"And, do you know," here the young man dawdled with his pencil and
presently ceased working for the moment, "I've always felt as if I had
had a hand in it--though I was only seven. I'd done something so naughty
and wrong that I looked forward all day to my father's home-coming as a
sinner looks forward to going to hell. My father had never punished me.
But he would this time, I knew--and I was terribly afraid and--sometimes
I have thought that, perhaps, I prayed to God that my father might never
come home. I'm not sure I prayed that--but I have a sneaking suspicion
that I did. Anyway, he never came, and, Great Grief! what a time there
was. My mother nearly went insane--"
"What had you done?" I asked, forcing a smile, "to merit such terrible
punishment?"
The young man blushed.
"Why," he said, "my mother had been quite sick for a long time, and, to
tempt her appetite, my father had journeyed 'way uptown and at vast
expense bought her a bunch of wonderful white hot-house grapes. I
remember she wouldn't eat them at first--just wanted to look at
them--and my father hung them for her over the foot of the bed. Well,
soon after he'd gone to business she fell asleep, leaving the grapes
untouched. They tempted me, and I fell. I wanted to show off, I suppose,
before my young friends in the street--there was a girl, Minnie
Hopflekoppf, I think her name was, who'd passed me up for an Italian
butcher's son. I wanted to show _her_. I'm sure I didn't mean to eat the
things. I'm sure I meant to return with them and hang them back at the
foot of the bed."
"Please go on," I managed to say. "This is such a very human page--I'm
really excited to know what happened."
"Well, one of those flashy Bowery dudes came loafing along and said:
'Hi, Johnny, let's have a look at the grapes,' I let him take them, in
my pride and innocence, and he wouldn't give them back. He only laughed
and began to eat them before my eyes. I begged for them, and wept, and
told him how my mother was sick and my father had gone 'way uptown to
get the grapes for her because there were none such to be had in our
neighborhood. And, please, he must give them back because they were
White Muscats of Alexandria, very precious, and my father would kill me.
But the young man only laughed until I began to make a real uproar. Then
he said sharply to shut up, called me a young thief, and said if I said
another word he'd turn me over to the police. Then he flung me a
fifty-cent piece and went away, munching the grapes. And," the young man
finished, "the fifty-cent piece was lead."
Then he looked up from his sketch and, seeing the expression of my
face, gave a little cry of delight.
"Great Grief, man!" he cried, "stay as you are--only hold that
expression for two minutes!"
But I have held it from that day to this.