William was at the office half an hour earlier than usual the next
morning. He entered cautiously by the back stair, and reconnoitred
carefully before closing the door. Lucien was the only person in
sight. He preserved a profound silence to William's first questionings
as to the happenings of the previous afternoon, but when William gave
him one minute in which to decide on fighting or telling the story, he
told. His narrative was curt and his demeanour cold: it became quite
frosty when William laughed delightedly over the recital of the
thrashing Lucien had received.
"Where did he hit you, Lucien?" asked William when the story had been
told.
"In this room," answered Lucien with dignity, and William roared again.
Lucien waited until the laughter died away and then called attention to
the fact that there was a letter on William's desk. "You're right for
once, Lucien," said William, who had noticed the letter on first
entering the room. He picked it up, aware that Lucien was watching him
closely, and feeling certain that the letter did not contain good news
for him. Therefore he slipped it into his pocket and walked out of the
office to the Bay front, where, with his feet dangling over one of the
wharves, he slowly opened the envelope and unfolded the enclosure. The
letter was as follows:--
"DEAR WILLIAM,--In view of the events of this afternoon, the full
details of which by the time you get this you will doubtless have
gleaned from Lucien, it is impossible that you should longer remain in
my employ. I am very sorry to lose you, but there is a limit to the
length that even an office boy can be allowed to go.
"Yours sincerely,
"CHAS. WHIMPLE."
"Fired!" said William to himself, "fired! Well, I ain't surprised.
Tough luck though." He read the letter through again, and continued
his soliloquy. "Well, after this, no more dogs for me. Gee--but I
hate to leave that place. It beats the band how things will turn out
rotten just when the luck seems to be all right."
But William didn't spend much time in regrets. The day was blazing
hot, the civic tug for the free baths off the Island sand bar was about
to leave the wharf, and he constituted himself a part of the noisy
human freight with which it was laden. He had a glorious swim, and at
noon time surprised the Turnpike household by arriving for luncheon,
having during his business career eaten that meal--packed by his
mother's hands--in the office. Quite frankly, and with the mimicry
which was the pride of his father and a constant source of astonishment
to his mother, he related the whole story. His mother grieved despite
her laughter: his father laughed and sorrowed not. "It'll come out
right in the end," he said philosophically, "and if it don't, you'll
soon get another job."
"Sure," said William; "don't you worry, Ma," he added. After the meal
he departed, his head full of a plan that had been nebulous only after
his first reading of the letter, but which now seemed to promise much.
The more he thought it over, the better he liked it, and despite the
heat, he walked quickly to the "Emporium" of one Walter Wadsworth.
Walter was the owner, manager, and entire staff of the "Emporium,"
which consisted of a rickety two-storied structure with a shooting
gallery on one side, and a peanut, candy, tobacco, and fruit department
on the other side. Walter, whose friendship with William was as old
almost as the boy himself, owned the building and the land, as well as
a more valuable property near by. But his greater claim to importance,
in the opinion of most of the boyhood of Toronto, lay in the fact that
for years he had held the refreshment privileges in the baseball park.
After a few preliminaries, William said, "The team's due next week,
ain't they?"
"According to schedule," answered Walter, a thick-set, pleasant-faced,
middle-aged man, who wasted few words, and who, in his day, had been a
star of the diamond.
"How's the chances for a job?"
"I thought you were in the law business, young fellow?"
"Well--I was kinder makin' a dab at it."
"Chucked it already?"
"No," said William, "it kinder chucked me.
"Umph! Watcher want?"
"Well, what's the matter with me having a basket and selling stuff
around the stands?"
"You're on, William: you're on. I've had an awful bunch of dubs on the
job so far this season, and I'd be glad to let you have a try."
"All right: and what do I get for it?" asked William in a business-like
tone.
"Well, of course, you see the game for nothing."
"Yes--" said William, slowly, "or some of it, between sales."
"Well, I never knew any one of the boys yet but could give all the
details of the game, whether his sales were good or not. I guess you
won't miss much of any of the games."
"Go on--I see the games free," said William, "and----" he paused.
"And you get ten cents commission on every dollar's worth of stuff you
sell."
"Any of the boys ever say they got too much?" inquired William, with a
pretence of eager interest.
Walter smiled. "Not that I remember," he answered, "but they don't do
so bad."
"All right," said William, "I'll be on hand for Monday's game. But I
can't afford to be loafin' until then. Anything doin' before that?"
"This place ain't had a cleaning up since I don't know when," replied
Walter, "and there's a lot of old boxes in the back yard that have to
be broken up for firewood sooner or later, and stored in the cellar.
Want to tackle the job? There's a few dollars in it anyway."
"Sure," said William, and set to work forthwith. He toiled steadily in
the Emporium, but not with his usual cheerfulness, for he was really
sorry to be away from Whimple's office. The more he thought of the
causes leading up to his dismissal, the more he wished that Lucien had
been responsible. "He got the lickin' anyway," said William to himself
with a smile, "but darn a fellow like that: I wonder if he ever made a
fool of himself in his life."
It was at this moment that William noticed a large megaphone, one of
Walter's cherished possessions, in the back part of the Emporium.
"Say, Walter," he cried excitedly, "let me have a crack at the
megaphone."
"Go ahead," said Walter good-naturedly, "but don't blame me if you get
pinched for disturbing the peace."
William carried the megaphone upstairs, rested one end on the sill of
the open window, and took a critical survey of the passers-by on the
street.
"Wow!" he cried aloud, and as though addressing some one in the room;
"look who's acomin'." He hastily adjusted the megaphone, waited until
he thought the person he had spoken of was within striking range, and
then there arose a weird shriek that attracted the attention of
everybody within seven blocks of the Emporium. It filled the heart of
one boy momentarily with fear, and brought him to a sudden standstill
without at once becoming acquainted with the source of the noise. He
looked around bewildered, and, as he looked, voices seemed to bellow in
both his ears, "Good evening, Lucien. How many stamps did you lick
to-day?"
Several people halted, irresolute, eventually focussing their gaze on
Lucien, who, having now noticed the megaphone, was staring towards it
like one under the influence of hypnotism. Again a question bellowed
forth from the megaphone, "Oh, Lucien: where did he hit you?" and
Lucien, waking up to the truth of the situation, for once displayed
some evidences of his youth. He shook his fists towards the open
window, and cried out threats of vengeance on William, but those were
soon drowned in another blast from the megaphone. "Get on to Lucien,
ladies and gents, the chee-ild wonder of the century." It was then
that Lucien, with a final shake of his fists, turned and fled. William
laid the megaphone away and walked down the stairs, to find Walter at
the door gazing after the fleeing Lucien.
"That kid was hollering something about knocking your block off," said
Walter. "He seemed to be sore on you."
"Maybe he is," answered William, slyly, "but yesterday he was sore for
me."