Somewhere in Red Gap Part 13

"After I'd been there a few days, along comes Angus, _fills_, out into the world from college to make a name for himself. By ingenuity or native brute force he had contrived to graduate. He was nice as ever and told me he was going to look about a bit until he could decide what his field of endeavour should be. Apparently it was breaking his neck in outdoor sports, including loop-the-loop in his new car on roads not meant for it, and delighting Ellabelle because he was a fine social drag in her favour, and enraging his father by the same reasons. Ellabelle was especially thrilled by his making up to a girl that was daughter to this here old train-robber I mentioned. It was looking like he might form an alliance, as they say, with this old family which had lived quite a decent life since they actually got it. The girl looked to me nice enough even for Angus, Junior, but his pa denounced her as a yellow-haired pest with none but frivolous aims in life, who wouldn't know whether a kitchen was a room in a house or a little woolly animal from Paraguay. We had some nice, friendly breakfasts, I believe not, whilst they discussed this poisonous topic, old Angus being only further embittered when it comes out that the train-robber is also dead set against this here alliance because his only daughter needs a decent, reputable man who would come home nights from some low mahogany den in a bank building, and not a worthless young hound that couldn't make a dollar of his own and had displayed no talent except for winning the notice of head waiters and policemen. Old Angus says he knows well enough his son can be arrested out of most crowds just on that description alone, but who is this So-and-So old thug to be saying it in public?

"And so it went, with Ellabelle living in high hopes and young Angus busy inventing new ways to b.u.mp himself off, and old Angus getting more and more seething--quiet enough outside, but so desperate inside that it wasn't any time at all till I saw he was just waiting for a good chance to make some horrible Scotch exhibition of himself.

"Then comes the fatal polo doings, with young Angus playing on the side that won, and Ellabelle being set up higher than ever till she actually begins to snub people here and there at the game that look like they'd swallow it, and old Angus ashamed and proud and glaring round as if he'd like to hear some one besides himself call his son a worthless young hound--if they wanted to start something.

"And the polo victory of course had to be celebrated by a banquet at the hotel, attended by all the players and their huskiest ruffian friends.

They didn't have the ponies there, but I guess they would of if they'd thought of it. It must have been a good banquet, with vintages and song and that sort of thing--I believe they even tried to have food at first--and hearty indoor sports with the china and silver and chairs that had been thoughtlessly provided and a couple of big mirrors that looked as if you could throw a catsup bottle clear through them, only you couldn't, because it would stop there after merely breaking the gla.s.s, and spatter in a helpless way.

"And of course there was speeches. The best one, as far as I could learn, was made by the owner of the outraged premises at a late hour--when the party was breaking up--as you might put it. He said the bill would be about eighteen hundred dollars, as near as he could tell at first glance. He was greeted with hearty laughter and applause from the high-spirited young incendiaries and retired hastily through an unsuspected door to the pantry as they rushed for him. It was then they found out what to do with the rest of the catsup--and did it--so the walls and ceiling wouldn't look so monotonous, and fixed the windows so they would let out the foul tobacco smoke, and completed a large painting of the Yosemite that hung on the wall, doing several things to it that hadn't occurred to the artist in his hurry, and performed a serious operation on the piano without the use of gas. The tables, I believe, was left flat on their backs.

"Angus, _fills_, was fetched home in a car by a gang of his roguish young playmates. They stopped down on the stately drive under my window and a quartet sung a pathetic song that run:

"Don't forget your parents, Think all they done for you!

"Then young Angus ascended the marble steps to the top one, bared his agreeable head to the moonlight, and made them a nice speech. He said the campaign now in progress, fellow-citizens, marked the gravest crisis in the affairs of our grand old state that an intelligent const.i.tuency had ever been called upon to vote down, but that he felt they were on the eve of a sweeping victory that would sweep the corrupt h.e.l.l-hounds of a venal opposition into an ignominy from which they would never be swept by any base act of his while they honoured him with their suffrages, because his life was an open book and he challenged any son-of-a-gun within sound of his voice to challenge this to his face or take the consequences of being swept into oblivion by the high tide of a people's indignation that would sweep everything before it on the third day of November next, having been aroused in its might at last from the debasing sloth into which the corrupt h.e.l.l-hounds of a venal opposition had swept them, but a brighter day had dawned, which would sweep the onrus.h.i.+ng hordes of petty chicanery to where they would get theirs; and, as one who had heard the call of an oppressed people, he would accept this fitting testimonial, not for its intrinsic worth but for the spirit in which it was tendered. As for the nefarious tariff on watch springs, sawed lumber, and indigo, he would defer his masterly discussion of these burning issues to a more fitting time because a man had to get a little sleep now and then or he wasn't any good next day.

In the meantime he thanked them one and all, and so, gentlemen, good-night.

"The audience cheered hoa.r.s.ely and drove off. I guess the speech would have been longer if a light hadn't showed in the east wing of the castle where Angus, _peer_, slept. And then all was peace and quiet till the storm broke on a rocky coast next day. It didn't really break until evening, but suspicious clouds no bigger than a man's hand might have been observed earlier. If young Angus took any breakfast that morning it was done in the privacy of his apartment under the pitying glances of a valet or something. But here he was at lunch, blithe as ever, and full of merry details about the late disaster. He spoke with much humour about a wider use for tomato catsup than was ever encouraged by the old school of house decorators. Old Angus listened respectfully, taking only a few bites of food but chewing them long and thoughtfully. Ellabelle was chiefly interested in the names of the hearty young vandals. She was delighted to learn that they was all of the right set, and her eyes glowed with pride. The eyes of Angus, _peer_, was now glowing with what I could see was something else, though I couldn't make out just what it was. He never once exploded like you'd of thought he was due to.

"Then come a note for the boy which the perfect-mannered Englishman that was tending us said was brought by a messenger. Young Angus glanced at the page and broke out indignantly. 'The thieving old pirate!' he says.

'Last night he thought it would be about eighteen hundred dollars, and that sounded hysterical enough for the few little things we'd scratched or mussed up. I told him he would doubtless feel better this morning, but in any event to send the bill to me and I would pay it.'

"'Quite right of you,' says Ellabelle proudly.

"'And now the scoundrel sends me one for twenty-three hundred and odd.

He's a robber, net!'

"Old Angus said never a word, but chewed slowly, whilst various puzzling expressions chased themselves acrost his eloquent face. I couldn't make a thing out of any of them.

"'Never patronize the fellow again,' says Ellabelle warmly.

"'As to that,' says her son, 'he hinted something last night about having me arrested if I ever tried to patronize him again, but that isn't the point. He's robbing me now.'

"'Oh, money!' says Ellabelle in a low tone of disgust and with a gesture like she was rebuking her son for mentioning such a thing before the servant.

"'But I don't like to be taken advantage of,' says he, looking very annoyed and grand. Then old Angus swallowed something he'd been chewing for eight minutes and spoke up with an entirely new expression that puzzled me more than ever.

"'If you're sure you have the right of it, don't you submit to the outrage.'

"Angus, Junior, backed up a little bit at this, not knowing quite how to take the old man's mildness. 'Oh, of course the fellow might win out if he took it into court,' he says. 'Every one knows the courts are just a ma.s.s of corruption.'

"'True, I've heard gossip to that effect,' says his father. 'Yet there must be some way to thwart the crook. I'm feeling strangely ingenious at the moment.' He was very mild, and yet there was something sinister and Scotch about him that the boy felt.

"'Of course I'd pay it out of my own money,' he remarks generously.

"'Even so, I hate to see you cheated,' says his father kindly. 'I hate to have you pay unjust extortions out of the mere pittance your tight-fisted old father allows you.'

"Young Angus said nothing to this, but blushed and coughed uncomfortably.

"'If you hurt that hotel anything like twenty-three hundred dollars'

worth, it must be an interesting sight,' his father goes on brightly.

"'Oh, it was funny at the time,' says Angus boy, cheering up again.

"'Things often are,' says old Angus. 'I'll have a look.'

"'At the bill?'

"'No, at the wreck,' says he. The old boy was still quiet on the outside, but was plainly under great excitement, for he now folded his napkin with care, a crime of which I knew Ellabelle had broken him the first week in New York, years before. I noticed their butler had the fine feeling to look steadily away at the wall during this obscenity.

The offender then made a pleasant remark about the beauty of the day and left the palatial apartment swiftly. Young Angus and his mother looked at each other and strolled after him softly over rugs costing about eighty thousand dollars. The husband and father was being driven off by a man he could trust in a car they had let him have for his own use.

Later Ellabelle confides to me that she mistrusts old Angus is contemplating some bit of his national deviltry. 'He had a strange look on his face,' says she, 'and you know--once a Scotchman, always a Scotchman! Oh, it would be pitiful if he did anything peculiarly Scotch just at our most critical period here!' Then she felt of her face to see if there was any nervous lines come into it, and there was, and she beat it for the maid to have 'em rubbed out ere they set.

"Yet at dinner that night everything seemed fine, with old Angus as jovial as I'd ever seen him, and the meal come to a cheerful end and we was having coffee in the Looey de Medisee saloon, I think it is, before a word was said about this here injured hotel.

"'You were far too modest this morning, you sly dog!' says Angus, _peer_, at last, chuckling delightedly. 'You misled me grievously. That job of wrecking shows genius of a quality that was all too rare in my time. I suspect it's the college that does it. I shouldn't wonder now if going through college is as good as a liberal education. I don't believe mere uneducated house-wreckers could have done so pretty a job in twice the time, and there's clever little touches they never would have thought of at all.'

"'It did look thorough when we left,' says young Angus, not quite knowing whether to laugh.

"'It's nothing short of sublime,' says his father proudly. 'I stood in that deserted banquet hall, though it looks never a bit like one, with ruin and desolation on every hand as far as the eye could reach. It inspired such awe in the bereaved owner and me that we instinctively spoke in hushed whispers. I've had no such gripping sensation as that since I gazed upon the dead city of Pompeii. No longer can it be said that Europe possesses all the impressive ruins.'

"Angus boy grinned cheerfully now, feeling that this tribute was heartfelt.

"'I suspect now,' goes on the old boy, 'that when the wreckage is cleared away we shall find the mangled bodies of several that perished when the bolts descended from a clear sky upon the gay scene.'

"'Perhaps under the tables,' says young Angus, chirking up still more at this geniality. 'Two or three went down early and may still be there.'

"'Yet twenty-three hundred for it is a monstrous outrage,' says the old man, changing his voice just a mite. 'Too well I know the cost of such repairs. Fifteen hundred at most would make the place better than ever--and to think that you, struggling along to keep up appearances on the little I give you, should be imposed upon by a crook that undoubtedly has the law on his side! I could endure no thought of it, so I foiled him.'

"'How?' says young Angus, kind of alarmed.

"Angus, _peer_, yawned and got up. 'It's a long story and would hardly interest you,' says he, moving over to the door. 'Besides, I must be to bed against the morrow, which will be a long, hard day for me.' His voice had tightened up.

"'What have you done?' demands Ellabelle pa.s.sionately.

"'Saved your son eight hundred dollars,' says Angus, 'or the equivalent of his own earnings for something like eight hundred years at current prices for labour.'

"'I've a right to know,' says Ellabelle through her teeth and stiffening in her chair. Young Angus just set there with his mouth open.

"'So you have,' says old Angus, and he goes on as crisp as a bunch of celery: 'I told you I felt ingenious. I've kept this money in the family by the simple device of taking the job. I've engaged two other painters and decorators besides myself, a carpenter, an electrician, a glazier, and a few proletariats of minor talent for clearing away the wreckage. I shall be on the job at eight. The loafers won't start at seven, as I used to. Don't think I'd see any son of mine robbed before my very eyes.

My new overalls are laid out and my valet has instructions to get me into them at seven, though he persists in believing I'm to attend a fancy-dress ball at some strangely fas.h.i.+onable hour. So I bid you all good evening.'

"Well, I guess that was the first time Ellabelle had really let go of herself since she was four years old or thereabouts. Talk about the empress of stormy emotion! For ten minutes the room sounded like a torture chamber of the dark Middle Ages. But the doctor reached there at last in a swift car, and him and the two maids managed to get her laid out all comfortable and moaning, though still with outbreaks about every twenty minutes that I could hear clear over on my side of the house.

"And down below my window on the marble porch Angus, _fills_, was walking swiftly up and down for about one hour. He made no speech like the night before. He just walked and walked. The part that struck me was that neither of them had ever seemed to have the slightest notion of pleading old Angus out of his mad folly. They both seemed to know the Scotch when it did break out.

"At seven-thirty the next morning the old boy in overalls and jumper and a cap was driven to his job in a car as big as an apartment house. The curtains to Ellabelle's Looey Seez boudoir remained drawn, with hourly bulletins from the two Swiss maids that she was pa.s.sing away in great agony. Angus, Junior, was off early, too, in his snakiest car. A few minutes later they got a telephone from him sixty miles away that he would not be home to lunch. Old Angus had taken his own lunch with him in a tin pail he'd bought the day before, with a little cupola on top for the cup to put the bottle of cold coffee in.

"It was a joyous home that day, if you don't care how you talk. All it needed was a crepe necktie on the k.n.o.b of the front door. That ornery old hound, Angus, got in from his work at six, spotty with paint and smelling of oil and turpentine, but cheerful as a new father. He washed up, ridding himself of at least a third of the paint smell, looked in at Ellabelle's door to say, 'What! Not feeling well, mamma? Now, that's too bad!' ate a hearty dinner with me, young Angus not having been heard from further, and fell asleep in a gold armchair at ten minutes past nine.