Peter Pape swung from the saddle and, pulling the reins over Polkadot's
head, led the law's "strong arm" down the heights over the way he had
ascended on horseback. A glance into the hectic visage beside him
offered the assurance that, while not yet under arrest, he soon would be
if he failed to find those circle-marked trees.
"The town that owns this park, now, should be the last to blame us for
mistaking our locale," he took occasion to argue amongst their downward
stumbles. "It's like a regular frontier wilderness--almost. There's
nothing much around to break the solitude except people--only about six
or seven million of them per day. And there's nothing to break the
silence except----Listen to that never-ending drone! Don't it sound for
all the world like the wind playing through pines?"
"Sounds more like motors to me--Fords _and_ automobiles a-playing over
macadam," grumbled the guard.
But Why-Not Pape was not easily to be diverted from his dream. "And yon
green dome to the north of the range--" he lifted eyes and a hand--"just
couldn't look more like the copper stain on a butte within binocular
range of my Hellroaring ranch house."
"Lay off of that irreverence. You can't cuss at the Cathedral of St.
John the Divine--not in my presence, you can't!"
The topmost of the trail-blazing trees Pape offered as Exhibit "A" for
the defense. The line of them, when sighted from below, looked to be
leading, he declared.
An off-duty grin humanized the official countenance. "White paint spots
tell the tree gang to saw down dying trunks and haul the logs to the
saw-mill over in North Meadow. If you was to follow all of them as
bridle signs you'd get yourself and that gingham nag of yourn sentenced
for life. This once I'm going to try to believe you're as green as you
look. C'mon down to the path."
Their wait at the equestrian trail was not long. A traffic policeman,
mounted on a well-groomed bay, loped toward them, evidently on his way
back to stables from a tour of duty that, from his magnificent
appearance, easily might have included several flirtations and at least
one runaway rescue. At a signal from his fellow afoot, he drew rein.
"You'll be doing me a favor, Medonis Moore, if you'll shoo this bird
outen the park," wheezed he of the whistle. "I got a date 'sevening and
Night Court's not me rondy-voo."
"What's he gone and done, O'Shay?"
"Called me a quail for one thing, which shows you at the start that he's
kind of off. I'm right many queer things, like my lady friend tells me,
but never that--not a quail."
"Nor a quailer from duty, eh Pudge?"
Ignoring the jibe, the weighty one went into detail. "He rode his horse
up to the top of the bluff. Says he's from somewheres far West. Framed
up a foolish excuse about believing in signs like religion. Says them
white spots on the doomed trees was no lost language to him, but a
message from the dead that led him wrong. Get me--or him? Howsomever,
I'm willing to leave him go this time on account his being
good-natured."
"Account of that date, don't you mean?"
The sparrow chaser drew up with dignity. "Which or whether, will you do
me the favor, Medonis, of shooing him out?"
The colloquy had advanced of its own spirit, without interruption or
plea from Why-Not Pape. Polkadot had improved the interim by
nose-rubbing an acquaintance with the "'Donis" mount. Here at last was
one of his kind of whom he could approve. Even though the police horse
showed to be too much groomed--was overly "dressy," as Why-Not often
said of human passers-by--his tail was not docked and he wore a saddle
very near "regular," certainly not one of those pads of leather on which
most of the park riders posted up and down like monkeys on so many
sticks.
"Come along, bo," decided the magnificent director of traffic. "I'm
weak, but maybe I can keep you on the crooked and narrow far as the
must-you-go gate."
With a friendly farewell to the "sparrow" who had a "date," Pape rode
off with his new, enforced escort, Polkadot and the officer's bay fell
into step.
"Paint that horse yourself?" inquired "'Donis" Moore, with a grin.
This brought a laugh from Pape. "No, my friend; he was foaled as is, so
far as his colors go. He's just mixed a bit like me, and feels kind of
lonesome in your cold New York."
"New York cold?"
"You see, Dot and I came expecting the kind of time-of-our-lives we'd
heard about. And we haven't had it--not yet."
The handsome officer, who presumedly had been nicknamed after Adonis by
the Force, nodded understandingly. "Ain't the trouble with your
expectations, now? Would you be likely to hear of those times-of-lives,
if they was the regular thing?"
"But we're not looking for the regular thing. And why not expect? Don't
you get what you go after? You, for instance--I should think you'd
expect the limit that kind Fate could give. If I looked like you----"
There was a sincerity of admiration in Pape's lanky shrug and lapsing
sigh such as "'Donis" Moore evidently wasn't fortified to resist. He
turned his dark eyes and fine-cut profile to a more detailed study of
his by-proxy charge.
Pape pursued the advantage. "Sound looking critter you're forking,
officer. What you call him?"
"Hylan is his name--Traffic 'B.'"
"That's a new horse alias to me. Dot here does a polka when persuaded
right. If Highland, now, does a fling, we might join them in a 'brother'
act and put them on the stage."
"You'll be trespassing the dignity of our sacred mayor, as well as the
people's park, if you ain't careful," warned 'Donis Moore. "H-y-l-a-n is
what I said was his name and he don't own up to flings like you mean any
more than our chief executive."
The Westerner looked interested. "Named your nag after your boss, eh?
Not an untactful idea at all. Hope hoss Hylan explains to Polkadot what
fine company he's in. First real acquaintance my poor brute's met up
with since I rode him out of the home corral and into a baggage car
which I couldn't hocus-pocus him into thinking was the latest in
stables. I reckon it was too portable. He'll be glad to know that he is
starting at the top in equine circles--with His Honor the Mayor's
namesake."
"You talk kind of discouraged, bo. Just what's gone wrong?"
"Nothing's gone wrong. You see, nothing's started."
"Then why don't you start something?"
Pape's attention looked much more arrested than his person. "Start
something?"
"Sure. Something, say, along the partic'aler line of your ambitions."
"The ambitions that have kept me on the move over the four States of my
past range wouldn't lead me into any nice place in this burg of rules
and regulations, I fear. Even out in God's country they had to make
allowance for a lot I did. Here, seems like there's an Indian sign hung
on me. Not a soul knows or cares who or what I am."
Evidently interested, the police rider checked his mount's manger-bound
trot to a walk, for they were nearing their division of ways.
"Would you be satisfied, now, with folks knowing who and what you really
are?" he asked impressively, throwing his weight on the right stirrup,
as he leaned toward his charge. "Who and what do you want to be?"
"Who doesn't matter so much. _What_ I want to be is gay--to get as much
out of playing as I do out of working when I'm home."
'Donis Moore looked him over critically. "You want to be a gay bird and
you ride around looking like the last shad in the Hudson!" Obviously
pleased with his role of mentor, Donis' dark, handsome face lighted with
his argument. "You see, bo, the people are right busy in this burg. They
can't stop to chum with strangers. You got to get in step with
them--insist on chumming with them as you swing along. First you got to
look like what you want to be. Appertainin' to which, I'd get me some
civilized togs if I was you--that is, if you happen to have any spare
change in them corduroys."
"Change?" enquired Pape. "I let them keep the change. I could buy quite
a chunk of this town--a whole cold shoulder of it--without straining my
finances. I mean that and at present prices. What I haven't got is
friends--not one among all these millions upon millions of effete folks.
I'm wondering if the run of the cards wouldn't have been some different
B. P."
"B. P.? How come? I ain't no Greek studjent any more than I'm a
descendant of Anna Eva Fay."
"Before Prohibition," Why-Not accommodated. "But then, I wouldn't want
the sort of friends whose innards I had to win any more than I'd want
those I could win with my outards. Clothes don't make the man--or so the
poets say."
"That dope's blank verse, young fellow. Leastwise, the opposite holds in
N'Yawk. The wrong clothes unmake him." The cop dandy straightened, with
an illustrative, downward glance over his own brass-buttoned
magnificence. "I'm giving it to you right, bo. Unless you're a celeb,
and have earned a sort of special license to dress contrary to form,
you'd best flatter the people you wanta trot with by harnessing out as
near like 'em as possible. You been wearing that broad-brim on Broadway?
You _have_, eh? Don't you see that they just naturally take you for a
steerer--likely think you're wanting to sell 'em stock in some gilt
mine? Not meaning to hurt your feelings, I'll say that the piebald
you're riding is the only O. K. thing about you. Happens to be a fawncy
of our _au fait_ cits. to ride broncs this spring. Seeing you're so
careless about your cash, you'd best throw some into the talons of a
tailor and a hatter and a near-silk-shirt grafter. Then, after you've
got yourself looking something like the gay guy you say you wanta be,
begin to act like him. _Do_ something, if you get me, to make 'em notice
you."
They parted at the "Remember the Maine" monument, the official mentor's
argument duly paid for in thanks, and a "good-luck" hope exchanged.
What could he do to make New York notice him?
Peter Pape pondered the question as Polkadot dodged through Columbus
Circle's whirligig of traffic--a feat which took all the skill acquired
in cutting out steers from range round-ups. The disinterested source of
the invited advice recommended its substance. Before he had walked his
mount a block down _The_ Way he had decided to follow it. Its first
half--the acquirement of the outer habiliments of sophistication--easily
could be acted upon through the free coinage of gold. The second
half----
_How_ make the big town wish to be friends with him?
To himself he admitted the reason back of his confidence to the friendly
Medonis of the Mounted. The very seriousness of his score-squaring
mission to the "cold" burg, made him ambitious to be taken for that "gay
guy" who must be haberdashed into his part--a Western gold-fish come
East to flap his fins in the Big Puddle. He mustn't forget that he now
was a wealthy man, with no obligations except one voluntary vow and that
to himself; that he still was young enough to feel as gay as any costume
could make him look; that so far in life he had proved strong enough to
do whatever he had decided to do.
So what--_what_?
The dusk of even this daylight-saving hour was thickening. Pape urged
his mount into the rack of Times Canon. There, toward the convergence of
each street, clumps of vehicles spun forward, only to stop and lose all
they had gained at the command of traffic signals. Variously bound
surface cars clattered through; clanged with self-importance; puffed
with passengers. Pedestrians darted this way, often, to turn and dart
back that, in what seemed a limb-regardless passion to get home in the
fewest possible seconds. Like flour upon the other ingredients in some
great mixing bowl, Evening was sifted over all, then stirred into a
conglomerate, working mass--dough to be baked by dinner time.
The sensation rather than sight of an overhead flash caused the
splotched horse to throw back his head with a snort and the rider to
hang his gaze on high. Unexpectedly, as happen most miracles, a blaze
lit the ungeometrical square and searched the lowering clouds--millions
of watts bottled in bulbs--a fan-fare of nitrogen dyed red, yellow,
blue, green and diamond-white--incalculable volts of power wired into
legible array.
The gray eyes of the Westerner upheld, fascinated, to this sight of
Broadway's electric display, to him the marvel of the marvels of to-day.
Always was his pulse stirred by it and his imagination set apace. As,
when a child, he had pored over the lurid illustrations of his
fairy-book, so now nightly he pored over this real-life picture. For him
it lit a bridle path into byways of the unknown--into the highway of the
impossible.
A moment before a problem had darkened his brow. Now the darkness was
displaced by light. Over the suggested answer to the unanswerable he
exulted. What was difficulty of any sort except illusion? His Fatness
the Quail--that is to say, the park sparrow cop--to-day had accused him
of believing too devoutly in signs. Yet _what_ were signs for if not to
point the way?
His chuckles evoked the curiosity of Polkadot. Back toward him waggled
one white-tipped, enquiring ear. Willingly, as at all such requests of
his quadruped pal, he leaned to oblige.
"Why not?" He laughed aloud. "I ask you that, old hoss--_why not_?"