Suzanna Stirs the Fire Part 34

He paused, only to continue with fire: "Or, if they have ambitions, know what they would best like to do, how helpless they are. No money, no opportunity."

"I'll warrant, Mr. Ma.s.sey," put in David, "that there are many men employed in your steel mills who by natural inclination are totally unfitted for their jobs. Now, wouldn't scientific investigation in their early manhood have helped to find for them the right place and so added to their happiness?"

"Well, I'm not interested in that part of the question; their happiness has nothing to do with me," returned John Ma.s.sey. "I pay 'em their wages and that's enough. And I don't believe that every man is born with a special talent. They all look alike to me mostly."

"Every man is born with the capacity to do something in a way impossible to another," said the inventor with conviction. "There are no two persons alike in the world."

John Ma.s.sey smiled. He really now felt that he was being entertained.

Such another rare specimen as this inventor with his ridiculous contentions would be hard to find. So he said pleasantly: "And after the machine has recorded its findings, what then?"

"Then you, and other men like you who have acc.u.mulated fortunes--"

"Stop!" cried the capitalist. "Let me finish for you. After the machine has done its work, I'm to have the privilege of paying for the professional education or trade of these same impecunious young men."

"Exactly, sir. The inst.i.tution you endow might be called the Temple of Natural Ability Apprais.e.m.e.nt. There the poor in money, but the rich in ambition may come; there the fumblers, the indecisive, may come to be put to a test. Ah, yours can be a great work."

"A great opportunity for you, Mr. Ma.s.sey," emphasized David, the gardener. "I envy you."

"You'd help out, wouldn't you, Eagle Man?" Suzanna now cried with perfect faith in his good will. "You see, you'd have to when you remembered that there's a little silver chain stretching from your wrist to everybody else's in the world. It must be rubber-plated, I guess."

"What do you mean?" asked the Eagle Man, involuntarily casting his glance down to his wrist, his flow of satire dammed.

"That's what Drusilla told me; we all belong. And you can't do something mean without breaking the chain that binds you to somebody else."

"Ah, my dear," said the Eagle Man, letting his hand fall upon her bright hair, "you belong to a family of impossible visionaries." He looked over at Suzanna's father, and his face suddenly grew crimson. "Were you in earnest, Procter," he cried, "when you told me in Doane's hardware store that your machine meant a big opportunity to me--were you jesting?"

"Jesting! Why, I've pointed out your opportunity, plainly."

"Shown me how I can throw a fortune away!"

After a moment Mr. Procter replied: "We speak in different languages. By opportunity you can see only a chance to make more money."

"Any other sane person makes the same guess," Mr. Ma.s.sey replied.

The inventor's face grew sad. He had dreamed of John Ma.s.sey's response, a dream built on sand, as perhaps he should have known. But hope eternal sprang in his heart, and the belief that every man wished the best for his brother.

The silence continued. To break it Mr. Ma.s.sey turned to David.

"Your friend seems to think he has but to put before me the need for charity and I shall thank him effusively."

David spoke slowly: "My friend should have known better. He forgot, I suppose, your slums where you house your mill hands."

"What do you mean by that?" Mr. Ma.s.sey began, when an exclamation from Suzanna, who was standing at the window, turned his attention there.

"See, there's a big fire over behind the big field," she cried excitedly. "Oh, look at the flames! The poor, poor people!"

David sprang to the window. "It's over in the huddled district," he cried. A fierce light sprang to his eyes. "Where most of your men live with their families, John Ma.s.sey. I wonder how many will escape."

CHAPTER XIX

SUZANNA PUTS A REQUEST

In that devastating fire which swept out of existence the entire tenement district of Anchorville two were lost, never to be heard of again, parents of a twain of children, a boy of four and a girl of three.

Mrs. Procter, finding the mites wandering away from the smoking ruins, had at once taken them home with her, fed them, found clothes for them, and rocked the tired little girl to sleep.

"Are we going to keep them forever, mother?" Maizie asked one afternoon about two weeks after the fire. No one had put in a claim for the children; they were homeless, friendless. What was to be done with them?

Mrs. Procter had turned with loathing from the thought of the orphanage.

She stood at Maizie's question in deep perplexity. She could not turn the children away or put them in an inst.i.tution--and yet, how could she care for them? There was the very definite problem of extra clothes and food to be found out of an income already stretched to its utmost.

"They haven't a home any more, have they, mother?" Suzanna asked, the while her earnest eyes searched her mother's face. "So we should do unto others as we'd be done by, shouldn't we?"

A vague memory returned to Mrs. Procter. What was it Suzanna had once said? "Mrs. Procter cuddles all children in her heart." And Suzanna and Maizie stood watching her, asking a literal translation of a principle laid down for man's guidance.

"We'll see what can be done," Mrs. Procter answered finally. And then she continued very carefully: "You see, it isn't only a question of giving these little ones a home, but they must be clothed and fed and educated, and we haven't a great deal of money."

"So many of those poor people haven't any homes any more, have they?"

asked Suzanna. Her eyes suddenly filled with tears of pity. She looked out of the window. The sun was s.h.i.+ning brightly. And to be in keeping with the suffering about them, Suzanna wished it would hide behind a cloud. It seemed the day itself, to be in sympathy, should be dark, depressed, altogether gloomy.

Her mother answered: "It's providential in a manner that those unsightly cottages were swept away; but they meant homes for many poor souls; and all that they possessed was contained in those homes."

Suzanna's ingenious mind settled itself to work on the problem of the bereft ones. She was no longer thinking of the two little orphans, but of the many troubled people. If only her home were large enough to accommodate them all! Her thoughts in natural sequence ran to the Eagle Man and his beautiful place, but she immediately rejected the idea. She feared he might not listen kindly to the plan of lending his home even as a temporary abode for the stricken. Had he not been a little unkind about her father's wonderful Machine?

Suddenly she remembered Bartlett Villa, and with the memory came a thousand thoughts. Impulsively she donned hat and coat, spoke a word to her mother and was off.

In a very short time, for she ran nearly all the way, she reached Bartlett Villa. She pushed open the big iron gate leading into the grounds, and stopped short, for there to the left, near a closed fountain, stood Graham. He was talking to a tall man whose back was toward Suzanna. About the two, in seeming happiness, played Jerry.

Graham cried out when he saw Suzanna. She went quickly to him. Then the man looked down at her and smiled. Suzanna decided that she liked him, but she wished his smile was more of a real one, one that should light his face. She did not know the word, but he looked, despite his smile, cynical, rather weary. Yes, she knew she should like him, for in some indefinite way he reminded her of her father. Was it the brown, rather nearsighted eyes? Surely they were keen, yet behind their keenness dwelt a softness; perhaps he, too, once had cherished a vision.

Graham greeted her demonstratively. "And this is my father, Suzanna," he said. "I've told him a lot about you."

"Yes, I know a great deal about you, Suzanna," said Mr. Bartlett; "and David has told me of your father's invention and what he expects to do some day with it."

Suzanna's face kindled. "Yes, my father's a great man," she said, simply.

Then she turned to Graham: "I came to talk to you about something very important. I was going to ask you afterwards to speak to your father about my plan."

"I may hear, then?" said Mr. Bartlett. "Shall we go on into the house?

There's a little chill in the air."

So they walked toward the great house, leaving Jerry rather disconsolate. Suzanna, looking up at Mr. Bartlett, said: "I've been here twice and I've never seen you."

"My business takes me often to different cities," he replied.