rubber bands, bundles of quill pens, quires of waste paper for
calculations, and a number of huge red-covered folios, containing the
tell-tale reports of the mercantile agencies. They had just completed
the selections from the list of applicants for discount, and were now in
that state of lethargy that commonly follows a great and important act.
The president, with his hands pressed together before him, was looking
at the fresco of Commerce upon the ceiling; his ponderous right-hand
neighbor was stumbling feebly over an addition that one of the
bookkeepers had made upon one of the papers--he hoped to find it wrong;
his left-hand neighbor was doubling his under-lip with his stout
fingers; an octogenarian beyond had buried his chin in his immense neck,
and was going to sleep; another was stupidly blinking at the nearest
coal-fire; two more were exchanging gasping whispers; another was wiping
his gold spectacles with a white handkerchief, now and then stopping to
hold them unsteadily up to the light; and another was fingering the
polished lapel of his old black coat, and saying, with asthmatic
hoarseness to all who would look at him, "F-o-u-r-teen years!
f-o-u-r-teen years!"
A tall regulator-clock, with its mercury pendulum, ticked upon the wall;
the noise of the heavy rumbling in the streets was softened into a low
monotone, and now and then a bit of coal rattled upon the fender.
The oil-portraits of four former presidents looked thoughtfully down on
the scene of their former labors; the polished wainscots reflected
ragged pictures of the silent fourteen, and all was perfectly in order
and perfectly secure.
Presently, however, there was an end to the stagnation; the white heads
began to move and to look around.
The president's eyes came gradually down from the Commerce, and, after
travelling over the countenances of his stirring _confrères,_ they
settled by accident upon the table before him. There they encountered a
white envelope, inscribed "to the President and Honorable Board of
Directors--Present."
"Oh gentlemen! gentlemen!" cried the president, seizing the letter, "one
moment more, I beg of you. Here's a--a--note--a communication--a--I
don't know what it is myself, I'm sure, but"--the thirteen sank back
again, feeling somewhat touched that they should be so restrained. The
president ran his eye over the missive. He smiled as one does sometimes
at the precocity of an infant. "The letter, gentlemen," said he,
slipping the paper through his fingers, "is from the paying teller. It
is a request for"--here the president delayed as if about making a
humorous point--"for a larger salary." Then he dropped his eyes and
lowered his head, as he might have done had he confessed that somebody
had kissed him. He seemed to be the innocent mouthpiece of a piece of
flagrant nonsense.
There was a moment's silence. Then a heavy-voiced gentleman took up a
pen and said:
"Is this man's name Dreyfus--or--or what is it?"
"Let me think," returned the president, returning once more to the
Commerce; "Dreyfus?--no--not Dreyfus--yes--no. Paying teller--hum--it's
curious I can't recall--it commences with an F--FIELDS--yes, Fields!
that's his name--Fields, to be sure!"
The questioner at once wrote down the word on the paper.
"This is the second time that he has applied for this favor, is it not?"
formally inquired another of the thirteen, in the tone that a judge uses
when he asks the clerk, "Has he not been before me on a former
occasion?"
"Yes," replied the president, "this is a renewal of an effort made six
months ago."
There was a general movement. Several chairs rolled back, and their
occupants exchanged querulous glances.
"Suppose we hear the letter read," suggested a fair soul. "Perhaps"--a
septuagenarian, with snowy hair and a thin body, clad in the clerical
guise of the old school, and who had made a fortune by inventing a
hat-block, arose hastily to his feet, and said:
"I cannot stay to listen to a dun!"
A chorus from the majority echoed the exclamation. All but four
staggered to their feet, and tottered off in various directions; some to
pretend to look out at the window, and some to the wardrobes, where was
deposited their outer clothing.
"Clarks," stammered the feeble hatter, feeling vainly for the arm-holes
in his great-coat--"clarks presume on their value. Turn 'em out, say I.
Give 'em a chance to rotate. You've got my opinion, Mr. President.
Refuse what's-his-name, Fields. Tell him he's happy and well off now,
without knowing it. Where _can_ be the sleeves to--to this"--his
voice expired in his perplexity.
Fields's cause looked blue. One director after another groped to the
door, saying, as he went, "I can't encourage it, Mr. President--tell him
'No,' Mr. President--it would only make the rest uneasy if we allowed
it--plenty more to fill his place."
The hatter's voice stopped further mention of the subject. He stood at
one end of the apartment in a paroxysm of laughter. Tears filled his
eyes. He pointed to another director, who, at the other extremity of the
room, was also puzzling over a coat. "There's Stuart with my mackintosh!
He's trying to _put it on--_and here am I with _his_ coat trying to put
_that_ on. I--I said to myself, 'This is pretty large for a slim man
like you.'--Great God, Stuart, if I hadn't been quick-sighted we might
have stayed here all night!" He immediately fell into another fit of
laughter, and so did his friend. They exchanged coats with great
hilarity, and those who had gone out of the door lumbered back to learn
the cause of it. The story went round from one to the other, "Why,
Stuart had Jacobs's coat, and Jacobs had Stuart's coat!" Everybody went
into convulsions, and the president drew out his pocket-handkerchief and
shrieked into it.
The board broke up with great good feeling, and Jacobs went away very
weak, saying that he was going to tell the joke against Stuart on the
street--if he lived to get there.
Three gentlemen remained, professedly to hear Fields's letter read. Two
staid because the room was comfortable, and the other because he wanted
to have a little private conversation with the president afterward.
Therefore the president wiped away the tears that Stuart's humor had
forced from his eyes, and opened the crumpled letter, and, turning his
back to the light, read it aloud, while the rest listened with looks of
great amusement in their wrinkled faces.
"_To the President and Directors of the ---- National Bank._
"GENTLEMEN: I most respectfully renew my application for an increase
of my salary to five thousand dollars per annum, it now being four
thousand. I am impelled to do this because I am convinced that I am
not sufficiently recompensed for the labor I perform; and because
other tellers, having the same responsibilities, receive the larger
sum per annum; and, lastly, because I am about to be married.
"I remember that your answer to my first application was a definite
refusal, and I blamed myself for not having presented the case more
clearly to your distinguished notice. Will you permit me to rectify
that fault now, and to state briefly why I feel assured that my
present claim is not an unreasonable one?
"1. While ten years ago we agreed that three thousand dollars was a
fair compensation for the work I was then called upon to perform,
and four years later agreed that four thousand dollars was then fair
pay for my increased tasks, caused by the increase of your business,
is it not just that I should now ask for a still further advance in
view of the fact that your business has doubled since the date of
our last contract?
"It has been necessary for me to acquaint myself with the signatures
and business customs and qualifications of twice the former number
of your customers, and my liability to error has also become greater
in like ratio. But I have committed no errors, which argues that I
have kept up an equal strain of care. This has made demands upon my
brain and my bodily strength, which I think should be requited for.
"2. I, like each of you, will one day reach an age when the body and
mind will no longer be able to provide for themselves. But between
us, should we continue our present relations, there would be this
vital difference: You would have made an accumulation of wealth that
would be sufficient for your wants, while I would be poor in spite
of the fact that I labored with you, and next to yourselves did the
most to protect your interests. In view of my approaching
incompetence (no matter how far off it is), I am working at a
disadvantage. Would it not be right to enable me to protect myself
from this disadvantage?
"3. While you pay me a price for my labor and for my skill as an
_expert_, do you compensate me for the trials you put upon my
probity? You pay me for what I do, but do you reward me for what I
_might_, but do _not_ do? Is what I do _not_ do a marketable
quantity? I think that it is. To prove it, inquire of those whose
servants have behaved ill, whether they would not have paid
something to have forestalled their dishonesty.
"There is a bad strain to this paragraph, and I will not dwell upon
it. I only ask you to remember that enormous sums of money pass
through my hands every day, and that the smallest slip of my memory,
or of my care, or of my fidelity, might cause you irreparable loss.
Familiarity with money and operations in money always tend to lessen
the respect for the regard that others hold it in. To resist the
subtle influences of this familiarity involves a certain wear and
tear of those principles which _must_ be kept intact for your sake.
"I beg you to accept what is my evident meaning, even if my method
of setting it forth has not been particularly happy. I have assured
myself that my claim is a valid one, and I await your obliging reply
with anxiety.
"I remain, very respectfully, "Your obedient servant,
"----FIELDS, _Paying Teller."_
At the end the president suddenly lowered his head with a smile, and
looked over the top of his glasses at his audience, clearly meaning,
"There's a letter for you!"
But two of the gentlemen were fast asleep, nodding gently at one another
across the table, while their hands clasped the arms of their chairs.
The other one was looking up toward the roofs of the buildings opposite,
absorbed in speculation.
The president said, aloud:
"I think, as long as Fields has made such a touse about it, that I'd
better draft a reply, and not give him a verbal an--"
"Draft!" said the speculator, brought to life by the word. "Draft did
you say, sir? What?--On whom?--"
"I said 'draft a reply' to--to this," returned the other, waving the
letter.
"Oh, a reply! Draft one. Draft a reply--a reply to the letter about the
salary. Oh, certainly, by all means."
"And read it to the directors at the meeting next Friday," suggested the
president.
The speculator's eyes turned vacantly upon him, and it was full half a
minute before he comprehended. "Yes, yes, of course, read it to the
directors next Friday. They'll approve it, you know. That will be
regular, and according to rule. But about Steinmeyer, you know. When a
man like Steinmeyer does such a thing as--but just come to the window a
minute."
He led the president off by the arm, and that was the last of Fields's
letter for that day.
* * * * *
II.
Fields was truly on the anxious-seat.
As he had said in his letter, he was engaged to be married, and he
wanted to be about the consummation of the contract, for he had already
delayed too long. His _affiancée_ was a sweet girl who lived with her
widowed mother in the country, where they had a fine house, and a fine
demesne attached to it. When the time for the marriage was finally
settled upon, the lady instantly set about remodelling her domicile and
its surroundings, and making it fit for the new spirits that were soon
to inhabit it. She drew upon her accumulation of money that had thriven
long in a private bank, and expended it in laying out new lawns,
planting new trees, building new stables, erecting tasteful graperies
and kiosks. This sum was not very large, and it included not only what
had been saved out of the earnings of the farm, but also what had been
saved out of the income from the widow's property, which consisted of
twelve thousand dollars in insurance stock.
Fields had thus far expended nearly all of his salary of four thousand
dollars. He was accustomed to use a quarter of it for his own purposes,
and the rest he applied to the comfort of his aged parents, whom he
maintained. Thus it will be seen that Fields's desire to add to his own
wealth had reason to be.
Just at this time there stepped in the Chicago fire. On the second day
Fields began to be frightened about the twelve thousand dollars in
insurance stock. Telegrams poured into the city by hundreds, and the
tale grew more dismal with each hour.