Читать книгу Where Your Treasure Is - Holman Day - Страница 12

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I HAD been about a bit during three years and a half. I own up frankly that I had found out that I had more or less of a cheap streak in me. I’m not disguising it wholly by the name of curiosity; though, of course, a country fellow has a keen hankering to look in on some of the sights of the big city.

When we boys up in Levant used to hand around among ourselves by stealth some of the flashy papers, I didn’t believe there were such things as I read in print and saw in pictures. After some of my sporty associates of the Trident workers began to take me around with them evenings I kept perfectly still about my earlier disbeliefs, and my cheap streak began to talk up to me. Somebody came distributing free admission cards to concerts, managed by religious and fraternal bodies—but I preferred to pay money at the door of a burlesque theater. I liked to go scouting in dance-halls, and I haunted low resorts to hear what I could hear and see what I could see.

We went boldly, for we were husky youths. As for myself, I had licked the boys of Levant at every opportunity—and my Sidney temper afforded me opportunities aplenty. I was never afraid when I went about alone, either. I had a rather quiet way of minding my own business and impressing it on the other fellow that he’d better mind his.

So, it may be guessed, most of my wanderings had been done in the lower quarters of the city.

That’s where I went to hide. And I had knowledge enough of the locality to hide myself effectually and keep hidden.

I did get in touch with one of the fellows who had been around a great deal with me and whom I trusted—for he had no special use for Anson C. Doughty.

Anson C. Doughty was out of doors once more, after spending a week of retirement in the company of a few busy little leeches, and, as to eyes and nose, he was not looking so very badly on the outside, but was evidently having a great amount of trouble with a volcano raging within, so my informant told me. Mr. Doughty was proclaiming that he proposed to catch me so that he could make an example for the sake of discipline in his crews in the future; but according to the program he had promulgated, he proposed to cut me up with a meatchopper before turning me over to the law. So I decided to keep under cover for an indefinite period.

Then I sent word to Captain Jodrey Vose and had him call on me in my castle, because I did not want him to think that he had wasted all his efforts when he had made me a diver.

However, the captain did seem to think so. He frankly said so.

“You’ll never get another job diving on the Atlantic coast,” he told me. “In the first place, you won’t dare to show up as a diver where Anson C. Doughty can grab you. In the next place, Anson C. Doughty has posted you with all the wrecking companies as being as dangerous as an Asiatic tiger with lighted kerosene on his tail. Now tell me what made you do it.”

I told him.

He looked at me with his eyes squizzled up and a frown on his forehead.

“I’m getting along in years and I’m probably losing my mind to some extent,” he said, “but I’ll be cussed if I believe I’ve got entire softening of the brain. It must be that I’m deaf and can’t understand—because I don’t get the least idea of why you did it to him. Tell it over.”

I told him again.

“Yes, I must have softening of the brain,” he grunted. “It’s all a riddle-come-ree to me!”

“It is the same to me—and that’s why I can’t explain,” I told him, frankly. “I hung onto myself all that time, wanting to do it, and then I let go and did it!”

“About as you went to cutting up in Levant before you skipped out,” he snapped.

Up to that time, not by word or look had he let me know that he had any knowledge of why I had left my home town.

“Dod explained it to me in the letter he sent with you. But he had excuses to give.”

I had to admire Captain Vose’s ability to keep his thoughts to himself, as I remembered the placid countenance he showed to me when he had read that letter.

“Now I reckon that Dod was prejudiced in your favor and that you had been a young devil the folks wanted to boost out of town. Dod’s judgment was never very good in the case of any critters who were willing to cater to him. I don’t suppose you dare to go back up there?”

“I don’t want to go.” But all of a sudden a queer wave of homesickness seemed to come swelling up in me and to choke me like water chokes the throat of a dredge-pump. “I’m done with that town for good and all,” I told him. “I got along all right while I was doing dirt as fast as the rest of ’em, but when I tried to be decent they didn’t give me a show!” I snapped my finger. “I wouldn’t give that for anybody in Levant!”

I knew I was lying and I think Jodrey Vose knew it, for he was a keen old chap. He scowled at me and grunted.

“Got any money left after all the rake-helling you’ve been doing for a year past?”

So he knew all about that, too!

“I’m fixed all right!” But I looked up at the ceiling of my room when I said it, and I knew I was not fooling him. I ought to have had a bank account, considering what I had been pulling down. I had all my capital in my pocket—a roll about as big as my thumb. I had considerable of a string of memories, such as they were, regarding money I had spent; I had a brand-new diving dress, and, above all, queer as this may sound, I had a specially new outfit which was my chief pride: a frock-coat and pearl-gray trousers, waistcoat modestly fancy—my real tastes in that direction having been gently suppressed by an honest tailor—and a plug-hat whose shininess fairly put my eyes out. And up to that time I had had no opportunity to wear that suit except in front of the mirror in my hiding-place!

I had tested the tilt of that hat at a dozen different angles; I had nearly broken my neck in efforts to see just how the coat-tails flared in the back. With a chart as help, a card stuck in the side of the mirror, I had practised tying a scarf in Ascot style until my staring eyes watered and my fingers ached. Then I had walked back and forth, trying to get the hang of a cane.

Again I suggest that this may sound queer. But it was only another manifestation of that cheap streak in me, so I reckon. I was not modeling my appearance on the looks of any real gentleman I had ever seen; I had not bought that garb in order to appear at church or to climb into better society. But from the time I was ten years old I had nursed one special, hungry, despairing ambition. At the county fair I saw “Diamond Dick” Shrady marshaling his painted beauties in front of his tent, and, according to my notion, his rig-out was apparel which shaded even the robes of royalty. I could not conceive higher height of happiness than to own and wear for “every day” a suit like that.

Consider the lily—as I considered “Diamond Dick”! Then consider me as I stood in front of that tent!

I had on brogan shoes which I had fresh-tallowed for the day. My stockings were home-knit and bulged out in folds over the tops of my shoes. But I was not so keenly self-conscious of my footwear as of the rest of my outfit, because Levant boys wore brogans quite commonly. My trousers were my special sore point, for even in Levant they had been ridiculed. In the first place, the cloth was a glazy, stiff stuff; in the second place, my good mother did not understand how to cut out a boy’s pants. There was just as much fullness in the front as in the seat. I kept denting in that fullness with my fists when I was unobserved. I found that by stooping quite a bit when I walked or stood I was able to keep the fullness caved in and less noticeable. It was a wonder I did not become permanently humpbacked while I was wearing out those pants. The legs of them were like twin stovepipes, and almost as unyielding. They crackled at the knees when I sat down. Add to those items of attire a hickory shirt, for which I had made a false bosom out of a shingle painted white, a paper collar, and a butterfly bow made of a gingham rag, a hard hat which was a paternal hand-me-down; they called them “dips.” It was a good name. The hat was exactly the shape of the bowl of a table-spoon.

As I leaned back and gaped up at that gorgeous stranger on the platform, straightening myself and letting my forward fullness swell as it would, there was born in me that unconquerable hankering—wild desire to be dressed like that—sometime! To say to myself—sometime—“Now I am dressed right! Everything about me is just as it should be!”

To base my ideas on the outfit “Diamond Dick” wore was probably evidence of the cheap streak in me, I say, but when you consider me as I stood there, and then consider the lily, is there not some excuse?

I confess with some shame that during my hiding in the city, while I was tucked away in that boarding-house room, my chief regret was not that I was out of a job, was not that I had battered the face of my employer, but was because I could not go out and swell around the streets and the amusement places wearing that suit and looking that picture of myself which had been the ideal that lulled me to sleep every night during my boyhood.

I was having some of those dreams while I sat there and gazed up at the ceiling. At last a big dream had come true. I owned that suit and I knew I looked mighty well in it. I had put in a good many hours in front of the looking-glass making sure of that fact. But now that I owned it I was getting none of the thrills and but little of the satisfaction I had looked forward to. Realized ambitions in my case—and probably it’s true in most cases—have always seemed to have a lot of discomforting tag-ends tied to them. I was practically a prisoner in a dingy room, I could not go out and sport around in my new regalia, and Jodrey Vose, who had undertaken to make a man of me, was sitting across the table, scowling at me with a great deal of disfavor.

“Have you taken up drinking along with the rest, young Sidney?”

“No, sir; and I never shall. I’m sure of that, sir.”

“What are you going to do next?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’d better go back to Levant.”

“I’ll never do that.”

“Dod writes that your uncle has been enlarging his business and is making a lot of money and is going to run for town office. He must need a chap like you and has probably forgotten any little trouble he might have had with you.”

But I shook my head.

“You don’t expect me to do anything more for you, do you?”

Again I shook my head. That homesick feeling was swelling up once more.

“I hear that they are fitting out another Cocos Island expedition to hunt for the Peru treasure-ship. You might be able to sign on there. But it’s a fake job. There’s no sunken ship. However, you’ll get wages.”

“I believe I’ll try the Pacific coast, sir.”

He slid his forefinger back and forth slowly under his nose.

“It might do, son. I have thought of the same jump, myself. I have waited now till I’m too old. What started me thinking about it some years ago was the Golden Gate proposition. What troubled me about making up my mind was that some said the treasure had been got out of her and others said there was some guesswork. Nobody seemed to be willing to produce any proof that the treasure was still there. Looking back, I can see now why all interested parties would naturally rather have it thought that the treasure wasn’t there. But when a fellow like me has his living to make he doesn’t want to take too many chances. And the one job I did go on sickened me of treasure-hunting on somebody’s guesswork.”

He was silent for a time.

“I am sorry you are in your scrape, young Sidney. You’re done for as a diver in these parts for a time. Try the Pacific. I don’t say it’s a bad idea.” He grinned at me. “If you recover the Golden Gate treasure drop me a postal card.”

Then he went away, making no more ado about the matter of our parting. I was not surprised by that manner of leave-taking. I am a Yankee myself, and I had found myself wishing that when he went he would walk off without jawing me or coddling me.

I counted my money and sent out for some railroad folders and trailed my finger across the map—and stayed right on in the city, week after week. I don’t know exactly what I had lost—ambition or pluck or what it was! But that was a spell in my life when I was a plumb, square loafer, and rather enjoyed myself—reading cheap novels and playing solitaire in the daytime, then getting in with some of the rest of the boarders and playing poker evenings. In Levant we used to play for beans in barn-chambers. I had a country boy’s shrewdness in that game, and the city fellows did not get much of my money away from me; nor did I get any particular amount of theirs.

However, the pastime did bring me into touch with some sporting characters and with some queer characters, too. There were men who were hiding the same as I was. The fact that I was under cover gave me open sesame to their confidence. They talked a great deal, whiling away dull hours in the day. Several were in the house where I was stopping, and after a time I dared to go visiting around a bit evenings and went along to other houses, in the locality.

It was all new to me, this “flash” side of fife, and I listened to their stories with eyes and mouth open. I conceived an idea of writing out these stories into a book, and after I got back into my room nights I would jot down all I had heard, names and all. I had all the nicknames of operators down pat—those names rather fascinated me. There were names which were based on personal peculiarities or blemishes or system of operating. I found out that a great many of the parties were linked, either by relationship or by gang ties, and that the wise boys among the crooks or the police officers could tell in many cases just what crowd had operated, providing the identity of one man could be revealed. I reckon I calculated in those times that I was going to make an exposé, for I made many notes about the different coteries and their associates.

I will say at this point that I have no intention of writing such a book, and I have gone into a bit of detail about the matter in order that certain following activities of mine may be understood. Otherwise, I might, later on, be thought to be advertising myself as one of those know-it-all and do-it-all heroes of fiction instead of a plain and ordinary chap who has been swayed by circumstance and governed by accident in large measure.

But I did get a lot of fresh and lively information out of those chaps with whom I was thrown in.

After a time they were not at all bashful about asking me if I wouldn’t like a lay in some of their operations.

They frankly said that they had the best luck in country communities. Understand that they proposed nothing except brace games! No safe-breakers in that lot! They said I had an honest way about me that would take well in the country districts.

My money was getting so low I listened with increasing interest. I cannot say that I was tempted, exactly. But I was beginning to wonder how I was ever going to make a go of it if I didn’t get some money. My Pacific trip was all off by that time! My capital had shrunk below the price of a ticket.

They told me that a regular village skinflint with lots of money was, in most cases, a prime victim if the right bait was offered; with the right bait he bit more easily than the more liberal kind of an individual, because the skinflint was more crazy to make money fast and was already used to getting high rates of interest for all money he let out. They were making constant search for old chaps in country communities, well-to-do men who would be tempted to grab at a rich chance or could be induced to serve as decoys to pull in the neighbors, provided a sufficient rake-off were offered.

There, too, was another thing which surprised me—that so often really prominent men could be secured as decoys. The knaves I was training with gave me a lot of stories of the kind; in most cases, so they said, the men seemed to talk themselves into believing that they were offering the neighbors an opportunity to make money.

If I had not been idle and very curious, and all the time wondering how I could make a little money for myself, a lot of this would have gone into one ear and out of the other.. But I was in the mood to take it all in, and so, in that foolish belief that I could write a story, I set down many names and many instances until I had well filled a sheaf of papers which I sewed together into a sort of note-book.

There were various side-lines of the craft of cheaters where I was allowed to be an observer. I watched one of the chaps make up his face for a trip and learned about false beards attached by spirit gum. There was a cute little mustache in his kit and I asked him to affix it to my upper lip. He allowed me to keep it on when I asked permission.

I felt so much confidence in that alteration of my features that I went directly to my room, put on that raiment of my yearning ambition, took in hand my cane, and went forth into the open.

One who has remained long within-doors gets used to the confinement after a time and the desire to go out is dulled; there are persons who have voluntarily remained in bed in perfect health for years; but, once the plunge outside is made, the desire for further liberty grows by what it grasps in the blessedness of outdoors. I determined to be free from then on and to test the quality of that freedom. It was astonishing what confidence I felt in myself when I walked abroad in that rig, casting side-glances at myself in store windows as I walked. It is amazing what the right sort of clothes will do for a man’s grip and grit.

I went down to the docks and walked about, deliberately seeking to put myself in the path of Anson C. Doughty. He did come face to face with me after a time, looked at me with considerable interest, for plug-hats were none too common in that locality, and passed on with bland indifference. My transition was too much for him; I was the butterfly that had emerged from the pupa of a diving-dress. After that I bestowed no further thought on dangers to be apprehended from Anson C. Doughty.

I was more concerned with speculation on where my next meal was coming from, for I was flat broke. I suppose that fact had something to do with driving me out on the street; it was not wholly proud eagerness to show myself in that suit of clothes.

All of a sudden I received direct proof that a plug-hat is occasionally something to conjure by.

Perhaps it is on the principle that advertising pays; a man with slick, silk headgear is supposed to be at least something which can be classed under the title of “professor.” At any rate, I was hailed by that title by a man who stood in a broad doorway. I stopped and he had something interesting to say to me.