Captain Elisha was very far from considering himself a Solomon. As he
would have said he had lived long enough with himself to know what a lot
he didn’t know. Nevertheless, deep down in his inner consciousness, he
cherished a belief in his judgment of human nature. This judgment was
not of the snap variety; he took his time in forming it. People and
their habits, their opinions and characters, were to him interesting
problems. He liked to study them and to reach conclusions founded upon
reason, observation, and common sense. Having reached such a conclusion,
it disturbed him when the subjects of the problem suddenly upset the
whole process of reasoning and apparently proved him wrong by behavior
exactly contrary to that which he had expected.
He had been pretty well satisfied with the result of his visit to
young Dunn at the latter’s office. Malcolm had surrendered, perhaps
not gracefully or unconditionally, but he had surrendered, and the
condition--secrecy--was one which the captain himself had suggested.
Captain Elisha’s mental attitude toward the son of the late Tammany
leader had been a sort of good-natured but alert tolerance. He judged
the young man to be a product of rearing and environment. He had known
spoiled youths at the Cape and, in their surroundings, they behaved much
as Malcolm did in his. The same disrespect to their elders, the same
cock-sureness, and the same careless indifference concerning the effect
which their actions might have upon other people--these were natural and
nothing but years and the hard knocks of experience could bring about a
change. Elkanah Chase, country swell and pampered heir to the cranberry
grower’s few thousands, and Malcolm Dunn, idol of his set at the
Metropolitan Club, were not so very different, except in externals. The
similarity confirmed his opinion that New York was merely South Denboro
many thousand times magnified.
He knew how young Chase had behaved after an interview not unlike that
just described. In Elkanah’s case several broken windows and property
destroyed on a revel the night before the Fourth had caused the trouble.
In Malcolm’s it was an automobile. Both had listened to reason and had
knuckled under rather than face possible lawsuits and certain publicity.
Chase, however, had sulkily refused to speak to him for a month, and
regained affability merely because he wished to borrow money. According
to the captain’s deduction, Dunn should have acted in similar fashion.
But he didn’t; that was the odd part of it.
For Malcolm, when he next called, in company with his mother, at the
Warren apartment, was not in the least sulky. Neither was he over
effusive, which would have argued fear and a desire to conciliate.
Possibly there was a bit more respect in his greeting of the new
guardian and a trifle less condescension, but not much. He still hailed
Captain Elisha as “Admiral,” and was as mockingly careless as ever in
his remarks concerning the latter’s newness in the big city. In fact, he
was so little changed that the captain was perplexed. A chap who could
take a licking when he deserved it, and not hold malice, must have good
in him, unless, of course, he was hiding the malice for a purpose. And
if that purpose was the wish to appear friendly, then the manner of
hiding it proved Malcolm Dunn to possess more brains than Captain Elisha
had given him credit for.
One thing seemed sure, the Dunns were not openly hostile. And Caroline
was. Since the interview in the library, when the girl had, as she
considered it, humiliated herself by asking her guardian for money to
help the Moriartys, she had scarcely spoken to him. Stephen, taking his
cue from his sister, was morose and silent, also. Captain Elisha found
it hard to forgive his dead brother for bringing all this trouble upon
him.
His lawyers, so Sylvester informed him, were setting about getting
Rodgers Warren’s tangible assets together. The task was likely to be a
long one. The late broker’s affairs were in a muddled state, the books
were anything but clear, some of the investments were foreign, and, at
the very earliest, months must elapse before the executor and trustee
could know, for certain, just how large a property he was in charge of.
He found some solace and forgetfulness of the unpleasant life he was
leading in helping the stricken Moriarty family. Annie, the maid at the
apartment, he swore to secrecy. She must not tell Miss Caroline of his
visits to her parents’ home. Doctor Henry, also, though he could not
understand why, promised silence. Caroline herself had engaged his
services in the case, and he was faithful. But the patient was more
seriously hurt than at first appeared, and consultations with a
specialist were necessary.
“Goin’ to be a pretty expensive job, ain’t it, Doctor?” asked the
captain of the physician.
“Rather, I’m afraid.”
“All right. If expense is necessary, don’t be afraid of it. You do just
what you’d ought to, and send the bill to me.”
“But Miss Warren insisted upon my sending it to her. She said it was a
private matter, and one with which you, as her guardian, had nothing to
do.”
“I know. Caroline intends to use her own allowance, I s’pose. Well,
let her think she will, if ‘twill please her. But when it comes to
the settlement, call on me. Give her any reason you want to; say
a--er--wealthy friend of the family come to life all at once and
couldn’t sleep nights unless he paid the costs.”
“But there isn’t any such friend, is there, Captain Warren? Other than
yourself, I mean?”
Captain Elisha grinned in appreciation of a private joke. “There is
somebody else,” he admitted, “who’ll pay a share, anyhow. I don’t
know’s he’s what you call a bosom friend, and, as for his sleepin’
nights--well, I never heard he couldn’t do that, after he went to bed.
But, anyhow, you saw wood, or bones, or whatever you have to do, and
leave the rest to me. And don’t tell Caroline or anybody else a word.”
The Moriartys lived in a four-room flat on the East Side, uptown, and
his visits there gave the captain a glimpse of another sort of New
York life, as different from that of Central Park West as could well be
imagined. The old man, Patrick, his wife, Margaret, the unmarried son,
Dennis, who worked in the gas house, and five other children of various
ages were hived somehow in those four small rooms and Captain Elisha
marveled greatly thereat.
“For the land sakes, ma’am,” he asked of the nurse, “how do they do it?
Where do they put ‘em nights? That--that closet in there’s the pantry
and woodshed and kitchen and dinin’ room; and that one’s the settin’
room and parlor; and them two dry-goods boxes with doors to ‘em are
bedrooms. There’s eight livin’ critters to stow away when it’s time to
turn in, and one whole bed’s took up by the patient. _Where_ do they
put the rest? Hang ‘em up on nails?”
The nurse laughed. “Goodness knows!” she said. “He should have been
taken to the hospital. In fact, the doctor and I at first insisted upon
his removal there. He would have been much better off. But neither he
nor his wife would hear of it. She said he would die sure without his
home comforts.”
“Humph! I should think more likely he’d die with ‘em, or under ‘em. I
watch that fleshy wife of his with fear and tremblin’. Every time she
goes nigh the bed I expect her to trip over a young one and fall. And if
she fell on that poor rack-o’-bones,” with a wave of the hand toward the
invalid, “‘twould be the final smash--like a brick chimney fallin’ on a
lath hencoop.”
At that moment the “brick chimney” herself entered the rooms and the
nurse accosted her.
“Captain Warren here,” she said, “was asking where you all found
sleeping quarters.”
Mrs. Moriarty smiled broadly. “Sure, ‘tis aisy,” she explained. “When
the ould man is laid up we’re all happy to be a bit uncomfortable. Not
that we are, neither. You see, sor, me and Nora and Rosy sleep in the
other bed; and Dinnie has a bit of a shakedown in the parlor; and Honora
is in the kitchen; and--”
“There! there!” Captain Elisha interrupted hastily, “don’t tell me any
more. I’d rather _guess_ that the baby bunks in the cookstove oven than
know it for sartin. How did the grapes I sent you go?” turning to the
sick man.
“Aw, sor! they were foine. God bless you, sor! Mary be kind to you, sor!
Sure the angels’ll watch over you every day you live and breathe!”
Captain Elisha bolted for the parlor, the sufferer firing a gatling
fusillade of blessings after him. Mrs. Moriarty continued the
bombardment, as she escorted him to the door of the flat.
“There! there!” protested the captain. “Just belay! cut it short,
there’s a good woman! I’ll admit I’m a saint and would wear a halo
instead of a hat if ‘twa’n’t so unfashionable. Good day. If you need
anything you ain’t got, tell the nurse.”
The grateful Irish woman did not intend to let him escape so easily.
“Aw, sor,” she went on, “it’s all right for you to make fun. I’m the
jokin’ kind, sor, meself. Whin the flats where we used to be got afire
and Pat had to lug me down the fire escape in his arms, they tell me
I was laughin’ fit to kill; that is, when I wasn’t screechin’ for fear
he’d drop me. And him, poor soul, never seein’ the joke, but puffin’ and
groanin’ that his back was in two pieces. Ha, ha! Oh, dear! And him
in two pieces now for sure and all! Aw, sor, it’s all right for you to
laugh it off, but what would we do without you? You and Miss Caroline,
God bless her!”
“Caroline? She doesn’t come here, does she?”
“Indade she does. Sure, she’s the perfect little lady! Hardly a day
passes--or a week, anyhow--that she doesn’t drop in to see how the ould
man’s gettin’ on.”
“Humph! Well, see that you don’t tell her about me.”
Mrs. Moriarty held up both hands in righteous protestation. _She_ tell?
Might the tongue of her wither between her teeth before it let slip a
word, and so on. Captain Elisha waved her to silence.
“All right! all right!” he exclaimed. “So long! Take good care of your
husband, and, and--for Heaven’s sake, walk careful and don’t step on any
of the children.”
Mrs. Moriarty’s tongue did not wither; at all events, it was lively
enough when he next met her. The captain’s secret was not divulged, and
he continued his visits to the flat, taking care, however, to ascertain
his niece’s whereabouts beforehand. It was not altogether a desire to
avoid making his charitable deeds public which influenced him. He had a
habit of not letting his right hand know what his left was about in
such cases, and he detested a Pharisaical philanthropist. But there
was another reason why Caroline must not learn of his interest in the
Moriartys. If she did learn it, she would believe him to be helping them
on his own responsibility; or, if not, that he was using money belonging
to the estate. Of course he would, and honestly must, deny the latter
charge, and, therefore, the first would, to her mind, be proven. He
intended that Malcolm Dunn should pay the larger share of the bills, as
was right and proper. But he could not tell Caroline that, because she
must not know of the young man’s responsibility for the accident. He
could not give Malcolm the credit, and he felt that he ought not to take
it himself. It was a delicate situation.
He was lonely, and the days seemed long. Reading the paper, walking in
the park, occasionally dropping in at the lawyers’ offices, or visiting
the shops and other places of interest about town made up the monotonous
routine. He breakfasted early, waited upon by Edwards, got lunch at the
restaurant nearest to wherever he happened to be at noon, and returned
to the apartment for dinner. His niece and nephew dined with him, but
when he attempted conversation they answered in monosyllables or not at
all. Every evening he wrote a letter to Abbie, and the mail each morning
brought him one from her. The Dunns came frequently and seemed disposed
to be friendly, but he kept out of their way as much as possible.
Pearson he had not seen since the latter’s call. This was a
disappointment, for he fancied the young fellow and believed he should
like him even better on closer acquaintance. He would have returned the
visit, but somehow or other the card with the boarding-house street and
number had been lost or mislaid, and the long list of “James Pearsons”
in the directory discouraged him. He speculated much concerning
the mystery at which the would-be novelist hinted as preventing his
accepting Caroline’s invitation. Evidently Pearson had once known
Rodgers Warren well, and had been esteemed and respected by the latter.
Caroline, too, had known him, and was frankly pleased to meet him again.
Whatever the trouble might be, she, evidently, was ignorant of it. The
captain wondered and pondered, but reached no satisfactory conclusion.
It seemed the irony of fate that the one congenial person--Sylvester
excepted--whom he had met during his stay in the big city should be
scratched from his small list of acquaintances.
With Sylvester he held many familiar and enjoyable chats. The
good-natured, democratic senior member of the law firm liked to have
Captain Elisha drop in for advice or to spin yarns. Graves, who was
well again, regarded the new guardian with respect of a kind, but with
distinct disapproval. The captain was, in his opinion, altogether too
flippant and jolly. There was nothing humorous in the situation, as
Graves saw it, and to laugh when one’s brother’s estate is in a tangle,
indicated unfitness, if nothing worse. Kuhn was a sharp, quick-moving
man, who had no time for frivolity if it delayed business.
It was after a long interview with Sylvester that Captain Elisha decided
to send Stephen back to college. When he broke the news there was
rebellion, brief but lively. Stephen had no desire to continue his
studies; he wished to become a stock broker at once, and, as soon as he
was of age, take his father’s seat on the Exchange.
“Stevie,” said Captain Elisha, “one of these days, when you get to be
as old as I am or before, you’ll realize that an education is worth
somethin’.”
“Ugh!” grunted the boy, in supreme disgust. “What do you know about
that?”
“Why, not much, maybe, but enough.”
“Yes?” sarcastically. “What college did you attend?”
“Me? Why, none, more’s the pity. What learnin’ there was in our family
your dad had. Maybe that’s why he was what he was, so fur as money and
position and society and so on went, and I’m what _I_ am.”
“Oh, rubbish! What difference does it make to Malcolm Dunn--now--his
going through college?”
“Well, he went, didn’t he?”
Stephen grinned. Malcolm had told him some particulars concerning his
university career and its termination.
“He went--part way,” he answered.
“Ya-as. Well, you’ve gone part way, so fur. And now you’ll go the rest.”
“I’d like to know why.”
“For one reason, because I’m your guardian and I say so.”
Stephen was furiously angry. His father’s indulgence and his sister’s
tolerance had, in most cases, made his will law in the household. To be
ordered about in this way by an ignorant interloper, as he considered
his uncle, was too much.
“By gad,” he shouted, “we’ll see!”
“No, we’ve seen. You run along now and pack your trunk. And take
my advice and study hard. You’ll be behindhand in your work, so Mr.
Sylvester tells me, but you’re smart, and you can catch up. Make us
proud of you; that’s what you can do.”
His nephew glanced at him. Captain Elisha was smiling kindly, but there
was no sign of change of purpose in his look.
Stephen ground his teeth.
“Oh,” he snarled, “if it wasn’t for the disgrace! If things weren’t as
they are, I’d--”
“S-s-s-h! I know; but they are. Maybe I wish they wa’n’t ‘most as much
as you do, but they are. I don’t blame you for feelin’ mad now; but I’m
right and I know it. And some day you’ll know it, and thank me.”
“When I do, I’ll be insane.”
“No, you’ll be older, that’s all. Now pack your trunk--or get the
Commodore to pack it for you.”
* * * * *
News from the Moriarty sick room continued favorable for a time. Then,
with alarming suddenness, a change came. The broken hip was mending
slowly, but poor Pat’s age was against him, and the shock and long
illness were too much for his system to fight. Dr. Henry shook his
head dubiously when the captain asked questions. And, one morning at
breakfast, Edwards informed him that the old man was dead. Annie had
been summoned by telephone at midnight and had gone home.
Captain Elisha, though not greatly surprised, was shocked and grieved.
It seemed such a needless tragedy, almost like murder, although there
was no malice in it. And the thought of the fatherless children and the
poverty of the stricken family made him shudder. Death at any time, amid
any surroundings, is terrible; when the dead hands have earned the bread
for many mouths it is appalling.
The captain dreaded visiting the flat, but because he felt it to be a
duty he went immediately. And the misery and wailing and dismay he found
there were worse than his anticipations. He did his best to comfort and
cheer. Mrs. Moriarty alternately called upon the saints to bless him and
begged to know what she would do now that they were all sure to starve.
Luckily, the family priest, a kind-hearted, quiet man who faced similar
scenes almost every day of his life, was there, and Captain Elisha had a
long talk with him. With Dennis, the oldest son, and Annie, the maid
at the Warrens’, he also consulted. Money for their immediate needs,
he told them, he would provide. And the funeral expenses must not
worry them. Afterward--well, plans for the future could be discussed at
another time. But upon Dennis and Annie he tried to impress a sense of
their responsibility.
“It’s up to you, Boy,” he said to the former. “Annie’s job’s sure, I
guess, as long as she wants it, and she can give her mother somethin’
every month. But you’re the man of the house now, and you’ve got to
steer the ship and keep it afloat. That means work, and hard work,
lots of it, too. You can do it, if you’ve got the grit. If I can find
a better place and more pay for you, I will, but you mustn’t depend on
that. It’s up to you, I tell you, and you’ve got to show what’s in you.
If you get stuck and need advice, come to me.”
He handed the priest a sum of money to cover immediate contingencies,
and departed. His letter to Abbie that afternoon was so blue that the
housekeeper felt sure he was “coming down” with some disease or other.
He had been riding in that awful subway, where the air--so the papers
said--was not fit to breathe, and just as like as not he’d caught
consumption. His great-uncle on his mother’s side died of it, so it “run
in the family.” Either he must come home or she should come to him, one
or the other.
But before evening his blueness had disappeared. He had just returned
to his room, after stepping into the hall to drop his letter in the mail
chute, when his niece knocked at the door. He was surprised to see her,
for she had not spoken to him, except in brief reply to questions, since
their misunderstanding in that very room. He looked at her wonderingly,
not knowing what to say or what to expect; but she spoke first.
“Captain Warren,” she began, hurriedly, “the last time I came to
you--the last time I came here, I came to ask a favor, and you--I
thought you--”
She was evidently embarrassed and confused. Her guardian was
embarrassed, also, but he tried to be hospitable.
“Yes, Caroline,” he said, gravely, “I know what you mean. Won’t
you--won’t you sit down?”
To his surprise, she accepted the invitation, taking the same chair she
had taken on the occasion of their former interview. But there was a
look in her eyes he had never seen there before; at least, not when she
was addressing him.
She went on, speaking hastily, as though determined to head off any
questioning on his part.
“Captain Warren,” she began once more, “the time I came to you in this
room you were, so I thought, unreasonable and unkind. I asked you for
money to help a poor family in trouble, and you refused to give it to
me.”
“No, Caroline,” he interrupted, “I didn’t refuse, you only thought I
did.”
She held up her hand. “Please let me go on,” she begged. “I thought you
refused, and I couldn’t understand why. I was hurt and angry. I knew
that father never would have refused me under such circumstances, and
you were his brother. But since then, only to-day, I have learned that I
was wrong. I have learned--”
She paused. The captain was silent. He was beginning to hope, to believe
once more in his judgment of character; and yet, with his hope and
growing joy, there was a trifle of anxiety.
“I have learned,” went on his niece, “that I was mistaken. I can’t
understand yet why you wished to wait before saying yes, but I do know
that it must have been neither because you were unkind nor ungenerous.
I have just come from those poor people, and they have told me
everything.”
Captain Elisha started. “What did they tell you?” he asked, quickly.
“Who told you?”
“Annie and her mother. They told me what you had done and were doing for
them. How kind you had been all through the illness and to-day. Oh, I
know you made them promise not to tell me; and you made the doctor and
nurse promise, too. But I knew _someone_ had helped, and Annie dropped
a hint. Then I suspected, and now I know. Those poor people!”
The captain, who had been looking at the floor, and frowning a bit,
suddenly glanced up to find his niece’s eyes fixed upon him, and they
were filled with tears.
“Will you forgive me?” she asked, rising from her chair, and coming
impulsively toward him. “I’m sorry I misjudged you and treated you so.
You must be a very good man. Please forgive me.”
He took her hand, which was swallowed up in his big one. His eyes were
moist, also.
“Lord love you, dearie,” he said, “there’s nothin’ to forgive. I
realized that I must have seemed like a mean, stingy old scamp. Yet I
didn’t mean to be. I only wanted to look into this thing just a little.
Just as a matter of business, you know. And I.... Caroline, did that
doctor tell you anything more?”
“Any more?” she repeated in bewilderment. “He told me that you were the
kindest man he had ever seen.”
“Yes, yes. Well, maybe his eyesight’s poor. What I mean is did he tell
you anything about anybody else bein’ in this with me?”
“Anybody else? What do you mean?”
“Oh, nothin’, nothin’. I joked with him a spell ago about a wealthy
relation of the Moriarty tribe turnin’ up. ‘Twas only a joke, of course.
And yet, Caroline, I--I think I’d ought to say--”
He hesitated. What could he say? Even a hint might lead to embarrassing
questions and he had promised Dunn.
“What ought you to say?” asked his niece.
“Why, nothin’, I guess. I’m glad you understand matters a little better
and I don’t intend for the estate nor you to pay these Moriarty bills.
Just get ‘em off your mind. Forget ‘em. I’ll see that everything’s
attended to. And, later on, if you and me can, by puttin’ our heads
together, help those folks to earnin’ a better livin’, why, we will,
hey?”
The girl smiled up at him. “I think,” she said, “that you must be one
who likes to hide his light under a bushel.”
“I guess likely a two-quart measure’d be plenty big enough to hide mine.
There! there! We won’t have any more misunderstandin’s, will we? I’m a
pretty green vegetable and about as out of place here as a lobster in
a balloon, but, as I said to you and Steve once before, if you’ll
just remember I _am_ green and sort of rough, and maybe make allowances
accordin’, this cruise of ours may not be so unpleasant. Now you
run along and get ready for dinner, or the Commodore’ll petrify from
standin’ so long behind your chair.”
She laughed, as she turned to go. “I should hate to have him do that,”
she said. “He would make a depressing statue. I shall see you again in a
few minutes, at dinner. Thank you--Uncle.”
She left Captain Elisha in a curious state of mind. Against his will he
had been forced to accept thanks and credit which, he believed, did not
rightfully belong to him. It was the only thing to do, and yet it seemed
almost like disloyalty to Malcolm Dunn. This troubled him, but the
trouble was, just then, a mere pinhead of blackness against the radiance
of his spirit.
His brother’s daughter had, for the first time, called him uncle.