A PRODIGAL PUFFED UP
LEANING on his well elbow, Johnnie related to Mrs. Kukor and Cis and
Grandpa the whole story of what had happened to him; and they paid such
rapt attention to him that at the most they did not interrupt him more
than fifteen or twenty times. "And, oh, didn't everything turn out just
fine?" he cried in ending. "T' be found by a cowboy and fetched home in
a' auto! and--all?"
Mrs. Kukor vowed that she dass-ent to deny how everytink about it wass
both stylish und grand!
Next, he had to hear what had transpired after his departure; how every
one had taken his going, especially Big Tom--now gone out to escort
One-Eye to the taxi.
"I tells to him, 'Sure does Chonnie go for sometink'," declared Mrs.
Kukor. But Barber had known better, and contradicted her violently. "Und
so I tells to him over that, 'Goot! Goot! if he runs away! In dis house
so much, it ain't healthy for him!' Und I shakes my fingers be-front of
hiss big nose!"
Mrs. Kukor had to go then, remembering with a start that she had a
filled fish cooking. She rushed out at a thumping gallop. Then the whole
adventure was told a second time, Johnnie sitting up with Grandpa's hat
cocked over one eye, and drawling in fine imitation of their late guest.
When Barber came back, he was not able to let matters pass without a
brief scolding for Johnnie, and a threat. "Y' go and git yourself laid
up," he complained, coming to stand over the pallet on the floor; "so's
you can't do your work, and earn your keep. Well, a good kick was the
right pay for runnin' away. And now let me tell y' this, and I mean it:
if y' ever run away again, y' won't git took _back_. Hear me?"
"Yes," answered Johnnie, almost carelessly.
Barber said no more, realizing that if Johnnie could run away once he
could again. Even without grumbling the longshoreman helped Cis to put
the wash to soak in the round, galvanized tub that stood on its side
under the dish cupboard--a Sunday night duty that was Johnnie's, and was
in preparation for the hated laundry work which he always did so badly
of a Monday.
Late that night, in the closet-room, with the door shut and a stub of
candle lighted, Johnnie heard Cis's story of what had happened in the
flat following her return from the factory, her lunch still in its neat
camera-box.
"I--I just couldn't believe it was so!" she whispered, ready to weep at
the mere recollection of her shock and grief. "And, oh, promise me you
won't ever go away again!" she begged, brown head on one side and tears
in her eyes; "and I'll promise never to leave _you_--never, never,
never, _never_!"
Johnnie would not promise. "I'm goin' to be a cowboy," he declared
calmly; "but after I go, why, I'll come back soon's as I can and take
you. And maybe, after the Prince is married, you'll forget him, and like
a cowboy."
Cis shook her head. Hers was an affection not lightly bestowed nor
easily withdrawn from its dear object. "I saw HIM go into the
Waldorf-Astoria by the floor on the Thirty-third Street side," she
recalled tenderly. Recollection brought a sweet, far-away look into
those violet-blue eyes.
Johnnie took this moment to fish from his shirt his five books, laying
them one by one on the bed-shelf at Cis's feet, from where she caught up
the new ones, marveling over them.
"I _thought_ there was something funny about your looks," she declared.
"I kept still, though.--Oh, Johnnie Smith, have you been robbing
somebody?"
When he had enjoyed her excitement and anxiety to the full, she was told
all about the book shop and the millionaire, and the lady, and the book
with the dollar bill, after which he again showed those books which he
had purchased with the money.
"Oh, you silly!" she cried. "You didn't do anything of the kind! They
bought 'em for you--all those nice people!"
It was hard to convince him, but at last she did, this by pointing out
to him the price marked in each book, a sum that took his breath away.
Three dollars and a half apiece they were! More than ten altogether!
("Und in kesh-money!" Mrs. Kukor marveled afterward, when she knew.)
_His_ eyes got a far-away expression as he thought about the generosity
of those strangers. Oh, how good strangers were to a person! It almost
seemed that the less you knew somebody-- But, no, that was not true,
because Mrs. Kukor----
"Tell me more about Mr. One-Eye," whispered Cis. "But what a name for a
_man_! He _can't_ be called just that! How could you write him a letter?
Don't you know the rest of it, Johnnie? It's One-eye What?"
"Just One-Eye," returned Johnnie. "That's what they all called him.
Maybe cowboys don't have two names like common men. What's the good of
two names, anyhow?"
Cis was shocked. "Everybody has to have two names," she told him,
severely. "The first is yours, and is your mother's fav'rite, and the
other shows who your father is. Or maybe, if you're a second child, your
mother allows your father to name you. But it's civilized to have two
names, and not a bit nice if you don't--unless you're a dog or a horse."
Johnnie lifted an inspired finger, pointing straight at her.
"Everybody?" he asked. "Well, what about the Prince of Wales? _His_ name
is Eddie. Eddie _What_?"
"Why--why--" She was confused.
"Horse or dog!" scoffed Johnnie. "Don't you b'lieve it? You mean Princes
and cowboys!"
Cis had to admit herself wrong.
"When I heard One-Eye speak, that first time," he informed her, "I was
afraid he was J. J. Hunter, come for _Aladdin_."
They laughed at that, fairly rocking. After which they returned to the
more personal aspects of One-Eye. "What makes him keep his hat on?" she
wanted to know. "That isn't good manners at _all_. I just know the
Prince wouldn't do it. Why, every time I saw the Prince he kept taking
his hat off. My!"
"Cowboys always keep their hats on," Johnnie asserted stoutly. "Maybe if
they didn't, their horses wouldn't know 'em. Anyhow, they all do. Don't
I know? I saw dozens!"
Well, if they did, then Cis thought them a strange lot. "And do all of
them chew tobacco?" she persisted. "Because I'm sure _he_ does."
Johnnie was insulted. He denied anything of the kind. He grew heated,
resenting this criticism of one who held that cowboys were noble.
One-Eye smoked--even when signs said he might not. And could any man
smoke and chew at the same time? He did not believe it, though he was
willing to admit that if any man _could_ perform these two feats
simultaneously, that man was certainly the incomparable One-Eye.
"Anyhow, he's awful homely," continued Cis, who could be as irritating
as most girls at times.
Johnnie rose then, cold and proud. "Honest, Cis, you make me sick!" he
told her. "Homely! Huh!" He would have liked to cast an aspersion upon a
certain Royal countenance, just to get even, but feared Cis might refuse
to hide his books for him. However, he decided that he would never again
be as nice as formerly to King George's son. He left the tiny room, nose
in air.
She did not follow him with apologies. And presently he stole back to
her door and moved the knob softly. "Cis!" he whispered. "What's a
vallay?"
She peeped out. "What's a _what_?"
"A v-a-l-l-a-y?"
"Oh!--A valley's a scoopy place between two hills."
A scoopy place between two hills! How like a girl's was the answer! Her
candle was out, her tone sleepy. He did not argue. Flat upon his pallet
once more, with both hands under his yellow head, he smiled into the
black of the kitchen, telling himself that he would not change places
with any boy in the whole of the great sleeping city.