MAX'S STORY CONTINUED--THE JOURNEYMAN PRINTER
"You may be sure that that night the public took the variety theater
by storm; every seat was filled; the very aisles were crowded with
men standing; the beer flowed in streams and the tobacco-smoke rose
in clouds; the establishment was doing a splendid business. Christina
was down on the bills for three solos. Each one was a triumph--encore
followed encore--and when the performance closed the little singer
was called before the curtain and another Danaë shower of silver and
gold, and some bouquets, fell around her. When I went behind the
scenes I found the happy girl surrounded by even a larger circle of
admirers than the night before, each one sounding her praises. I
called the manager aside. He knew me well as a rich young
spendthrift. I said to him:
"'How much a week do you pay Christina?'
"'I promised her,' said he, 'five dollars a week; but,' and here he
looked at me suspiciously, 'I have determined to double it. I shall
pay her ten.'
"'That is not enough,' I said; 'you will find in her a gold mine. You
must pay her fifty.'
"'My dear sir,' he said, 'I cannot afford it. I really cannot.'
"'Well,' said 'I will speak to Jobson [a rival in business]; he will
pay her a hundred. I saw him here to-night. He has already heard of
her.'
"'But,' said he, 'she has contracted with me to sing for three
months, at five dollars per week; and I have permitted her to take
home all the money that was thrown on the stage last night and
to-night. Now I shall pay her ten. Is not that liberal?'
"'Liberal!' I said; 'it is hoggish. This girl has made you two
hundred dollars extra profit to-night. She is under age. She cannot
make a binding contract. And the money that was thrown to her belongs
to her and not to you. Come, what do you say--shall I speak to
Jobson?'
"'What interest have you in this girl?' he asked, sullenly.
"'That is no matter of yours,' I replied; 'if you will not pay her
what I demand, to-morrow night she will sing for Jobson, and your
place will be empty.'
"'Well,' said he, 'I will pay it; but I don't see what right you have
to interfere in my business.'
"'That is not all,' I said; 'go to her now and tell her you have made
a good deal of money to-night, by her help, and ask her to accept
fifty dollars from you as a present; and tell her, in my hearing,
that she is to receive fifty dollars a week hereafter. The family are
very poor, and need immediate help. And besides, if she does not know
that she is to receive a liberal salary, when the agents of the other
houses come for her, she may leave you. Fair play is the wisest
thing.'
"He thought a moment; he was very angry with me; but finally he
swallowed his wrath, and pushed his way through the crowd to where
Christina stood, and said to her with many a bow and smile:
"'Miss Christina, your charming voice has greatly increased my
business to-night; and I think it only fair to give you a part of my
profits--here are fifty dollars.'
"Christina was delighted--she took the money--she had never seen so
large an amount before--she handed it to her mother; and both were
profuse in their thanks, while the crowd vigorously applauded the
good and generous manager.
"'But this is not all,' he continued; 'instead of five dollars per
week, the sum we had agreed upon, for your singing, I shall pay you
hereafter fifty dollars a week!'
"There was still greater applause; Christina's eyes swam with
happiness; her mother began to cry; Christina seized the manager's
hand, and the old scamp posed, as he received the thanks of those
present, as if all this were the outcome of his own generosity, and
as if he were indeed the best and noblest of men. I have no doubt
that if I had not interfered he would have kept her on the five
dollars a week, and the silly little soul would have been satisfied.
"I followed them home. I again listened to their happiness. And then
I heard the mother tell the father that they must both go out
to-morrow and find a better place to lodge in, for they were rich
now. A bright thought flashed across my mind, and I hastened away.
"The next morning, at daybreak, I hurried to the same detective I had
employed the day before; he was a shrewd, but not unkindly fellow. I
explained to him my plans, and we went out together. We took a
carriage and drove rapidly from place to place; he really seemed
pleased to find himself engaged, for once in his life, in a good
action. What I did will be revealed as I go on with this story.
"At half past eight o'clock that morning the Jansen family had
finished their breakfast and talked over and over again, for the
twentieth time, their wonderful turn of fortune, and all its
incidents, including repeated counting of their marvelous hoard of
money. Then Christina was left in charge of the children, and the
father and mother sallied forth to look for a new residence. The
neighbors crowded around to congratulate them; and they
explained,--for, kindly-hearted souls, they did not wish their old
companions in poverty to think that they had willingly fled from
them, at the first approach of good fortune,--they explained that
they must get a new home nearer to the theater, for Christina's sake;
and that they proposed that she should have teachers in music and
singing and acting; for she was now the bread-winner of the family,
and they hoped that some day she would shine in opera with the great
artists.
"Did the neighbors know of any place, suitable for them, which they
could rent?
"No, they did not; they rarely passed out of their own poor
neighborhood.
"But here a plainly dressed man, who looked like a workman, and who
had been listening to the conversation, spoke up and said that he had
observed, only that morning, a bill of 'To Rent' upon a very neat
little house, only a few blocks from the theater; and, as he was
going that way, he would be glad to show them the place. They thanked
him; and, explaining to him that the business of renting houses was
something new to them, for heretofore they had lived in one or two
rooms--they might have added, very near the roof--they walked off
with the stranger. He led them into a pleasant, quiet, respectable
neighborhood, and at last stopped before a small, neat three-story
house, with a little garden in front and another larger one in the
rear.
"'What a pretty place!' said the mother; 'but I fear the rent will be
too high for us.'
"'Well, there is no harm in inquiring,' said the workman, and he rang
the bell.
"A young man, dressed like a mechanic, answered the summons. He
invited them in; the house was comfortably, but not richly furnished.
They went through it and into the garden; they were delighted with
everything. And then came the question they feared to ask: What was
the rent?
"'Well,' said the young man, pleasantly, I must explain my position.
I am a printer by trade. My name is Francis Montgomery. I own this
house. It was left to me by my parents. It is all I have. I am not
married. I cannot live in it alone; it is too big for that; and,
besides, I think I should get some income out of it, for there are
the taxes to be paid. But I do not want to leave the house. I was
born and raised here. I thought that if I could get some pleasant
family to take it, who would let me retain one of the upper rooms,
and would board me, I would rent the house for'--here he mentioned a
ridiculously low price. 'I do not want,' he added, 'any expensive
fare. I am content to take "pot-luck" with the family. I like your
looks; and if you want the house, at the terms I have named, I think
we can get along pleasantly together. I may not be here all the time.'
"The offer was accepted; the workman was dismissed with thanks. That
afternoon the whole family moved in. The delight of Christina was
unbounded. There was one room which I had forseen would be assigned
to her, and that I had adorned with some flowers. She was introduced
to me; we shook hands; and I was soon a member of the family. What a
curious flock of little white-heads, of all ages, they were--sturdy,
rosy, chubby, healthy, merry, and loving toward one another. They
brought very little of their poor furniture with them; it was too
shabby for the new surroundings; they gave it away to their former
neighbors. But I noticed that the father carefully carried into the
kitchen an old chair, time-worn and venerable; the back was gone, and
it was nothing but a stool. The next day I observed a pudgy little
boy, not quite three years old (the father's favorite, as I
discovered), driving wrought nails into it with a little iron hammer.
"'Stop! stop! my man!' I exclaimed; 'you must not drive nails in the
furniture.'
"I looked at the chair: the seat of it was a mass of nailholes. And
then Christina, noticing my looks of perplexity, said:
"'Last Christmas we were very, very poor. Papa was out of work. We
could scarcely get enough to eat. Papa saw the preparations in the
store windows for Christmas--the great heaps of presents; and he saw
the busy parents hurrying about buying gifts for their children, and
he felt very sad that he could not give us any presents, not even to
little Ole, whom he loves so much. So he went into the blacksmith
shop of a friend, and, taking up a piece of iron that had been thrown
on the floor, he made that little hammer Ole has in his hand, and a
number of wrought nails; and he brought them home and showed Ole how
to use the hammer and drive the nails into the chair; and when he had
driven them all into the wood, papa would pry them out for him, and
the work would commence all over again, and Ole was happy all day
long.'
"I found my eyes growing damp; for I was thinking of the riotous
profusion of the rich, and of the costly toys they heap upon their
children; and the contrast of this poor man, unable to buy a single
cheap toy for his family, and giving his chubby boy a rude iron
hammer and nails, to pound into that poor stool, as a substitute for
doll or rocking-horse, was very touching. And then I looked with some
wonder at the straightforward honesty of the little maid, who, in the
midst of the new, fine house, was not ashamed to talk so frankly of
the dismal wretchedness and want which a few days before had been the
lot of the family. She saw nothing to be ashamed of in poverty; while
by meaner and more sordid souls it is regarded as the very abasement
of shame and crime.
"Ole was pounding away at his nails.
"'Does he not hurt himself sometimes?' I asked.
"'Oh yes, she said, laughing; 'at first he would hit his little
fingers many a hard rap; and he would start to cry, but papa would
tell him that "_men_ never cry;--and then it was funny to see how he
would purse up his little red mouth, while the tears of pain ran down
from his big round eyes, but not a sound more would escape him.'
"And I said to myself: 'This is the stuff of which was formed the
masterful race that overran the world under the names of a dozen
different peoples. Ice and snow made the tough fiber, mental and
physical, which the hot sun of southern climes afterward melted into
the viciousness of more luxurious nations. Man is scourged into
greatness by adversity, and leveled into mediocrity by prosperity.
This little fellow, whose groans die between his set teeth, has in
him the blood of the Vikings.'
"There was one thing I did out of policy, which yet went very much
against my inclinations, in dealing with such good and honest people.
I knew that in all probability I had been traced by the spies of the
Oligarchy to this house; they would regard it of course as a crazy
adventure, and would naturally assign it to base purposes. But it
would not do for me to appear altogether different, even in this
family, from the character I had given myself out to be, of a
reckless and dissipated man; for the agents of my enemies might talk
to the servant, or to members of the household. And so the second
night I came home to supper apparently drunk. It was curious to see
the looks of wonder, sorrow and sympathy exchanged between the
members of the family as I talked ramblingly and incoherently at the
table. But this feint served one purpose; it broke down the barrier
between landlord and tenants. Indeed, paradoxical as it may seem, I
think they thought more of me because of my supposed infirmity; for
'pity is akin to love;' and it is hard for the tenderer feelings of
the heart to twine about one who is so strong and flawless that he
demands no sympathy or forbearance at our hands. I ceased to be the
rich owner of a house--I was simply one of themselves; a foolish
journeyman printer; given to drink, but withal a kindly and pleasant
man. Two days afterwards, Christina, who had looked at me several
times with a troubled brow, took me aside and tried to persuade me to
join a temperance society of which her father was a member. It was
very pretty and touching to see the motherly way in which the little
woman took my hand, and coaxed me to give up my vice, and told me,
with eloquent earnestness, all the terrible consequences which would
flow from it. I was riot foolish enough to think that any tender
sentiment influenced her. It was simply her natural goodness, and her
pity for a poor fellow, almost now one of their own family, who was
going to destruction. And indeed, if I had been a veritable drunkard,
she would have turned me from my evil courses. But I assured her that
I would try to reform; that I would drink less than previously, and
that, on the next New Year's day, I might be able to summon up
courage enough to go with her father to his society, and pledge
myself to total abstinence. She received these promises with many
expressions of pleasure; and, although I had to keep up my false
character, I never afterwards wounded her feelings by appearing
anything more than simply elevated in spirit by drink.
"They were a very kind, gentle, good people; quite unchanged by
prosperity and unaffected in their manners. Even in their poverty the
children had all looked clean and neat; now they were prettily, but
not expensively, dressed. Their religious devotion was great; and I
endeared myself to them by sometimes joining in their household
prayers. And I said to myself: If there is no God--as the miserable
philosophers tell us--there surely ought to be one, if for nothing
else than to listen to the supplications of these loving and grateful
hearts. And I could not believe that such tender devotions could
ascend and be lost forever in empty and unresponsive space. The
impulse of prayer, it seems to me, presupposes a God."