Edith and John Part 11

Mr. Jarney then laid his hand upon John's shoulder, and said:

"Mr. Winthrope, I believe you will make good."

"I will be faithful to any trust imposed in me," returned John.

Together they walked across the room. Mr. Jarney opened the door, as he said, "Good bye." John stepped out. The door closed behind him. John stopped a few seconds before that blasted flower, Monroe, who gazed at him without the least intimation of what was going on in his apparently inactive brain. John gazed at Monroe as if he meant to inquire the reason for his unimaginative stare, for he thought he wanted to ask a question. John stood waiting for it to issue forth from his thin lips; but, as none came, he went out through the labyrinth of offices, and to his desk, where he resumed his pen and figuring as if nothing in the world had come up to alter his preconceived routine of existence--except the pinching slippers, which he soon discarded.

At the quitting hour, Monroe, as empty as ever in his stare, came to him and whispered:

"He has told me of your promotion."

"Yes," answered John, without looking up.

"Your desk will be ready at ten."

"Yes, I have been instructed."

"Yes," returned Monroe; and he walked away, with the same mouse-like tread he always a.s.sumed among the main office force.

That evening, in his dingy little room, John meditated a long time over this extraordinary turn in his wheel of fate. He could attribute it to no other cause than the incident of the night before. What other reason had Mr. Jarney for selecting him, he thought, for this important post, when there were above him in the office men with more experience, more capabilities, more knowledge of the world of business than he? Could it be, he thought, that Mr. Jarney was repaying him for his gentlemanly actions toward his daughter? Could it be? Mr. Jarney gave no reason for his promotion, nor intimation as to why he favored him above so many others who had been in his service so much the longer time. John never thought that such men as Mr. Jarney give no reason for their actions, except, perhaps, on graver questions.

If it was not for that affair, then what was it? But why should Mr.

Jarney favor him for that? He had given Edith Jarney a great amount of compound consideration. He thought of their chance meeting from the viewpoint of one, who, knowing fully his lowly station, could not, by any unheard of reasoning, ever hope to meet her on friendly or intimate terms. He might chance upon her, of course, sometime, somewhere; but that was, while possible, hardly likely--unless it should be in her father's office. But recalling that he had never seen her there, nor ever heard her name spoken in the office no more than if she did not exist, he was still less inclined to a faint hope. Such young ladies were not the topic of confabulating remarks among the employes of such great fathers as hers.

Still, with all his meditating, deliberating, weighing this and balancing that, he could not get her out of his bucolic head. Ah, he thought, he would fill a new position on the morrow! Perhaps she would come to her father's office, sometime; not an improbable thing for Edith to do. Then, in that event, he could only hope to bow to her as she should switch her way in or out past him, with a toss of her dignified head; or a contemptuous look out of her bright blue eyes; or, more like it, to give him a blank stare for his presumptuous ogling.

Would Edith Jarney do this? Dear Edith, it is hoped that John has a wrong impression of you.

So, after thinking on all these things, John could, in nowise, bring himself to believe, or ever to expect that he would receive any recognition from Edith. Therefore, with such extraneous ideas excluded from his thoughts, he concluded that day-dreams were useless; and with all the a.s.sumed wisdom that was stored up in his soul, he deliberately cast her aside as beyond his attainment.

CHAPTER VIII.

PETER DIEMAN RECEIVES VISITORS.

Peter Dieman, since he had reached his present state of affluence and influence, did not condescend to wait on customers. He was now above that menial branch of his trade. He seldom went into his store, as a clerk; but he went occasionally to settle some dispute, of one kind or another, that Eli Jerey was continually involved in with some one of the many people, who, for one reason or another, visited The Die.

Eli, in this period of his trammeled existence, was a combative sort of an individual--not through a natural disposition in that direction, but mainly by force of circ.u.mstances. Being a creature who was impelled by any line of action by the urgent necessity of earning his bread and b.u.t.ter, he became a willing tool in the hands of Peter for the furtherance of that man's business, or any other of the transactions with which he might be connected. Eli, therefore, was a good servant more through a sense of duty, than through any reason he would bring to bear in applying himself. He might be cla.s.sed with one of those trusties who is purblind to any one else's good, save that of his employer.

Hence, he loved Peter, not for any attraction that the personality of the man had for him, but simply for the job that he filled.

Peter Dieman had that way about him that causes men of any rank, almost, to bow down to force and power and money. While he was revolting in his general aspect, as a man socially, he was certainly a genius when it came to manipulating the "ropes" that so often lead men and women into combinations against society's welfare. Even in the building up of an established business in the marts of other men, he exhibited a wonderful gift of sagacity in organization, and in a knack of acc.u.mulating wealth, so far as his endeavors went in the one particular line that to the world at large he was supposed to follow.

One day Peter was sitting at his place of espial, intently concerned for the time with the one predominating thought as to whether his spider-like clerk, Eli Jerey, could accommodate all the customers he saw in waiting, before any of them could get away without leaving a few shekels behind. As he looked, he rubbed his hands nervously, whimsically, naturally, as was his habit; then he squinted up one of his piggish eyes, and scowled menacingly. The reason for this contorting facial expression and revolutionary exhibition with his hands was that he noted his clerk suddenly throw up his left arm to a guarding position, rear backward, clinch his fists, look daggers out of his cat-like eyes, and then lunge forward, with the force of a battering ram going into execution. He also saw two other long arms whirling through the air like a Dutch wind-wheel in motion, saw a head duck, saw the bodies of two men writhe and squirm, and then saw them fall together on a bundle of dirty coiled-up ropes. Seeing all which, he put down his pipe, put on his black cap, and waddled out with the intensity of the furies spread over the wide expanse of his red and rounded visage.

"Wow!" he roared like an exploding blunderbuss. "What in G.o.d Almighty's name be you doing, Eli?"

Eli did not look up to respond to the query. He could not look up had he wanted to. The stranger, with whom Eli was in combat, had him gripped so tightly around the neck with one arm, that Eli could neither hurt his antagonist, nor get hurt himself. All that Eli could do was to breathe heavily, strike out at random with his one free hand, hitting the ropes, the floor, a bench leg, and many other things about him. Meanwhile the stranger seemed to lie contentedly on his back surveying the upper regions of the interior of the junkery.

When Peter came up to the combatants, he stopped, with his hands upon his hips, and his arms akimbo, sized up the situation in an instant, and then seized Eli by the scruff of the neck, and raised him to the floor, with his victim still clinging to him in a very loving-like embrace, and with Eli still beating the air at random with his free hand.

"Loosen yourself, brute!" squealed Peter to the stranger. "Loosen yourself, I say!" he shouted.

But the stranger paid no heed to him. Whereupon, Peter, using his fat hands as an entering wedge, heaved away with mighty force, to left and to right, and the twain came asunder. The stranger now stood back, with tousled head and frightful mien, glaring savagely at Eli; while Eli looked the same in the matter of dishevelment, his scanty face showed little more of the baser pa.s.sions than would a paving stone.

"You rascals! What's all this about?" demanded Peter, directing his eyes on Eli.

"Nothing," piped Eli.

Then turning to the stranger, who was a young man, Peter said, stentoriously: "Clear out at once!"

The stranger took up his fallen hat, turned malevolently upon Peter, and hissed: "All right, you hog! You will pay dear for such an insult!" He turned toward Eli. "You scoundrel," he shouted, "your master keeps you here to insult people--" but he did not finish the sentence, so wroth was he in his anger.

Peter rubbed his hands so rapidly that it would be a wild guess to say whether he was doing it in jest or in earnest. The stranger proceeded toward the front door.

"Wait!" exclaimed Peter, as the stranger was about to make his exit.

The young man turned about, very deliberately, in his tracks, leered at Peter as if he would again hurl a terrible threat at him, but he said nothing.

"Mike Barton," commanded Peter, for that is whom the young man proved to be, "come to my office."

Whereupon, Peter led the way, and Mike Barton followed him to the little black office. Peter removed his cap, resumed his pipe, and sat down, wheezing like an asthmatic pup, near his place of espionage; and he looked curiously at Mike, who had taken a seat unbidden.

"What was the trouble, Mike?" he asked.

"I simply sought to pa.s.s him to get to your office, when he confronted me with the insulting remark, 'No pimps allowed in there--your office--without permission of the boss.'"

"He's a good clerk, Mike; he is; and he serves me well."

"Too well, Mr. Dieman, for your safety."

"Ha, ha! Well, he has my instructions, and you know the pa.s.sword to this office."

"I do, sir; but I resent the insult."

"All right, my boy, it's over with now; Eli is a good one for me, you know."

"I reckon he is," returned Mike.

"Now, what can I do for you?" asked Peter, eyeing Mike with one of his singularly inquisitorial stares, which gave Mike a spell of the fidgets.

"I was sent here by the keeper of our place to know the outlook for a continuance of police protection," he replied without any circ.u.mlocution about saying what he had in mind.

"Eh!" Peter e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

"Yes; we want to know--or they want to know. What's the prospects?"