One afternoon, a few days afterwards, Whimple, dropping into Tommy
Watson's store, found the auctioneer and "Chuck" Epstein gravely
examining a doll's carriage and its occupant, a doll eminently
respectable in mien and terrifically blue of eye.
"Is this a new line, Tommy?" Whimple asked.
"No--it's 'Chuck's' purchase, he intends to present the outfit to a young
lady."
"To Dolly Turnpike," said Epstein quietly, "it's her birthday to-morrow;
what do you think of it?"
Whimple examined the carriage and the doll as closely and as gravely as
the others had done, and expressed the opinion that it was all right. He
added the hope that the young lady would think so too, and the opinion
that she was extremely fortunate in having among her friends so
thoughtful a man as Epstein.
It is doubtful if Epstein heard him, although it was quiet enough in the
back part of the store where the three had conducted their examination.
Whimple started to repeat his hope when he became aware that Tommy was
shaking his head and holding a finger to his lips. Whimple thereupon
broke off in the middle of a sentence and kept silence.
Epstein was looking at him, but not with the eyes of one who sees the
object he gazes on. Whimple thought to himself that he had never dreamed
the retired comedian was as old as he looked now. He wondered if it
would be kindly taken if he should advise the old man that home and a
rest in bed would brace him up a little, when Epstein began to speak.
"My little girl," he said, in the rich round voice his friends loved to
hear, "was born on the same day of the month that Dolly was. Only, a
long time ago--quite a long time ago, or perhaps I only dream that it was
long ago," he stammered and paused, and then went on. "She would have
been thirty years old now, wedded, no doubt, a mother, perhaps--what
dreams--what dreams----" Again he paused.
Tommy Watson rose softly, went to the front door, deliberately locked it,
and then returned to Whimple and Epstein--who was talking again. "I had
retired from the stage, happy and contented, to take up a business
career, so that I might be with my wife and child, and the other
children, if they should come. We loved so well--we loved so
well--and--and----" again a long pause. And then, as though some one had
spoken to him, "Yes, yes, I went back to the stage again, but that was
afterwards; and how they welcomed me and cheered me and praised me; for I
made them laugh as in the olden time, but my heart was gone.
"My little girl was two years old when we began to notice the shadow.
Just two; with a wealth of brown hair and eyes, her eyes--they were brown
too; such a brown, so wonderful, and they were her mother's eyes. The
shadow darkened; the little tongue became strangely quiet, the little
limbs were tired so easily, the little hands were all too often idle.
But how she clung to us--she seemed to know that she must go, and so she
slipped away at last, so gently--so gently--and we could not hold her.
"What is a man anyway?" he demanded abruptly, but they did not speak:
they knew he did not see them. "What is a man?" he reiterated. "I have
made thousands laugh the world over: I have driven away their sorrows and
heartaches, for a few hours at least, but I could not drive away the
shadow; I could not, I could not. Nor could she who held first place in
my heart and first place in the heart of our darling." His voice lowered
again and he went on, "After--after--we had laid her little body in the
graveyard we went to the home of a friend, thinking--thinking: I know not
what. But when the night came, I could not rest nor even sit still, and
all the while she was listening, listening, and looking at her arms. I
knew, I knew: for my heart was bleeding too, and at last I took her arm,
and together we went back to our own home; 'For it seems to me,' said my
wife, 'that I hear the patter of her little feet moving about the rooms,
and I hear her crying, "Mamma: Dad-dy:" and we are not there, Jacob, and
she'll be so lonely, so lonely.'
"I was thinking that too. I could not have stayed away, and so back we
went. She--she--my wife, seemed more content there. But always I
noticed that she seemed to be listening and waiting, and often she smiled
and talked as though she was answering the little one, but--but----" his
head was drooping, he seemed to be falling asleep. Whimple stirred
uneasily, and Tommy Watson, whose cheeks were wet with tears, shook a
warning finger at him. The old man looked up again. "The shadow came
again," he said quietly, "and somewhere--somewhere--they are waiting for
me. Men differ on religion, and fight over the future state. What do I
know of it? I don't know. A Jew, though a British subject born, a
comedian--some say I have no religion, and never had. I don't know.
But, oh! I know they wait for me--and where they wait is home."
For a long time there was silence; Epstein was the first to break it. He
stood up suddenly, and with a new light in his eyes asked of Whimple, as
though seeing him for the first time that day, how he liked the carriage
and the doll.
"Fine," said Whimple as heartily as he could, for his throat was lumpy
and his heart was beating quickly.
"I'm glad of that. Why, what's the matter, Tommy, you look as though you
had been crying?"
"Slight cold in the head," returned Tommy rather abruptly, "rotten time
of the year to get a cold too."
"It'll be all right in a day or two, I hope," said Epstein. "I must be
going to Turnpike's. I want them to give this to Dolly to-morrow. You
know I had a baby girl one time"--he proceeded quite firmly--"she--she
died--and Rachel, her mother, followed--shortly. We called her
Dolly--after Flo Dearmore's mother, who was very good to us"--here he
looked smilingly at Tommy, who had blushed at the mention of Flo's
name--"my little girl had beautiful brown eyes--just like Dolly
Turnpike's."
He left them then. Whimple lingered a little while and finally blurted
out--"I never knew that about Epstein."
"I've heard little bits of it," said Tommy, whose eyes were still moist.
"Say, but he's a wonder though." Whimple agreed. Twice he made as
though to go, and after the second attempt he asked bluntly, "Does
William come here every morning yet?"
"Yes," answered Tommy.
"Well, I--that is----" he did not finish the sentence, and did not know
how he could, but Tommy saved him. "That's all right," he said, "I'll
send him over right after his lesson to-morrow. Whimple, you know what
the good book says: it's more blessed to take a man on again than to
refuse to give him another chance."
"Well, I don't just remember that," said Whimple, "but I do know that
I've had sixty applicants in response to my advertisement for an office
boy, and of all the----"
"I know--I know," broke in Tommy, "there's mighty few William Adolphus
Turnpikes in this world, and he'll be just as glad to get back as you
will be to have him."
"Confound him," said Whimple, but he laughed as he said it.
"Sure, but that'll be all right so long as the two of you get together
again."
When Whimple reached the office the next morning he found William there.
The lad's face was shining with pleasure. "I'm sorry about that dog
business, Mister Whimple," he said, "and I'll try to be good."
"All right, William," said Whimple happily, "let it go at that." But to
the surprised and disgruntled Lucien Torrance, William said darkly,
"Well, what between you and the bunch that was after my job, I guess
Mister Whimple was nearly crazy. It's more'n one man can stand for
keeping you straight; it beats me how your own boss can put up with it."