and presently he got up and went out.
XI. THEO'S NEW BUSINESS
Theodore went slowly down the stairs, but stopped on the outside steps
and stood there with his hands in his pockets looking listlessly up
and down the street. There was another big tenement house opposite,
and on its steps sat a girl of ten or eleven with a baby in her
lap. The baby kept up a low wailing cry, but the girl paid no
attention to it. She sat with her head leaning against the house, and
seemed to notice nothing about her.
Theodore glanced at her indifferently. His thoughts were still
dwelling on his great disappointment--the sorrowful ending of the
hopes and longings of so many weeks. It seemed to him that he had now
nothing to which to look forward; nothing that was worth working for.
Then suddenly there flashed into his mind the words he had heard the
bishop speak to a man who came to him one day in great sorrow.
"My life is spoiled," the man had said. "All my hopes and plans are
destroyed. What shall I do?"
And the bishop had answered, "My son, you must forget yourself, and
your broken hopes and plans, and think of others. Do something for
somebody else--and keep on doing."
"That's what he would say to me, I s'pose," thought the boy. "I wonder
what I can do. There's Tommy O'Brien, I 'spect he'd be glad 'nough to
see most anybody."
He turned and went slowly and reluctantly back up the stairs. He
didn't want to see Tommy O'Brien. He didn't want to see anybody just
then, but still he went on to Tommy's door. As he approached it, he
heard loud, angry voices mingled with the crying of a baby. He
knocked, but the noise within continued, and after a moment's pause he
pushed open the door and went in.
The three women who lived in the room were all standing with red,
angry faces, each trying to outscold the others. Three or four little
children, with frightened eyes, were huddled together in one corner,
while a baby cried unheeded on the floor, its mother being too much
occupied with the quarrel to pay any attention to her child. The
women glanced indifferently at Theodore as he entered, and kept on
with their loud talk. Theo crossed over to Tommy's cot. The sick boy
had pulled his pillow over his head and was pressing it close to his
ears to shut out the racket.
"Le'me 'lone!" he exclaimed, as Theodore tried to lift the pillow. His
face was drawn with pain and there were dark hollows beneath his heavy
eyes. Such a weary, suffering face it was that a great flood of pity
surged over Theodore's heart at sight of it. Then Tommy opened his
eyes and as he saw who had pulled aside his pillow a faint smile crept
around his pale lips.
"Oh!" he cried. "It's you. I thought 'twas some o' them a-pullin' off
my piller. Can't you make 'em stop, Tode? They've been a-fightin' off
an' on all day." He glanced at the noisy women as he spoke.
"What's the row about?" asked Theo.
"'Cause Mis' Carey said Mis' Green's baby was cross-eyed. Mis' Green
got so mad at that that she's been scoldin' 'bout it ever since an'
leavin' the baby to yell there by itself on the floor--poor little
beggar! Seem's if my head'll split open with all the noise," sighed
Tommy, wearily, then he brightened up as he inquired, "What d' you
come for, Tode?"
"Just to talk to you a little," replied Theo. "S'pose you get awful
tired layin' here all the time, don't ye, Tommy?"
The unexpected sympathy in the voice and look touched the lonely heart
of the little cripple. His eyes filled with tears, and he reached up
one skinny little hand and laid it on the rough, strong one of his
visitor as he answered,
"Oh, you don't know--you don't know anything about it, Tode. I don't
b'lieve dyin' can be half so bad's livin' this way. She wishes I'd
die. She's said so lots o' times," he nodded toward his aunt, who was
one of the women in the room, "an' I wish so too, 'f I've got to be
this way always."
"Ain't ye never had no doctor, Tommy?" asked Theo, with a quick catch
in his breath as he realised dimly what it would be to have such a
life to look forward to.
"No--she says she ain't got no money for doctors," replied the boy,
soberly.
"I'll"--began Theodore, then wisely concluding to raise no hopes that
might not be realised, he changed his sentence to, "I'll find out if
there's a doctor that will come for nothin'. I believe there is
one. Can ye read, Tommy?"
The sick boy shook his head. "How could I?" he answered. "Ain't nobody
ter show me nothin'."
"Wonder 'f I couldn't," said Theo, thoughtfully. "I c'n tell ye the
letters anyhow, an' that'll be better'n nothin'."
A bit of torn newspaper lay on the floor beside the bed. He picked it
up and pointed out A, O and S, to Tommy. By the time the little
cripple had thoroughly mastered those three letters so that he could
pick them out every time, the women had given up their quarrel.
Mrs. Green had taken up her baby and was feeding it, and the other
women, with sullen faces, had resumed their neglected duties.
"Oh dear! Must you go?" Tommy exclaimed as Theo got off the cot on
which he had been sitting. "But you was real good to come,
anyhow. When'll ye come again an' tell me some more letters?"
"I'll show ye one ev'ry day if I can get time. Then in three weeks
you'll know all the big ones an' some o' the little ones that are just
like the big ones. Now don't ye forget them three."
"You bet I won't. I shall say 'em a hundred times 'fore to-morrow,"
rejoined the little fellow, and his eyes followed his new friend
eagerly until the door closed behind him.
As for Theodore himself, half the weight seemed to have been lifted
from his own heart as he went down the stairs again.
"I'll run outside a minute 'fore I go to supper," he said to
himself. "The air was awful thick in that room. Reckon that's one
thing makes Tommy feel so bad."
He walked briskly around two or three squares, and as he came back to
the house he noticed that the girl and the baby still sat where he had
seen them an hour before. The baby's cry had ceased, but it began
again as Theo was passing the two. He stopped and looked at them. The
girl's eyes rested on his face with a dull, indifferent glance.
"What makes it cry? Is it sick?" the boy asked, nodding toward the
baby.
The girl shook her head.
"What ails it then?"
"Starvin'."
The girl uttered the word in a lifeless tone as if it were a matter of
no interest to her.
"Where's yer mother?" pursued the boy.
"Dead."
"An' yer father?"
"Drunk."
"Ain't there nobody to look out for ye?"
Again the girl shook her head.
"Ain't ye had anything to eat to-day?"
"No."
"What d'ye have yesterday?"
"Some crusts I found in the street. Do go off an' le'me 'lone. We're
most dead, an' I'm glad of it," moaned the girl, drearily.
"You gi' me that baby an' come along. I'll get ye somethin' to eat,"
cried Theo, and as the girl looked up at him half doubtfully and half
joyfully, he seized the bundle of shawl and baby and hurried with it
up to Nan's room, the girl dragging herself slowly along behind him.
Nan cast a doubtful and half dismayed glance at the two strangers as
Theodore ushered them in, but the boy exclaimed,
"They're half starved, Nan. We _must_ give 'em somethin' to eat,"
and when she saw the baby's little pinched face she hesitated no
longer, but quickly warmed some milk and fed it to the little one
while the girl devoured the bread and milk and meat set before her
with a ravenous haste that confirmed what she had said.
Then, refreshed by the food, she told her pitiful story, the old story
of a father who spent his earnings in the saloon, leaving his
motherless children to live or die as might be. Nan's heart ached as
she listened, and Theodore's face was very grave. When the girl had
gone away with the baby in her arms, Theo said, earnestly,
"Nan, I've got to earn more money."
"How can you?" Nan asked. "You work so hard now, Theo."
"I must work harder, Nan. I can't stand it to see folks starvin' an'
not help 'em. I'll pay you for what these two had you know."
Nan looked at him reproachfully. "Don't you think I want to help too?"
she returned. "Do you think I've forgotten that meal you gave Little
Brother an' me?"
"That was nothin'. Anyhow you've done lots more for me than ever I did
for you," the boy answered, earnestly, "but, Nan, how _can_ rich
folks keep their money for themselves when there are people--babies,
Nan--starvin' right here in this city?"
"I suppose the rich folks don't know about them," replied the girl,
thoughtfully, as she set the table for supper.
"I've got to talk it over with Mr. Scott," Theo said, as he drew his
chair up to the table.
"You talk everything over with Mr. Scott now, don't you, Theo?"
"'Most everything. He's fine as silk, Mr. Scott is. He rings true
every time, but he ain't"--
He left his sentence unfinished, but Nan knew of whom he was thinking.
The next afternoon Theodore walked slowly through the business
streets, with eyes and ears alert, for some opening of which he might
take advantage to increase his income. Past block after block he
wandered till he was tired and discouraged. Finally he sat down on
some high stone steps to rest a bit, and while he sat there a coloured
boy came out of the building. He had a tin box and some rags in his
hands, and he began in an idle fashion to clean the brass railing to
the steps. Theodore fell into conversation with him, carelessly and
indifferently at first, but after a little with a sudden, keen
interest as the boy began to grumble about his work.
"I ain't a-goin' ter clean these yer ol' railin's many more times," he
said. "It's too much work. I c'n git a place easy where the' ain't no
brasses to clean, an' I'm a-goin' ter, too. All the office boys hates
ter clean brasses."
"What do ye clean 'em with?" Theodore inquired.
The boy held out the tin box. "This stuff an' soft rags. Say--you want
ter try it?"
He grinned as he spoke, but to his surprise his offer was
accepted. "Gi' me your rags," cried Theo, and he proceeded to rub and
polish energetically, until one side of the railings glittered like
gold.
"Yer a gay ol' cleaner!" exclaimed the black boy, as he lolled in
blissful idleness on the top step. "Now go ahead with the other rail."
But Theodore threw down the rags.
"Not much," he answered. "I've done half your work an' you can do the
other half."
"Oh, come now, finish up the job," remonstrated the other. "'Tain't
fair not to, for you've made that one shine so. I'll have ter put an
extry polish on the other to match it."
But Theodore only laughed and walked off saying to himself,
"Rather think this'll work first-rate."
He went straight to a store, and asked for "the stuff for shining up
brass," and bought a box of it. Then he wondered where he could get
some clean rags.
"Per'aps Mrs. Hunt'll have some," he thought, "an' anyhow I want to
see Jim."
So home he hastened as fast as his feet would carry him.
Good Mrs. Hunt was still a little cool to Theodore, though she could
see for herself how steady and industrious he was now, and how much he
had improved in every way; but she had never gotten over her first
impression of him, founded not only on his appearance and manners when
she first knew him, but also on Dick's evil reports in regard to
him. Now that Dick himself had gone so far wrong, his mother went
about with a heartache all the time, and found it hard sometimes to
rejoice as she knew she ought to do in the vast change for the better
in this other boy.
"Is Jim here?" Theodore asked when Mrs. Hunt opened the door in
response to his knock.
"Yes--what's wanted, Tode?" Jimmy answered for himself before his
mother could reply.
"Can you stay out o' school to-morrow?" Theo questioned.
"No, he can't, an' you needn't be temptin' him," broke in the mother,
quickly.
"Oh, come now, ma, wait till ye hear what he wants," remonstrated
Jimmy, in whose eyes Theo was just about right.
"I wanted him to run my stand to-morrow," said Theodore. "I've got
somethin' else to 'tend to. There's plenty o' fellers that would like
to run it for me, but ye see I can't trust 'em an' I _can_ trust
Jim every time."
Jimmy drew himself up proudly. "Oh, ma, do let me stay out an' do it,"
he cried, eagerly.
"It's Friday, an' we don't have much to do Fridays anyhow, in our
school."
"We-ell, I s'pose then you might stay out just this once," Mrs. Hunt
said, slowly, being fully alive to the advantages to Jimmy of such a
friendly feeling on Theo's part. She recognized Theodore's business
ability, and would have been only too glad to see her own boy develop
something of the same kind. She was haunted with a dread that he might
become idle and vicious as Dick had done.
"All right, then," Theodore responded, promptly. "You be ready to go
down with me at seven o'clock, Jim, an' I'll see you started all right
before I leave you. Oh, Mrs. Hunt, there's one more thing I want. Have
you any clean old rags?"
"For what?"
"Any kind o' soft white cotton stuff or old flannel will do," replied
the boy, purposely leaving her question unanswered. "I'll pay you for
'em, of course, if you let me have 'em."
"Well, I guess I ain't so stingy as all that comes to," exclaimed
Mrs. Hunt, sharply. "D'ye want 'em now?"
"I'll come for 'em after supper," answered the boy, thinking that it
was best to make sure of them, lest he be delayed for want of them in
the morning.
When later that evening, he knocked at her door, Mrs. Hunt had the
pieces ready for him, and the next morning, Jimmy was waiting in the
hall when Theo came from Nan's room with his big basket, and the two
boys went down the street carrying the basket between them. As soon as
its contents had been arranged as attractively as possible on the
clean white marbled oilcloth with which the stand was covered, and the
coffee made and ready to serve, Theo handed Jimmy two dollars in
dimes, nickels and pennies, to make change, and set off with the box
of paste in his pocket, and the roll of rags under his arm.
Jimmy watched him out of sight, and then with a proud sense of
responsibility awaited the appearance of his customers.
Theodore walked rapidly on till he reached the business streets where
most of the handsome stores and offices were. Then he slackened his
pace and went on slowly, glancing keenly at each building until he
came to one that had half a dozen brass signs on the front.
"Here's a good place to make a try," he said to himself, and going
into the first office on the ground floor he asked as politely as he
knew how,
"Can I shine up your brass signs for you?"
There were several young men in the outer office. One of them answered
carelessly, "Yes indeed, shine 'em up, boy, and see 't you make a good
job of it."
"I will that, sir," responded Theodore, blithely, and set to work with
a will.
There had been much wet weather and the signs were badly
discoloured. It took hard, steady rubbing for nearly an hour to get
them into good shining order, but Theodore worked away vigourously
until they gleamed and glittered in the morning sunlight. Then he went
again into the office.
"I've finished 'em, sir," he said to the young man to whom he had
spoken before, "an' I think I've made a good job of it. Will you step
out an' see what you think?"
"Not at all necessary. If you're satisfied, I am," replied the man,
bending over his desk and writing rapidly.
Theodore waited in silence. The young man wrote on. Finally he glanced
up and remarked in a tone of surprise,
"Oh, you here yet? Thought you'd finished your job."
"I have done my part. I'm waitin' for you to do yours," replied the
boy.
"Mine? What's my part, I'd like to know?" demanded the young man,
sharply.
"To pay me for my work." replied Theo, promptly, but with a shadow
falling on his face.
"Pay you? Well, if this isn't cheeky! I didn't agree to pay you
anything."
"But you knew that I expected to be paid for my work," persisted the
boy, the angry colour rising in his cheeks.
"You expected--pshaw! Young man, you've had a lesson that is well
worth the time and labour you've expended," remarked the clerk in a
tone of great dignity. "Hereafter you will know better than to take
anything for granted in business transactions. Good-morning," and he
turned his back on the boy and began to write again.
Theodore glanced around the room to see if there was any one on his
side, but two of the other clerks were grinning at his discomfiture,
and the others pretended not to know anything about the affair. He saw
now that he had been foolish to undertake the work as he had done, but
he realised that it would not help his case to make a fuss about
it. All the same he was unwilling to submit without a protest.
"Next time I'll take care to make my bargain with a gentleman," he
said, quietly.
He saw a singular change in the expression of the clerk's face at
these words, and as he turned sharply about to leave the office he
almost ran into a tall, grey-haired man who had just entered.
"Stop a bit, my boy. I don't understand that remark of yours. What
bargain are you going to make with a gentleman?"
The tone of authority, together with the disturbed face of one clerk
and the quite evident amusement of the others, suddenly enlightened
Theodore. He knew instinctively that this man was master here and in a
few quick sentences he told what had happened.
The gentleman listened in silence, but his keen, dark eyes took note
of the flushed face of one clerk and the amused smiles of his
companions.
"Is this boy's story true, Mr. Hammond?" he asked, sternly.
Mr. Hammond could not deny it "It was only a joke, sir," he said,
uneasily.
"A joke, was it?" responded his employer. "I am not fond of such
jokes." Then he turned again to the boy and inquired, "How much is due
you for cleaning the signs?"
"I don't know. I'm just starting in in this business, an' I'm not sure
what I ought to charge. Can you tell me, sir?"
The gentleman smiled down into the young face lifted so frankly to
his.
"Why, no," he answered, gravely, but with a twinkle in his eyes. "I
believe our janitor usually attends to the signs."
"Guess he don't attend to 'em very well, for they were awful dirty,"
remarked the boy. "Took 'me 'most an hour to shine 'em up. Did you
notice 'em, sir, as you came in?"
"No, I did not. I'll look at them now," and Theodore followed the
gentleman out to the steps.
"Well, you have made a good job of it, certainly," the gentleman
said. "The signs haven't shone like that since they were first put
there. Quite a contrast to the others on the building. Come back
into the office a moment."
He went back to Mr. Hammond's desk and again Theodore followed.
"Mr. Hammond," said the gentleman, quietly, "you are willing of course
to pay for your joke. The boy has done his work extremely well. I
think he ought to have half a dollar for it."
With anything but a happy expression, Mr. Hammond drew from his
pocket a half dollar and handed it to Theodore, who said, not to the
clerk, but to the gentleman, "Thank you, sir," and left the office.
But he did not leave the building. He went to the owner of every brass
sign in or on the building and asked to be allowed to make every other
sign look as well as those of T.S. Harris, which he had just polished.
Now, T.S. Harris was the owner of the building and the occupants of
the other offices considered that it would be wise to follow his
example in this matter, so the result was that Theodore spent all the
morning over the signs on that one building, and Mr. Harris having set
the price, he received twenty-five cents for each sign. He was just
putting a finishing rub on the last one when the janitor discovered
what had been going on. He came at the boy in a great rage for he
wanted no one to have anything to do with the care of the building
except those whom he chose to hire.
"You take your traps an' clear out o' this now, an' don't you ever
dare to show your face here again," he shouted, angrily. "If I catch
ye here again I'll kick ye down the stairs!"
"P'raps Mr. Harris will have a word to say about that," replied
Theodore, coolly, for in one and another of the offices he had picked
up enough to convince him that the word of Mr. Harris was law in that
building. Then he added, in a much more friendly tone,
"Now, look here, mister. You're too busy a man to be cleaning
signs--'course you are. You've got to hire somebody t' do it an' the'
won't anybody do it better or fer less money 'n I will. I'm a-goin' to
make a reg'lar business of cleanin' brasses all 'round this
neighbourhood, an' if you'll stan' by me an' help me fix it all right
with the other bosses 'bout here--I'll see 't you don't lose anythin'
by it."
The janitor's fierce frown had slowly faded as the boy spoke. Nothing
pleased him so much as to be considered a person of influence, and had
Theodore been ever so shrewd he could have adopted no other line of
argument that would so quickly and effectually have changed an enemy
into a friend as did this that he hit upon merely by chance. The man
stepped down to the sidewalk and looked up at the signs with a
critical air.
"Wai'," he answered, slowly, "I ain't a-goin' to deny that you've done
your work well--yes a sight better'n any of the lazy rascals I've been
hiring, an' if you could be depended on now, I d'know but what I
might's well give the work to you as to anybody else. Of course, as
you say, 'tain't my place to do servant's work like brass cleanin'."
"Of course not," assented Theo, promptly.
"But then," the man went on, "if I should speak for ye t' the janitors
of the other buildings 'long here, 'n' get ye a big line o' custom,
'course I sh'ld have a right t' expect a--er--a sort o' commission on
the profits, so to speak?"
"Oh!" replied Theodore, rather blankly. "What _is_ a commission,
anyhow?"
The man explained.
"And how much of a commission would you expect?" questioned the boy.
The janitor made a mental calculation. Here on this one building, the
boy had cleaned seven signs. That made a dollar and seventy-five cents
that he had earned in one morning. Of course he would not often get so
much out of one building, but the man saw that there were good
possibilities in this line of work.
"S'pose we say ten per cent.--ten cents out of every dollar?" he
ventured, with a keen glance at the boy.
"You mean ten per cent, on all the work that I get through you?" Theo
replied.
"Oh no--on _all_ the work of this sort that you do. That's no
more'n fair since you'll owe your start to me."
"Not much! I owe my start to myself, an' I'll make no such bargain as
that," answered Theo, decidedly. "I'm willin' to give you ten per
cent. on all that I get through you, but not a cent more. You see I'm
bound to put this thing through whether you help me or not," he added,
quietly.
The janitor saw that he had been too grasping and hastened to modify
his demands lest he lose his commissions altogether.
"Well, well," he said, soothingly, "we won't quarrel over a little
difference like that. Let it be as you say, ten per cent. on all the
jobs I get for ye, an' there's the janitor of the Laramie Building on
the steps this minute. Come along with me an' I'll give ye a start
over there--or, first--ain't there a little matter to attend to," he
added, with an insinuating smile. "You'll settle your bills fast as
they come due, of course, an' you've got a snug little sum out of my
building here."
"Yes, but no thanks to you for that," replied Theo, but as the man's
face darkened again, he added, "but never mind, I'll give you the
commission on this work since it's in your building," and he handed
eighteen cents to the janitor, who slipped it into his pocket with an
abstracted air as if unconscious of what he was doing.
The result of the man's recommendation to his brother janitor was that
Theodore secured the promise of all the brass cleaning in the Laramie
Building also, and that with one or two small jobs kept him busy until
dark when he went home with a light heart and with the sum of three
dollars and fourteen cents in his pocket. To be sure he had worked
hard all day to earn it, but Theodore never had been lazy and he was
willing enough to work hard now.
He carried home some oranges as a special treat that night, for now he
took his supper regularly with Nan who was glad to make a return in
this fashion for the help he was continually giving her in carrying
out her food supplies, as well as many other ways.
As they arose from the supper-table, Theodore said, "I'll go across
an' see how Jimmy got on to-day, at the stand," but even as he spoke
there came a low knock at the door and there stood Jimmy--no longer
proud and happy as he had been in the morning, but with red eyes and a
face full of trouble.