THE NIGHT-HAWKS.
Mr. Shell was proprietor of the New Hope Oyster Saloon. He got up nice
game suppers, and treated his customers to ale, whiskey, and brandy.
Philip loved good living, and often ate an oyster-stew and a broiled
quail, and washed it down with a glass of ale, late at night in Mr.
Shell's rooms, in company with three or four other boys. After supper
they had cigars and a game of cards, till midnight, when Mr. Shell put
out his lights and closed his doors, often interrupting them in the
middle of a game. That was not agreeable, and so the young gentlemen
hired a room over the saloon, fitted it up with tables and chairs, and
organized a club, calling themselves "Night-Hawks." Philip was the chief
hawk. They met nearly every evening. No one could get into their room
without giving a signal to those within, and they had a secret sign by
which they knew each other in the dark.
At first they enjoyed themselves, playing cards, smoking cigars,
drinking ale, sipping hot whiskey punch, and telling stories; but in a
short time the stories were not worth laughing at, the games of cards
were the same thing over and over, and they wanted something more
exciting.
It was the fall of the year. There was rich fruit in the orchards and
gardens of New Hope, russet and crimson-cheeked apples, golden-hued
pears, luscious grapes purpling in the October sun, and juicy melons.
The bee-hives were heavy with honey, and the bees were still at work,
gathering new sweets from the late blooming flowers. Many baskets of
ripe apples and choicest pears, many a bunch of grapes, with melons,
found their way up the narrow stairs to the room of the Night-Hawks.
There was a pleasing excitement in gathering the apples and pears under
the windows of the unsuspecting people fast asleep, or in plucking the
grapes from garden trellises at midnight. But people began to keep
watch.
"We must throw them off our track. I'll make them think that Paul does
it," said Philip to himself one day. He had not forgotten the night of
Daphne's party,--how Paul had won a victory and he had suffered defeat.
Paul was respected; he was the leader of the choir, and was getting on
in the world. "I'll fix him!" said he.
The next morning, when Mr. Leatherby kindled the fire in his shoe-shop,
he found that the stove would not draw. The smoke, instead of going up
the funnel, poured into the room, and the fire, instead of roaring and
blazing, smouldered a few moments and finally died out. He kindled it
again, opened the windows to let in the air, but it would not burn. He
got down on his knees and blew till he was out of breath, got his eyes
filled with smoke, which made the tears roll down his cheeks. The shop
was a mere box of a building, with a low roof; so he climbed up and
looked into the chimney and found it stuffed with newspapers. Pulling
them out, he saw a crumpled piece of writing-paper. He smoothed it out.
"Ah! what is this?" said he; and, putting on his spectacles, he read,
"North 69 deg. East, 140 rods to a stake; South 87 deg. West, 50 rods to an
oak-tree."
"That is Paul Parker's figuring, I reckon. I always knew that Paul loved
fun, but I didn't think he would do this!" said Mr. Leatherby to
himself, more in sorrow than in anger.
"Good morning, Mr. Leatherby," said Philip, coming up at that moment.
"What is the matter with your chimney?"
"Some of you boys have been playing a trick upon me."
"Who, I should like to know, is there in New Hope mean enough to do
that?" Philip asked.
"Whose figuring do you call that?" Mr. Leatherby asked, presenting the
paper.
"Paul Parker's, as sure as I am alive! You ought to expose him, Mr.
Leatherby."
"I don't like to say anything against him. I always liked him; but I
didn't think he would cut up such a shine as this," Mr. Leatherby
replied.
"Appearances are deceptive. It won't do for me to say anything against
Paul, for people might say I was envious; but if I were you, Mr.
Leatherby, I'd put him over the road," said Philip, walking on.
Mr. Leatherby thought the matter over all day, as he sat in his dingy
shop, which was only a few rods from Mr. Chrome's, where Paul was
painting wagons, singing snatches of songs, and psalms and hymns. Mr.
Leatherby loved to hear him. It made the days seem shorter. It rested
him when he was tired, cheered him when he was discouraged. It was like
sunshine in his soul, for it made him happy. Thinking it over, and
hearing Paul's voice so round, clear, full, and sweet, he couldn't make
up his mind to tell anybody of the little joke. "After all, he didn't
mean anything in particular, only to have a little fun with me. Boys
will be boys,"--and so Mr. Leatherby, kind old man that he was,
determined to keep it all to himself.
When Paul passed by the shop on his way home at night, he said, "Good
evening, Mr. Leatherby," so pleasantly and kindly, that Mr. Leatherby
half made up his mind that it wasn't Paul who did it, after all, but
some of the other boys,--Bob Swift, perhaps, a sly, cunning, crafty
fellow, who was one of Philip's cronies. "It would be just like Bob, but
not at all like Paul, and so I won't say anything to anybody," said the
mild old man to himself.
Miss Dobb's shaggy little poodle came out, barking furiously at Paul as
he passed down the street. Paul gave him a kick which sent him howling
towards the house, saying, "Get out, you ugly puppy!" Miss Dobb heard
him. She came to the door and clasped the poodle to her bosom, saying,
"Poor dear Trippee! Did the bad fellow hurt the dear little Trippee?"
Then she looked savagely at Paul, and as she put out her hand to close
the door, she seemed to clutch at Paul with her long, bony fingers, as
if to get hold of him and give him a shaking.
Trip wasn't hurt much, for he was out again in a few minutes, snapping
and snarling at all passers-by. Just at dark he was missing. Miss Dobb
went to the door and called, "Trip! Trip! Trip!" but he did not come at
her call. She looked up and down the street, but could not see him. The
evening passed away. She went to the door many times and called; she
went to Mr. Shelbarke's and to Mr. Noggin's, but no one had seen Trip.
She went to bed wondering what had become of him, and fearing that
somebody had killed or stolen him.
But in the night she heard him whining at the door. She opened it
joyfully. "Where have you been, you dear little good-for-nothing darling
Trip?" she said, kissing him, finding, as she did so, that all his hair
had been sheared off, except a tuft on the end of his tail. She was so
angry that she could not refrain from shedding tears. The puppy
shivered, trembled, and whined in the cold, and Miss Dobb was obliged
to sew him up in flannel. He looked so funny in his coat, with the tuft
of hair waving on the end of his tail, that Miss Dobb laughed
notwithstanding her anger. In the morning she went out to tell her
neighbors what had happened, and met Philip.
"Good morning. I hope you are well, Miss Dobb," he said politely.
"Yes, I am well, only I am so vexed that I don't know what to do."
"Indeed! What has happened?"
"Why, somebody has sheared all of Trip's hair off, except a tuft on the
end of his tail, which looks like a swab. It is an outrageous insult,
for Trip had a beautiful tail. I would pull every hair out of the
villain's head, if I knew who did it."
"Who was it that kicked your dog last night, and called him an ugly
puppy?" Philip asked.
Miss Dobb remembered who, and her eyes flashed. Philip walked on, and
came across Bob Swift, who had been standing round the corner of Mr.
Noggin's shop, listening to all that was said. They laughed at
something, then stopped and looked at Mr. Noggin's bees, which were
buzzing and humming merrily in the bright October sun.
That night Mr. Noggin heard a noise in his yard. Springing out of bed
and going to the window, he saw that a thief was taking the boxes of
honey from his patent hives. He opened the door and shouted, "Thief!
Thief!" The robber ran. In the morning Mr. Noggin found that the thief
had dropped his hat in his haste. He picked it up. "Aha! 'Pears to me I
have seen this hat before. Paul Parker's, as sure as I am alive!" he
said. It was the hat which Paul wore in Mr. Chrome's paint-shop.
Everybody knew it, because it was daubed and spattered with paint.
Mr. Noggin went to his work. He was a well-meaning man, but
shallow-brained. He knew how to make good barrels, tubs, and buckets,
but had no mind of his own. He put on his leather apron, and commenced
driving the hoops upon a barrel, pounding with his adze, singing, and
making the barrel ring with
"Cooper ding, cooper ding, cooper ding, ding, ding!
Cooper ding, cooper ding, cooper ding, ding, ding!
Cooper ding, job, job,
Cooper ding, bob, bob,
Heigh ho,--ding, ding, ding!"
Mr. Noggin was rattling on in that fashion when Miss Dobb, followed by
Trip, entered the shop.
"Well, I declare! That is the first time I ever saw a pup with a shirt
on," said Mr. Noggin, stopping and looking at the poodle sewed up in
flannel. "That is Paul Parker's doings,--I mean the shearing," said Miss
Dobb, her eyes flashing indignantly.
"Paul's work! O ho! Then he shears pups besides robbing bee-hives, does
he?" said Mr. Noggin. He told Miss Dobb what had happened.
"It is your duty, Mr. Noggin, to have him arrested at once. You are
under imperative obligations to the community as a law and order abiding
citizen to put the sheriff upon his track. He is a hypocrite. He ought
to be pitched out of the singing-seats head first." So Miss Dobb wound
Mr. Noggin round her finger, and induced him to enter a complaint
against Paul.