Stories by American Authors Volume I Part 15

Now, the rest of my story is very muddled, you'll say, and confused. But the truth is, I don't understand it myself. I ran on ahead to Mrs.

Peters's to prepare his bed for him, but they did not bring him to Peters's. After I waited an hour or two I found George had been taken to the princ.i.p.al hotel in the place, and a bedroom and every comfort that money could buy were there for him. Susy came home sobbing late in the night, but she told me nothing, except that those who had a right to have charge of him had taken him. I found afterward the poor girl was driven from the door of his room, where she was waiting like a faithful dog. I went myself, but I fared no better. What with surgeons and professional nurses, and the gentlemen that crowded about with their solemn looks of authority, I dared not ask to see him. Yet I believe still George would rather have had old Loper by him in his extremity than any of them. Once, when the door was opened, I thought I saw Mrs.

Lloyd stooping over the bed between the lace curtains, and just then her husband came out talking to one of the surgeons.

He said: "It is certain there were here the finest elements of manhood.

And I will do my part to rescue him from the abyss into which he has fallen."

"Will you tell me how George is, sir?" I asked, pus.h.i.+ng up. "Balacchi?

My partner?"

Mr. Lloyd turned away directly, but the surgeon told me civilly enough that if George's life could be saved, it must be with the loss of one or perhaps both of his legs.

"He'll never mount a trapeze again, then," I said, and I suppose I groaned; for to think of George helpless--

"G.o.d forbid!" cried Mr. Lloyd, sharply. "Now look here, my good man: you can be of no possible use to Mr.--Balacchi as you call him. He is in the hands of his own people, and he will feel, as they do, that the kindest thing you can do is to let him alone."

There was nothing to be done after that but to touch my hat and go out, but as I went I heard him talking of "inexplicable madness and years of wasted opportunities."

Well, sir, I never went again: the words hurt like the cut of a whip, though 'twan't George that spoke them. But I quit business, and hung around the town till I heard he was going to live, and I broke up my contract with South. I never went on a trapeze again. I felt as if the infernal thing was always dripping with his blood after that day.

Anyhow, all the heart went out of the business for me with George. So I came back here and settled down to the milling, and by degrees I learned to think of George as a rich and fortunate man.

I've nearly done now--only a word or two more. About six years afterward there was a circus came to town, and I took the wife and children and went. I always did when I had the chance. It was the old Adam in me yet, likely.

Well, sir, among the attractions of the circus was the great and unrivalled Hercules, who could play with cannon-b.a.l.l.s as other men would with dice. I don't know what made me restless and excited when I read about this man. It seemed as though the old spirit was coming back to me again. I could hardly keep still when the time drew near for him to appear. I don't know what I expected, but when he came out from behind the curtain I shouted out like a madman, "Balacchi! George! George!"

He stopped short, looked about, and catching sight of me tossed up his cap with his old boyish shout; then he remembered himself and went on with his performance.

He was lame--yes, in one leg. The other was gone altogether. He walked on crutches. Whether the strength had gone into his chest and arms, I don't know; but there he stood tossing about the cannon-b.a.l.l.s as I might marbles. So full of hearty good-humor too, joking with his audience, and so delighted when they gave him a round of applause.

After the performance I hurried around the tent, and you may be sure there was rejoicing that made the manager and other fellows laugh.

George haled me off with him down the street. He cleared the ground with that crutch and wooden leg like a steam-engine. "Come! come along!" he cried; "I've something to show you, Loper."

He took me to a quiet boarding-house, and there, in a cosey room, was Susy with a four-year-old girl.

"We were married as soon as I could hobble about," he said, "and she goes with me and makes a home wherever I am."

Susy nodded and blushed and laughed. "Baby and I," she said. "Do you see Baby? She has her father's eyes, do you see?"

"She _is_ her mother, Loper," said George--"just as innocent and pure and foolish--just as sure of the Father in heaven taking care of her.

They've made a different man of me in some ways--a different man,"

bending his head reverently.

After a while I began, "You did not stay with--?" But Balacchi frowned. "I knew where _I_ belonged," he said.

Well, he's young yet. He's the best Hercules in the profession, and has laid up a snug sum. Why doesn't he invest it and retire? I doubt if he'll ever do that, sir. He may do it, but I doubt it. He can't change his blood, and there's that in Balacchi that makes me suspect he will die with the velvet and gilt on, and in the height of good-humor and fun with his audience.

AN OPERATION IN MONEY.

BY ALBERT WEBSTER.

I.

In an elegant and lofty bank-parlor there sat in council, on an autumn morning, fourteen millionaires. They reposed in deep arm-chairs, and their venerable faces were filled with profound gravity. Before them, upon a broad mahogany table, were piles of books, sheaves of paper in rubber bands, bundles of quill pens, quires of waste paper for calculations, and a number of huge red-covered folios, containing the tell-tale reports of the mercantile agencies. They had just completed the selections from the list of applicants for discount, and were now in that state of lethargy that commonly follows a great and important act.

The president, with his hands pressed together before him, was looking at the fresco of Commerce upon the ceiling; his ponderous right-hand neighbor was stumbling feebly over an addition that one of the bookkeepers had made upon one of the papers--he hoped to find it wrong; his left-hand neighbor was doubling his under-lip with his stout fingers; an octogenarian beyond had buried his chin in his immense neck, and was going to sleep; another was stupidly blinking at the nearest coal-fire; two more were exchanging gasping whispers; another was wiping his gold spectacles with a white handkerchief, now and then stopping to hold them unsteadily up to the light; and another was fingering the polished lapel of his old black coat, and saying, with asthmatic hoa.r.s.eness to all who would look at him, "F-o-u-r-teen years!

f-o-u-r-teen years!"

A tall regulator-clock, with its mercury pendulum, ticked upon the wall; the noise of the heavy rumbling in the streets was softened into a low monotone, and now and then a bit of coal rattled upon the fender.

The oil-portraits of four former presidents looked thoughtfully down on the scene of their former labors; the polished wainscots reflected ragged pictures of the silent fourteen, and all was perfectly in order and perfectly secure.

Presently, however, there was an end to the stagnation; the white heads began to move and to look around.

The president's eyes came gradually down from the Commerce, and, after travelling over the countenances of his stirring _confreres,_ they settled by accident upon the table before him. There they encountered a white envelope, inscribed "to the President and Honorable Board of Directors--Present."

"Oh gentlemen! gentlemen!" cried the president, seizing the letter, "one moment more, I beg of you. Here's a--a--note--a communication--a--I don't know what it is myself, I'm sure, but"--the thirteen sank back again, feeling somewhat touched that they should be so restrained. The president ran his eye over the missive. He smiled as one does sometimes at the precocity of an infant. "The letter, gentlemen," said he, slipping the paper through his fingers, "is from the paying teller. It is a request for"--here the president delayed as if about making a humorous point--"for a larger salary." Then he dropped his eyes and lowered his head, as he might have done had he confessed that somebody had kissed him. He seemed to be the innocent mouthpiece of a piece of flagrant nonsense.

There was a moment's silence. Then a heavy-voiced gentleman took up a pen and said:

"Is this man's name Dreyfus--or--or what is it?"

"Let me think," returned the president, returning once more to the Commerce; "Dreyfus?--no--not Dreyfus--yes--no. Paying teller--hum--it's curious I can't recall--it commences with an F--FIELDS--yes, Fields!

that's his name--Fields, to be sure!"

The questioner at once wrote down the word on the paper.

"This is the second time that he has applied for this favor, is it not?"

formally inquired another of the thirteen, in the tone that a judge uses when he asks the clerk, "Has he not been before me on a former occasion?"

"Yes," replied the president, "this is a renewal of an effort made six months ago."

There was a general movement. Several chairs rolled back, and their occupants exchanged querulous glances.

"Suppose we hear the letter read," suggested a fair soul. "Perhaps"--a septuagenarian, with snowy hair and a thin body, clad in the clerical guise of the old school, and who had made a fortune by inventing a hat-block, arose hastily to his feet, and said:

"I cannot stay to listen to a dun!"

A chorus from the majority echoed the exclamation. All but four staggered to their feet, and tottered off in various directions; some to pretend to look out at the window, and some to the wardrobes, where was deposited their outer clothing.

"Clarks," stammered the feeble hatter, feeling vainly for the arm-holes in his great-coat--"clarks presume on their value. Turn 'em out, say I.

Give 'em a chance to rotate. You've got my opinion, Mr. President.

Refuse what's-his-name, Fields. Tell him he's happy and well off now, without knowing it. Where _can_ be the sleeves to--to this"--his voice expired in his perplexity.

Fields's cause looked blue. One director after another groped to the door, saying, as he went, "I can't encourage it, Mr. President--tell him 'No,' Mr. President--it would only make the rest uneasy if we allowed it--plenty more to fill his place."