A NEW USE FOR A WATER HOSE
The motor-bus ran up Fifth Avenue, cut across to Broadway, passed
Columbus Circle, and swept into the Drive. It was a day divinely young
and fair. The fragrance of a lingering spring was wafted to the
nostrils. Only the evening before the trees had been given a bath of
rain and the refreshment of it showed in every quivering leaf. From
its little waves the Hudson reflected a million sparkles of light.
Glimpses of the Park tempted Clay. Its winding paths! The children
playing on the grass while their maids in neat caps and aprons gossiped
together on the benches near! This was the most human spot the man
from Arizona had seen in the metropolis.
Somewhere in the early three-figure streets he descended from the top
of the bus and let his footsteps follow his inclinations into the Park.
A little shaver in a sailor suit ran across the path and fell sprawling
at the feet of Clay. He picked up and began to comfort the howling
four-year-old.
"That sure was a right hard fall, sonny, but you're not goin' to make
any fuss about it. You're Daddy's little man and--"
A sharp, high voice cut into his consolation.
"Cedric, come here!"
The little boy went, bawling lustily to win sympathy. The nursemaid
shook him impatiently. "How many times have I told you to look where
you're going? Serves you just right. Now be still."
There was a deep instinct in Clay to stand by those in trouble when
they were weak. A child or a woman in distress always had a claim on
him.
"I reckon the li'l' fellow was in a hurry, Miss," he said, smiling. "I
'most always was at his age. But he ain't hurt much."
The maid looked Clay up and down scornfully before she turned her back
on him and began to talk with another nurse.
Beneath the tan of the range-rider's cheeks the color flamed. This
young woman had not mistaken the friendliness of the West for the
impudence of a street masher. The impulse of snobbery had expressed
itself in her action.
The cowpuncher followed a path that took him back to the street. He
grinned, but there was no smile in his heart. He was ashamed of this
young woman who could meet good-will with scorn, and he wanted to get
away from her without any unnecessary delay. What were the folks like
in this part of the country that you couldn't speak to them without
getting insulted?
He struck across the Drive into a side street. An apartment house
occupied the corner, but from the other side a row of handsome private
dwellings faced him.
The janitor of the apartment house was watering the parking beyond the
sidewalk. The edge of the stream from the nozzle of the hose sprayed
the path in front of Clay. He hesitated for a moment to give the man
time to turn aside the hose.
But the janitor on this particular morning had been fed up with
trouble. One of the tenants had complained of him to the agent of the
place. Another had moved away without tipping him for an hour's help
in packing he had given her. He was sulkily of the opinion that the
whole world was in a conspiracy to annoy him. Just now the approaching
rube typified the world.
A little flirt of the hose deluged Clay's newly shined boots and the
lower six inches of his trousers.
"Look out what you're doing!" protested the man from Arizona.
"I tank you better look where you're going," retorted the one from
Sweden. He was a heavy-set, muscular man with a sullen, obstinate face.
"My shoes and trousers are sopping wet."
"Yust you bate it oop street. I ant look for no trouble with no rubes."
"I believe you did it on purpose."
"Tank so? Val, yust one teng I lak to tell you. I got no time for
damn fule talk."
The Westerner started on his way. There was no use having a row with a
sulky janitor.
But the Swede misunderstood his purpose. At Clay's first step forward
he jerked round the nozzle and let the range-rider have it with full
force.
Clay was swept back to the wall by the heavy pressure of water that
played over him. The stream moved swiftly up and down him from head to
foot till it had drenched every inch of the perfect fifty-five-dollar
suit. He drowned fathoms deep in a water spout. He was swept over
Niagara Falls. He came to life again to find himself the choking
center of a world flood. He sputtered furiously while his arms flailed
like windmills to keep back the river of water that engulfed him.
The thought that brought him back to action was one that had to do with
the blue serge. The best fifty-five-dollar suit in New York was ruined
in this submarine disaster.
He gave a strangled whoop and charged straight at the man behind the
hose. The two clinched. While they struggled, the writhing hose
slapped back and forth between them like an agitated snake. Clay had
one advantage. He was wet through anyhow. It did not matter how much
of the deluge struck him. The janitor fought to keep dry and he had
not a chance on earth to succeed.
For one hundred and seventy-five pounds of Arizona bone and muscle,
toughened by years of hard work in sun and wind, had clamped itself
upon him. The nozzle twisted toward the janitor. He ducked, went
down, and was instantly submerged. When he tried to rise, the stream
beat him back. He struggled halfway up, slipped, got again to his
feet, and came down sitting with a hard bump when his legs skated from
under him.
A smothered "Vat t'ell!" rose out of the waters. It was both a yelp of
rage and a wail of puzzled chagrin. The janitor could not understand
what was happening to him. He did not know that he was being treated
to a new form of the water cure.
Before his dull brain had functioned to action an iron grip had him by
the back of the neck. He was jerked to his feet and propelled forward
to the curb. Every inch of the way the heavy stream from the nozzle
broke on his face and neck. It paralyzed his resistance, jarred him so
that he could not gather himself to fight. He was still sputtering "By
damn," when Clay bumped him up against a hitching-post, garroted him,
and swung the hose around the post in such a way as to encircle the
feet of the man.
The cowpuncher drew the hose tight, slipped the nozzle through the iron
ring, and caught the flapping arms of the man to his body. With the
deft skill of a trained roper Clay swung the rubber pipe round the body
of the man again and again, drawing it close to the post and knotting
it securely behind. The Swede struggled, but his furious rage availed
him nothing. He was in the hands of the champion roper of Graham
County, a man who had hogtied a wild hill steer in thirty-three seconds
by the watch.
It took longer than this to rope up the husky janitor with a squirming
hose, but when Clay stepped back to inspect his job he knew he was
looking at one that had been done thoroughly.
"I keel you, by damn, ef you don't turn me loose!" roared the big man
in a rage.
The range-rider grinned gayly at him. He was having the time of his
young life. He did not even regret his fifty-five-dollar suit.
Already he could see that Arizona had nothing on New York when it came
to getting action for your money.
"Life's just loaded to the hocks with disappointment, Olie," he
explained, and his voice was full of genial sympathy. "I'll bet a
dollar Mex you'd sure like to beat me on the haid with a two by four.
But I don't reckon you'll ever get that fond wish gratified. We're not
liable to meet up with each other again _pronto_. To-day we're here
and to-morrow we're at Yuma, Arizona, say, for life is short and darned
fleeting as the poet fellow says."
He waved a hand jauntily and turned to go. But he changed his mind.
His eye had fallen on a young woman standing at a French window of the
house opposite. She was beckoning to him imperiously.
The young woman disappeared as he crossed the street, but in a few
moments the door opened and she stood there waiting for him. Clay
stared. He had never before seen a girl dressed like this. She was in
riding-boots, breeches, and coat. Her eyes dilated while she looked at
him.
"Wyoming?" she asked at last in a low voice.
"Arizona," he answered.
"All one. Knew it the moment I saw you tie him. Come in." She stood
aside to let him pass.
That hall, with its tapestried walls, its polished floors, and Oriental
rugs, was reminiscent of "the movies" to Clay. Nowhere else had he
seen a home so stamped with the mark of ample means.
"Come in," she ordered again, a little sharply.
He came in and she closed the door.
"I'm sopping wet. I'll drip all over the floor."
"What are you going to do? You'll be arrested, you know." She stood
straight and slim as a boy, and the frank directness of her gaze had a
boy's sexless unconsciousness.
"Thought I'd give myself up to the marshal."
She laughed outright at this. "Not in this town. A stranger like you
would have no chance. Listen." There came to them from outside the
tap-tap-tap-tap of a policeman's night stick rattling on the curbstone.
"He's calling help."
"I can explain how it happened."
"No. He wouldn't understand. They'd find you guilty."
He moved from the rug where he was standing to let the water drip on
the hardwood floor.
"Sho! Folks are mostly reasonable. I'd tell the judge how it come
about."
"No."
"Well, I can't stay here."
"Yes--till they've gone."
Her imperative warmed his heart, but he tried to explain gently why he
could not. "I can't drag you into this. Like as not the Swede saw me
come in."
To a manservant standing in the background the young woman spoke.
"Jenkins, have Nora clean up the floor and the steps outside. And
remember--I don't want the police to know this gentleman is here."
"Yes, Miss."
"Come!" said the girl to her guest. She led Clay to the massive
stairway, but stopped at the first tread to call back an order over her
shoulder. "Refer the officers to me if they insist on coming into the
house."
"I'll see to it, Miss."
Clay followed his hostess to the stairs and went up them with her, but
he went protesting, though with a chuckle of mirth. "He sure ruined my
clothes a heap. I ain't fit to be seen."
The suit he had been so proud of was shrinking so that his arms and
legs stuck out like signposts. The color had run and left the goods a
peculiar bilious-looking overall blue.
She lit a gas-log in a small library den.
"Just a minute, please."
She stepped briskly from the room. In her manner was a crisp decision,
in her poise a trim gallantry that won him instantly.
"I'll bet she'd do to ride with," he told himself in a current Western
idiom.
When she came back it was to take him to a dressing-room. A complete
change of clothing was laid out for him on a couch. A man whom Clay
recognized as a valet--he had seen his duplicate in the moving-picture
theaters at Tucson--was there to supply his needs and attend to the
temperature of his bath.
"Stevens will look after you," she said; "when you are ready come back
to Dad's den."
His eyes followed to the door her resilient step. Once, when he was a
boy, he had seen Ada Rehan play in "As You Like It." Her acting had
entranced him. This girl carried him back to that hour. She was
boyish as Rosalind, woman in every motion of her slim and lissom body.
At the head of the stairway she paused. Jenkins was moving hurriedly
up to meet her.
"It's a policeman, Miss. 'E's come about the--the person that came in,
and 'e's talkin' to Nora on the steps. She's a-jollyin' 'im, as you
might say, Miss."
His young mistress nodded. She swept the hall with the eye of a
general. Swiftly she changed the position of a Turkish rug so as to
hide a spot on the polished floor that had been recently scrubbed and
was still moist. It seemed best to discover Nora's plan of campaign
before taking over the charge of affairs.
"Many's the time I've met yuh goin' down the Avenoo with your heels
clickin' an' your head high," came the rich brogue of Nora O'Flannigan.
"An' I've said to myself, sez I, who's the handsome officer that sets
off his uniform so gr-rand?"
The girl leaned on her mop and gave the policeman a slant glance out of
eyes of Irish brown. It was not Nora's fault that she was as pretty a
colleen as ever came out of Limerick, but there was no law that made
her send such a roguish come-hither look at the man in blue.
He beamed. He was as pleased as a cat that has been stroked and fed
cream.
"Well, an' yuh 're not the only wan that notices, Miss Nora. I'm a
noticin' lad mesilf. An' it's the truth that I'd be glad enough to
meet yuh some fine evenin' when I'm off duty. But about this
strong-arm guy that tied up the janitor. The Swede says he went into
wan av these houses. Now here's the wet color from his suit that ran
over the steps. He musta come up here."
"Before he ran down the street. Sure, an' that's just what he done.
Yuh're a janious, officer."
"Maybe he got into the house somehow."
"Now, how could he do that? With all av us upstairs and down."
"I don't say he did. But if I was to just take a look inside so as to
report that I'd searched--"
"Och! Yuh 'd be wastin' your time, officer."
"Sure, I know that. But for the report--"
The young woman in the riding costume chose this moment to open the
door and saunter out.
"Does the officer want something, Nora?" she asked innocently,
switching the end of a crop against her riding-boots.
"Yes, Miss. There's been a ruffian batin' up Swedes an' tyin' 'em to
posts. This officer thinks he came here," explained Nora.
"Does he want to look in the house?"
"Yes, Miss."
"Then let him come in." The young mistress took the responsibility on
her own shoulders. She led the policeman into the hall. "I don't
really see how he could have got in here without some of us seeing him,
officer."
"No, ma'am. I don't see how he could." The patrolman scratched his
red head. "The janitor's a Swede, anyhow. He jist guessed it. I came
to make sure av it. I'll be sorry for troubling yuh, Miss."
The smile she gave him was warm and friendly. "Oh, that's all right.
If you'd care to look around. . . . But there really is no use."
"No." The forehead under the red thatch wrinkled in thought. "He said
he seen him come in here or next door, an' he came up the steps. But
nobody could have got in without some of youse seein' him. That's a
lead pipe." The officer pushed any doubt that remained from his mind.
"Only a muddle-headed Swede."
"It was good of you to come. It makes us feel safer to have officers
like you. If you'll give me your name I'll call up the precinct
captain and tell him so."
The man in uniform turned beet red. "McGuffey, Miss, and it's a
pleasure to serve the likes of yuh," he said, pleased and embarrassed.
He bowed himself out backward, skidded on the polished floor, and saved
himself from going down by a frantic fling of arms and some fancy
skating. When he recovered, his foot caught in a rug and wadded it to
a knot.
Nora giggled behind her fingers, but her mistress did not even smile at
the awkwardness of Patrolman McGuffey.
"Thank you _so_ much," she said sweetly.