CHAPTER IX
How about him, eh?—the two-spot of clubs in billiard cloth and buttons at the door. There's no tellin' what the Studio'll have next—maybe a sidewalk canopy and a carriage caller. Swifty Joe's gettin' ambitious. Me gettin' mixed up with that Newport push has gone to Swifty's head like a four-line notice does to the pompadour of a second row chorus girl. First off he says it's a shame I don't have a valet.
"Say," says I, "don't it keep me busy enough remindin' you that I'm still able to wear my own clothes, without puttin' on an extra hand?"
But after this last stunt he broke out again; so we compromised on Congo. I thought Swifty'd had him made to order, uniform and all; but he says he found him, just as he stands, doin' the stray act over on Sixth-ave. He'd come up from New Orleans with a fortune-tellin' gent that had got himself pinched for doing a little voudoo turn on the side, and as Congo didn't have much left but his appetite, I put him on the pay-roll at two per and found. And say, I'm stung, at that. To look at him you'd think a ham sandwich would run him over; but he's got a capacity like a shop-lifter's pocket. For three days I tried to feed him up on the retail plan, and then I let out the contract to a free-lunch supply concern.
Sure, it gives the joint kind of a swell look, havin' him on the door, and if it didn't act the same on Swifty's head I wouldn't kick.
On the dead now, I don't care so much about loomin' up in the picture. There's them that it suits down to the ground, and that shows up well in front; and then again, there's a lot of people gets the spot light on 'em continual who'd be better off in the shade. I'm a top-gallery boy, by rights, and that's where you'll find me most of the time; but now and then I get dragged down into the wings with a note. Yes, yes, I'm just back after one of them excursions.
You see, after we'd shunted Sadie's Baron back on to the goulash circuit, where he belonged, and Sadie and Pinckney had got over their merry fit and skipped off to wake up another crowd of time assassinators, at Rockywold, or some such place as that, I says to myself, "Shorty," says I, "you stick to the physical-culture game and whittle out the by-plays."
That's just what I was doin', too, when an A. D. T. shows up with a prepaid josh from Pinckney, givin' me a special invite to run out and help 'em celebrate.
"Any come-back?" says the boy.
"No, sonny," says I; "you can cut the wire."
Say, Pinckney means all right, and he's done me some good turns; but that don't put me in his class, does it? Nay, nay, says I. Here's one dinner party that I ducks. And with that I gets busy on one of my reg'lars who's bein' trained to go against two months of foreign cookin'. I hadn't more'n finished with him, though, when there comes another yellow envelop. This one was from Sadie, and it was a hurry call. She didn't say much; but I could see heel-prints of trouble all over it.
"Me for Rockywold," says I, chuckin' a collar in a suit-case and grabbin' a time-table off the rack.
Yes, that was different. Maybe I'm a jay to cast myself for any such part; but since Sadie an' me had that little reunion, I've kind of felt that sooner or later she might be let in for a mix-up where I'd come in handy, and when it was pulled off I wanted to be within hail.
Course, I wasn't layin' out no hero act; like showin' up with a can of gasolene just as the tank ran dry, or battin' the block off'm a villyun in a dress suit. I was just willin' to hang around on the edges and make myself useful generally. Not that I'm followin' the she-male protectin' business regular. But with Sadie it's another thing. We used to play in the same alley, you know; and she don't forget it, even if she has come into a bunch of green money as big as a haystack.
She was on hand when I dropped off the smoker, sittin' in the Rockywold station rig and lookin' for me with both eyes. And say, what a difference it makes to clothes who wears 'em!
"It's bully of you to come, Shorty," says she.
"Oh, I don't know," says I. "I guess good judges wouldn't call it a medal play. What's loose?"
"Buddy," says she.
For a minute I was lost, until she asks if I don't remember the youngster. "Oh, sure!" says I. "That kid brother of yours, with the eighteen-karat ringlets and a girly kind of face? The Sisters used to dress him up in a Fauntleroy suit for the parochial school fair, and make him look like a picture on an Easter card. Nice, cute little chap, eh?"
"He was cute once—ten or twelve years ago," says Sadie. "He isn't as cute as he was. He doesn't wear ringlets now—he likes rings better. And that's why I had to send for you, Shorty. I couldn't tell anyone else. Oh, the little wretch! If it wasn't for mother I'd cure him of a lot of things."
Well, we had some family history on the way out, beginnin' with the way Buddy'd been spoiled at home, takin' in a few of the scrapes Sadie had helped him out of, and endin' with his blowin' in at Rockywold without waitin' for a bid from anyone. Seems he'd separated himself from the last stake Sadie had handed out—nothin' new, same old fool games—and now he wanted a refill, just as a loan, until he could play a tip he'd got from a gent he'd met in a beanery.
"And I just wouldn't stand for that," says Sadie. "Those bookmakers are nothing but swindlers, anyway. I know, because I bet ten dollars on a race once, and didn't win."
Say, I had a lithograph of Buddy and his beanery tip goin' up against an argument like that. Of course it wa'n't more'n two minutes before Sadie'd got her Sullivan up. She offered Buddy his choice between a railroad ticket home to mother, or nothing at all. Buddy wouldn't arbitrate on those lines. He said he was a desperate man, and that she'd be sorry before night. Sadie'd heard that before; so she just laughed and said the steam-car ticket offer would be held open until night.
She didn't see anything more of Buddy for a couple of hours, and then she caught him as he came up from the billiard-room. Bein' an expert on such symptoms, she knew why he talked like his mouth was full of cotton, but she couldn't account for the wad of bills he shook at her. Buddy could. He'd run across a young Englishman down there who thought he could handle a cue. Buddy had bet hot air against real money, and trimmed his man.
"That wasn't the worst of it, though," said Sadie. "After I had got him up to my rooms he pulled out the money again, to count it over, and out came a three-inch marquise ring—an opal set with diamonds—that I knew the minute I put my eyes on it. There were her initials on the inside, too. Oh, no one but Mrs. Purdy Pell."
"Tut, tut!" says I. "You can easy square it with her."
"But that's just what I can't do," says Sadie. "She loves me about as much as a tramp likes work. She tells folks that I make fools of her boys. Her boys, mind you! She claims every stray man under twenty-five, and when I came here she had three of them on the string. Goodness knows, I didn't want them! They're only imitation men, anyway. And it was her ring that Buddy had in his pocket."
"Maybe he hadn't lifted it," says I.
Sadie swallowed a bit hard at that; but she raps out the straight goods. "Yes, he did," says she. "He must have sneaked it out of her room as he went down stairs. Think of it! Stealing! He's done a lot of foolish things before; but I didn't think he would turn out a crook. The Lord knows where he gets that kind of blood from—not from the Sullivans, or the Scannells, either. But I can't have him put away. There's mother. And he won't mind a thing I say. Now what shall I do, Shorty?"
"Where's Buddy now?" says I.
"Locked in my clothes-closet, with his hands tied and a gag in his mouth," says she. "Oh, I can handle him that way, big as he is; and I wasn't going to take any more chances. But it's likely that Mrs. Pell has missed her ring by this time and is raising a howl about it. What's to be done?"
Say, there was a proposition for you! And me just a plain, every-day mitt juggler that don't take thinkin' exercises reg'lar. "Guess you've pushed the wrong button this time, Sadie," says I. "But I'll stay in your corner till the lights go out. Is anyone else on?"
"Not a soul," says Sadie.
"That's some help," says I. "First we'll have a little talk with Buddy."
I couldn't see what good that would do, but it was up to me to make some kind of a move.
When they'd landed us under the porte cochere—yes, you'd call it stoppin' at the horse-block—I sails in like I'd come alone, and hunts up Pinckney.
"What's all this about me bein' needed up here?" says I. "Goin' to make me Queen of the May?"
"By Jove, Shorty!" says he, "that's a clever idea. We'll do it."
"Yes, you will—not," says I. "You'll cut it out. I ain't no wine agent, and I left me rag doll to home; so if there's any funny stunts expected, you tell 'em I've put on a sub. Oh, sure, I'll stay to dinner, but as for leadin' any cotillions, change the card."
He gave his word they wouldn't spring anything like that on me, and then he called up a waiter in knee pants, and had him show me up to my quarters so I could get me gas-light clothes on before they unlocked the dinin'-room doors. After I'd made a quick shift I slid over into the next wing, followin' directions, and found Sadie.
"Mrs. Pell's on the war-path already," says she. "She's having it out with her maid now. Come in."
She'd dug Buddy out of the wardrobe and had him propped up in a corner.
"Better unstopper him and take off the bandages," says I.
And say, he had a lot of language corked up inside of him. It wasn't very sisterly, either, and most of it would have sounded better at a race-track; but I shut the transom and motioned to Sadie to let him spiel away, never chippin' in a word, only standing one side and lookin' him over.
So far as the outside went he was a credit to the family—one of these slim clean-cut youngsters, with a lot of curly red hair, pinky-white cheeks, and a pair of blue eyes that had nine kinds of deviltry in 'em. I could figure out how mother might be able not to see anything but good in Buddy. Hanged if I could get very sore on him myself, and knowin' how he'd been cuttin' up, at that.
"Well," says I, when he'd got out of breath some, "feel any better, do you?"
"Huh!" says he, givin' me a squint sideways. "Some cheap skate of a private detective, eh! You can't throw a scare into me that way, sis. Chase him out."
"Buddy," says I, "give up the rings."
"How'd you know there was more than one?" says he.
"Give up," says I, holdin' out me hand.
He did it, like a little man. There was two besides the marquise; one an emerald as big as a lima bean, and the other a solitaire spark that could have been shoved up for three or four hundred. You see, a woman like Mrs. Purdy Pell generally has a collection of those things lyin' around on her dressin'-table, and; knew if Buddy'd got any, he'd made a haul.
"I'm ashamed of you, Buddy," says I.
"You needn't be," says he. "I guess you'd do the same if you had a sister that wanted to see you starve in the streets. Oh, you needn't screw up your eyebrows, Sadie. It's so. And if you don't cough up a thousand and let me go, I'll swipe anything in sight. I can stand being pinched if you can afford to have me."
Sadie threw up her hands at that, and began walkin' up and down the room. "Do you hear that?" says she. "That's the kind of a brother I've got."
"It's something awful," says I. "Just hearin' him talk makes me feel shivery. It beats the band how wicked some of these cigarette desperados do get. Don't, Buddy, or I'll faint. I wouldn't dare stay in the room if your sister wa'n't handy to tie you up again in case you started to cut loose."
"I've got a good notion to push in your face," says he.
"Don't pay any attention to him, Shorty," says Sadie.
"I won't," says I; "but I'm scared stiff."
Just about then, though, Buddy seemed to have got a bulletin over a special wire. He was gazin' at me with his mouth open and a pucker between his eyes. "What Shorty?" says he. "Say, you ain't Shorty McCabe, are you?"
"Not to you," says I. "I got to draw the line somewhere, and with bad men I stands on my dignity. I'm Professor McCabe, sonny."
"Holy cats!" says he. "Honest, professor, I didn't mean a word of it. I take it all back. Why say, I saw you put out the Kangaroo in two rounds."
"Then you've had a liberal education," says I.
"Gee!" says he, lettin' off some more surprise, and bracin' himself back in the chair like he was afraid of falling off.
Well say, I've been rode to my dressin'-room on shoulders, and welcomed home from fights by mobs with brass bands; but for a gen-u-ine ovation I guess Buddy's little stunt came as near bein' the real thing as any. Dewey comin' back from the Philippines, or Mr. Get-There Hadley landin' in St. Louis with the Standard Oil scalps, wa'n't in it with me bein' discovered by Buddy Sullivan. I couldn't get the key to it then, but I've mapped it out now. Most of his enthusiasm was owin' to the fact that ever since he was fifteen Buddy'd based his claim to bein' a real sport on my havin' come from the same block as he did.
Anyway, it was a lightnin' change. From being a holy terror, Buddy calmed down to as peaceful a young gent as you'd want to meet. If I'd just shake hands with him once and call it square, he'd follow any program I'd a mind to plan out.
"Only don't let her send me home to maw," says he. "Say, they get up at six in the morning there, and if I don't crawl down by seven maw lugs up toast and eggs, and talks to me like I was a kid."
"Well, where'd you like to be shipped?" says I.
"Aw, come now, professor," says he. "You don't have to be told that. There ain't but one place where a fellow like me can really live. You get sis to put me back on Broadway with a few hundred in my clothes, and I'll kiss the Book that she won't hear from me for a year."
"But how about this jewelry-collectin' fad of yours?" says I.
"Ah, I wasn't going to carry it off," says he. "I let her see I had it, on purpose. I'll be good."
Well, Sadie was willin' to let it go at that, and we was just gettin' this part of the mix-up straightened out lovely, when there came a rap at the door.
"Quick," says Sadie. "They mustn't see Buddy or you either, Shorty!"
So Buddy was pushed into the closet again, and I dodges behind a tall dressin'-mirror in the corner. It was a red-eyed girl with lumps in her throat. She said she was Mrs. Purdy Pell's maid.
"Mrs. Pell's missed some rings," says she, "and we've been havin' words over it. I told her there was a suspicious-looking young man in the house that I'd seen comin' out of your rooms awhile ago, and I didn't know but what you'd missed some things, too, ma'am."
"Ask Mrs. Pell to step over here for a minute," says Sadie.
"What's doing?" says I, after the maid had left.
"I don't know," says Sadie. "I've got to give that jewelry back to the silly thing first; then we'll see."
So I handed the trinkets over, and it wasn't long before Mrs. Pell shows up. And say, the minute them two came together the mercury dropped about thirty degrees. Bein' behind the glass, I couldn't see; but I could hear, and that was enough.
"Here are your lost rings," says Sadie.
That's her, every tick of the watch. If she was tackled by a gyasticutus, she'd grab it by the horns.
"Oh!" says Mrs, Pell, gatherin' 'em in; "And how does it happen that you have them?"
"I'll tell you to-morrow," says Sadie.
"I'd rather not wait that long," says Mrs. Pell. "I prefer to know now."
"You ought to be satisfied to get them back," says Sadie.
"Perhaps," says Mrs. Pell; "but I'm just a little curious to know how they got away. My maid thinks the person who took them is still in the house."
"If I listened to all the things my maid says—" begins Sadie.
"There are maids and maids," says Mrs. Pell. "I can trust mine. She saw the man. More than that, Mrs. Dipworthy, she thinks he is hidden in your rooms."
"She must have seen my brother," says Sadie, "or Professor McCabe."
"It's quite possible," says Mrs. Pell; "but I shall insist on having the officers sent for."
"Why," says Sadie, "I might have taken them myself, just as a joke."
"Indeed!" says Mrs. Pell in a polite assault-and-battery tone. "Then perhaps you will confess as much to the other guests? Will you?"
And that was a facer for Sadie. She'd been keeping a stiff lip up to this, but she came to the scratch wabbly in her voice. "You wouldn't want me to do that, would you?" says she.
"In justice to my maid, I must," says Mrs. Pell.
"Well," says Sadie, "if you're mean enough for that, I suppose I—"
But, say, I couldn't stay under cover any longer, with her bein' pushed down the chute in that style. I was wise to her game all right. She meant to stand up and take all that was coming, even if it put her down and out, just to keep the hooks off that kid brother of hers. And me loafin' back of the ropes with me hands in me pockets! I'd been a welcher, wouldn't I?
"Did I hear my cue?" says I, steppin' out into the lime-light.
It was a tableau, for fair. Me and Mrs. Purdy Pell didn't do anything but swap looks for a minute or so. I can't say just how pleased she was, but I've had better views. She wasn't any dainty, lily-of-the-valley sort. She was a good deal of a cabbage rose, I should say, and carried more or less weight for age. She had an arm on her like a fore-quarter of beef. I don't wonder that Purdy Pell skipped to Europe and didn't put in any answer when the proceedin's came up.
"No, he isn't," says Sadie, speakin' up brisk.
"That's right," says I; "but it was me brought your finger sparks back to light, ma'am."
"And where did you find them?" says Mrs. Pell, turnin' the third-degree stare on me.
"That's a professional secret," says I, "which I can't give up just yet."
"Oh, you can't!" says she. "This is interesting."
And with that she begins to size us up, one after the other. Oh, she had us tied to the post, with nothin' to do but chuck the knives at us. For a gallery play, it was the punkiest I ever put up. Here I'd come splashin' in with both feet, like an amateur life-saver goin' to the rescue, and I hadn't done anything but raise the tide.
Sadie didn't have a word to say. She was just bitin' her lip, and gettin' white about the mouth from the mad in her. And say, maybe Her Stoutness didn't enjoy watchin' us squirm. She was gettin' even for every look one of her Willie boys had ever wasted on Sadie.
"We'll see if you two can be induced to confide your precious secret to the police," says she. "I mean to find out who stole my rings."
She hadn't more than sent in that shot before the closet door opens, and Buddy comes out, blinkin' like a bat.
"It's all over, ain't it?" says he.
"It is now," says I, and looks to see Mrs. Purdy Pell begin to holler: "Stop thief!"
But it was a case of being off the alley again. Say, I'm glad I wasn't backin' my guesses with good money that night, or I'd come home with my pockets wrong side out. Ever see a hundred-and-eighty-pound fairy with a double chin turn kittenish? That was her.
"Why, Mr. Sullivan!" she gurgles, throwin' him a Julia Marlowe goo-goo glance.
"Hello, Dimples!" says Buddy. "Oh, they were your rings, were they? Then it's all right. I just borrowed 'em to scare sister into a cat fit and make her open up—just for a josh, you know."
"Why, why!" says Mrs. Pell, lookin' twisted, "is Mrs. Dipworthy your sister?"
"Sure," says Buddy. "But say, Dimples, you're the very girl I was wanting to see most. I've got another sure thing, good as a title guarantee, for the Croton stakes, and if you'll back it for me we'll make a killing. How about it, eh?"
"Oh, you reckless boy," says Mrs. Pell, tapping him on the cheek. "But you did give me such a lovely tip at the Aqueduct, and—and we'll see. Come, I want to talk to you," and she put out a wing for him to take.
As they drifted down towards the terrace Buddy turns and gives us the sassy wink over his shoulder.
"Looks like we'd lost our job, Sadie," says I.
"The silly old moss-agate!" says Sadie.
Then I goes down and reports to Pinckney, and puts in the rest of the evenin' bein' introduced as the gent that set the Baron Patchouli up in the shoe-string business. I felt like I'd opened up a jack-pot on a four-flush, but Pinckney and the rest seemed to be having a good time, so I stuck it out. In the morning Buddy goes along back to town with me.
"Say, professor," says he, pattin' a roll of twenties in his trousers pocket, "I wouldn't pass this along to anyone else, but if you want to connect with a hatful of easy coin, just plunge on Candy Boy."
"That's your beanery tip, is it?" says I. "Much obliged, Buddy, but I guess after the bookies get all you and Mrs. Pell are goin' to throw at 'em they won't need mine."
See? It was up to me to push home a great moral lesson, and I done my best. But what's the use? Next mornin' I takes up the paper and reads how Candy Boy wins, heads apart.