Читать книгу Edith and John - Franklin Smith Farquhar - Страница 9

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The rusty perspective of a four story building rises in the midst of many similarly nondescript structures, between Wood and Liberty streets, looking out over the cobblestoned wharf skirting the Monongahela river, flowing lazily by.

It was builded in the days when it was a lofty office building: when its three flights of darkened stairs were mounted by leg muscle: in the days when its little windows were barn-doors of undimmed light, and the panes were of minimum size for economy sake: in the days when the steamboat trade was a valuable asset of the river front merchants: in the days when men fought in the merry war of competition, and when life was not so strenuous as it is now: in the days when its name stood prominently among the business blocks in the city directory. But now it has no resemblance to its former self; it makes no impression on the passer-by, unless he be the curious delving into ancient lore; it is silently languishing into the past, waiting for the strong arm of Progress to raze it to the ground for something more imposing in its place.

Here, in the past, were offices on the upper floors devoted to the exclusive use of professional men; while on the ground floor, for years, a merchant held sway with an assortment of merchandise that equaled in variety, if not in quantity, the great department stores of the present.

Where the store was, there is a junk shop now, and it is called The Die. In it may be found, collected together in an heterogeneous mass, a miscellaneous lot of rubbish that even the bearish-like proprietor himself wonders, sometimes, where it all comes from, and whither it all goes. Here may be found the worn out and cast off articles of rivermen: boatmen, wharfmen, raftsmen, and every other class of men who ply their trade in, on, and about the water. Here may be found an indeterminable assortment of wearing apparel, for all ages of men, women and children, in all conditions of wear and tear, from a riverman's oiled coat, with greasy spots upon it and burned holes in many places in it, to a worn out pair of infantine shoes. Here may be found a hecatomb of articles of the household, of the store, of the office, of the hotel, of the church, of the school, of the cemetery, of the railway yards, of the building of justice, of jail, of penitentiary—from every place, almost—all telling a tale of grandeur, of poverty, of happiness, of misery; of pride, of modesty, of virtue; of honor, of dishonor; of sickness, pain and death.

The keeper of this shop, at this period in this narrative, was Peter Dieman—a red-jowled, pig-eyed, sharp-nosed, dirty-mouthed, frowsy-headed, big-bellied American, whose ancestry may be determined by his name. A glance into his gloomy place was enough to convince the most unobserving that he was specially adapted to his established trade of buying and selling all manner of second-hand goods, ranging in value from a penny to the enormous sum of one great American Eagle; and seldom, if ever, did anything go above the latter figure, when he was the purchaser; but when he was the seller—that was different.

In the rear of the darksome room, on the ground floor, there was a little cubby-hole built around a little window that opened on the rear street. The window was so begrimed with dust and cobwebs that it was necessary, even on the brightest days, to keep a sixteen candle power incandescent globe going continually to furnish sufficient light for the proprietor to see himself, and enable him to scribble down his accounts, what few he kept in books. In this gruesome little office Peter sat, from early morning to late night, smoking his foul smelling pipe, receiving his cash from sales, and also receiving the people who did not call on strictly commercial affairs; and betimes he peered through a smoky glass-covered square hole that perforated one side of the thin partition that circled him about, into the store, watching, with squinting eyes, Eli Jerey, his clerk, dealing out the junk to the poor purchasers.

Peter Dieman was a fiend incarnate, after money. He was avaricious to the core. He was relentlessly pressing in the collection of overdue bills, and heartlessly "jewing" in the purchase of the worn-out, worm-eaten, moth-ravaged articles that he gathered up, in his rounds, from the unfortunates, the n'er-do-wells, the hopeless mortals who had to sacrifice their goods and chattels to make ends meet; or who, peradventure, were glad to dispose of any cumbersome article of their more prosperous days. Further, besides being a close dealer, he was a shaver of notes, a conscienceless dealer without regard whatever for the principles of justice, or the duties of a citizen, or the honor of the brethren of his tribe of men. And still further, he was so selfishly constituted that no barterer could ever equal him in his surprisingly pronounced talents for cheating, filching and over-charging. Without education, and alone, on his own initiative, and through his own painstaking, persistent, persevering efforts he arose from nothing to, what would be considered by many, a state of enviable affluence for his station in the ranks of the commercial men of the city.

He could neither read nor write when he started out for himself on the road of life; but by dint of much endeavor he learned to write by rote, like a blind man, and talk by imitation, like a parrot. For many years he was his own buyer, his own seller, his own bookkeeper, his own handy man and henchman. But when he had accumulated a world of experience, a great quantity of junk, a large sum of money, and the desire to be an expert ward heeler, he hired Eli Jerey, as a boy of ten, to be his helper.

Now, Eli was a lad with no more ambition than a toad. Being obsessed with that slavish passion one finds in so many of his class to serve a master for a mere competance that would meet his daily expenses, he went about his business with such translucent simplicity and dutiful obedience to his master's will that he worked from six in the morning till seven in the evening with such a zeal that Peter could make no complaint whatever to his energy in keeping shop, while he in turn kept office and watched through the little square hole aforesaid.

This place became known as The Die early in the career of Peter—a corruption of the name of Dieman, and perhaps a revealer of his principles.

One day, in September, while the fog and smoke hung darkly over the river and everything, a short heavyset man, very plainly dressed, but with an inquisitorial air in his bearing, sauntered into the shop, and looked about as carelessly and indolently as if he were a sojourner come to view, with a curious eye, the accumulation of things as if on display in a museum. The stranger walked about, with his hands in his pockets, through the narrow aisles between ropes, chains, furniture, pictures, old shoes, hats, clothing, saws, hammers, hatchets, and a thousand and one other things piled up, hanging about, swinging here, or perching there. He was so mysterious in his movements that Eli, upon concluding a simple deal with a louting riverman, came timidly up to him in such a condescending manner that the stranger was struck with amusing amazement at the deferential halo that seemed to pervade the shrimp-like head of the clerk.

"Anything?" asked Eli, approaching.

"Well, I don't know," answered the stranger, his eyes roving about the room. "I just came in to see if you had anything I wanted." Still gazing abstractedly into a far corner where lay deeper piles of junk, he went on, "I guess, though, from the looks of things, I might get anything I want here, from a gimlet to a gibet."

Eli stared doubtfully at the man, wondering at his utter lack of concentration on the object sought. In the meantime, Peter was not off his guard at his peephole. He was standing, looking out, rubbing his hands and squinting, in an effort to make out the identity of the man.

"Nothing in iron? Nothing in ropes? Nothing in old clothes? Nothing in furniture?" asked Eli.

"Don't know just yet," answered the stranger, now with his eyes cast down upon the docile but ever guardful Eli.

"What then?" asked Eli, still pursuing his questioning, and still indecisive as to how to approach this uncommunicative customer.

"I am just looking," answered the stranger, vacantly. "Oh, well—just to see if I can see anything of benefit that I might carry off."

Then off he went, mozying through the congested aisles, with that vacuous stare about him that is assumed, usually, by a Jehue in a vaudeville show. Eli followed him, very closely, watching very sharply, being suspicious all the time that he might pick up a stray pin and carry it off without just compensation to his close-fisted master. The stranger strayed on, in and out, in and out, among the junkage, till he came at last to the cubby-hole, eyed through at that moment by old Peter.

Arriving at the entrance of Peter's sanctuary, the stranger stopped, looked about him listlessly, and took hold of the latch of the door, pressed his thumb slowly upon it, opened it, and walked within, without invitation, or concern as to who might be the occupant therein—bear or man.

"Good morning," said Peter, eyeing him suspiciously. "What do you want?"

"Well, sir," answered the stranger, "I just stepped in a moment to see if you could supply me with a kit of tools."

"This is my office, sir; my office," said Peter, cross as a she-bear. "Why didn't you ask my clerk, sir; my clerk?"—now rubbing his hands briskly and leering at the stranger. "He will supply your wants, maybe, sir, if he has what you want."

"I always deal with the proprietor of an establishment," remarked the stranger, seating himself. "No harm in that, I reckon, sir?"

"None," returned Peter, with a growl. "None, sir."

"Then, do you have a kit of burglar tools?" asked the stranger, with a suavity of an oily-tongued vender of patent medicine.

Peter looked him over again more critically, eyed him more suspiciously, growled out an unintelligible word or two, and sat down himself in a corner, but in such a position that he still could keep one eye on his loophole of observance.

"No, sir!" deliberately groaned out Peter, "I never carry such articles by choice."

"Then by chance, perhaps?" questioned the stranger.

"Nor by chance, if I can help it," screeched the crusty Peter. "I am an honest dealer in my wares."

"I presume so," returned the stranger, with his eyes roaming about the four bare walls of the cubby-hole, as if he were unwinding his thoughts preparatory to a plunge into the secrets of something hidden within his breast.

"You doubt my word, sir?" said Peter, on his dignity.

"Your veracity, I presume," calmly remarked the stranger, "is equal to the rest of men in business."

"It is, sir," answered Peter, foaming.

"Well, if you have not got what I want, I must leave your place without it," said the stranger, with a nonchalance that caused Peter to squint one of his little eyes up like a question mark.

"I am a fair dealer in all things, I am, sir," retorted Peter, "and I don't like for strangers coming about here and eyeing as if I was in league with criminals, or any other such disreputables."

"That's all right, stranger," replied the stranger, with mollifying effectiveness. "This being a junk shop, I took it to be no more than natural to find here such tools as I have indicated."

Peter rubbed his dirty hands together for a moment, gave an avaricious curl to his under lip, squinted his porcine eyes, and asked:

"What do you propose doing with them tools?"

Then he suddenly turned his head, with a grin of malice on his countenance, and looked through his peephole at Eli, whom he saw at that moment parlying with a forlorn creature of the feminine gender. After gazing thereat for a moment, he turned to the stranger to receive an answer to his question.

"Nothing, any more than that I want them," answered the stranger, carelessly.

"That is not a satisfactory answer," said Peter, again turning to his peephole, from which place he could not now unrivet his eyes.

"That's my only answer," replied the stranger. "Your name is Peter Dieman, is it not?"

Peter quickly unriveted his eyes, and looked up with astonishment at the peculiar tone in the stranger's voice, and the sharp look in his steel-gray eyes.

"It is my name," growled Peter.

"I knew it was—judging by the sign over the door," said the stranger.

"Then why in the devil do you ask such a foolish question, if you knew it?" said Peter, ferociously.

"Because, I wanted to make sure," said the stranger. "Say, Mr. Dieman," he now asked, "do you know Ford & Ford, who are after the contract for repaving 444th street with wood blocks?"

"I do."

"Do you know Councilman Biff?"

"I do."

"You know all the other councilmen?"

"I do."

"Very well. Do you know the chief clerk?"

"I do."

"How many can you buy?"

Peter eyed him again, growled again, again peeped out of his place of espial at Eli and the forlorn creature still parlying, rubbed his hands, ran his greasy fingers through his thin setting of hair, coughed, sneezed, looked out the peephole, screwed his mouth to one side, hem-hawed, then snorted:

"Who do you represent?"

"Ford & Ford. Here is my passport to you," replied the stranger, handing Peter a typewritten sheet of paper signed by a member of that firm.

"Why, in the devil, didn't you make yourself known in the beginning?"

"Oh, I just wanted to lead you up to the question."

"What do they want?"

"They want the contract."

"Have they got the money?"

"They have."

"It will cost you—"

"We have the necessary amount."

"—Fifty thousand to get it—money first."

"When do you want the money?"

"Tomorrow at eleven o'clock."

The stranger arose, went out into the smoke and fog, and disappeared somewhere into the infolding channels of great business undertakings of this wonderfully prosperous city of steel and iron, where even the hearts of men are as the material that the great blast furnaces spew out, day and night, for seven days in the week, week in and week out.