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A
REVERSIBLE
SANTA CLAUS
BY
MEREDITH NICHOLSON
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
FLORENCE H. MINARD
BOSTON and NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
1917
COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY MEREDITH NICHOLSON
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
_Published October 1917_
By Meredeth Nicholson
A REVERSIBLE SANTA CLAUS. Illustrated.
THE PROOF OF THE PUDDING. Illustrated.
THE POET. Illustrated.
OTHERWISE PHYLLIS. With frontispiece in color.
THE PROVINCIAL AMERICAN AND OTHER PAPERS.
A HOOSIER CHRONICLE. With illustrations.
THE SIEGE OF THE SEVEN SUITORS. With illustrations.
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
A Reversible Santa Claus
[Illustration: "DO YOU MIND TELLING ME JUST WHY YOU READ THAT NOTE?"
_(Page 78)_]
Illustrations
"DO YOU MIND TELLING ME JUST WHY YOU READ THAT NOTE?" _Frontispiece_
THE HOPPER GRINNED, PROUD OF HIS SUCCESS,
WHICH MARY AND HUMPY VIEWED WITH GRUDGING ADMIRATION 44
THE FAINT CLICK OF A LATCH MARKED THE PROWLER'S PROXIMITY TO A HEDGE 116
THE THREE MEN GATHERED ROUND THEM, STARING DULLY 150
_From Drawings by F. Minard_
* * * * *
[Illustration]
A Reversible Santa Claus
I
Mr. William B. Aikins, _alias_ "Softy" Hubbard, _alias_ Billy The Hopper,
paused for breath behind a hedge that bordered a quiet lane and peered out
into the highway at a roadster whose tail light advertised its presence to
his felonious gaze. It was Christmas Eve, and after a day of unseasonable
warmth a slow, drizzling rain was whimsically changing to snow.
The Hopper was blowing from two hours' hard travel over rough country. He
had stumbled through woodlands, flattened himself in fence corners to
avoid the eyes of curious motorists speeding homeward or flying about
distributing Christmas gifts, and he was now bent upon committing himself
to an inter-urban trolley line that would afford comfortable
transportation for the remainder of his journey. Twenty miles, he
estimated, still lay between him and his domicile.
The rain had penetrated his clothing and vigorous exercise had not greatly
diminished the chill in his blood. His heart knocked violently against his
ribs and he was dismayed by his shortness of wind. The Hopper was not so
young as in the days when his agility and genius for effecting a quick
"get-away" had earned for him his sobriquet. The last time his Bertillon
measurements were checked (he was subjected to this humiliating
experience in Omaha during the Ak-Sar-Ben carnival three years earlier)
official note was taken of the fact that The Hopper's hair, long carried
in the records as black, was rapidly whitening.
At forty-eight a crook--even so resourceful and versatile a member of the
fraternity as The Hopper--begins to mistrust himself. For the greater part
of his life, when not in durance vile, The Hopper had been in hiding, and
the state or condition of being a fugitive, hunted by keen-eyed agents of
justice, is not, from all accounts, an enviable one. His latest experience
of involuntary servitude had been under the auspices of the State of
Oregon, for a trifling indiscretion in the way of safe-blowing. Having
served his sentence, he skillfully effaced himself by a year's siesta on
a pine-apple plantation in Hawaii. The island climate was not wholly
pleasing to The Hopper, and when pine-apples palled he took passage from
Honolulu as a stoker, reached San Francisco (not greatly chastened in
spirit), and by a series of characteristic hops, skips, and jumps across
the continent landed in Maine by way of the Canadian provinces. The Hopper
needed money. He was not without a certain crude philosophy, and it had
been his dream to acquire by some brilliant _coup_ a sufficient fortune
upon which to retire and live as a decent, law-abiding citizen for the
remainder of his days. This ambition, or at least the means to its
fulfillment, can hardly be defended as praiseworthy, but The Hopper was a
singular character and we must take him as we find him. Many prison
chaplains and jail visitors bearing tracts had striven with little
success to implant moral ideals in the mind and soul of The Hopper, but he
was still to be catalogued among the impenitent; and as he moved southward
through the Commonwealth of Maine he was so oppressed by his poverty, as
contrasted with the world's abundance, that he lifted forty thousand
dollars in a neat bundle from an express car which Providence had
sidetracked, apparently for his personal enrichment, on the upper waters
of the Penobscot. Whereupon he began perforce playing his old game of
artful dodging, exercising his best powers as a hopper and skipper. Forty
thousand dollars is no inconsiderable sum of money, and the success of
this master stroke of his career was not to be jeopardized by careless
moves. By craftily hiding in the big woods and making himself agreeable
to isolated lumberjacks who rarely saw newspapers, he arrived in due
course on Manhattan Island, where with shrewd judgment he avoided the
haunts of his kind while planning a future commensurate with his new
dignity as a capitalist.
He spent a year as a diligent and faithful employee of a garage which
served a fashionable quarter of the metropolis; then, animated by a worthy
desire to continue to lead an honest life, he purchased a chicken farm
fifteen miles as the crow flies from Center Church, New Haven, and boldly
opened a bank account in that academic center in his newly adopted name of
Charles S. Stevens, of Happy Hill Farm. Feeling the need of companionship,
he married a lady somewhat his junior, a shoplifter of the second class,
whom he had known before the vigilance of the metropolitan police
necessitated his removal to the Far West. Mrs. Stevens's inferior talents
as a petty larcenist had led her into many difficulties, and she
gratefully availed herself of The Hopper's offer of his heart and hand.
They had added to their establishment a retired yegg who had lost an eye
by the premature popping of the "soup" (i.e., nitro-glycerin) poured into
the crevices of a country post-office in Missouri. In offering shelter to
Mr. James Whitesides, _alias_ "Humpy" Thompson, The Hopper's motives had
not been wholly unselfish, as Humpy had been entrusted with the herding of
poultry in several penitentiaries and was familiar with the most advanced
scientific thought on chicken culture.
The roadster was headed toward his home and The Hopper contemplated it in
the deepening dusk with greedy eyes. His labors in the New York garage had
familiarized him with automobiles, and while he was not ignorant of the
pains and penalties inflicted upon lawless persons who appropriate motors
illegally, he was the victim of an irresistible temptation to jump into
the machine thus left in the highway, drive as near home as he dared, and
then abandon it. The owner of the roadster was presumably eating his
evening meal in peace in the snug little cottage behind the shrubbery, and
The Hopper was aware of no sound reason why he should not seize the
vehicle and further widen the distance between himself and a
suspicious-looking gentleman he had observed on the New Haven local.
The Hopper's conscience was not altogether at ease, as he had, that
afternoon, possessed himself of a bill-book that was protruding from the
breast-pocket of a dignified citizen whose strap he had shared in a
crowded subway train. Having foresworn crime as a means of livelihood, The
Hopper was chagrined that he had suffered himself to be beguiled into
stealing by the mere propinquity of a piece of red leather. He was angry
at the world as well as himself. People should not go about with
bill-books sticking out of their pockets; it was unfair and unjust to
those weak members of the human race who yield readily to temptation.
He had agreed with Mary when she married him and the chicken farm that
they would respect the Ten Commandments and all statutory laws, State and
Federal, and he was painfully conscious that when he confessed his sin she
would deal severely with him. Even Humpy, now enjoying a peace that he had
rarely known outside the walls of prison, even Humpy would be bitter. The
thought that he was again among the hunted would depress Mary and Humpy,
and he knew that their harshness would be intensified because of his
violation of the unwritten law of the underworld in resorting to
purse-lifting, an infringement upon a branch of felony despicable and
greatly inferior in dignity to safe-blowing.
These reflections spurred The Hopper to action, for the sooner he reached
home the more quickly he could explain his protracted stay in New York (to
which metropolis he had repaired in the hope of making a better price for
eggs with the commission merchants who handled his products), submit
himself to Mary's chastisement, and promise to sin no more. By returning
on Christmas Eve, of all times, again a fugitive, he knew that he would
merit the unsparing condemnation that Mary and Humpy would visit upon him.
It was possible, it was even quite likely, that the short, stocky
gentleman he had seen on the New Haven local was not a "bull"--not really
a detective who had observed the little transaction in the subway; but the
very uncertainty annoyed The Hopper. In his happy and profitable year at
Happy Hill Farm he had learned to prize his personal comfort, and he was
humiliated to find that he had been frightened into leaving the train at
Bansford to continue his journey afoot, and merely because a man had
looked at him a little queerly.
Any Christmas spirit that had taken root in The Hopper's soul had been
disturbed, not to say seriously threatened with extinction, by the
untoward occurrences of the afternoon.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
II
The Hopper waited for a limousine to pass and then crawled out of his
hiding-place, jumped into the roadster, and was at once in motion. He
glanced back, fearing that the owner might have heard his departure, and
then, satisfied of his immediate security, negotiated a difficult turn in
the road and settled himself with a feeling of relief to careful but
expeditious flight. It was at this moment, when he had urged the car to
its highest speed, that a noise startled him--an amazing little chirrupy
sound which corresponded to none of the familiar forewarnings of engine
trouble. With his eyes to the front he listened for a repetition of the
sound. It rose again--it was like a perplexing cheep and chirrup, changing
to a chortle of glee.
"Goo-goo! Goo-goo-goo!"
The car was skimming a dark stretch of road and a superstitious awe fell
upon The Hopper. Murder, he gratefully remembered, had never been among
his crimes, though he had once winged a too-inquisitive policeman in
Kansas City. He glanced over his shoulder, but saw no pursuing ghost in
the snowy highway; then, looking down apprehensively, he detected on the
seat beside him what appeared to be an animate bundle, and, prompted by a
louder "goo-goo," he put out his hand. His fingers touched something warm
and soft and were promptly seized and held by Something.
The Hopper snatched his hand free of the tentacles of the unknown and
shook it violently. The nature of the Something troubled him. He renewed
his experiments, steering with his left hand and exposing the right to
what now seemed to be the grasp of two very small mittened hands.
"Goo-goo! Goody; teep wunnin'!"
"A kid!" The Hopper gasped.
That he had eloped with a child was the blackest of the day's calamities.
He experienced a strange sinking feeling in the stomach. In moments of
apprehension a crook's thoughts run naturally into periods of penal
servitude, and the punishment for kidnaping, The Hopper recalled, was
severe. He stopped the car and inspected his unwelcome fellow passenger
by the light of matches. Two big blue eyes stared at him from a hood and
two mittens were poked into his face. Two small feet, wrapped tightly in a
blanket, kicked at him energetically.
"Detup! Mate um skedaddle!"
Obedient to this command The Hopper made the car skedaddle, but
superstitious dread settled upon him more heavily. He was satisfied now
that from the moment he transferred the strap-hanger's bill-book to his
own pocket he had been hoodooed. Only a jinx of the most malevolent type
could have prompted his hurried exit from a train to dodge an imaginary
"bull." Only the blackest of evil spirits could be responsible for this
involuntary kidnaping!
"Mate um wun! Mate um 'ippity stip!"
The mittened hands reached for the wheel at this juncture and an
unlooked-for "jippity skip" precipitated the young passenger into The
Hopper's lap.
This mishap was attended with the jolliest baby laughter. Gently but with
much firmness The Hopper restored the youngster to an upright position and
supported him until sure he was able to sustain himself.
"Ye better set still, little feller," he admonished.
The little feller seemed in no wise astonished to find himself abroad with
a perfect stranger and his courage and good cheer were not lost upon The
Hopper. He wanted to be severe, to vent his rage for the day's calamities
upon the only human being within range, but in spite of himself he felt no
animosity toward the friendly little bundle of humanity beside him.
Still, he had stolen a baby and it was incumbent upon him to free himself
at once of the appalling burden; but a baby is not so easily disposed of.
He could not, without seriously imperiling his liberty, return to the
cottage. It was the rule of house-breakers, he recalled, to avoid babies.
He had heard it said by burglars of wide experience and unquestioned
wisdom that babies were the most dangerous of all burglar alarms. All
things considered, kidnaping and automobile theft were not a happy
combination with which to appear before a criminal court. The Hopper was
vexed because the child did not cry; if he had shown a bad disposition The
Hopper might have abandoned him; but the youngster was the cheeriest and
most agreeable of traveling companions. Indeed, The Hopper's spirits rose
under his continued "goo-gooing" and chirruping.
"Nice little Shaver!" he said, patting the child's knees.
Little Shaver was so pleased by this friendly demonstration that he threw
up his arms in an effort to embrace The Hopper.
"Bil-lee," he gurgled delightedly.
The Hopper was so astonished at being addressed in his own lawful name by
a strange baby that he barely averted a collision with a passing motor
truck. It was unbelievable that the baby really knew his name, but perhaps
it was a good omen that he had hit upon it. The Hopper's resentment
against the dark fate that seemed to pursue him vanished. Even though he
had stolen a baby, it was a merry, brave little baby who didn't mind at
all being run away with! He dismissed the thought of planting the little
shaver at a door, ringing the bell and running away; this was no way to
treat a friendly child that had done him no injury, and The Hopper highly
resolved to do the square thing by the youngster even at personal
inconvenience and risk.
The snow was now falling in generous Christmasy flakes, and the high speed
the car had again attained was evidently deeply gratifying to the young
person, whose reckless tumbling about made it necessary for The Hopper to
keep a hand on him.
"Steady, little un; steady!" The Hopper kept mumbling.
His wits were busy trying to devise some means of getting rid of the
youngster without exposing himself to the danger of arrest. By this time
some one was undoubtedly busily engaged in searching for both baby and
car; the police far and near would be notified, and would be on the
lookout for a smart roadster containing a stolen child.
"Merry Christmas!" a boy shouted from a farm gate.
"M'y Kwismus!" piped Shaver.
The Hopper decided to run the machine home and there ponder the
disposition of his blithe companion with the care the unusual
circumstances demanded.
"'Urry up; me's goin' 'ome to me's gwanpa's kwismus t'ee!"
"Right ye be, little un; right ye be!" affirmed The Hopper.
The youngster was evidently blessed with a sanguine and confiding nature.
His reference to his grandfather's Christmas tree impinged sharply upon
The Hopper's conscience. Christmas had never figured very prominently in
his scheme of life. About the only Christmases that he recalled with any
pleasure were those that he had spent in prison, and those were marked
only by Christmas dinners varying with the generosity of a series of
wardens.
But Shaver was entitled to all the joys of Christmas, and The Hopper had
no desire to deprive him of them.
"Keep a-larfin', Shaver, keep a-larfin'," said the Hopper. "Ole Hop ain't
a-goin' to hurt ye!"
The Hopper, feeling his way cautiously round the fringes of New Haven,
arrived presently at Happy Hill Farm, where he ran the car in among the
chicken sheds behind the cottage and carefully extinguished the lights.
"Now, Shaver, out ye come!"
Whereupon Shaver obediently jumped into his arms.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
III
The Hopper knocked twice at the back door, waited an instant, and knocked
again. As he completed the signal the door was opened guardedly. A man and
woman surveyed him in hostile silence as he pushed past them, kicked the
door shut, and deposited the blinking child on the kitchen table. Humpy,
the one-eyed, jumped to the windows and jammed the green shades close into
the frames. The woman scowlingly waited for the head of the house to
explain himself, and this, with the perversity of one who knows the
dramatic value of suspense, he was in no haste to do.
"Well," Mary questioned sharply. "What ye got there, Bill?"
The Hopper was regarding Shaver with a grin of benevolent satisfaction.
The youngster had seized a bottle of catsup and was making heroic efforts
to raise it to his mouth, and the Hopper was intensely tickled by Shaver's
efforts to swallow the bottle. Mrs. Stevens, _alias_ Weeping Mary, was not
amused, and her husband's enjoyment of the child's antics irritated her.
"Come out with ut, Bill!" she commanded, seizing the bottle. "What ye been
doin'?"
Shaver's big blue eyes expressed surprise and displeasure at being
deprived of his plaything, but he recovered quickly and reached for a
plate with which he began thumping the table.
"Out with ut, Hop!" snapped Humpy nervously. "Nothin' wuz said about
kidnapin', an' I don't stand for ut!"
"When I heard the machine comin' in the yard I knowed somethin' was wrong
an' I guess it couldn't be no worse," added Mary, beginning to cry. "You
hadn't no right to do ut, Bill. Hookin' a buzz-buzz an' a kid an' when we
wuz playin' the white card! You ought t' 'a' told me, Bill, what ye went
to town fer, an' it bein' Christmas, an' all."
That he should have chosen for his fall the Christmas season of all times
was reprehensible, a fact which Mary and Humpy impressed upon him in the
strongest terms. The Hopper was fully aware of the inopportuneness of his
transgressions, but not to the point of encouraging his wife to abuse
him.
As he clumsily tried to unfasten Shaver's hood, Mary pushed him aside and
with shaking fingers removed the child's wraps. Shaver's cheeks were rosy
from his drive through the cold; he was a plump, healthy little shaver and
The Hopper viewed him with intense pride. Mary held the hood and coat to
the light and inspected them with a sophisticated eye. They were of
excellent quality and workmanship, and she shook her head and sighed
deeply as she placed them carefully on a chair.
"It ain't on the square, Hop," protested Humpy, whose lone eye expressed
the most poignant sorrow at The Hopper's derelictions. Humpy was tall and
lean, with a thin, many-lined face. He was an ill-favored person at best,
and his habit of turning his head constantly as though to compel his
single eye to perform double service gave one an impression of restless
watchfulness.
"Cute little Shaver, ain't 'e? Give Shaver somethin' to eat, Mary. I guess
milk'll be the right ticket considerin' th' size of 'im. How ole you make
'im? Not more'n three, I reckon?"
"Two. He ain't more'n two, that kid."
"A nice little feller; you're a cute un, ain't ye, Shaver?"
Shaver nodded his head solemnly. Having wearied of playing with the plate
he gravely inspected the trio; found something amusing in Humpy's bizarre
countenance and laughed merrily. Finding no response to his friendly
overtures he appealed to Mary.
"Me wants me's paw-widge," he announced.
"Porridge," interpreted Humpy with the air of one whose superior breeding
makes him the proper arbiter of the speech of children of high social
station. Whereupon Shaver appreciatively poked his forefinger into Humpy's
surviving optic.
"I'll see what I got," muttered Mary. "What ye used t' eatin' for supper,
honey?"
The "honey" was a concession, and The Hopper, who was giving Shaver his
watch to play with, bent a commendatory glance upon his spouse.
"Go on an' tell us what ye done," said Mary, doggedly busying herself
about the stove.
The Hopper drew a chair to the table to be within reach of Shaver and
related succinctly his day's adventures.
"A dip!" moaned Mary as he described the seizure of the purse in the
subway.
"You hadn't no right to do ut, Hop!" bleated Humpy, who had tipped his
chair against the wall and was sucking a cold pipe. And then, professional
curiosity overmastering his shocked conscience, he added: "What'd she
measure, Hop?"
The Hopper grinned.
"Flubbed! Nothin' but papers," he confessed ruefully.
Mary and Humpy expressed their indignation and contempt in unequivocal
terms, which they repeated after he told of the suspected "bull" whose
presence on the local had so alarmed him. A frank description of his
flight and of his seizure of the roadster only added to their bitterness.
Humpy rose and paced the floor with the quick, short stride of men
habituated to narrow spaces. The Hopper watched the telltale step so
disagreeably reminiscent of evil times and shrugged his shoulders
impatiently.
"Set down, Hump; ye make me nervous. I got thinkin' to do."
"Ye'd better be quick about doin' ut!" Humpy snorted with an oath.
"Cut the cussin'!" The Hopper admonished sharply. Since his retirement to
private life he had sought diligently to free his speech of profanity and
thieves' slang, as not only unbecoming in a respectable chicken farmer,
but likely to arouse suspicions as to his origin and previous condition of
servitude. "Can't ye see Shaver ain't use to ut? Shaver's a little gent;
he's a reg'ler little juke; that's wot Shaver is."
"The more 'way up he is the worse fer us," whimpered Humpy. "It's
kidnapin', that's wot ut is!"
"That's wot it _ain't_," declared The Hopper, averting a calamity to his
watch, which Shaver was swinging by its chain. "He was took by accident I
tell ye! I'm goin' to take Shaver back to his ma--ain't I, Shaver?"
"Take 'im back!" echoed Mary.
Humpy crumpled up in his chair at this new evidence of The Hopper's
insanity.
"I'm goin' to make a Chris'mas present o' Shaver to his ma," reaffirmed
The Hopper, pinching the nearer ruddy cheek of the merry, contented
guest.
Shaver kicked The Hopper in the stomach and emitted a chortle expressive
of unshakable confidence in The Hopper's ability to restore him to his
lawful owners. This confidence was not, however, manifested toward Mary,
who had prepared with care the only cereal her pantry afforded, and now
approached Shaver, bowl and spoon in hand. Shaver, taken by surprise,
inspected his supper with disdain and spurned it with a vigor that sent
the spoon rattling across the floor.
"Me wants me's paw-widge bowl! Me wants me's _own_ paw-widge bowl!" he
screamed.
Mary expostulated; Humpy offered advice as to the best manner of dealing
with the refractory Shaver, who gave further expression to his resentment
by throwing The Hopper's watch with violence against the wall. That the
table-service of The Hopper's establishment was not to Shaver's liking was
manifested in repeated rejections of the plain white bowl in which Mary
offered the porridge. He demanded his very own porridge bowl with the
increasing vehemence of one who is willing to starve rather than accept so
palpable a substitute. He threw himself back on the table and lay there
kicking and crying. Other needs now occurred to Shaver: he wanted his
papa; he wanted his mamma; he wanted to go to his gwan'pa's. He clamored
for Santa Claus and numerous Christmas trees which, it seemed, had been
promised him at the houses of his kinsfolk. It was amazing and bewildering
that the heart of one so young could desire so many things that were not
immediately attainable. He had begun to suspect that he was among
strangers who were not of his way of life, and this was fraught with the
gravest danger.
"They'll hear 'im hollerin' in China," wailed the pessimistic Humpy,
running about the room and examining the fastenings of doors and windows.
"Folks goin' along the road'll hear 'im, an' it's terms fer the whole
bunch!"
The Hopper began pacing the floor with Shaver, while Humpy and Mary
denounced the child for unreasonableness and lack of discipline, not
overlooking the stupidity and criminal carelessness of The Hopper in
projecting so lawless a youngster into their domestic circle.
"Twenty years, that's wot ut is!" mourned Humpy.
"Ye kin get the chair fer kidnapin'," Mary added dolefully. "Ye gotta get
'im out o' here, Bill."
Pleasant predictions of a long prison term with capital punishment as the
happy alternative failed to disturb The Hopper. To their surprise and
somewhat to their shame he won the Shaver to a tractable humor. There was
nothing in The Hopper's known past to justify any expectation that he
could quiet a crying baby, and yet Shaver with a child's unerring instinct
realized that The Hopper meant to be kind. He patted The Hopper's face
with one fat little paw, chokingly declaring that he was hungry.
'"Course Shaver's hungry; an' Shaver's goin' to eat nice porridge Aunt
Mary made fer 'im. Shaver's goin' to have 'is own porridge bowl
to-morry--yes, sir-ee, oo is, little Shaver!"
Restored to the table, Shaver opened his mouth in obedience to The
Hopper's patient pleading and swallowed a spoonful of the mush, Humpy
holding the bowl out of sight in tactful deference to the child's delicate
æsthetic sensibilities. A tumbler of milk was sipped with grateful gasps.
[Illustration: THE HOPPER GRINNED, PROUD OF HIS SUCCESS, WHICH MARY AND
HUMPY VIEWED WITH GRUDGING ADMIRATION]
The Hopper grinned, proud of his success, while Mary and Humpy viewed his
efforts with somewhat grudging admiration, and waited patiently until The
Hopper took the wholly surfeited Shaver in his arms and began pacing the
floor, humming softly. In normal circumstances The Hopper was not musical,
and Humpy and Mary exchanged looks which, when interpreted, pointed to
nothing less than a belief that the owner of Happy Hill Farm was bereft of
his senses. There was some question as to whether Shaver should be
undressed. Mary discouraged the idea and Humpy took a like view.
"Ye gotta chuck 'im quick; that's what ye gotta do," said Mary hoarsely.
"We don't want 'im sleepin' here."
Whereupon The Hopper demonstrated his entire independence by carrying the
Shaver to Humpy's bed and partially undressing him. While this was in
progress, Shaver suddenly opened his eyes wide and raising one foot until
it approximated the perpendicular, reached for it with his chubby hands.
"Sant' Claus comin'; m'y Kwismus!"
"Jes' listen to Shaver!" chuckled The Hopper. "'Course Santy is comin,'
an' we're goin' to hang up Shaver's stockin', ain't we, Shaver?"
He pinned both stockings to the foot-board of Humpy's bed. By the time
this was accomplished under the hostile eyes of Mary and Humpy, Shaver
slept the sleep of the innocent.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
IV
They watched the child in silence for a few minutes and then Mary detached
a gold locket from his neck and bore it to the kitchen for examination.
"Ye gotta move quick, Hop," Humpy urged. "The white card's what we wuz all
goin' to play. We wuz fixed nice here, an' things goin' easy; an' the yard
full o' br'ilers. I don't want to do no more time. I'm an ole man, Hop."
"Cut ut!" ordered The Hopper, taking the locket from Mary and weighing it
critically in his hand. They bent over him as he scrutinized the face on
which was inscribed:--
_Roger Livingston Talbot_
_June 13, 1913_
"Lemme see; he's two an' a harf. Ye purty nigh guessed 'im right, Mary."
The sight of the gold trinket, the probability that the Shaver belonged to
a family of wealth, proved disturbing to Humpy's late protestations of
virtue.
"They'd be a heap o' kale in ut, Hop. His folks is rich, I reckon. Ef we
wuzn't playin' the white card--"
Ignoring this shocking evidence of Humpy's moral instability, The Hopper
became lost in reverie, meditatively drawing at his pipe.
"We ain't never goin' to quit playin' ut square," he announced, to Mary's
manifest relief. "I hadn't ought t' 'a' done th' dippin'. It were a
mistake. My ole head wuzn't workin' right er I wouldn't 'a' slipped. But
ye needn't jump on me no more."
"Wot ye goin' to do with that kid? Ye tell me that!" demanded Mary,
unwilling too readily to accept The Hopper's repentance at face value.
"I'm goin' to take 'im to 'is folks, that's wot I'm goin' to do with 'im,"
announced The Hopper.
"Yer crazy--yer plum' crazy!" cried Humpy, slapping his knees excitedly.
"Ye kin take 'im to an orphant asylum an' tell um ye found 'im in that
machine ye lifted. And mebbe ye'll git by with ut an' mebbe ye won't, but
ye gotta keep me out of ut!"
"I found the machine in th' road, right here by th' house; an' th' kid
was in ut all by hisself. An' bein' humin an' respectible I brought 'im in
to keep 'im from freezin' t' death," said The Hopper, as though repeating
lines he was committing to memory. "They ain't nobody can say as I didn't.
Ef I git pinched, that's my spiel to th' cops. It ain't kidnapin'; it's
life-savin', that's wot ut is! I'm a-goin' back an' have a look at that
place where I got 'im. Kind o' queer they left the kid out there in the
buzz-wagon; _mighty_ queer, now's I think of ut. Little house back from
the road; lots o' trees an' bushes in front. Didn't seem to be no lights.
He keeps talkin' about Chris'mas at his grandpa's. Folks must 'a' been
goin' to take th' kid somewheres fer Chris'mas. I guess it'll throw a
skeer into 'em to find him up an' gone."
"They's rich, an' all the big bulls'll be lookin' fer 'im; ye'd better
'phone the New Haven cops ye've picked 'im up. Then they'll come out, an'
yer spiel about findin' 'im'll sound easy an' sensible like."
The Hopper, puffing his pipe philosophically, paid no heed to Humpy's
suggestion even when supported warmly by Mary.
"I gotta find some way o' puttin' th' kid back without seein' no cops.
I'll jes' take a sneak back an' have a look at th' place," said The
Hopper. "I ain't goin' to turn Shaver over to no cops. Ye can't take no
chances with 'em. They don't know nothin' about us bein' here, but they
ain't fools, an' I ain't goin' to give none o' 'em a squint at me!"
He defended his plan against a joint attack by Mary and Humpy, who saw in
it only further proof of his tottering reason. He was obliged to tell
them in harsh terms to be quiet, and he added to their rage by the
deliberation with which he made his preparations to leave.
He opened the door of a clock and drew out a revolver which he examined
carefully and thrust into his pocket. Mary groaned; Humpy beat the air in
impotent despair. The Hopper possessed himself also of a jimmy and an
electric lamp. The latter he flashed upon the face of the sleeping Shaver,
who turned restlessly for a moment and then lay still again. He smoothed
the coverlet over the tiny form, while Mary and Humpy huddled in the
doorway. Mary wept; Humpy was awed into silence by his old friend's
perversity. For years he had admired The Hopper's cleverness, his genius
for extricating himself from difficulties; he was deeply shaken to think
that one who had stood so high in one of the most exacting of professions
should have fallen so low. As The Hopper imperturbably buttoned his coat
and walked toward the door, Humpy set his back against it in a last
attempt to save his friend from his own foolhardiness.
"Ef anybody turns up here an' asks for th' kid, ye kin tell 'em wot I
said. We finds 'im in th' road right here by the farm when we're doin' th'
night chores an' takes 'im in t' keep 'im from freezin'. Ye'll have th'
machine an' kid here to show 'em. An' as fer me, I'm off lookin' fer his
folks."
Mary buried her face in her apron and wept despairingly. The Hopper,
noting for the first time that Humpy was guarding the door, roughly pushed
him aside and stood for a moment with his hand on the knob.
"They's things wot is," he remarked with a last attempt to justify his
course, "an' things wot ain't. I reckon I'll take a peek at that place an'
see wot's th' best way t' shake th' kid. Ye can't jes' run up to a house
in a machine with his folks all settin' round cryin' an' cops askin'
questions. Ye got to do some plannin' an' thinkin'. I'm goin' t' clean ut
all up before daylight, an' ye needn't worry none about ut. Hop ain't
worryin'; jes' leave ut t' Hop!"
There was no alternative but to leave it to Hop, and they stood mute as he
went out and softly closed the door.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
V
The snow had ceased and the stars shone brightly on a white world as The
Hopper made his way by various trolley lines to the house from which he
had snatched Shaver. On a New Haven car he debated the prospects of more
snow with a policeman who seemed oblivious to the fact that a child had
been stolen--shamelessly carried off by a man with a long police record.
Merry Christmas passed from lip to lip as if all creation were attuned to
the note of love and peace, and crime were an undreamed of thing.
For two years The Hopper had led an exemplary life and he was keenly alive
now to the joy of adventure. His lapses of the day were unfortunate; he
thought of them with regret and misgivings, but he was zestful for
whatever the unknown held in store for him. Abroad again with a pistol in
his pocket, he was a lawless being, but with the difference that he was
intent now upon making restitution, though in such manner as would give
him something akin to the old thrill that he experienced when he enjoyed
the reputation of being one of the most skillful yeggs in the country. The
successful thief is of necessity an imaginative person; he must be able to
visualize the unseen and to deal with a thousand hidden contingencies. At
best the chances are against him; with all his ingenuity the broad, heavy
hand of the law is likely at any moment to close upon him from some
unexpected quarter. The Hopper knew this, and knew, too, that in yielding
to the exhilaration of the hour he was likely to come to grief. Justice
has a long memory, and if he again made himself the object of police
scrutiny that little forty-thousand dollar affair in Maine might still be
fixed upon him.
When he reached the house from whose gate he had removed the roadster with
Shaver attached, he studied it with the eye of an experienced strategist.
No gleam anywhere published the presence of frantic parents bewailing the
loss of a baby. The cottage lay snugly behind its barrier of elms and
shrubbery as though its young heir had not vanished into the void. The
Hopper was a deliberating being and he gave careful weight to these
circumstances as he crept round the walk, in which the snow lay
undisturbed, and investigated the rear of the premises. The lattice door
of the summer kitchen opened readily, and, after satisfying himself that
no one was stirring in the lower part of the house, he pried up the sash
of a window and stepped in. The larder was well stocked, as though in
preparation for a Christmas feast, and he passed on to the dining-room,
whose appointments spoke for good taste and a degree of prosperity in the
householder.
Cautious flashes of his lamp disclosed on the table a hamper, in which
were packed a silver cup, plate, and bowl which at once awoke the Hopper's
interest. Here indubitably was proof that this was the home of Shaver, now
sleeping sweetly in Humpy's bed, and this was the porridge bowl for which
Shaver's soul had yearned. If Shaver did not belong to the house, he had
at least been a visitor there, and it struck The Hopper as a reasonable
assumption that Shaver had been deposited in the roadster while his lawful
guardians returned to the cottage for the hamper preparatory to an
excursion of some sort. But The Hopper groped in the dark for an
explanation of the calmness with which the householders accepted the loss
of the child. It was not in human nature for the parents of a youngster so
handsome and in every way so delightful as Shaver to permit him to be
stolen from under their very noses without making an outcry. The Hopper
examined the silver pieces and found them engraved with the name borne by
the locket. He crept through a living-room and came to a Christmas
tree--the smallest of Christmas trees. Beside it lay a number of packages
designed clearly for none other than young Roger Livingston Talbot.
Housebreaking is a very different business from the forcible entry of
country post-offices, and The Hopper was nervous. This particular house
seemed utterly deserted. He stole upstairs and found doors open and a
disorder indicative of the occupants' hasty departure. His attention was
arrested by a small room finished in white, with a white enameled bed, and
other furniture to match. A generous litter of toys was the last proof
needed to establish the house as Shaver's true domicile. Indeed, there was
every indication that Shaver was the central figure of this home of whose
charm and atmosphere The Hopper was vaguely sensible. A frieze of dancing
children and watercolor sketches of Shaver's head, dabbed here and there
in the most unlooked-for places, hinted at an artistic household. This
impression was strengthened when The Hopper, bewildered and baffled,
returned to the lower floor and found a studio opening off the living
room. The Hopper had never visited a studio before, and satisfied now that
he was the sole occupant of the house, he passed passed about shooting his
light upon unfinished canvases, pausing finally before an easel supporting
a portrait of Shaver--newly finished, he discovered, by poking his finger
into the wet paint. Something fell to the floor and he picked up a large
sheet of drawing paper on which this message was written in charcoal:--
_Six-thirty._
_Dear Sweetheart:_--
This is a fine trick you have played on me, you dear girl! I've
been expecting you back all afternoon. At six I decided that you
were going to spend the night with your infuriated parent and
thought I'd try my luck with mine! I put Billie into the
roadster and, leaving him there, ran over to the Flemings's to
say Merry Christmas and tell 'em we were off for the night. They
kept me just a minute to look at those new Jap prints Jim's so
crazy about, and while I was gone you came along and skipped
with Billie and the car! I suppose this means that you've been
making headway with your dad and want to try the effect of
Billie's blandishments. Good luck! But you might have stopped
long enough to tell me about it! How fine it would be if
everything could be straightened out for Christmas! Do you
remember the first time I kissed you--it was on Christmas Eve
four years ago at the Billings's dance! I'm just trolleying out
to father's to see what an evening session will do. I'll be back
early in the morning.
Love always,
ROGER.
Billie was undoubtedly Shaver's nickname. This delighted The Hopper. That
they should possess the same name appeared to create a strong bond of
comradeship. The writer of the note was presumably the child's father and
the "Dear Sweetheart" the youngster's mother. The Hopper was not reassured
by these disclosures. The return of Shaver to his parents was far from
being the pleasant little Christmas Eve adventure he had imagined. He had
only the lowest opinion of a father who would, on a winter evening,
carelessly leave his baby in a motor-car while he looked at pictures, and
who, finding both motor and baby gone, would take it for granted that the
baby's mother had run off with them. But these people were artists, and
artists, The Hopper had heard, were a queer breed, sadly lacking in
common sense. He tore the note into strips which he stuffed into his
pocket.
Depressed by the impenetrable wall of mystery along which he was groping,
he returned to the living-room, raised one of the windows and unbolted the
front door to make sure of an exit in case these strange, foolish Talbots
should unexpectedly return. The shades were up and he shielded his light
carefully with his cap as he passed rapidly about the room. It began to
look very much as though Shaver would spend Christmas at Happy Hill
Farm--a possibility that had not figured in The Hopper's calculations.
Flashing his lamp for a last survey a letter propped against a lamp on the
table arrested his eye. He dropped to the floor and crawled into a corner
where he turned his light upon the note and read, not without difficulty,
the following:--
_Seven o'clock._
_Dear Roger:--_
I've just got back from father's where I spent the last three
hours talking over our troubles. I didn't tell you I was going,
knowing you would think it foolish, but it seemed best, dear,
and I hope you'll forgive me. And now I find that you've gone
off with Billie, and I'm guessing that you've gone to _your_
father's to see what you can do. I'm taking the trolley into New
Haven to ask Mamie Palmer about that cook she thought we might
get, and if possible I'll bring the girl home with me. Don't
trouble about me, as I'll be perfectly safe, and, as you know, I
rather enjoy prowling around at night. You'll certainly get back
before I do, but if I'm not here don't be alarmed.
We are so happy in each other, dear, and if only we could get
our foolish fathers to stop hating each other, how beautiful
everything would be! And we could all have such a merry, merry
Christmas!
MURIEL.
The Hopper's acquaintance with the epistolary art was the slightest, but
even to a mind unfamiliar with this branch of literature it was plain that
Shaver's parents were involved in some difficulty that was attributable,
not to any lessening of affection between them, but to a row of some sort
between their respective fathers. Muriel, running into the house to write
her note, had failed to see Roger's letter in the studio, and this was
very fortunate for The Hopper; but Muriel might return at any moment, and
it would add nothing to the plausibility of the story he meant to tell if
he were found in the house.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
VI
Anxious and dejected at the increasing difficulties that confronted him,
he was moving toward the door when a light, buoyant step sounded on the
veranda. In a moment the living-room lights were switched on from the
entry and a woman called out sharply:--
"Stop right where you are or I'll shoot!"
The authoritative voice of the speaker, the quickness with which she had
grasped the situation and leveled her revolver, brought The Hopper to an
abrupt halt in the middle of the room, where he fell with a discordant
crash across the keyboard of a grand piano. He turned, cowering, to
confront a tall, young woman in a long ulster who advanced toward him
slowly, but with every mark of determination upon her face. The Hopper
stared beyond the gun, held in a very steady hand, into a pair of fearless
dark eyes. In all his experiences he had never been cornered by a woman,
and he stood gaping at his captor in astonishment. She was a very pretty
young woman, with cheeks that still had the curve of youth, but with a
chin that spoke for much firmness of character. A fur toque perched a
little to one side gave her a boyish air.
This undoubtedly was Shaver's mother who had caught him prowling in her
house, and all The Hopper's plans for explaining her son's disappearance
and returning him in a manner to win praise and gratitude went glimmering.
There was nothing in the appearance of this Muriel to encourage a hope
that she was either embarrassed or alarmed by his presence. He had been
captured many times, but the trick had never been turned by any one so
cool as this young woman. She seemed to be pondering with the greatest
calmness what disposition she should make of him. In the intentness of her
thought the revolver wavered for an instant, and The Hopper, without
taking his eyes from her, made a cat-like spring that brought him to the
window he had raised against just such an emergency.
"None of that!" she cried, walking slowly toward him without lowering the
pistol. "If you attempt to jump from that window I'll shoot! But it's
cold in here and you may lower it."
The Hopper, weighing the chances, decided that the odds were heavily
against escape, and lowered the window.
"Now," said Muriel, "step into that corner and keep your hands up where I
can watch them."
The Hopper obeyed her instructions strictly. There was a telephone on the
table near her and he expected her to summon help; but to his surprise she
calmly seated herself, resting her right elbow on the arm of the chair,
her head slightly tilted to one side, as she inspected him with greater
attention along the blueblack barrel of her automatic. Unless he made a
dash for liberty this extraordinary woman would, at her leisure, turn him
over to the police as a housebreaker and his peaceful life as a chicken
farmer would be at an end. Her prolonged silence troubled The Hopper. He
had not been more nervous when waiting for the report of the juries which
at times had passed upon his conduct, or for judges to fix his term of
imprisonment.
"Yes'm," he muttered, with a view to ending a silence that had become
intolerable.
Her eyes danced to the accompaniment of her thoughts, but in no way did
she betray the slightest perturbation.
"I ain't done nothin'; hones' to God, I ain't!" he protested brokenly.
"I saw you through the window when you entered this room and I was
watching while you read that note," said his captor. "I thought it funny
that you should do that instead of packing up the silver. Do you mind
telling me just why you read that note?"
"Well, miss, I jes' thought it kind o' funny there wuzn't nobody round an'
the letter was layin' there all open, an' I didn't see no harm in
lookin'."
"It was awfully clever of you to crawl into the corner so nobody could see
your light from the windows," she said with a tinge of admiration. "I
suppose you thought you might find out how long the people of the house
were likely to be gone and how much time you could spend here. Was that
it?"
"I reckon ut wuz some thin' like that," he agreed.
This was received with the noncommittal "Um" of a person whose thoughts
are elsewhere. Then, as though she were eliciting from an artist or man of
letters a frank opinion as to his own ideas of his attainments and
professional standing, she asked, with a meditative air that puzzled him
as much as her question:--
"Just how good a burglar are you? Can you do a job neatly and safely?"
The Hopper, staggered by her inquiry and overcome by modesty, shrugged his
shoulders and twisted about uncomfortably.
"I reckon as how you've pinched me I ain't much good," he replied, and was
rewarded with a smile followed by a light little laugh. He was beginning
to feel pleased that she manifested no fear of him. In fact, he had
decided that Shaver's mother was the most remarkable woman he had ever
encountered, and by all odds the handsomest. He began to take heart.
Perhaps after all he might hit upon some way of restoring Shaver to his
proper place in the house of Talbot without making himself liable to a
long term for kidnaping.
"If you're really a successful burglar--one who doesn't just poke abound
in empty houses as you were doing here, but clever and brave enough to
break into houses where people are living and steal things without making
a mess of it; and if you can play fair about it--then I think--I
think--maybe--we can come to terms!"