And now I’ll tell you how I once threw stones at Hartford and thereby
gained queer money to carry me to the bedside of my mother at her death.
My father, you should know, was a lawyer of eminence and wide practice
at the New York bar. His income was magnificent; yet--thriftless and
well living--he spent it with both hands. My mother, who took as little
concern for the future as himself, aided pleasantly in scattering the
dollars as fast as they were earned.
With no original estate on either side, and not a shilling saved, it was
to be expected that my father’s death should leave us wanting a penny. I
was twenty-two when the blow fell; he died stricken of an apoplexy, his
full habit and want of physical exercise marking him to that malady as a
certain prey.
I well recall how this death came upon us as a bolt from the blue. And
while his partner stood over our affairs like a brother, when the debts
were paid there remained no more than would manage an annuity for
my mother of some six hundred dollars. With that she retreated to
Westchester and lived the little balance of her years with a maiden
sister who owned a starved farm, all chequered of stone fences, in that
region of breath-taking hills.
It stood my misfortune that I was bred as the son of a wealthy man.
Columbia was my school and the generosity of my father gilded those
college days with an allowance of five thousand a year. I became
proficient--like many another hare-brain--in everything save books, and
was a notable guard on the University Eleven and pulled the bow oar
in the University Eight. When I came from college the year before my
father’s death I could write myself adept of a score of sciences,
each physical, not one of which might serve to bring a splinter of
return--not one, indeed, that did not demand the possession of largest
wealth in its pursuit. I was poor in that I did not have a dollar when
brought to face the world; I was doubly poor with a training that had
taught me to spend thousands. Therefore, during the eighteen years to
succeed my father’s going, was I tossed on the waves of existence
like so much wreckage; and that I am not still so thrown about is the
offspring of happy exigency rather than a condition due to wisdom of my
own.
My ship of money did not come in until after I’d encountered my fortieth
year. For those eighteen years next prior, if truth must out, I’d picked
up intermittent small money following the races. Turf interest of
that day settled about such speedy ones as Goldsmith Maid, Lucy, Judge
Fullerton and American Girl, while Budd Doble, Dan Mace and Jack Splan
were more often in the papers than was the President. I followed the
races, I say; sometimes I was flush of money, more often I was poor; but
one way or another I clung to the skirts of the circuits and managed to
live.
Now, since age has come to my head and gold to my fingers, and I’ve had
time and the cooled blood wherewith to think, I’ve laid my ill courses
of those eighteen evil years to the doors of what vile ideals of life
are taught in circles of our very rich. What is true now, was true
then. Among our “best people”--if “best” be the word where “worst” might
better fit the case--who is held up to youthful emulation? Is it the
great lawyer, or writer, or preacher, or merchant, or man of medicine?
Is it he of any trade or calling who stands usefully and profitably at
the head of his fellows? Never; such gentry of decent effort and clean
dollars to flow therefrom are not mentioned; or if they be, it is not
for compliment and often with disdain.
And who has honor in the social conventions of our American aristocrats?
It is young A, who drives an automobile some eighty miles an hour; or
young B, who sails a single-sticker until her canvas is blown from the
bolt ropes; or young C, who rides like an Arab at polo; or young D,
who drives farthest at golf; or young E, who is the headlong first in a
paper chase. These be the ideals; these the promontories to steer by. Is
it marvel then when a youth raised of those “best circles” falls out
of his nest of money that he lies sprawling, unable to honestly aid
himself? Is it strange that he afterward lives drunken and precariously
and seldom in walks asking industry and hard work? His training has been
to spend money, while his contempt was reserved for those who labored
its honorable accumulation. Such wrong-taught creatures, bereft of bank
accounts, are left to adopt the races, the gambling tables, or the
wine trade; and with all my black wealth of experience, I sit unable to
determine which is basest and most loathly of the three.
During those eighteen roving, race-course years I saw my mother but
seldom; and I never exposed to her my methods of life. I told her that
I “traveled;” and she, good, innocent girl! gained from the phrase a
cloudy notion that I went the trusted ambassador to various courts of
trade of some great manufactory. I protected her from the truth to
the end, and she died brightly confident that her son made a brilliant
figure in the world.
While on my ignoble wanderings I kept myself in touch with one whom I
might trust, and who, dwelling near my mother, saw her day by day. He
was ever in possession of my whereabouts. Her health was a bit perilous
from heart troubles, and I, as much as I might, maintained arrangements
to warn me should she turn seriously ill.
At first I looked hourly for such notice; but as month after month
went by and no bad tidings--nothing save word at intervals that she was
passing her quiet, uneventful days in comfort, and as each occasional
visit made to Westchester confirmed such news, my apprehension became
dulled and dormant. It was a surprise then, and pierced me hideously,
when I opened the message that told how her days were down to hours and
she lay dying.
The telegram reached me in Hartford. When I took it from the messenger’s
hand I was so poor I could not give him a dime for finding me; and as he
had been to some detective pains in the business, he left with an ugly
face as one cheated of appreciation. I could not help it; there dwelt
not so much as one cheap copper in my pocket. Also, my clothes were none
of the best; for I’d been in ill fortune, and months of bankruptcy had
dealt unkindly with my wardrobe. But there should be no such word as
fail; I must find the money to go to her--find it even though it arrive
on the tides of robbery.
Luck came to me. Within the minute to follow the summons, and while the
yellow message still fluttered between my fingers, I was hailed from
across the street. The hail came from a certain coarse gentleman who
seemed born to horse-races as to an heritage and was, withal, one of the
few who reaped a harvest from them. This fortunate one was known to the
guild as Sure-thing Pete.
It was fairly early of the morning, eight o’clock, and Surething Pete
in the wake of his several morning drinks--he was a celebrated sot--was
having his boots cleaned. It is a curious thing that half-drunken folk
are prone to this improvement. That is why a boot-black’s chair is found
so frequently just outside the portals of a rum shop. The prospect of
a seat allures your drunkard fresh from his latest drink; he may sit
at secure ease and please his rum-contented fancy with a review of the
passing crowds; also, the Italian digging and brushing about his soles
gives an impression that he is subject of concern to some one and this
nurses a sense of importance and comes as vague tickle to his vanity.
Surething Pete, as related, was under the hands of a boot-black when I
approached. He was much older than I and regarded me as a boy.
“Broke, eh?” said Surething Pete. His eye, though bleary, was keen.
Then he tendered a quarter. “Take this and go and eat. I’ll wait for you
here. Come back in fifteen minutes and I’ll put you in line to make some
money. I’d give you more, but I’m afraid you wouldn’t return.”
Make money! I bolted two eggs and a cup of coffee and was back in ten
minutes. Surething’s second shoe was receiving its last polish. He
paid the artist, and then turning led me to a rear room of the nearby
ginmill.
“This is it,” said Surething. His voice was rum-husky but he made
himself clear. “There’s the special race between Prince Rupert and
Creole Belle. You know about that?”
Of course I knew. These cracks had been especially matched against
each other. It would be a great contest; the odds were five to three on
Prince Rupert; thousands were being wagered; the fraternity had talked
of nothing else for three weeks. Of course I knew!
“Well,” went on Surething, “I’ve been put wrong, understand! I’ve got
my bundle on Creole Belle and stand to win a fortune if Prince Rupert
is beaten. I supposed that I’d got his driver fixed. I paid this crook
a thousand cold and gave him tickets on Creole Belle which stand him to
win five thousand more to throw the race. But now, with the race to be
called at two o’clock, I get it straight he’s out to double-cross me.
He’ll drive Rupert to win; an’ if he does I’m a gone fawnskin. But I’ve
thought of another trick.”
Then suddenly: “I’ll tell you what you do; get into this wagon outside
and come with me.”
With the last word, Surething again headed for the street. We took
a carriage that stood at the door. In thirty minutes we were on the
Charter ‘Oak track. At this early hour, we had the course to ourselves.
Surething walked up the homestretch until we arrived at a point midway
between the half mile post and the entrance to the stretch.
“See that tree?” said Surething, and he pointed to a huge buttonwood--a
native--that stood perhaps twenty feet inside the rail. “Come over and
take a look at it.”
The great buttonwood was hollow; or rather a half had been torn away
by some storm. What remained, however, was growing green and strong
and stood in such fashion towards the course that it offered a perfect
hiding place. By lying close within the hollow one was screened from any
who might drive along.
“This is the proposition,” continued Surething, when I had taken in
the convenient buttonwood and its advantages. “This Rupert can beat the
Belle if he’s driven. But he’s as nervous as a girl. If a fly should
light on him he’d go ten feet in the air--understand? Here now is what
I want of you. I’ll tell you what you’re to do; then I’ll tell you what
you’re to get. I want you to plant yourself behind this tree--better
come here as early as the noon hour. The track ’ll be clear and no
one’ll see you go under cover, understand! As I say, I want you to plant
yourself in the sheltering hollow of this buttonwood. You ought to
have three rocks--say as big as a guinea’s egg--three stones, d’ye see,
’cause the race is heats, best three in five. You must lay dead so no
one’ll get on. As Rupert and the Belle sweep ’round the curve for the
stretch, you want to let ’em get a trifle past you. Then you’re to
step out and nail Rupert--he’ll have the pole without a doubt--and nail
Rupert, I say, with a rock. That’ll settle him; he’ll be up in the air
like a swallow-bird. It’ll give the Belle the heat.” Having gotten thus
far, Surething fell into a mighty fit of coughing; his face congested
and his eyes rolled. For a moment I feared that apoplexy--my father’s
death--might take him in the midst of his hopeful enterprise and deprive
me of this chance of riches. I was not a little relieved therefore when
he somewhat recovered and went on: “That trick’s as safe as seven-up,”
continued Surething. “You’ll be alone up here, as everybody else will
be down about the finish. The drivers, driving like mad, won’t see
you--won’t see anything but their horses’ ears. You must get Rupert--get
him three times--every time he comes’round--understand?”
I understood.
“Right you are,” concluded Surething. “And to make it worth your while,
here are tickets on the Belle that call for five hundred dollars if she
wins. And here’s a dollar also for a drink and another feed to steady
your wrists for the stonethrowing.”
It will seem strange and may even attract resentment that I, a college
graduate and come of good folk, should accept such commission from a
felon like Surething Pete. All I say is that I did accept it; was glad
to get it; and for two hours before the great contest between Prince
Rupert and Creole Belle was called, I lay ensconced in my buttonwood
ambush, armed of three stones like David without the sling, ready to
play my part towards the acquirement of those promised hundreds.
And with that, my thoughts were on my mother. The money would count
handsomely to procure me proper clothes and take me home. To me the
proposed bombardment of the nervous Rupert appeared an opportunity
heaven-sent when my need was most.
For fear of discovery and woe to follow, I put my tickets in the hands
of one who, while as poor as I, could yet be trusted. He was, if the
Belle won, to cash them; and should I be observed at my sleight of hand
work and made to fly, he would meet me in a near-by village with the
proceeds.
At prompt two o’clock the race was called. There were bustling crowds
of spectators; but none came near my hiding place, as Surething Pete
had foreseen. The horses got off with the second trial. They trotted as
steadily as clockwork. As the pair rounded the second curve they were
coming like the wind; drivers leaning far forward in their sulkies,
eagle of glance, steady of rein, soothing with encouraging words, and
“sending them,” as the phrase is, for every inch. It was a splendid race
and splendidly driven, with Rupert on the pole and a half length to the
good. They flashed by my post like twin meteors.
As they passed I stepped free of my buttonwood; and then, as unerringly
as one might send a bullet--for I had not been long enough from school
to forget how to throw--my first pebble, full two ounces, caught the
hurrying Rupert in mid-rib.
Mighty were the results. Prince Rupert leaped into the
air--stumbled--came almost to a halt--then into the air a second
time--and following that, went galloping and pitching down the course,
his driver sawing and whipping in distracted alternation. Meanwhile,
Creole Belle slipped away like a spirit in harness and finished a wide
winner. I took in results from my buttonwood. There was no untoward
excitement about the grandstand or among the judges. Good; I was not
suspected!
There ensued a long wait; planted close to my tree I wearied with the
aching length of it. Then Rupert and the Belle were on the track again.
The gong sounded; I heard the word “Go!” even in my faraway hiding;
the second heat was on. It was patterned of the first; the two took the
curve and flew for the head of the stretch as they did before; Rupert on
the pole and leading with half a length. I repeated the former success.
The stone struck poor Rupert squarely. He shot straight toward the skies
and all but fell in the sulky when he came down. It was near to ending
matters; for Rupert regained his feet in scantiest time to get inside
the distance flag before the Belle streamed under the wire.
Creole Belle! two straight heats! What a row and a roar went up about
the pools! What hedging was done! From five to three on Rupert the
odds shifted to seven to two on Creole Belle. I could hear the riot and
interpret it. I clung closely to the protecting buttonwood; there was
still a last act before the play was done.
It was the third heat. The pace, comparatively, was neither hot nor
hard; the previous exertions of both Rupert and the Belle had worn
away the wire edge and abated their appetites for any utmost speed.
Relatively, however, conditions were equal and each as tired as the
other; and as Rupert was the quicker in the get-away and never failed of
the pole in the first quarter, the two as they neared me offered the old
picture of Rupert on the rail and leading by half his length.
Had I owned a better chance of observation, I might have noted as
Prince Rupert drew near the buttonwood that his mind was not at ease. He
remembered those two biting flints; they were lessons not lost on
him. As I stepped from concealment to hurl my last stone, it is to
be believed that Rupert--his alarmed eyes roving for lions in his
path--glimpsed me. Certain it is that as the missile flew from my hand,
Rupert swerved across the track, the hub of his sulky narrowly missing
the shoulder of the mare.
The sudden shift confused my markmanship, and instead of Rupert, the
stone smote the driver on the ear and all but swept him from his seat.
It did the work, however; whether from the stone, the whip, or that
state of general perturbation wherein his fell experiences had left his
nerves, Rupert went fairly to pieces. Before he was on his feet again
and squared away, the Belle had won.
Peeping from my hiding place I could tell that my adroit interference
in the late contest was becoming the subject of public concern. Rupert’s
driver, still sitting in his sulky, was holding high his whip in
professional invocation of the judges’ eyes. And that ill-used horseman
was talking; at intervals he pointed with the utmost feeling towards my
butonwood. Nor was his oratory without power; he had not discoursed long
when amid an abundance of shouts and oaths and brandished canes, one
thousand gentlemen of the turf were under head in my direction.
It was interesting, but I did not stay in contemplation of the
spectacle; I out and bolted. I crossed the track and ran straight for
the end fence. This latter barrier looked somewhat high; I made no essay
to climb, but, picking a broadest board, launched myself against it,
shoulder on. The board fell and I was through the gap and in an open
field.
But why waste time with that hustling hue and cry? It was futile for
all its indignant energy; I promise you, I made good my distance. Young,
strung like a harp, with a third of a mile start and able to speed like
a deer, I ran the hunt out of sight in the first ten minutes. It was all
earnestness, that flight of mine. I fled through three villages and a
puny little river that fell across my path. I welcomed the river, for I
knew it would cool the quest.
Of a verity! I got my money, and my stone throwing was not to be in
vain. True, the driver and the owner of Rupert both protested, but the
track statutes were inexorable. The judges could take no cognizance of
that cannonading from the buttonwood and gave the race--three straight
heats--to Creole Belle. Surething Pete won his thousands; and as for me,
my friend and I encountered according to our tryst and he brought me my
money safe. Within fifteen hours from that time when I dealt disaster to
Rupert from the sheltering buttonwood, clothed and in respectable tears,
I was kneeling by my mother’s side and taking what sorrowful joy I
might for having arrived while she was yet equal to the bestowal of her
blessing.
*****
It was to be our last evening about the great stone fireplace; the last
of our stories would be told. The roads were now broken, and though a
now-and-then upset was more than likely to enliven one’s goings about,
sleighs and sleds as schemes of conveyance were pronounced to be among
things possible. As we drew our chairs about the blaze, the jangle of
an occasional leash of bells showed how some brave spirit was even then
abroad.
Under these inspiring conditions, the Sour Gentleman and the Red Nosed
Gentleman declared their purpose of on the morrow pressing for the
railway station eighteen miles away. To this end they had already
chartered a sleigh, and the word was out that it be at the Inn door by
ten of the morning clock.
For myself, nothing was driving me of business or concern, and I was in
no haste to leave; and the Old Cattleman and his ward, Sioux Sam, were
also of a mind to abide where they were for a farther day or two at
least. But the going of the Sour Gentleman and the Red Nosed Gentleman
would destroy our circle, wherefore we were driven to regard this as
“our last evening,” and to crown it honorably the Jolly Doctor brewed a
giant bowl of what he described as punch. The others, both by voice
and the loyalty wherewith they applied themselves to its disappearance,
avowed its excellencies, and on that point Sioux Sam and I were content
to receive their words.
The Red Nosed Gentleman--who had put aside his burgundy in compliment to
the Jolly Doctor and his punch, and seemed sensibly exhilarated by this
change of beverage--was the first to give the company a story. It was of
his younger, green-cloth days, and the title by which he distinguished
it was “When I Ran the Shotgun.”