Читать книгу Odd Numbers - Ford Sewell - Страница 1

One of my highbrow reg’lars at the Physical Culture Studio, a gent that mixes up in charity works, like organizin’ debatin’ societies in the deaf and dumb asylums, was tellin’ me awhile back of a great scheme of his to help out the stranger in our fair village. He wants to open public information bureaus, where a jay might go and find out anything he wanted to know, from how to locate a New Thought church, to the nearest place where he could buy a fresh celluloid collar.

“Get the idea?” says he. “A public bureau where strangers in New York would be given courteous attention, friendly advice, and that sort of thing.”

“What’s the use?” says I. “Ain’t I here?”

Course, I was just gettin’ over a josh. But say, it ain’t all a funny dream, either. Don’t a lot of ’em come my way? Maybe it’s because I’m so apt to lay myself open to the confidential tackle. But somehow, when I see one of these tourist freaks sizin’ me up, and lookin’ kind of dazed and lonesome, I can’t chuck him back the frosty stare. I’ve been a stray in a strange town myself. So I gen’rally tries to seem halfway human, and if he opens up with some shot on the weather, I let him get in the follow-up questions and take the chances.

Here the other day, though, I wa’n’t lookin’ for anything of the kind. I was just joltin’ down my luncheon with a little promenade up the sunny side of Avenue V, taking in the exhibits – things in the show windows and folks on the sidewalks – as keen as if I’d paid in my dollar at some ticket office.

And say, where can you beat it? I see it ’most every day in the year, and it’s always new. There’s different flowers in the florists’ displays, new flags hung out on the big hotels, and even the chorus ladies in the limousines are changed now and then.

I can’t figure out just what it was landed me in front of this millinery window. Gen’rally I hurry by them exhibits with a shudder; for once I got gay and told Sadie to take her pick, as this one was on me; and it was months before I got over the shock of payin’ that bill. But there I finds myself, close up to the plate glass, gawpin’ at a sample of what can be done in the hat line when the Bureau of Obstructions has been bought off and nobody’s thought of applyin’ the statute of limitations.

It’s a heliotrope lid, and the foundation must have used up enough straw to bed down a circus. It has the dimensions and general outlines of a summerhouse. The scheme of decoration is simple enough, though. The top of this heliotrope summerhouse has been caught in a heliotrope fog, that’s all. There’s yards and yards of this gauzy stuff draped and puffed and looped around it, with only a wide purple ribbon showin’ here and there and keepin’ the fog in place.

Well, all that is restin’ careless in a box, the size of a quarter-mile runnin’ track, with the cover half off. And it’s a work of art in itself, that box, – all Looey Cans pictures, and a thick purple silk cord to tie it up with. Why, one glimpse of that combination was enough to make me clap my hand over my roll and back away from the spot!

Just then, though, I notices another gent steppin’ up for a squint at the monstrosity, and I can’t help lingerin’ to see if he gets the same kind of a shock. He’s sort of a queer party, too, – short, stoop shouldered, thin faced, wrinkled old chap, with a sandy mustache mixed some with gray, and a pair of shrewd little eyes peerin’ out under bushy brows. Anybody could spot him as a rutabaga delegate by the high crowned soft hat and the back number ulster that he’s still stickin’ to, though the thermometer is way up in the eighties.

But he don’t seem to shy any at the purple lid. He sticks his head out first this way and then that, like a turtle, and then all of a sudden he shoots over kind of a quizzin’ glance at me. I can’t help but give him the grin. At that his mouth corners wrinkle up and the little gray eyes begin to twinkle.

“Quite a hat, eh?” he chuckles.

“It’s goin’ some in the lid line,” says I.

“I expect that’s a mighty stylish article, though,” says he.

“That’s the bluff the store people are makin’,” says I, “and there’s no law against it.”

“What would be your guess on the price of that there, now?” says he, edging up.

“Ah, let’s leave such harrowin’ details to the man that has to pay for it,” says I. “No use in our gettin’ the chilly spine over what’s marked on the price ticket; that is, unless you’re thinking of investin’,” and as I tips him the humorous wink I starts to move off.

But this wa’n’t a case where I was to get out so easy. He comes right after me. “Excuse me, neighbor,” says he; “but – but that’s exactly what I was thinking of doing, if it wasn’t too infernally expensive.”

“What!” says I, gazin’ at him; for he ain’t the kind of citizen you’d expect to find indulgin’ in such foolishness. “Oh, well, don’t mind my remarks. Go ahead and blow yourself. You want it for the missus, eh?”

“Ye-e-es,” he drawls; “for – for my wife. Ah – er – would it be asking too much of a stranger if I should get you to step in there with me while I find out the price?”

“Why,” says I, lookin’ him over careful, – “why, I don’t know as I’d want to go as far as – Well, what’s the object?”

“You see,” says he, “I’m sort of a bashful person, – always have been, – and I don’t just like to go in there alone amongst all them women folks. But the fact is, I’ve kind of got my mind set on having that hat, and – ”

“Wife ain’t in town, then?” says I.

“No,” says he, “she’s – she isn’t.”

“Ain’t you runnin’ some risks,” says I, “loadin’ up with a lid that may not fit her partic’lar style of beauty?”

“That’s so, that’s so,” says he. “Ought to be something that would kind of jibe with her complexion and the color of her hair, hadn’t it?”

“You’ve surrounded the idea,” says I. “Maybe it would be safer to send for her to come on.”

“No,” says he; “couldn’t be done. But see here,” and he takes my arm and steers me up the avenue, “if you don’t mind talking this over, I’d like to tell you a plan I’ve just thought out.”

Well, he’d got me some int’rested in him by that time. I could see he wa’n’t no common Rube, and them twinklin’ little eyes of his kind of got me. So I tells him to reel it off.

“Maybe you never heard of me,” he goes on; “but I’m Goliah Daggett, from South Forks, Iowy.”

“Guess I’ve missed hearin’ of you,” says I.

“I suppose so,” says he, kind of disappointed, though. “The boys out there call me Gol Daggett.”

“Sounds most like a cussword,” says I.

“Yes,” says he; “that’s one reason I’m pretty well known in the State. And there may be other reasons, too.” He lets out a little chuckle at that; not loud, you know, but just as though he was swallowin’ some joke or other. It was a specialty of his, this smothered chuckle business. “Of course,” he goes on, “you needn’t tell me your name, unless – ”

“It’s a fair swap,” says I. “Mine’s McCabe; Shorty for short.”

“Yes?” says he. “I knew a McCabe once. He – er – well, he – ”

“Never mind,” says I. “It’s a big fam’ly, and there’s only a few of us that’s real credits to the name. But about this scheme of yours, Mr. Daggett?”

“Certainly,” says he. “It’s just this: If I could find a woman who looked a good deal like my wife, I could try the hat on her, couldn’t I? She’d do as well, eh?”

“I don’t know why not,” says I.

“Well,” says he, “I know of just such a woman; saw her this morning in my hotel barber shop, where I dropped in for a haircut. She was one of these – What do you call ’em now?”

“Manicure artists?” says I.

“That’s it,” says he. “Asked me if I didn’t want my fingers manicured; and, by jinks! I let her do it, just to see what it was like. Never felt so blamed foolish in my life! Look at them fingernails, will you? Been parin’ ’em with a jackknife for fifty-seven years; and she soaks ’em out in a bowl of perfumery, jabs under ’em with a little stick wrapped in cotton, cuts off all the hang nails, files ’em round at the ends, and polishes ’em up so they shine as if they were varnished! He, he! Guess the boys would laugh if they could have seen me.”

“It’s one experience you’ve got on me,” says I. “And this manicure lady is a ringer for Mrs. Daggett, eh?”

“Well, now,” says he, scratchin’ his chin, “maybe I ought to put it that she looks a good deal as Mrs. Daggett might have looked ten or fifteen years ago if she’d been got up that way, – same shade of red hair, only not such a thunderin’ lot of it; same kind of blue eyes, only not so wide open and starry; and a nose and chin that I couldn’t help remarking. Course, now, you understand this young woman was fixed up considerable smarter than Mrs. Daggett ever was in her life.”

“If she’s a manicure artist in one of them Broadway hotels,” says I, “I could guess that; specially if Mrs. Daggett’s always stuck to Iowa.”

“Yes, that’s right; she has,” says Daggett. “But if she’d had the same chance to know what to wear and how to wear it – Well, I wish she’d had it, that’s all. And she wanted it. My, my! how she did hanker for such things, Mr. McCabe!”

“Well, better late than never,” says I.

“No, no!” says he, his voice kind of breakin’ up. “That’s what I want to forget, how – how late it is!” and hanged if he don’t have to fish out a handkerchief and swab off his eyes. “You see,” he goes on, “Marthy’s gone.”

“Eh?” says I. “You mean she’s – ”

He nods. “Four years ago this spring,” says he. “Typhoid.”

“But,” says I, “how about this hat?”

“One of my notions,” says he, – “just a foolish idea of mine. I’ll tell you. When she was lying there, all white and thin, and not caring whether she ever got up again or not, a new spring hat was the only thing I could get her to take an interest in. She’d never had what you might call a real, bang-up, stylish hat. Always wanted one, too. And it wasn’t because I was such a mean critter that she couldn’t have had the money. But you know how it is in a little place like South Forks. They don’t have ’em in stock, not the kind she wanted, and maybe we couldn’t have found one nearer than Omaha or Chicago; and someway there never was a spring when I could seem to fix things so we could take the trip. Looked kind of foolish, too, traveling so far just to get a hat. So she went without, and put up with what Miss Simmons could trim for her. They looked all right, too, and I used to tell Marthy they were mighty becoming; but all the time I knew they weren’t just – well, you know.”

Say, I never saw any specimens of Miss Simmons’ art works; but I could make a guess. And I nods my head.

“Well,” says Daggett, “when I saw that Marthy was kind of giving up, I used to coax her to get well. ‘You just get on your feet once, Marthy,’ says I, ‘and we’ll go down to Chicago and buy you the finest and stylishest hat we can find in the whole city. More than that, you shall have a new one every spring, the very best.’ She’d almost smile at that, and half promise she’d try. But it wasn’t any use. The fever hadn’t left her strength enough. And the first thing I knew she’d slipped away.”

Odd sort of yarn to be hearin’ there on Fifth-ave. on a sunshiny afternoon, wa’n’t it? And us dodgin’ over crossin’s, and duckin’ under awnin’s, and sidesteppin’ the foot traffic! But he keeps right close to my elbow and gives me the whole story, even to how they’d agreed to use the little knoll just back of the farmhouse as a burial plot, and how she marked the hymns she wanted sung, and how she wanted him to find someone else as soon as the year was out.

“Which was the only thing I couldn’t say yes to,” says Daggett. “‘No, Marthy,’ says I, ‘not unless I can find another just like you.’ – ‘You’ll be mighty lonesome, Goliah,’ says she, ‘and you’ll be wanting to change your flannels too early.’ – ‘Maybe so,’ says I; ‘but I guess I’ll worry along for the rest of the time alone.’ Yes, sir, Mr. McCabe, she was a fine woman, and a patient one. No one ever knew how bad she wanted lots of things that she might of had, and gave up. You see, I was pretty deep in the wheat business, and every dollar I could get hold of went to buying more reapers and interests in elevator companies and crop options. I was bound to be a rich man, and they say I got there. Yes, I guess I am fairly well fixed.”

It wa’n’t any chesty crow, but more like a sigh, and as we stops on a crossing to let a lady plutess roll by in her brougham, Mr. Daggett he sizes up the costume she wore and shakes his head kind of regretful.

“That’s the way Marthy should have been dressed,” says he. “She’d have liked it. And she’d liked a hat such as that one we saw back there; that is, if it’s the right kind. I’ve been buying ’em kind of careless, maybe.”

“How’s that?” says I.

“Oh!” says he, “I didn’t finish telling you about my fool idea. I’ve been getting one every spring, the best I could pick out in Chicago, and carrying it up there on the knoll where Marthy is – and just leaving it. Go on now, Mr. McCabe; laugh if you want to. I won’t mind. I can almost laugh at myself. Of course, Marthy’s beyond caring for hats now. Still, I like to leave ’em there; and I like to think perhaps she does know, after all. So – so I want to get that purple one, providing it would be the right shade. What do you say?”

Talk about your nutty propositions, eh? But honest, I didn’t feel even like crackin’ a smile.

“Daggett,” says I, “you’re a true sport, even if you have got a few bats in the loft. Let’s go back and get quotations on the lid.”

“I wish,” says he, “I could see it tried on that manicure young woman first. Suppose we go down and bring her up?”

“What makes you think she’ll come?” says I.

“Oh, I guess she will,” says he, quiet and thoughtful. “We’ll try, anyway.”

And say, right there I got a new line on him. I could almost frame up how it was he’d started in as a bacon borrowin’ homesteader, and got to be the John D. of his county. But I could see he was up against a new deal this trip. And as it was time for me to be gettin’ down towards 42d-st. anyway, I goes along. As we strikes the hotel barber shop I hangs up on the end of the cigar counter while Daggett looks around for the young woman who’d put the chappy polish on his nails.

“That’s her,” says he, pointing out a heavyweight Titian blonde in the far corner, and over he pikes.

I couldn’t help admirin’ the nerve of him; for of all the l’ongoline queens I ever saw, she’s about the haughtiest. Maybe you can throw on the screen a picture of a female party with a Lillian Russell shape, hair like Mrs. Leslie Carter’s, and an air like a twelve-dollar cloak model showin’ off a five hundred-dollar lace dress to a bookmaker’s bride.

Just as Daggett tiptoes up she’s pattin’ down some of the red puffs that makes the back of her head look like a burnin’ oil tank, and she swings around languid and scornful to see who it is that dares butt in on her presence. All the way she recognizes him is by a little lift of the eyebrows.

I don’t need to hear the dialogue. I can tell by her expression what Daggett is saying. First there’s a kind of condescendin’ curiosity as he begins, then she looks bored and turns back to the mirror, and pretty soon she sings out, “What’s that?” so you could hear her all over the shop. Then Daggett springs his proposition flat.

“Sir!” says she, jumpin’ up and glarin’ at him.

Daggett tries to soothe her down; but it’s no go.

“Mr. Heinmuller!” she calls out, and the boss barber comes steppin’ over, leavin’ a customer with his face muffled in a hot towel. “This person,” she goes on, “is insulting!”

“Hey?” says Heinmuller, puffin’ out his cheeks. “Vos iss dot?”

And for a minute it looked like I’d have to jump in and save Daggett from being chucked through the window. I was just preparin’ to grab the boss by the collar, too, when Daggett gets in his fine work. Slippin’ a ten off his roll, he passes it to Heinmuller, while he explains that all he asked of the lady was to try on a hat he was thinkin’ of gettin’ for his wife.

“That’s all,” says he. “No insult intended. And of course I expect to make it worth while for the young lady.”

I don’t know whether it was the smooth “young lady” business, or the sight of the fat roll that turned the trick; but the tragedy is declared off. Inside of three minutes the boss tells Daggett that Miss Rooney accepts his apology and consents to go if he’ll call a cab.

“Why, surely,” says he. “You’ll come along, too, won’t you, McCabe? Honest, now, I wouldn’t dare do this alone.”

“Too bad about that shy, retirin’ disposition of yours!” says I. “Afraid she’ll steal you, eh?”

But he hangs onto my sleeve and coaxes me until I give in. And we sure made a fine trio ridin’ up Fifth-ave. in a taxi! But you should have seen ’em in the millinery shop as we sails in with Miss Rooney, and Daggett says how he’d like a view of that heliotrope lid in the window. We had ’em guessin’, all right.

Then they gets Miss Rooney in a chair before the mirror, and fits the monstrosity on top of her red hair. Well, say, what a diff’rence it does make in them freak bonnets whether they’re in a box or on the right head! For Miss Rooney has got just the right kind of a face that hat was built to go with. It’s a bit giddy, I’ll admit; but she’s a stunner in it. And does she notice it any herself? Well, some!

“A triumph!” gurgles the saleslady, lookin’ from one to the other of us, tryin’ to figure out who she ought to play to.

“It’s a game combination, all right,” says I, lookin’ wise.

“I only wish – ” begins Daggett, and then swallows the rest of it. In a minute he steps up and says it’ll do, and that the young lady is to pick out one for herself now.

“Oh, how perfectly sweet of you!” says Miss Rooney, slippin’ him a smile that should have had him clear through the ropes. “But if I am to have any, why not this?” and she balances the heliotrope lid on her fingers, lookin’ it over yearnin’ and tender. “It just suits me, doesn’t it?”

Then there’s more of the coy business, aimed straight at Daggett. But Miss Rooney don’t quite put it across.

“That’s going out to Iowy with me,” says he, prompt and decided.

“Oh!” says Miss Rooney, and she proceeds to pick out a white straw with a green ostrich feather a yard long. She was still lookin’ puzzled, though, as we put her into the cab and started her back to the barber shop.

“Must have set you back near a hundred, didn’t they?” says I, as Daggett and I parts on the corner.

“Almost,” says he. “But it’s worth it. Marthy would have looked mighty stylish in that purple one. Yes, yes! And when I get back to South Forks, the first thing I do will be to carry it up on the knoll, box and all, and leave it there. I wonder if she’ll know, eh?”

There wa’n’t any use in my tellin’ him what I thought, though. He wa’n’t talkin’ to me, anyway. There was a kind of a far off, batty look in his eyes as he stood there on the corner, and a drop of brine was tricklin’ down one side of his nose. So we never says a word, but just shakes hands, him goin’ his way, and me mine.

“Chee!” says Swifty Joe, when I shows up, along about three o’clock, “you must have been puttin’ away a hearty lunch!”

“It wa’n’t that kept me,” says I. “I was helpin’ hand a late one to Marthy.”