Читать книгу Nothing But the Truth - Isham Frederic Stewart - Страница 1

“It can’t be done.”

“Of course, it can.”

“A man couldn’t survive the ordeal.”

“Could do it myself.”

The scene was the University Club. The talk spread over a good deal of space, as talk will when pink cocktails, or “green gardens in a glass” confront, or are in front of, the talkees. Dickie said it couldn’t be done and Bob said it was possible and that he could do it. He might not have felt such confidence had it not been for the verdant stimulation. He could have done anything just then, so why not this particular feat or stunt? And who was this temerarious one and what was he like?

As an excellent specimen of a masculine young animal, genus homo, Bob Bennett was good to look on. Some of those young ladies who wave banners when young men strain their backs and their arms and their legs in the cause of learning, had, in the days of the not remote past, dubbed him, sub rosa, the “blue-eyed Apollo.” Some of the fellows not so euphemistically inclined had, however, during that same glorious period found frequent occasion to refer to him less classically, if more truthfully, as “that darn fool, Bob Bennett.” That was on account of a streak of wildness in him, for he was a free bold creature, was Bob. Conventional bars and gates chafed him. He may have looked like a “blue-eyed Apollo,” but his spirit had the wings of a wild goose, than which there are no faster birds – for a wild goose is the biplane of the empyrean.

Now that Bob had ceased the chase for learning and was out in the wide world, he should have acquired an additional sobriquet – that of “Impecunious Bob.” It would have fitted his pecuniary condition very nicely. Once he had had great expectations, but alas! – dad had just “come a cropper.” They had sheared him on the street. The world in general didn’t know about it yet, but Bob did.

“We’re broke, Bob,” said dad that very morning.

“That’s all right, Gov.,” said Bob. “Can you get up?”

“I can’t even procure a pair of crutches to hobble with,” answered dad.

“Never mind,” observed Bob magnanimously. “You’ve done pretty well by me up to date. Don’t you worry or reproach yourself. I’m not going to heap abuse on those gray hairs.”

“Thanks, Bob.” Coolly. “I’m not worrying. You see, it’s up to you now.”

“Me?” Bob stared.

“Yes. You see I believe in the Japanese method.”

“What’s that?” Uneasily.

“Duty of a child to support his parent, when said child is grown up!”

Bob whistled. “Say, Gov., do you mean it?”

“Gospel truth, Bob.”

Bob whistled again. “Not joking?”

“’Pon honor!” Cheerfully.

“I never did like the Japanese,” from Bob, sotto voce. “Blame lot of heathens – that’s what they are!”

“I’ve got a dollar or two that I owe tucked away where no one can find it except me,” went on dad, unmindful of Bob’s little soliloquy. “That will have to last until you come to the rescue.”

“Gee! I’m glad you were thoughtful enough for that!” ejaculated the young man. “Sure you can keep it hidden?”

“Burglars couldn’t find it,” said dad confidently, “let alone my creditors – God bless them! But it won’t last long, Bob. Bear that in mind. It’ll be a mighty short respite.”

“Oh, I’ll not forget it. If – if it’s not an impertinence, may I ask what you are going to do, dad?”

“I’m contemplating a fishing trip, first of all, and after that – quien sabe? Some pleasure suitable to my retired condition will undoubtedly suggest itself. I may take up the study of philosophy. Confucius has always interested me. They say it takes forty years to read him and then forty years to digest what you have read. The occupation would, no doubt, prove adequate. But don’t concern yourself about that, dear boy. I’ll get on. You owe me a large debt of gratitude. I’m thrusting a great responsibility on you. It should be the making of you.” Bob had his secret doubts. “Get out and hustle, dear boy. It’s up to you, now!” And he spread out his hands in care-free fashion and smiled blandly. No Buddha could have appeared more complacent – only instead of a lotus flower, Bob’s dad held in his hand a long black weed, the puffing of which seemed to afford a large measure of ecstatic satisfaction. “Go!” He waved the free hand. “My blessing on your efforts.”

Bob started to go, and then he lingered. “Perhaps,” he said, “you can tell me what I am going to do?”

“Don’t know.” Cheerfully.

“What can I do?” Hopelessly.

“Couldn’t say.”

“I don’t know anything.”

“Ha! ha!” Dad laughed, as if son had sprung a joke. “Well, that is a condition experience will remove. Experience and hard knocks,” he added.

Bob swore softly. His head was humming. No heroic purpose to get out and fight his way moved him. He didn’t care about shoveling earth, or chopping down trees. He had no frenzied desire to brave the sixty-below-zero temperature of the Klondike in a mad search for gold. In a word, he didn’t feel at all like the heroes in the books who conquer under almost impossible conditions in the vastnesses of the “open,” and incidentally whallop a few herculean simple-minded sons of nature, just to prove that breed is better than brawn.

“Of course, I could give you a little advice, Bob,” said the governor softly. “If you should find hustling a bit arduous for one of your luxurious nature, there’s an alternative. It is always open to a young man upon whom nature has showered her favors.”

“Don’t know what you mean by that last,” growled Bob, who disliked personalities. “But what is the alternative to hustling?”

“Get married,” said dad coolly.

Bob changed color. Dad watched him keenly.

“There’s always the matrimonial market for young men who have not learned to specialize. I’ve known many such marriages to turn out happily, too. Marrying right, my boy, is a practical, not a sentimental business.”

Bob looked disgusted.

“There’s Miss Gwendoline Gerald, for example. Millions in her own name, and – ”

“Hold on, dad!” cried Bob. His face was flaming now. The blue eyes gleamed almost fiercely.

“I knew you were acquainted,” observed dad softly, still studying him. “Besides she’s a beautiful girl and – ”

“Drop it, dad!” burst from Bob. “We’ve never had a quarrel, but – ” Suddenly he realized his attitude was actually menacing. And toward dad – his own dad! “I beg your pardon, sir,” he muttered contritely. “I’m afraid I am forgetting myself. But please turn the talk.”

“All right,” said dad. “I forgive you. I was only trying to elucidate your position. But since it’s not to be the matrimonial market, it’ll have to be a hustle, my boy. I’m too old to make another fortune. I’ve done my bit and now I’m going to retire on my son. Sounds fair and equitable, doesn’t it, Bob?”

“I’d hate to contradict you, sir,” the other answered moodily.

Dad walked up to him and laid an arm affectionately upon son’s broad shoulders. “I’ve the utmost confidence in you, my boy,” he said, with a bland smile.

“Thank you, sir,” replied Bob. He always preserved an attitude of filial respect toward his one and only parent. But he tore himself away from dad now as soon as he could. He wanted to think. The average hero, thrust out into the world, has only a single load to carry. He has only to earn a living for himself. Bob’s load was a double one and therefore he would have to be a double hero. Mechanically he walked on and on, cogitating upon his unenviable fate. Suddenly he stopped. He found himself in front of the club. Bob went in. And there he met Dickie, Clarence, Dan the doughty “commodore” and some others.

That Impecunious Bob should have said “It could be done” to Imperial Dickie’s “It couldn’t” and have allowed himself to be drawn further into the affair was, in itself, an impertinence. For Dickie was a person of importance. He had a string of simoleons so long that a newspaper-mathematician once computed if you spread them out, touching one another, they would reach half around the world. Or was it twice around? Anyhow, Dickie didn’t have to worry about hustling, the way Bob did now. At the moment the latter was in a mood to contradict any one. He felt reckless. He was ready for almost anything – short of an imitation of that back-to-nature hero of a popular novel.

They had been going on about that “could” and “couldn’t” proposition for some time when some one staked Bob. That some one was promptly “called” by the “commodore” – as jolly a sea-dog as never trod a deck. Dan was a land-commodore, but he was very popular at the Yacht Club, where something besides waves seethed when he was around. He didn’t go often to the University Club where he complained things were too pedagogic. (No one else ever complained of that.) He liked to see the decks – or floors – wave. Then he was in his element and would issue orders with the blithe abandon of a son of Neptune. There was no delay in “clapping on sail” when the commodore was at the helm. And if he said: “Clear the decks for action,” there was action. When he did occasionally drift into the University, he brought with him the flavor of the sea. Things at once breezed up.

Well, the commodore called that some one quick.

“Five thousand he can’t do it.”

“For how long?” says Dickie.

“A week,” answered the commodore.

“Make it two.”

“Oh, very well.”

“Three, if you like!” from Bob, the stormy petrel.

They gazed at him admiringly.

“It isn’t the green garden talking, is it, Bob?” asked Clarence Van Duzen whose sole occupation was being a director in a few corporations – or, more strictly speaking, not being one. It took almost all Clarence’s time to “direct” his wife, or try to.

Bob looked at Clarence reproachfully. “No,” he said. “I’m still master of all my thoughts.” Gloomily. “I couldn’t forget if I tried.”

“That’s all right, then,” said Dickie.

Then Clarence “took” some one else who staked Bob. And Dickie did likewise. And there was some more talk. And then Bob staked himself.

“Little short of cash at the bank just now,” he observed. “But if you’ll take my note – ”

“Take your word if you want,” said the commodore.

“No; here’s my note.” He gave it – a large amount – payable in thirty days. It was awful, but he did it. He hardly thought what he was doing. Having the utmost confidence he would win, he didn’t stop to realize what a large contract he was taking on. But Dan, Dickie, Clarence and the others did.

“Of course, you can’t go away and hide,” said Dickie to Bob with sudden suspicion.

“No; you can’t do that,” from Clarence. “Or get yourself arrested and locked up for three weeks! That wouldn’t be fair, old chap.”

“Bob understands he’s got to go on in the even tenor of his way,” said the commodore.

Bob nodded. “Just as if nothing had happened!” he observed. “I’ll not seek, or I’ll not shirk. I’m on honor, you understand.”

“That’s good enough for me!” said Dickie. “Bob’s honest.”

“And me!” from Clarence.

“And me!” from half a dozen other good souls, including the non-aqueous commodore.

“Gentlemen, I thank you,” said Bob, affected by this outburst of confidence. “I thank you for this display of – this display – ”

“Cut it!”

“Cork it up! And speaking of corks – ”

“When does it begin?” interrupted Bob.

“When you walk out of here,”

“At the front door?”

“When your foot touches the sidewalk, son.” The commodore who was about forty in years sometimes assumed the paternal.

“Never mind the ‘son.’” Bob shuddered. “One father at a time, please!” And then hastily, not to seem ungracious: “I’ve got such a jolly good, real dad, you understand – ”

The commodore dropped the paternal. “Well, lads, here’s a bumper to Bob,” he said.

“We see his finish.”

“No doubt of that.”

“To Bob! Good old Bob! Ho! ho!”

“Ha! ha!” said Bob funereally.

Then he got up.

“Going?”

“Might as well.”

The commodore drew out a watch.

“Twelve minutes after three p.m. Monday, the twelfth of September, in the year of our Lord, 1813,” he said. “You are all witnesses of the time the ball was opened?”

“We are.”

“Good-by, Bob.”

“Oh, let’s go with him a way!”

“Might be interesting,” from Clarence sardonically.

“It might. Least we can do is to see him start on his way rejoicing.”

“That’s so. Come on.” Which they did.

Bob offered no objection. He didn’t much care at the time whether they did or not. What would happen would. He braced himself for the inevitable.