This was a start, so Mr. Peck limped over to the Palace Hotel and
procured a telephone directory. By actual count there were nineteen B.
Cohens scattered throughout the city, so before commencing to call the
nineteen, Bill Peck borrowed the city directory from the hotel clerk and
scanned it for the particular B. Cohen who owned the art shop. His
search availed him nothing. B. Cohen was listed as an art dealer at the
address where the blue vase reposed in the show window. That was all.
"I suppose he's a commuter," Mr. Peck concluded, and at once proceeded
to procure directories of the adjacent cities of Berkeley, Oakland and
Alameda. They were not available, so in despair he changed a dollar into
five cent pieces, sought a telephone booth and commenced calling up all
the B. Cohens in San Francisco. Of the nineteen, four did not answer,
three were temporarily disconnected, six replied in Yiddish, five were
not the B. Cohen he sought, and one swore he was Irish and that his name
was spelled Cohan and pronounced with an accent on both syllables.
The B. Cohens resident in Berkeley, Oakland, Alameda, San Rafael,
Sausalito, Mill Valley, San Mateo, Redwood City and Palo Alto were next
telephoned to, and when this long and expensive task was done,
Ex-Private Bill Peck emerged from the telephone booth wringing wet with
perspiration and as irritable as a clucking hen. Once outside the hotel
he raised his haggard face to heaven and dumbly queried of the Almighty
what He meant by saving him from quick death on the field of honor only
to condemn him to be talked to death by B. Cohens in civil life.
It was now six o'clock. Suddenly Peck had an inspiration. Was the name
spelled Cohen, Cohan, Cohn, Kohn or Coen?
"If I have to take a Jewish census again tonight I'll die," he told
himself desperately, and went back to the art shop.
The sign read: B. COHN'S ART SHOP.
"I wish I knew a bootlegger's joint," poor Peck complained. "I'm pretty
far gone and a little wood alcohol couldn't hurt me much now. Why, I
could have sworn that name was spelled with an E. It seems to me I noted
that particularly."
He went back to the hotel telephone booth and commenced calling up all
the B. Cohns in town. There were eight of them and six of them were out,
one was maudlin with liquor and the other was very deaf and shouted
unintelligibly.
"Peace hath its barbarities no less than war," Mr. Peck sighed. He
changed a twenty-dollar bill into nickles, dimes and quarters, returned
to the hot, ill-smelling telephone booth and proceeded to lay down a
barrage of telephone calls to the B. Cohns of all towns of any
importance contiguous to San Francisco Bay. And he was lucky. On the
sixth call he located the particular B. Cohn in San Rafael, only to be
informed by Mr. Cohn's cook that Mr. Cohn was dining at the home of a
Mr. Simons in Mill Valley.
There were three Mr. Simons in Mill Valley, and Peck called them all
before connecting with the right one. Yes, Mr. B. Cohn was there. Who
wished to speak to him? Mr. Heck? Oh, Mr. Lake! A silence. Then--Mr.
Cohn says he doesn't know any Mr. Lake and wants to know the nature of
your business. He is dining and doesn't like to be disturbed unless the
matter is of grave importance."
"Tell him Mr. Peck wishes to speak to him on a matter of very great
importance," wailed the ex-private.
"Mr. Metz? Mr. Ben Metz?
"No, no, no. Peck--p-e-c-k."
"D-e-c-k?"
"No, P."
"C?"
"P."
"Oh, yes, E. E-what?"
"C-K--"
"Oh, yes, Mr. Eckstein."
"Call Cohn to the 'phone or I'll go over there on the next boat and kill
you, you damned idiot," shrieked Peck. "Tell him his store is on fire."
That message was evidently delivered for almost instantly Mr. B. Cohn
was puffing and spluttering into the phone.
"Iss dot der fire marshal?" he managed to articulate.
"Listen, Mr. Cohn. Your store is not on fire, but I had to say so in
order to get you to the telephone. I am Mr. Peck, a total stranger to
you. You have a blue vase in your shop window on Geary Street in San
Francisco. I want to buy it and I want to buy it before seven forty-five
tonight. I want you to come across the bay and open the store and sell
me that vase."
"Such a business! Vot you think I am? Crazy?"
"No, Mr. Cohn, I do not. I'm the only crazy man talking. I'm crazy for
that vase and I've got to have it right away."
"You know vot dot vase costs?" Mr. B. Cohn's voice dripped syrup.
"No, and I don't give a hoot what it costs. I want what I want when I
want it. Do I get it?"
"Ve-ell, lemme see. Vot time iss it?" A silence while B. Cohn evidently
looked at his watch. "It iss now a quarter of seven, Mr. Eckstein, und
der nexd drain from Mill Valley don't leaf until eight o'clock. Dot vill
get me to San Francisco at eight-fifty--und I am dining mit friends und
haf just finished my soup."
"To hell with your soup. I want that blue vase."
"Vell, I tell you, Mr. Eckstein, if you got to have it, call up my head
salesman, Herman Joost, in der Chilton Apardments--Prospect
three--two--four--nine, und tell him I said he should come down right
avay qvick und sell you dot blue vase. Goodbye, Mr. Eckstein."
And B. Cohn hung up.
Instantly Peck called Prospect 3249 and asked for Herman Joost. Mr.
Joost's mother answered. She was desolated because Herman was not at
home, but vouchsafed the information that he was dining at the country
club. Which country club? She did not know. So Peck procured from the
hotel clerk a list of the country clubs in and around San Francisco and
started calling them up. At eight o'clock he was still being informed
that Mr. Juice was not a member, that Mr. Luce wasn't in, that Mr. Coos
had been dead three months and that Mr. Boos had played but eight holes
when he received a telegram calling him back to New York. At the other
clubs Mr. Joust was unknown.
"Licked," murmured Bill Peck, "but never let it be said that I didn't go
down fighting. I'm going to heave a brick through that show window, grab
the vase and run with it."
He engaged a taxicab and instructed the driver to wait for him at the
corner of Geary and Stockton Streets. Also, he borrowed from the
chauffeur a ball peen hammer. When he reached the art shop of B. Cohn,
however, a policeman was standing in the doorway, violating the general
orders of a policeman on duty by surreptitiously smoking a cigar.
"He'll nab me if I crack that window," the desperate Peck decided, and
continued on down the street, crossed to the other side and came back.
It was now dark and over the art shop B. Cohn's name burned in small
red, white and blue electric lights.
And lo, it was spelled B. Cohen!
Ex-private William E. Peck sat down on a fire hydrant and cursed with
rage. His weak leg hurt him, too, and for some damnable reason, the
stump of his left arm developed the feeling that his missing hand was
itchy.
"The world is filled with idiots," he raved furiously. "I'm tired and
I'm hungry. I skipped luncheon and I've been too busy to think of
dinner."
He walked back to his taxicab and returned to the hotel where, hope
springing eternal in his breast, he called Prospect 3249 again and
discovered that the missing Herman Joost had returned to the bosom of
his family. To him the frantic Peck delivered the message of B. Cohn,
whereupon the cautious Herman Joost replied that he would confirm the
authenticity of the message by telephoning to Mr. Cohn at Mr. Simon's
home in Mill Valley. If Mr. B. Cohn or Cohen confirmed Mr. Kek's story
he, the said Herman Joost, would be at the store sometime before nine
o'clock, and if Mr. Kek cared to, he might await him there.
Mr. Kek said he would be delighted to wait for him there.
At nine-fifteen Herman Joost appeared on the scene. On his way down the
street he had taken the precaution to pick up a policeman and bring him
along with him. The lights were switched on in the store and Mr. Joost
lovingly abstracted the blue vase from the window.
"What's the cursed thing worth?" Peck demanded.
"Two thousand dollars," Mr. Joost replied without so much as the quiver
of an eyelash. "Cash," he added, apparently as an afterthought.
The exhausted Peck leaned against the sturdy guardian of the law and
sighed. This was the final straw. He had about ten dollars in his
possession.
"You refuse, absolutely, to accept my check?" he quavered.
"I don't know you, Mr. Peck," Herman Joost replied simply.
"Where's your telephone?"
Mr. Joost led Peck to the telephone and the latter called up Mr.
Skinner.
"Mr. Skinner," he announced, "this is all that is mortal of Bill Peck
speaking. I've got the store open and for two thousand dollars--cash--I
can buy the blue vase Mr. Ricks has set his heart upon."
"Oh, Peck, dear fellow," Mr. Skinner purred sympathetically. "Have you
been all this time on that errand?"
"I have. And I'm going to stick on the job until I deliver the goods.
For God's sake let me have two thousand dollars and bring it down to me
at B. Cohen's Art Shop on Geary Street near Grant Avenue. I'm too
utterly exhausted to go up after it."
"My dear Mr. Peck, I haven't two thousand dollars in my house. That is
too great a sum of money to keep on hand."
"Well, then, come downtown, open up the office safe and get the money
for me."
"Time lock on the office safe, Peck. Impossible."
"Well then, come downtown and identify me at hotels and cafés and
restaurants so I can cash my own check."
"Is your check good, Mr. Peck?"
The flood of invective which had been accumulating in Mr. Peck's system
all the afternoon now broke its bounds. He screamed at Mr. Skinner a
blasphemous invitation to betake himself to the lower regions.
"Tomorrow morning," he promised hoarsely, "I'll beat you to death with
the stump of my left arm, you miserable, cold-blooded, lazy, shiftless
slacker."
He called up Cappy Ricks' residence next, and asked for Captain Matt
Peasley, who, he knew, made his home with his father-in-law. Matt
Peasley came to the telephone and listened sympathetically to Peck's
tale of woe.
"Peck, that's the worst outrage I ever heard of," he declared. "The idea
of setting you such a task. You take my advice and forget the blue
vase."
"I can't," Peck panted. "Mr. Ricks will feel mighty chagrined if I fail
to get the vase to him. I wouldn't disappoint him for my right arm. He's
been a dead game sport with me, Captain Peasley."
"But it's too late to get the vase to him, Peck. He left the city at
eight o'clock and it is now almost half past nine."
"I know, but if I can secure legal possession of the vase I'll get it to
him before he leaves the train at Santa Barbara at six o'clock tomorrow
morning."
"How?"
"There's a flying school out at the Marina and one of the pilots there
is a friend of mine. He'll fly to Santa Barbara with me and the vase."
"You're crazy."
"I know it. Please lend me two thousand dollars."
"What for?"
"To pay for the vase."
"Now I know you're crazy--or drunk. Why if Cappy Ricks ever forgot
himself to the extent of paying two hundred dollars for a vase he'd
bleed to death in an hour."
"Won't you let me have two thousand dollars, Captain Peasley?"
"I will not, Peck, old son. Go home and to bed and forget it."
"Please. You can cash your checks. You're known so much better than I,
and it's Sunday night--"
"And it's a fine way to keep holy the Sabbath day," Matt Peasley
retorted and hung up.
"Well," Herman Joost queried, "do we stay here all night?"
Bill Peck bowed his head. "Look here," he demanded suddenly, "do you
know a good diamond when you see it?"
"I do," Herman Joost replied.
"Will you wait here until I go to my hotel and get one?"
"Sure."
Bill Peck limped painfully away. Forty minutes later he returned with a
platinum ring set with diamonds and sapphires.
"What are they worth?" he demanded.
Herman Joost looked the ring over lovingly and appraised it
conservatively at twenty-five hundred dollars.
"Take it as security for the payment of my check," Peck pleaded. "Give
me a receipt for it and after my check has gone through clearing I'll
come back and get the ring."
Fifteen minutes later, with the blue vase packed in excelsior and
reposing in a stout cardboard box, Bill Peck entered a restaurant and
ordered dinner. When he had dined he engaged a taxi and was driven to
the flying field at the Marina. From the night watchman he ascertained
the address of his pilot friend and at midnight, with his friend at the
wheel, Bill Peck and his blue vase soared up into the moonlight and
headed south.
An hour and a half later they landed in a stubble field in the Salinas
Valley and, bidding his friend good-bye, Bill Peck trudged across to the
railroad track and sat down. When the train bearing Cappy Ricks came
roaring down the valley, Peck twisted a Sunday paper with which he had
provided himself, into an improvised torch, which he lighted. Standing
between the rails he swung the flaming paper frantically.
The train slid to a halt, a brakeman opened a vestibule door, and Bill
Peck stepped wearily aboard.
"What do you mean by flagging this train?" the brakeman demanded
angrily, as he signaled the engineer to proceed. "Got a ticket?"
"No, but I've got the money to pay my way. And I flagged this train
because I wanted to change my method of travel. I'm looking for a man in
stateroom A of car 7, and if you try to block me there'll be murder
done."
"That's right. Take advantage of your half-portion arm and abuse me,"
the brakeman retorted bitterly. "Are you looking for that little old man
with the Henry Clay collar and the white mutton-chop whiskers?"
"I certainly am."
"Well, he was looking for you just before we left San Francisco. He
asked me if I had seen a one-armed man with a box under his good arm.
I'll lead you to him."
A prolonged ringing at Cappy's stateroom door brought the old gentleman
to the entrance in his nightshirt.
"Very sorry to have to disturb you, Mr. Ricks," said Bill Peck, "but the
fact is there were so many Cohens and Cohns and Cohans, and it was such
a job to dig up two thousand dollars, that I failed to connect with you
at seven forty-five last night, as per orders. It was absolutely
impossible for me to accomplish the task within the time limit set, but
I was resolved that you should not be disappointed. Here is the vase.
The shop wasn't within four blocks of where you thought it was, sir, but
I'm sure I found the right vase. It ought to be. It cost enough and was
hard enough to get, so it should be precious enough to form a gift for
any friend of yours."
Cappy Ricks stared at Bill Peck as if the latter were a wraith.
"By the Twelve Ragged Apostles!" he murmured. "By the Holy Pink-toed
Prophet! We changed the sign on you and we stacked the Cohens on you and
we set a policeman to guard the shop to keep you from breaking the
window, and we made you dig up two thousand dollars on Sunday night in a
town where you are practically unknown, and while you missed the train
at eight o'clock, you overtake it at two o'clock in the morning and
deliver the blue vase. Come in and rest your poor old game leg, Bill.
Brake-man, I'm much obliged to you."
Bill Peck entered and slumped wearily down on the settee. "So it was a
plant?" he cracked, and his voice trembled with rage. "Well, sir, you're
an old man and you've been good to me, so I do not begrudge you your
little joke, but Mr. Ricks, I can't stand things like I used to. My leg
hurts and my stump hurts and my heart hurts----"
He paused, choking, and the tears of impotent rage filled his eyes. "You
shouldn't treat me that way, sir," he complained presently. "I've been
trained not to question orders, even when they seem utterly foolish to
me; I've been trained to obey them--on time, if possible, but if
impossible, to obey them anyhow. I've been taught loyalty to my
chief--and I'm sorry my chief found it necessary to make a buffoon of
me. I haven't had a very good time the past three years and--and--you
can--pa-pa-pass your skunk spruce and larch rustic and short odd length
stock to some slacker like Skinner--and you'd better--arrange--to
replace--Skinner, because he's young--enough to--take a beating--and I'm
going to--give it to him--and it'll be a hospital--job--sir--"
Cappy Ricks ruffled Bill Peck's aching head with a paternal hand.
"Bill, old boy, it was cruel--damnably cruel, but I had a big job for
you and I had to find out a lot of things about you before I entrusted
you with that job. So I arranged to give you the Degree of the Blue
Vase, which is the supreme test of a go-getter. You thought you carried
into this stateroom a two thousand dollar vase, but between ourselves,
what you really carried in was a ten thousand dollar job as our Shanghai
manager."
"Wha--what!"
"Every time I have to pick out a permanent holder of a job worth ten
thousand dollars, or more, I give the candidate the Degree of the Blue
Vase," Cappy explained. "I've had two men out of a field of fifteen
deliver the vase, Bill."
Bill Peck had forgotten his rage, but the tears of his recent fury still
glistened in his bold blue eyes. "Thank you, sir. I forgive you--and
I'll make good in Shanghai."
"I know you will, Bill. Now, tell me, son, weren't you tempted to quit
when you discovered the almost insuperable obstacles I'd placed in your
way?"
"Yes, sir, I was. I wanted to commit suicide before I'd finished
telephoning all the C-o-h-e-n-s in the world. And when I started on the
C-o-h-n-s--well, it's this way, sir. I just couldn't quit because that
would have been disloyal to a man I once knew."
"Who was he?" Cappy demanded, and there was awe in his voice.
"He was my brigadier, and he had a brigade motto: It shall be done. When
the divisional commander called him up and told him to move forward with
his brigade and occupy certain territory, our brigadier would say: 'Very
well, sir. It shall be done.' If any officer in his brigade showed signs
of flunking his job because it appeared impossible, the brigadier would
just look at him once--and then that officer would remember the motto
and go and do his job or die trying.
"In the army, sir, the _esprit de corps_ doesn't bubble up from the
bottom. It filters down from the top. An organization is what its
commanding officer is--neither better nor worse. In my company, when the
top sergeant handed out a week of kitchen police to a buck, that buck
was out of luck if he couldn't muster a grin and say: 'All right,
sergeant. It shall be done.'
"The brigadier sent for me once and ordered me to go out and get a
certain German sniper. I'd been pretty lucky--some days I got enough for
a mess--and he'd heard of me. He opened a map and said to me: 'Here's
about where he holes up. Go get him, Private Peck.' Well, Mr. Ricks, I
snapped into it and gave him a rifle salute, and said, 'Sir, it shall be
done'--and I'll never forget the look that man gave me. He came down to
the field hospital to see me after I'd walked into one of those Austrian
88's. I knew my left wing was a total loss and I suspected my left leg
was about to leave me, and I was downhearted and wanted to die. He came
and bucked me up. He said: 'Why, Private Peck, you aren't half dead. In
civil life you're going to be worth half a dozen live ones--aren't you?'
But I was pretty far gone and I told him I didn't believe it, so he gave
me a hard look and said: 'Private Peck will do his utmost to recover and
as a starter he will smile.' Of course, putting it in the form of an
order, I had to give him the usual reply, so I grinned and said: 'Sir,
it shall be done.' He was quite a man, sir, and his brigade had a
soul--his soul----"
"I see, Bill. And his soul goes marching on, eh? Who was he, Bill?"
Bill Peck named his idol.
"By the Twelve Ragged Apostles!" There was awe in Cappy Ricks' voice,
there was reverence in his faded old eyes. "Son," he continued gently,
"twenty-five years ago your brigadier was a candidate for an important job
in my employ--and I gave him the Degree of the Blue Vase. He couldn't
get the vase legitimately, so he threw a cobble-stone through the
window, grabbed the vase and ran a mile and a half before the police
captured him. Cost me a lot of money to square the case and keep it
quiet. But he was too good, Bill, and I couldn't stand in his way; I let
him go forward to his destiny. But tell me, Bill. How did you get the
two thousand dollars to pay for this vase?"
"Once," said ex-Private Peck thoughtfully, "the brigadier and I were
first at a dug-out entrance. It was a headquarters dug-out and they
wouldn't surrender, so I bombed them and then we went down. I found a
finger with a ring on it--and the brigadier said if I didn't take the
ring somebody else would. I left that ring as security for my check."
"But how could you have the courage to let me in for a two thousand
dollar vase? Didn't you realize that the price was absurd and that I
might repudiate the transaction?"
"Certainly not. You are responsible for the acts of your servant. You
are a true blue sport and would never repudiate my action. You told me
what to do, but you did not insult my intelligence by telling me how to
do it. When my late brigadier sent me after the German sniper he didn't
take into consideration the probability that the sniper might get me. He
told me to get the sniper. It was my business to see to it that I
accomplished my mission and carried my objective, which, of course, I
could not have done if I had permitted the German to get me."
"I see, Bill. Well, give that blue vase to the porter in the morning. I
paid fifteen cents for it in a five, ten and fifteen cent store.
Meanwhile, hop into that upper berth and help yourself to a well-earned
rest."
"But aren't you going to a wedding anniversary at Santa Barbara, Mr.
Ricks?"
"I am not. Bill, I discovered a long time ago that it's a good idea for
me to get out of town and play golf as often as I can. Besides which,
prudence dictates that I remain away from the office for a week after
the seeker of blue vases fails to deliver the goods and--by the way,
Bill, what sort of a game do you play? Oh, forgive me, Bill. I forgot
about your left arm."
"Say, look here, sir," Bill Peck retorted, "I'm big enough and ugly
enough to play one-handed golf."
"But, have you ever tried it?"
"No, sir," Bill Peck replied seriously, "but--it shall be done!"