CHAPTER I
In which Clarence Esmond places himself in the hands of the Bright-eyed Goddess of Adventure, and is entrusted by that Deity to the care of a Butcher’s Boy.
On a morning early in September, the sun was shining brightly upon the village of McGregor. Nestled in a coulée between two hills, one rising squarely and rock-ribbed, lacking only the illusion of windows to give it the appearance of a ruined castle, the other to the northwest, sloping gently upwards, and crowned at the summit with a number of villas, McGregor, running down to the Mississippi River, was as pretty a town as Iowa could boast.
On this bright particular morning, an overgrown youth was sitting on the boat-landing, his feet dangling above the water, his face glooming darkly. Master Abe Thompson, age sixteen, was troubled in spirit.
He was homeless. He had lost his position, that of a butcher’s boy, just a little after sunrise. It arose out of a difference of seventy-five cents in the butcher’s accounts. Abe had been told under penalty of having “his face shoved in” never to darken the doors of the butcher-shop again. At the tender age of twelve Abe had left his home unostentatiously and without serving notice, and ever since had spent his time in losing jobs up and down the river. The trouble with Abe was that he never could resist “obeying that impulse,” no matter what that impulse might be. He had been blessed, if one may say so, with an obedient mother and an indifferent father. The discipline of the public school which Abe was supposed to attend might have done something for the boy had he been present for so much as six days hand-running. But Abe had early made a successful course in the art of dodging duty. He was by way of joining that vast army of the unemployed who are the ornament of our country roads in summer and of our back alleys in winter. Abe was entitled to graduate with honors in the ranks of those who have learned the gentle art entitled “How not to do it.” At the present moment Abe Thompson was in darkest mood. His soul just now was fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils. His gloomy eyes moved vacantly over the waters shimmering in the sun. Suddenly his air of listlessness disappeared, his eyes grew tense. Among the boats around the landing was one small skiff riding high on the water, in which (for some people will be careless) lay a pair of oars and a paddle.
Abe was still gazing at this boat and its contents with greedy eyes when there came upon his ears the sound of a sweet, piercing soprano voice, giving, to whoso should wish to hear, the ineffable chorus of an almost forgotten music-hall melody:
“Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay,
Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay,
Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay,
Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay!”