Chapter V: Part 5

Many men are only feared, while they believe themselves to be respected. That is how it was with me, and that is why my "other" voice did not say "respected," but "feared."

The battle was waged within me until I was almost at Chatham Square. And then a strange thing came to pass. Mike Callahan's place was on the western side of the square. I had come down on that side, but, when on the corner of the square, I deliberately crossed over to the eastern sidewalk, and, from there, surveyed my camping ground.

I stood and looked at the flashily illuminated front of Mike Callahan's dive and wavered between the old-rooted and the new-come influences. It would have been laughable had it not been so pitiful.

Just think, a man, supposedly intelligent and mature, considering himself the martyr of martyrs if he had to forego the "pleasures" of Callahan's dive for one precious night.

The new-come influence was a potent one, yet it was so strange, so inexplicable to me that I could have refused to heed it and would have let my old inclinations persuade me, had I not thought of my good old Bill. The importance of my recent adventure had driven my partner temporarily from my mind. But now I thought of him, remembered that he had been subjected to a long fast by my carelessness and hurried to the attic to make up for my negligence. I found him as expectant and philosophical as ever, and watched him with languid interest while he was munching the scraps I had saved for him. Then it occurred to me that Bill had been deprived of his customary walk with me and had not had a breath of fresh air all day. It also rankled in my mind what she had said about the parks and the Brooklyn Bridge, and, lo and behold, Bill and I found ourselves in the street, bound for City Hall Park, like two eminently respectable citizens intent on getting a little air.

I consoled myself for this evident display of weakness by emphatically resolving to return to Callahan's as soon as Bill should have had his fill of fresh air.

We were comparative strangers to City Hall Park. Every foot of the park and the sidewalks about it had been traveled by my bare feet many years ago, but never had I looked on the leafed oasis in the light of a recreation ground.

We felt a trifle out of place, and, most likely on that account chose the most secluded and unobserved spot for our experimental siesta. The rear stoop of the City Hall, facing the County Court House, was in deep shadow, and there we seated ourselves to test how it felt to be there just to rest.

It gradually began to dawn on us that City Hall Park was almost as interesting as the sidewalk in front of Mike Callahan's dive on Chatham Square. A perpetual stream of people crossed our view on their way to and from the Brooklyn Bridge and to and from the Jersey ferries. Very few of them walked leisurely. Most of them seemed in a hurry and all seemed to have a definite purpose. Bill and I were the only two without a purpose.

Ah, no, it is wrong for me to say that. Let me speak only for myself. Bill had a purpose, and a noble one.

My thoughts ran oddly that night. I looked around and saw the people on the benches. Then, as now, the majority of the seats were occupied by homeless men, by "has-beens."

"Well, I am surely better than those tramps," I assured myself with self-satisfied smirk.

Was I better than those tramps? The newer voice gave me the answer. These tramps, useless now, had once been useful, had once worked and earned, but I, almost thirty years of age, couldn't call one day in my life well spent.

It was a wondrous night to us, this night in the shadow of City Hall Park. It was the first night I had given to thought, and found myself at my true estimate. Saints are not made in a day, and I was still hard and callous, but, after my introspection, a feeling took possession of me which very much resembled shame. Instead of returning the way we had come, via Chatham street--now called Park Row--we wandered home by the way of Centre street. We passed the Tombs, the sinister prison for the city's offenders, and Bill and I looked at it musingly. There were many in the cells who were known by me. Many in them could justly call me their accomplice, because I had willingly spent their money with them, knowing, or, at least, suspecting, how it had been gotten. And how long would it be before a cell in there would be but a way station for me before taking the long journey "up the river"?

The mere suggestion of it was shivery and I remarked to Bill that our attic, no matter how humble, was preferable to a sojourn at Sing-Sing.

Then an inspiration came to me, and, to this very day I am making myself believe it came from old Bill. Most likely I am a fool for doing it, but I want to have my old pal have his full share of credit in my reincarnation. The inspiration was: "Why not try and stay in my attic in preference to going to Sing-Sing?" To this came an augmentation: "If able to keep away from the road that leads to prison, it may not always be necessary to stay in an attic. There are more nicely furnished rooms in the city than your cubby-hole on the top floor, friend Kildare."

How can I now, at this long range, analyze my feelings of that critical night? I would have to perform a psychic wonder, and I am not that kind of a magician. But I did not go back to Callahan's, and have never been there since as a participant in the slimy festivities.

Up in our attic Bill and I gave ourselves up to much mutual scrutiny. Some outward change in me must have been noticeable, for Bill watched me most critically.

The one thing I remember best of all the little incidents which left their clear impressions on my mind was my first attempt at praying.

Bill laid in his usual place at the foot of my bed, and I was stretched on my back, gazing into the ceiling and overcoming my astonishment at being in bed at such an unearthly early hour by going over the events of the day. I lingered longest at the scene at her door and tried to laugh when my train brought me to her advice to pray. Somehow the laugh was not sincere, and, instead of being able to continue my mind's recital, I could not get away from her admonition.

That was not all. A soliloquy ensued and ended with the result of giving prayer a chance to prove itself. Why not? It did not cost anything, might do some good after all, and, besides, it would be interesting to note how it felt to pray.

I prayed, and you will not accuse me of irreverence when I make the statement that my prayer was certainly one of the funniest that ever rolled on to the Father's throne. It was hardly a prayer. The "thou" and "thee" and "thy" were sadly missing. I did not think or ask with faith. Quite the reverse. I frankly avowed my skepticism. The substance of it was that I had been told God could do much, everything. The one who had told me this possessed my greatest respect, yet was only a little girl and not as experienced as I, and, perhaps, fooled. So, if God wanted me to believe in Him, He would have to give me conclusive proof right away or else lose a follower. It was a heart-to-heart talk of the most informal kind and--are they not the best prayers?

I said quite coolly that I had been told I wasn't as much of a man as I had thought myself to be and that there was a much better life than the one I had led. Well, I was willing to try it, and, if I really liked the newer life better than the old one, I promised to stick as closely to God as I had stuck to all that was evil before.

One should not bargain with the Creator, but I am sure that on the Judgment Day my God will find extenuating circumstances. As for the bargain made that night, both parties have lived up to it.

*THE OLD DOORS CLOSED.*

*CHAPTER XIV.*

*THE OLD DOORS CLOSED.*

Sober to bed and sober out of it was an uncommon experience and I felt embarrassed by the unwonted sensation. Happily I found some money in my pocket and that deprived me of the excuse to my conscience that I must go to Callahan's so as to get my breakfast money. How we ate that morning, Bill and I, and how we relished our breakfast. Yes, I had a drink, a big drink of whiskey, but not because I had forgotten my resolve of the night before, but because I was yet ignorant. To be quite frank, I have always been a bit cynical about these sudden conversions of confirmed drunkards.

Not long ago I met a man at a rescue mission where I frequently attend, who, as we say on the Bowery, "eats whiskey" and almost subsists on it. He was homeless, or rather bedless, his home being forfeited long ago, and received his "bed ticket" from the missionary after his confession of salvation. I happened to meet him on the following day; and his breath was strong with the perfume of cloves. He told me he liked to chew them, which is rather an odd hobby.

Far be it from me to slander any one, yet the perfume of cloves can hide a multitude of aromas.

Sublime is the aim of the rescue missions, but how and whether they accomplish this aim is another story, which we might discuss at some future time.

Another habit, which also still clung to me, was my late rising. It was noon before Bill and I appeared on the street on our way to the restaurant. After breakfast we walked over to City Hall Park, looked gravely and wisely at the spot where we had sat the night before, and then we permitted ourselves the luxury of a day dream.

Dreams are funny fellows, always playing pranks. This dream kept me embraced until I found myself in the immediate neighborhood of the school where a certain little professor was engaged in leading the infantile mind through the labyrinth of the A, B, C's.

Soon they began to stumble out with noisy, natural, healthy laughter and hubbub, and the dingy street became one long, squirming stream of babbling children. I could not help looking back on my boyish years and tried to imagine how it would feel to have your slate and books under your arm. There were many youngsters before me and I kept staring at them to draw the picture in my mind's eye of how I would have looked coming from school, my school.

At last she came!

As I saw the little tots, her pupils, cling to her skirts from very love of her, I felt a light, an oriflamme, within my breast, and knew that I would have to fight a harder fight than ever before; that I would have to conquer myself before I would dare to touch the hem of her skirt as those children. And he who fights, fights best when in the sight of an inspiring emblem. So then I took my sailing flag and nailed it to the mast of purity. It has withstood all sorts of weather. Sometimes it droops, again it flies defiantly. But, whatever, it is still safely on the mast and will stay there until I strike my colors for the last dipping to my God above.

I crossed the street and put myself in her way so that she could not help seeing me.

"Oh, Mr. Kildare!"

She remembered my name.

It is impossible for me to recall how I acted at this meeting. However, I consider it very fortunate that no camera fiend took a snapshot at me. The human document which would have evolved from it would certainly be very embarrassing to me. Still, lout, churl as I was, it was the first time in my life that I spoke to a girl without even the shadow of an ulterior or impure motif, and some of my want of politeness may be forgiven on that account.

If I cannot recollect my behavior during that scene, I can correctly recollect my feelings. I was in a turmoil. Her face showed real, unaffected pleasure on seeing me, and that to me, if you will understand my social position then--was an incomparable boon. If people, the good, well intending people, would only realize that the hardest heart is very often the most ready to respond to genuine kindness and that, usually, it is only hard, because, through life, it had to be satisfied with the stereotyped prating which passes as a message from our all-loving and loving-all God!

Knowing the awkward propensities of my limbs and arms, it does not surprise me in the least that I stood there shuffling and wobbling, and never noticing the little hand held out to me in truest greeting.

She greeted me kindly, in evident surprise.

Most gingerly I took her dainty hand into my big, brawny paw. She spoke of the "chance meeting." Since then I have often felt certain that when I said "chance meeting," a twinkle danced for the time of a breath in her eyes. Afterward, I often accused her of it and was severely squelched for my presumption. Yet, yes, she was an angel, but also very much of a woman, and, between you and me, there are times when a true, little woman with staunch heart, level head and unwavering faith is of more practical benefit to a rough, big fellow like me than the angel who wouldn't dare take a chance of spoiling those snowy garments or to let the harp remain untwanged for a few moments.

Being more unfamiliar with etiquette than I am now, I had no little white lie ready, but blurted out that I had come there for the express purpose of seeing her. She seemed a trifle annoyed at this and I hastened to explain that I was there to see her home, so that she would not have to run the risk of being insulted again. When she learned this determination of mine to act henceforth as her body guard, she chided at first, declared it absolutely unnecessary, but then laughed, and told me it was very kind of me.

And all this time I was playing a part and, as I thought, so perfectly that she could not penetrate my disguise. But she could not be deceived. She quickly saw through my pretense of wishing to appear a fairly considerate man of the world, who, not having anything better to do, would do a chivalrous act merely for the sake of killing some of his superfluous time. The only wonder is that she permitted me to bother her.

Then, though no daisies or roses garlanded our path and though we walked along the crowded, not too clean, sidewalks in the precincts of the poor, began walks that one could turn into poetry, but which I cannot do, not having the essential gift of expression. All I could do in return for being permitted to be beside her was to devote myself entirely to the task of protecting her. Protect her against what?

You know the most glorious thing about love is that it is no respecter of persons. To rich and poor it comes alike; here to be received in passion and impurity, there to be welcomed in a better spirit and to be nested in an ever-loyal heart. But the bad thing about love is that it makes us lose our proper respect for truth. In short, it makes splendid liars out of us.

Where is there the young man who has not told her whom he adored that her eyes made the most brilliant star look like a tallow candle, or that her cheeks were as peaches?

In the same way did I magnify my knightly duty to myself. Surely the dangers along the journey to her home were trifling and few, but, thanks to my love-stirred imagination, I felt as serious as a plumed knight, and no proud queen in days of sword and lance had more devoted cavalier to fight, die or live for her. That now became my sole duty, and with such duty, to serve the best and truest, a man must grow better even in spite of himself.

Every day, rain or shine, I waited on the corner above the school to serve as permanent escort. Every day she told me it was not necessary to see her home, yet, every day she permitted me to do so. When one arrives in a strange land the smaller details are often not noticed, and, afterward, you can only re-see the grander pictures. I cannot tell you how and why the turns in our conversations occurred, but I can remember certain bits of talk and questions, very important to both of us.

For instance, on our third meeting she asked me if I were still one of Mike Callahan's ornamental fixtures. I felt then, as many of us have felt before and will feel again; I was ashamed to admit that I had severed my connection with the gang and had not been there since the night I had taken her home. You see, I still considered myself a "red-hot sport," and did not care to be identified with anything that was goody-goody. Since then I have learned that it is quite the thing among certain sets to speak lightly of one's religion and to laugh at being found out as an occasional church-goer. It makes such a rakish impression to intimate you are "really devilish."

So, to her question, I did not give a straightforward answer, but hummed and hawed and--lied.

"No, I ain't been there the last two nights, because--because, I wasn't feeling any too good, and--and, oh, yes, one night I went up to a show."

The greatest lies can be compressed into the smallest parcels, yet they always weigh the same.

She had a way of letting me know when my lies were too transparent. It was not what she said, but how she looked when she said it.

In reality I had stood away from Callahan's because I had taken a dislike to the place and everybody in it, but, of course, it would have never done to tell that to a little slip of a girl.

Apparently my explanation was not taken at its face value, for she merely said: "Oh, I see." Barely a second later she added: "Oh, I'm so glad."

The intuition of women is certainly wonderful. Even such an accomplished diplomat as myself was floored on the spot by a little girl.

Well, the days wore on, and our walks became to me walks in an unknown realm. Her little casual references to mother, brother, home, friends and daily work gave me a vista of a life not even imagined by me. To live as she, in well-regulated household and according to well-ordained schedule, had never been desired by me and, therefore, never been considered by me.

"If that kind of life turns out such fine little women, it can't be so bad after all, and may be worth trying," was my train of reasoning, and a dull but positive desire to try that sort of life began to rankle in my soul.

While I was engaged in these musings, she did not keep entirely quiet, but put me through the most severe kind of civil service. I had to answer so many questions--and truthfully, too, as she could tell a fabrication immediately--until I honestly believe every hour of my life was covered. The finish of it all was that I was made the subject of several of the most scathing lectures ever delivered. Those sermons fairly made my blood boil, and often, under my breath, I wished she were a man, that I could close the lecturing for good and all with a blow.

It is simply awful how impudent little people--and especially women--are. And the worst of it is that we big fellows have to stand it from them.

She had a peculiarly direct way of getting at things and never minced matters. The effect of it was that I began to shrink into myself.

A leering knave, I had stood on the pinnacle of wickedness; had grinned and sneered at decency, manhood and womanhood; had thought myself a "somebody" because the laws of God and man were unregarded by me, and because a chorus of fools and friends had always shouted an amen to my deeds, and now--now I awoke to the pitiful fact that I was not only a "nobody," but a despicable, contemptible thing, without the least of claims to the grandest title--man.

Yes, there was no denying the fact, the "somebody" had fallen, sadly fallen from his horse, and all his house of cards had been knocked into smithereens by a little bit of a schoolma'am.

*A KINDERGARTEN OF ONE.*

*CHAPTER XV.*

*A KINDERGARTEN OF ONE.*

Keeping away from Callahan's and from the sinister harvest which was often reaped there, had a depressing effect on my income. For a comparatively long time I lived on a few dollars, which came to me from outstanding loans, now determinedly collected. I learned then that if one keeps away from Callahan's and places like it, one can subsist on a remarkably small income. As it had been with me, it was always a case of "getting it easy and spending it easy."

My expenses became the object of much thinking and figuring. So much for room rent, so much for meals, including Bill's fare, and so much for shaves and incidentals were estimated at the lowest minimum and so as to last the longest until something should turn up. This something did not fail to turn up.

When the funds became dangerously low, I bethought myself of some of my swell friends, who had often evinced a desire to have me "train" them or keep them in condition. These propositions had been so frequent as to make me think that to be rich included being rich in ailments.

Some wanted me to make them thin, others desired more flesh to cover their bones, and they all came to me, I being such an authority on anatomy and physiology!

I communicated with many of these ailing swells and ere long made a fairly good living by my physical culture lessons. There is a heavy cloud on my conscience that on my balance-sheet a score of offenses are recorded against me in connection with the furtherance of my physical culture system. A frank confession is good for the soul, and I might as well confess right here that, only too frequently, I prescribed the identically same course for fat and lean.

This calling of mine was not without humor. I remember a "patient" who was troubled with too much embonpoint. He did not believe in the prescriptions of his physician, but rather preferred the physical culture system of "Professor" Kildare. He was a man of much weight in public affairs and in flesh. About 250 pounds in the flesh, if I remember right.

He lived in the immediate neighborhood of Madison Square, and for a long succession of many mornings a select audience, including several news-boys, a few policemen and myself, had the edifying spectacle of seeing these 250 absolutely-refusing-to-melt pounds chase around the square like mad at 5 A.M.

I do not think it did him very much harm and it did the audience an awful lot of good, if you will take laughter as an indication of increasing health.

No fear of want or need threatening me, I gave myself completely up to peeping into the better life. I fairly revelled in my new experience, and dreams by day and night were my only territory.

A few weeks of this and then a crisis came.

We had reached her house from our customary walk from the school. I had taken leave and had already taken a few steps, when she called me back.

"Mr. Kildare, I forgot something."

I was quickly back to the door waiting to hear what she had forgotten.

She took a small card from her bag and handed it to me.

"Mr. Kildare, you have been very kind and considerate and I would like to show you that I appreciate it. I am afraid you will find it rather tame, but I hope you will come."

I twirled the card between my fingers and without looking at it asked: "What is it?"

"Why, just a little social entertainment of our church."

"When and where does it take place?" I still kept on asking.

"I am not quite sure as to the date, but the card will tell you."

As it was said, I could do no less than refer to the card. Whether I held the card upside down or what I did, I do not know, but my secret was out and nothing could hide it any longer.

There I stood, to all appearances a man, intelligent and able-bodied, and not able to cipher or decipher even my own name.

I felt all go away from me. My fairy palace of bliss crumbled to pieces. What else could I do but slink away, to hide myself, my ignorance, my shame forever?

Why prolong the agony of this torturing moment?

I turned quickly without a word, intending to return to the dark "whence" from which I had come.

But before I had taken a step a little hand grasped my arm, and then and there took up its faithful guidance of me, and every fibre of my big, ungainly frame thrilled at this waking of the better life.

The memory of the following months--yes, years--but for the tingeing sadness would be a bit of most laughable humor.

The work of my little schoolma'am became doubled. Besides her class at school she saddled herself with this unwieldy, husky kindergarten of one. I know many youngsters--God bless them!--who like their school and studies, but they were not in it with me in the drilling of my A, B, C's. Never was the alphabet more quickly mastered. In a surprisingly short time "c-a-t, cat," and "r-a-t, rat," were spelled by me with the facility of a primary scholar.

Who would not have learned quickly with such a teacher?

My good old Bill did not fail to note this educational process and was sorely puzzled at it.

Our attic became a study; the washstand a student's desk, with a big, ungainly head bent close to a smoking oil lamp.

How I pored over my private lessons!

The pen in cramped fingers would trace those tantalizing letters, while the lips gruffly murmured the spelling. Naturally, arithmetic was also included in my curriculum, and often Bill had flung at him the maddening puzzle: "Seven into thirty-five goes how many times--yes, how many times?"

Bill always sat beside me during my studies and blinked a hundred questions at me.

"Say, Kil, what are you up to now? I am afraid it is some new sort of tomfoolery. If not, why can't I do it, too?"

I often answered and explained, but the situation was not fully grasped by my old pal until he met my teacher. And then? Why the rocks, the hillsides, trees and birds and flowers were all responsive to that little sprite, and Bill, in just one glance, saw that the fairy of our destinies had but begun her miracle of love.

But even dolls can be made to talk and parrots can imitate empty chatter. My teacher wanted me to have the means to lift myself out of my ditch. The little sculptor who was moulding this huge mass of the commonest clay into the semblance of a man wanted to waken that in me which would make me something apart from the thing I had been. Coming out of blackest darkness I was not led at once into the radius of the dazzling light, but, as with the tots in her class at school, she coached me, step by step, into the way of righteous intelligence.

Gradually I began to see--to see with the eyes of my soul--and I found a great world about me abounding in the evidences of an almighty and wise Creator. I began to understand and love this newer and better life, and began to hate the old life, which often tried to tempt me back to it.

Our lessons were carried on with much inconvenience and difficulty. The distance from school to home was little more than ten blocks, and during the time it took us to walk that length I had to report my lesson and to receive instructions for additional study. The inconvenience of this method was not at all conducive to learning, and one day I was asked by my teacher to come to her house to receive my lesson there.

I could hardly believe mine own ears. I was to see the very place in which she lived. It was beyond belief. Was it not a sacrifice on her part? Indeed it was, and I can never sufficiently emphasize the many sacrifices this sweet little girl underwent for me from the beginning to the very end.

Let us understand her position.

Marie Deering was the sole support of her mother and a young invalid brother. Besides these two she had only one other relative, an elder brother in a far western city. The father, a retired captain of engineers in the British army, had come to America to dispose of several inventions. Whatever the value of these inventions, the captain knew little of the ways of business and commerce, and soon found himself minus his inventions and balance of his savings. Disappointment and failing health combined to shorten his days, and the little family found themselves fatherless.

The burden to provide fell then on the shoulders of the daughter, and that, as all her other burdens, was borne with a fortitude worthy of a saint in heaven.

It goes without saying that the Deerings were refined people, and you can imagine what it meant to them to have a big, uncouth fellow intrude into their home circle. I shall never forget the horror-stricken countenance of Mrs. Deering when I appeared for my first lesson. It needed no interpreter to read the question in her eyes: "For goodness' sake, where did this come from, and what is it?"

But I immediately found a dear little ally in my teacher's invalid brother, who quickly discovered me a willing horse for many a wild and hazardous canter from kitchen to parlor.

This first glance into real home life fairly upset me. Since then I have seen many more luxurious places, but none where my heart felt so much at home. I noticed everything--the neatness, the taste of the modest decorations--and I set my teeth and said: "I, too, will have a home, a real home, and, perhaps, not only for myself, but----"

Ah, it was too early to dream that far.

To dream of things will never bring them. People who had known me had always given me credit for stubborn determination in wicked pursuits. I resolved to test the strength of my determination by applying it to a better end.

As soon as my mentor ascertained that my income came from practising my uniform system of physical culture, of which the only beneficiary was the inventor and professor, she counselled against it and told me to cease it.

This brought me face to face with my most novel experience. I looked for work--good, honest, hard work.

My luck surprised me.

Only a few months had passed since the beginning of my transformation, but it had been noticed by men whom I had thought indifferent to my fate.

I can say, with all the conviction possible, that, if a man determines without compromise to do right, he will find friends, all willing to help along, among those he had expected to be nothing more than mere acquaintances. And another thing. I also claim--and it has never disproven itself to me--that the man who really wants to work can always find it, friends or no friends. The rub is that "suitable" work cannot always be found so easily. It is this lack of "suitable" work which sends men to Bowery lodging-houses, there to keep themselves in high collars and cuffs by begging instead of soiling their tender hands by the first work offered to them.

I started out to do my hustling turn and had no trouble in finding work. Happily it was of the--to me--"suitable" kind.

I went to work at one of the steamboat piers as a baggageman--sometimes lovingly referred to as a "baggage-smasher." The wages were eight dollars a week, and that was a smaller amount than I had often "earned" in one night while employed in the dives.

On my first pay day, those eight dollars were recounted by me innumerable times, not because I was dissatisfied with the smallness of the amount, but because I felt good, really good, at having at length earned a week's wages by honest toil. Every one of those bills had its own meaning for me.

My teacher knew of my new employment, and, with my first pay I bought a little gift for her. It also gave me a pretext for explaining to her my future plans.

Much of her time had been taken up with me, and I owed all of my new life to her endeavor. Persistently she claimed that all her efforts were only a small return for the favor done for her by me, and that, besides, it was her duty to help me to gain a foothold on my new road of life. This argument failed to convince me, as my favor amounted to nothing, and I understood without difficulty that all the benefit I received from her unceasing toil with me was inspired by nothing else than the sweet, Christian spirit which ruled every one of her actions. I insisted that it would have been an imposition for me to be a trouble and bother to her any longer, especially when I had steady employment, which afforded me the time and means to attend evening schools and to study at home in spare hours. I wanted to thank her, and not be quite so conspicuous where, because of social differences, I felt I did not belong.

I mentioned something about coming from the gutter. As always, she had an answer, and a flattering one, ready. As to coming from the gutter, she expostulated, why, many a coin is dropped there and remains until some one picks it up and, by a little polishing, makes it as good as it ever was.

It was just like her. She always claimed to have found in me something good, something I could never have discovered. On the other hand, as soon as we resumed the lessons, she found that quite often her pupil could be severely trying.

It was the harrowing science of arithmetic which caused the most trouble, and even to this day--but that is a different story. I had a confirmed habit of becoming hopelessly muddled in my multiplication table. When floundering in the numerical labyrinth I would hear just the faintest little sigh, and, looking up, would see a dear little forehead showing the most cunning wrinkles of resignation. It was then that horrid wickedness would take possession of me, and I would intentionally make more mistakes just to see those eyes reproach me for my stupidity. I would also make errors in my spelling and reading to have the pleasure of being chided in her modulated voice.

My course of education had now run on for months and the beginning of winter gave us the chance to elaborate it. The free lectures of the Board of Education were a boon quickly taken advantage of by us. Almost every night we went to Cooper Union or some public school where an interesting lecture was announced. To be sure I was not at first a howling success as an attendant. I could stand the illustrated lectures, but astronomy and political economy without pictures always produced the lullaby effect on me, and I was often on the verge of snoring. All this disappointed my professor, but did not discourage her.

Summer came and my knowledge of botany was destined to be enriched. Strange are the paradoxes of fate. No class loves flowers as much as the poor, and no class has less of them than they. Ah, it is pitiful, I tell you, to wander through the streets inhabited by my people, and to see never a patch of green, a fragrant oasis, in this stretch of barren, joyless materialism. There is no time there for flowers, where even the cabbages in front of the dingy grocery stores look withered and seared, and where there is no other watchword than, "Work, work, or we will be homeless and starving." That one thought rules the brains of my fellows with an iron grasp. With the close of their daily toil their day's worry is not over. Listen to the talks on the stoops and in the doorways of the tenements and you will be the witness of much fretting. Often all this mind's botheration is not necessary. There is no actual want, no threatening danger of it. Yet, the poor find a gruesome pleasure in dwelling in the midst of their horrors, and the roll of their organ of misery churns along on an endless chain.

And I believe that this is so because the child life of the East Side is dwarfed and deprived of all that is dear to a child's natural desires. Every year brings improvements. Men and women with hearts of gold are working like Trojans among the children of the poor, and the harder they work the more are they appreciated by their charges. I cannot rid myself of the opinion that in the aiding of the children lies the only solution of our social troubles. Teach them to be natural--a difficult feat, to swing themselves above their level in intellect and not by imitating the modes and fashions of the idle rich in the shoddy fabrics offered to them by unscrupulous dealers, and we will have advanced miles nearer to the goal which is desired by all who love their fellow men, not with mushy sentiment, but with intelligence.

Still, in spite of all that is done, the yearning look in the eyes of the children is still there, and I would not care to have the heart of the man who can see the unspoken wish in the childish gaze when beholding a flower, no matter how scraggy, and then laugh at it as at a freak of humor.

My acquaintance with the denizens of the kingdom of flowers was exceedingly limited. My teacher had noticed this and forthwith set to work to remedy this other defect in my education.

As early as May did we begin our out-of-door course. We did it by means of excursions. I did not care to have this arrangement all one-sided and we agreed to change off in the management of our personally conducted tours. We both had to work during the week and could only indulge in our excursions on Sundays. So, on one outing she would be the supreme director and dictator; I, on the next.

Candor compels me to confess that my outings always led us dangerously near to Coney Island, if not quite to it, yet, people can enjoy themselves even there, for it is the same old ocean, and the same sea air there as elsewhere, and it only lies with the visitor how to spend the holiday.

On her Sundays I was always kept in the dark as to our destination until we reached it. It invariably proved to be some quiet country place, with nooks and brooks and all the charming props which set the stage of nature with tranquil loveliness. After depositing the luncheon in some shady spot, the professor would trip from flower to flower, from tree to tree, and deliver little sermons on birds, flowers and minerals. There is no schoolroom like God's own nature, and in a way which I cannot describe to you, I learned that there was a life abounding in purity, in the understanding of things, and based in the wisdom of a wise Father. Step by step my faithful teacher led me on, until there was no doubt travailing me, until I could stand in street, or field, or forest, and feel my soul, my own undying soul.

There never were other days like these and, surely, there never will be again.

We had then known one another for a long time. I had become capable of reasoning, and had grave cause for doing so. Was it all for the best? Will it surprise you to know that constant companionship with my mentor had awakened in me thoughts very foreign to grammar and arithmetic?

I loved her. I knew it, but I also felt that that love was doomed to be buried unsatisfied. A cat may look at a queen, but that is about all a cat may presume to do.

That is what my reason told me, but in my heart there echoed a stirring hymn of fondest hope. It would not let me rest, and I became a pestering nuisance to my teacher. Many times daily would I ask her the questions, "Why, why do you undergo this ceaseless labor--why do you set yourself this gigantic task of making of me a man?"

As in all other matters, I was rough and uncouth in my annoying questioning, and an answer to it was long refused. But my bulldog tenacity came to my aid and I would not let go. Determination will overcome a good many things, and surely a little school teacher. I need not tell you how it happened--you either know, or will know it yourself--but one day we understood the question and the answer.

Then life for us became a blessed thing indeed. For the first time in my life I was supremely happy. I cannot tell you how my little girl felt, but can give a very strong guess at it, for my sweetheart never wavered, never failed me, and was my very own until the very last.

My Mamie Rose, my bride, my dearest friend, my all.

It took me a long time to fully grasp that she had really said "Yes," to the ever-important question, but, as soon as I was quite sure of it, I assumed the grand airs of proprietorship new swains usually assume.

First of all I exerted my prerogative of calling her by her first name.

Although long under her tutelage and exposed to her refining influence, I was by no means, very polished, and still harbored many prejudices against customs and usages not common to the social shift from which I had sprung. The nomenclature of my people is very limited. Only a very small choice of male and female baptismal names is resorted to by tenement house folk. John, James, Michael, Patrick, Henry, George, Charles are the most used male names; Maggie, Sadie, Susie, Lizzie, Nellie and Mamie are the favorite female names, or, at least, the favorite abbreviations of the names.

The name, Marie R. Deering, sounded a trifle too fashionable, too "toney," to me, and I proceeded to acclimatize it.

"Mamie" is the abbreviation or substitute for "Marie," so my little girl was immediately dubbed "Mamie."

The "R."--the initial of her middle name, stood for Rosetta, and it was decidedly against the code of ethics of the Fourth Ward for any one to be burdened by such an enormity. Again I officiated at the imaginary baptismal font, and "Rosetta" became a plain "Rose," sweet to me as no other.

Let no one think for a moment that my changing of names was accomplished without opposition. Besides other things, little people also possess the virtue of stubbornness, and many were the arguments pro and con. I was told with most charming emphasis that I could shout "Mamie Rose" to the winds, but that she, Marie R. Deering, would never--no, never--answer to that name. But, you know the old saying about many little drops of water penetrating the surface of the hardest stone, and the same was true in this case. Also, it should not be forgotten that she, my Mamie Rose, was of English descent, I was of Irish stock, and it is in Ireland where the Blarney stone is, which same instils a wonderful magic in the love-making of every descendant of good Erin's folk.

We had barely sealed the compact of our love when I received a fearful shock. My Mamie Rose wanted me to inform her mother concerning what had happened.

Mrs. Deering and myself had become very good friends. On several occasions she had even been my fellow-conspirator, by helping me to solve some weird puzzles in multiplication, imposed on me by her daughter. I had often sat at her table and had spent many hours, made pleasant by her, in the cosy home. However, all this did not seem sufficient to screw my courage up to the required pitch. Many particularly ticklish situations in my past life had been met by me without flinching, but I actually trembled when I was obliged to face this sweet lady with my portentous information and request.

If I had trembled with fear before telling her, I trembled with joy after it.

I could hardly believe my senses when I did not hear one word of regret or reproach from her lips. And when she said quietly, and, therefore, most impressively: "I have no fear for Marie's future," I became her bonded slave right on the spot, and hold myself in bondage to her to this very day.

Richard, my brave, crippled Dick--my "other" pal--was most effusive in his congratulations, but, he admitted to me his was a selfish reason, for now I was his big brother in "dead earnest."

Naturally, all this gave me an increased impetus to earn more money, and I put so much zeal into my work that my wages were several times increased. Nevertheless, I was still nothing more or less than a "baggage smasher." However, all of it, courtship and the rest, was so entirely out of the ordinary that a little thing like this did not cause us any worry. And if one happens to be a "baggage-smasher," it does not follow that one must always remain one. Besides, the queen did not mind it, and as to the cat, well--there is no use in talking to you if you cannot imagine what the cat thought about it.

*AMBASSADOR BILL.*

*CHAPTER XVI.*

*AMBASSADOR BILL.*

One who has been somewhat neglected in the few preceding pages is my old pal, my Bill. His soul, heart, instinct, call it what you will, was undergoing severe trials.

Mamie Rose was the cause of it.

With her coming into our lives, she sowed the seed of jealousy between me and Bill.

Bill found a new joy in trotting beside my teacher at times when he should have been at my side. He seemed the proudest dog in all the world and hardly deigned to notice me.

This I resented.

On the other hand, at times when Mamie Rose and I would sit close together, Bill could not rest until, with all his mighty prowess, he had squirmed himself between us.

For a long time he did not know whom of his two friends he should love the best. But, with coming weeks and months, he decided to share his affection evenly, and then we understood one another's feelings and respected our relative positions.

Would that I could take a peep into Bill's doggish brain and read the memory of those heavenly days!

A man who is born to coarseness and brutality will sometimes lose control of his acquired attainments. There came a day, long forgiven and forgotten by her, but not yet sufficiently atoned by me, when I permitted the subdued brute within me to assert itself for one brief moment. I saw immediately what I had done, and realized that my rowdyism could not be forgiven.

Then was a lapse in deepest shadows. Regrets, reproaches, self-accusations--what good were they? They could not lead me back to paradise. The room became a place of silent brooding, and not as regularly shared by Bill as formerly. Bill had taken no part in our estrangement. Emotional dog as he was, he never forgot to take care of the inner dog whenever an opportunity presented itself. From the very beginning he had industriously cultivated the acquaintance of my little girl's mother. First, becomingly modest, he had, in the course of time, insisted on being a regular guest at the dinner-table. I meant to break him of this habit, but the mother told me in confidence that Bill had whispered to her, quite plainly: "I think you are the very best cook in the world." Few women can resist such a compliment.

For two long days I had not seen her--had not heard her voice. She lived just around the corner, and, from the window of my tenement, I could see the walls that sheltered my treasure, that I thought forever lost. I sat and sat and stared at the cruel bricks that seemed to cry, "Halt!" Small wonder that the lesser things of life had lost their importance to me! Even Bill had, for the nonce, but little space in my thoughts; but he lost no time in bringing himself most forcibly to my notice.

I was at the window, and the door way slightly ajar. All was quiet, very quiet, until a slow patter on the stairs told of my partner's home-coming. My most casual glance was his share on entering the room. He was very anxious to avail himself of this, and made quickly for the sheltering shadows under the bed. But my careless glance had quickly changed to one of concern on beholding him, and, after much coaxing, he crawled out to face me.

My valiant knight had met his conqueror. The hero of many a battle sat wounded and bandaged before me. His left eye was swathed in linen. He tried to pass over the matter lightly; he wagged his tail, but only once, for that, too, was bandaged. Then he threw himself on my mercy.

It behooved me, as his partner, to investigate the extent of the damage, and I carefully untied the bandage that covered his eye. It was only a trifling scratch, suspiciously like one made by a cat. I also noticed that his badge of honor--his collar--was missing. On the point of throwing aside the bandage, a handkerchief, my eye fell on a well-known monogram in its corner, and--I cannot exactly recall how it happened--but, in the very next minute, my Bill and I were descending the rickety stairs, two steps at a time.

Just as we turned the corner, a belligerent-looking tabby made herself exceedingly conspicuous. Somehow, Bill found the other side of the street preferable. At her door he joined me again, and my queen's ambassador led the way upstairs.

There I stood before her, and stammered uncouth phrases of apology. I mentioned Bill's collar. A dainty hand took it from the mantel and handed it to me; our fingers met and--all the world was singing again the sweet refrain which for days had been silent. The impudence of that dog beggars all description. He had the unblushing nerve to claim all the credit for having brought love's jangle into tune again, and, in his excitement, rapped his damaged caudal appendage three times on the floor before he tried to bite it.

Then our happiness began once more.

*MY DEBUT IN SOCIETY.*

*CHAPTER XVII.*

*MY DEBUT IN SOCIETY.*

Had our future plans depended on my inclinations, or rather my impulses, our wedding would have taken place very soon after our engagement. All I deemed necessary to insure our future happiness was our love. All else was of no importance. Now I know that her judgment was the better.

I had sense enough to admit her wisdom. I was still very much entangled in the forest of ignorance. It could not have been right for me to force myself on her, refined and cultured as she was--until, at least approximately I was on the same level. I had still much, very much, to learn before considering myself capable to class myself with the non-illiterate. There were years of study before me, yet, with such a prize dancing before me, I threw myself into my task with true enthusiasm.