CHAPTER IV
The Reluctant One
One knew Anthony Fry for two or three decades before quite understandinghim. David's great disadvantage, of course, was that he had met Anthonyonly an hour or so before. To David, doubtless, the quiet, mysterious,speculative smile seemed sinister, for he repeated thickly:
"I want my--my cap and my coat and----"
"Well, what are you going to do if you don't get them?" Anthony laughed.
"What did you say?" David asked quickly.
"What if you don't get your coat?"
"Does that mean that you're going to keep me here, whether I want tostay or not?" the boy asked quickly.
"Not just that, perhaps, but it does mean that I'm going to keep youhere for a little while, David, until you've come to your sensesand----"
"I'll yell!" David stated.
"Eh?"
"If you try to keep me here I'll yell until everybody in the house comesin to see what's happening!"
Anthony laughed quietly.
"Don't be ridiculous, David," he said. "I've lived here for years, andthey will know perfectly well that I'm not injuring you in any way."
"Oh!" gasped David.
"So just sit down again and consider what I have offered you. Sit stillfor just one minute and consider--and then give me your answer."
Finger-tips drumming, benevolent gaze beaming over his glasses, theunusual Anthony waited. David's scared eyes roved the room, wanderedover Johnson Boller, reading his paper, and finally settled so steadilyon that gentleman that he looked up and, looking, read David's mind andshrugged his shoulders.
"Your own fault, kid," said he. "I wanted to give you a free ride, butyou had to come up and hear what he had to say."
"Johnson!" Anthony said sharply, "Just let the youngster's mentalprocesses work the thing out in their own way."
Half a minute dragged along--yet before it was gone one saw clearly thatthe mental processes had taken their grip. An extremely visible changewas coming over David Prentiss. He gulped down certain emotions of hisown, and presently managed to smile, uneasily at first and then with acertain confidence. He cleared his throat and, with a slight huskiness,addressed Anthony:
"Er--do I understand that you want me to stay here until I fullyappreciate all you've offered me, Mr. Fry?"
"Virtually that."
"Well, I appreciated that all along; but--but I was sort of worriedabout it getting so late, you know," David said brightly. "I certainlydo appreciate it, and I thank you very much. Now can I have my coat?"
"Really decided to grip the opportunity, eh?" Anthony asked keenly.
"You bet!"
Johnson Boller laid aside his paper.
"Now chase him, Anthony!" he said. "He's standing up and holding thesugar on his nose. Slip the kid a five-dollar bill and let Wilkins----"
"Do you really imagine that I'd rouse all the boy's hopes and then playhim a shabby trick like that?" Anthony asked sharply.
"Huh?"
"Most emphatically not!" Mr. Fry said. "I'll play no such shabby trickon the youngster. He shall have exactly the chance I promised, and Ishall watch the working out of the idea with the most intense interest.David, I'm going to keep you here from this minute!"
"Keep me here?" David echoed blankly.
"Certainly."
David gazed fixedly at the electrolier.
"Well, I'll tell you, Mr. Fry," he said. "I'd like to stay to-night, butI can't--not to-night. You see, I have to go home to my father. He'san--an invalid."
"We'll telephone the good news to him," Anthony smiled.
"You can't," said David. "We're too poor to have a telephone."
"Very well. Then we'll wire him."
David shook his head energetically.
"That wouldn't do, either," said he. "Father's sick, you know. Hisheart's very weak. Just the sight of a telegram might kill him."
"Unfortunate!" Anthony sighed and shrugged his shoulders. "Very well,David. Then you shall write him a note, and I'll have Wilkins take it tohim."
David swallowed audibly and smiled a wild little smile.
"Oh, no! Not that, sir!" said he. "That might be even worse than atelegram, I think."
"Why?"
"Well, father would be likely to think that I'd been--been injured andtaken into some swell home, you know, and that I was writing like thatjust to reassure him. No," David said firmly, "that would be the worstpossible thing. I'll have to go myself and talk it over with fatherand--now if I can have my cap and my coat?"
It came as a familiar refrain. It caused Anthony's eye to darkensuddenly as he sat back and stared at the boy.
"Confound your hat and coat!" he rapped out. "See here, David. You writethe note, and I myself will take it to your father and explain--and besure that he will rejoice. There is the desk. Where do you live?"
His tone was not nearly so benevolent. Opposition, as always, wasrousing Anthony's unfortunate stubbornness; with or without reason, hadDavid but known it, every mention of that cap and coat was diminishinghis chances of walking out of the Lasande--and it is possible that hesensed something of the kind, for his smile disappeared abruptly, andthe assurance that had been with him was no more.
"I can't tell you where I live!" he said hoarsely.
"In the name of heaven, why not?" Anthony snapped.
"Because--because--well, you may not understand this, sir, but Ipromised father I wouldn't tell any one where we live."
"What?"
"I did, and I can't break a promise!" David insisted. "You see, fatherwas rich once, and he's terribly proud. He doesn't want any one to knowwe live in such a poor place, because somebody he used to know mighthear of it and try to help him, and that would break father's heart."
"His heart's in pretty bad shape, isn't it?" Johnson Boller muttered.
"Frightful!" said David. "And that's why I'll have to go now and explainto him and think it all over and----"
"Why think it over?" Anthony rasped. "Isn't your mind made up now?"
"Of course it is," the boy said hastily. "Only I'll have to tell fatherand then come back here in the morning, Mr. Fry; only--_I have, to gohome now_!"
His voice broke strangely.
Anthony Fry looked him over with a quantity of sour curiosity.
If the golden opportunity before his very eyes was making even the traceof an impression on David Prentiss, the boy's faculty for masking histrue emotions was downright amazing. That bright, rather attractiveyoung countenance told of absolutely nothing but the heartfelt desire toescape from the gentleman who wished to improve his condition.
It was the same old story, world-old and world-wide. David, once he wasout of this apartment, would never return; with opportunity fairlypushing against him, he turned from her in terror, refusing to know thatshe was there.
Well, then, he _should_ see her!
Anthony's square chin set. He rose with a jerk and stood surveying thenervous David, a tall, commanding, rather fearsome figure. Some littletime he transfixed the lad with his cold, hard eyes, while David grewpaler and paler; then he walked down upon David, who cringed visibly,and seized his shoulders.
"David," he said sternly, "you have no conception at all of what I amtrying to offer you. I'm going to keep you here until you have."
"Keep me--here?" David faltered.
"Just that."
It was in Johnson Boller's mind to rise and deliver a little speech ofhis own, pointing out the legal rights of David Prentiss and the chancethat, at some later date, interested parties might hear of this eveningand use it in moving Anthony toward an insane asylum. Yet he did notspeak, for he grew interested in David himself.
That bewildered youngster was shrinking and shrinking away from Anthony.He was wilting before the stem eye, and he was smiling in the sickliest,most ghastly fashion. And now he was nodding submissively and speaking:
"Yes, I'll stay, Mr. Fry."
"Ah!" said Anthony.
"I--I'm glad to st
ay," David assured him.
Then, looking at Anthony, he contrived another smile and yawned; andhaving yawned once, he yawned again, vastly, and stretching the secondtime.
"The--the trouble with me is that I'm sleepy," David stated, in astrange, low voice. "I get that way because I'm not used to late hours,and when I do get sleepy I--I can't think or talk or do anything. I'llbe myself in the morning, Mr. Fry; but if I'm going to stay here, I'dlike to go to bed now."
He yawned again and still again, quite noisily and eying Anthony in anodd, expectant, pleading way. Anthony, after a puzzled moment, shruggedhis shoulders and smiled.
"Go to bed if you like, David," he said. "There are one or two things Iwant to say to you first."
"Yes, sir," David said obediently.
"To-morrow, when you have slept on it, I'm confident that you will seethe huge opportunity that I have offered you, and that you will staywith me as one of my little household. It is not an exacting position,but there are one or two laws you must remember. For the first--nodissipation. You don't drink, David?"
"Not a drop, sir."
"And for another," Anthony said gravely, "no women!"
"Eh?" said David.
"Absolutely no women in this Hotel Lasande!" Anthony repeated, with afanatic force that caused Johnson Boller to snort disgustedly and throwup his hands. "This is, perhaps, more strictly than any other house inNew York an all-man establishment. There are not even women servantshere, David, and other sorts of women _don't_ run in and out of here. Infact, the ladies who do come--relatives of the tenants, of course--areso very few that they're all known to the clerks. So, while you may havea sweetheart, David, and while she may be all very well in herplace--keep her out of here!"
"But----"
"That's the unwritten law of the house, and it makes for profoundpeace," Anthony concluded. "You'll appreciate it more fully when youhave lived here for a time."
David, facing Mr. Fry, gazed at the floor and yawned again.
"I guess I'll go to bed," he said weakly.
"And before that we'll start you on the right track," Anthony said witha gentle smile. "You'll take a good, hot bath."
He pressed the button and Wilkins appeared.
"The guest-chamber for young Mr. Prentiss, Wilkins," said Anthony. "Youwill outfit him with pajamas of my own and the gray bathrobe I used lastyear. To-morrow we'll get you something that fits, David."
David nodded numbly.
"And, Wilkins," said his master, "you will assist Mr. Prentiss with hisbath."
David's nod broke in two.
"I don't want any help," he said.
"But Wilkins----"
"Wilkins or anybody else; I don't want any help with a bath. I know howto take a bath, at least. I don't know how you swells take yours, but Itake mine alone; I don't want any one pottering around me, and I won'thave it!"
His countenance flushed angrily, and Anthony favored him with anindulgent smile. After all, he was very young.
"As you please, David. Show him to the north bathroom, Wilkins. That isall."
But he tapped Wilkins's shoulder and held him back a moment to add:
"And get his wretched togs, Wilkins. I'll dress him properly to-morrow;but get those rags away from him."
"Very good, sir," said Wilkins, as he glided down the corridor afterDavid.
The proprietor of Fry's Imperial Liniment watched him go and smiledsoftly, returning to his chair to grin at Johnson Boller in a perfectlyhuman fashion. Johnson Boller, on the other hand, did not grin at all.He merely gazed at his old friend until, after a minute or two, Anthonyasked:
"Well--what do you think?"
"I think you're a nut!" Johnson Boller said with sweet candor. "I thinkyou're a plain da--well, I think you're unbalanced. You know what thatyoung thug will do to you, don't you?"
"Eh?"
"If he's the crook he looks, he'll light out of here about three in themorning with everything but the piano and your encyclopaedia. If he isn'ta crook, just as soon as he gets loose and talks it over with hisfriends, he'll have you pinched for detaining him here against his will;and I'll give you ten to one that he collects not less than twenty-fivehundred dollars before he's through. You scared him stiff with youreagle eye and your crazy notions, and he pleaded guilty so he could goto bed and get away from you. I'll have to testify to that if he callson me."
"Fiddlesticks!" said Anthony Fry.
"Is it? Wait and see, Anthony," Johnson Boller said earnestly. "That kidspells trouble. I can feel it in the air."
"You can always feel it in the air," Anthony smiled.
"Maybe so; but this feeling amounts to a pain!" Boller said warmly."This is a hunch--a premonition--one of those prophetic aches that can'tbe ignored. Why, he had a fight started before you had spoken ten wordsto him, and----"
"Oh, rot!" Anthony said.
Johnson Boller drew a deep, concerned breath.
"On the level," he said, "are you going to keep this kid imprisonedhere?"
"By no means," Anthony laughed. "As a matter of fact, all I want to dois to talk to him in the morning. I want to know, Johnson, whether hewill actually persist in fighting off the chance I'm offeringhim--because it's so confounded characteristic of the whole human race.If he's as obstinate in the morning as he is now--well, I suppose I'llturn him loose with a ten-dollar bill, and look around for anothersubject. I'd really like to approach a dozen men, picked haphazard, andwrite a little paper on the manner in which they greet opportunity."
"Yes, but not while I'm with you," Johnson Boller said. "Anthony, dothis--get the kid aside in the morning and tell him you'd been drinkingheavily all day and didn't know what you were doing to-night. See? Makea joke of it and slip him fifty to keep quiet, and then----"
"Ah, Wilkins," Anthony smiled. "Got his togs, did you?"
The invaluable one bowed and held the shabby garments at a distance fromhis person.
"He passed them out to me through a crack in the door," he reporteddisgustedly. "What shall I do with them? They're hardly worth pressing,sir."
"Of course not. Don't bother with them," Anthony smiled, and waved hisman away. "Johnson, turn intelligent for a moment, will you?"
"Why? Intelligence has no place in this evening."
"Oh, yes it has. Let's examine the case of this David youngster and tryto reconstruct his emotions and his mental impressions when confrontedwith opportunity such as----"
"Damn opportunity!" said Johnson Boller, rising with a jerk. "I'm goingto bed!"
* * * * *
Only once had Johnson Boller tarried in Montreal, and on that occasionthe thermometer had ranged about ninety in the shade. Yet now, as heslumbered fitfully in Anthony's Circassian guest-chamber, childhoodnotions of Canada came to haunt his dreams.
He saw snow--long, glistening roads of snow over which Beatrice whizzedin a four-horse sleigh, with driver and footman on the box, and besideher a tall, foreign-looking creature with a big mustache and flashingeyes and teeth. He talked to Beatrice and leaned very close, devouringher beauty with his eyes; and Johnson Boller groaned, woke briefly, anddrifted off again.
He saw ice; they were holding an ice carnival in Montreal, and everybodywas on skates. Beatrice was on skates, ravishing in white fur, leadingsome sort of grand march with the Governor General of Canada, who skatedvery close to her and devoured her beauty with his bold, official eyes,causing Johnson Boller to groan again and thresh over on his other side.
He saw a glittering toboggan slide; laughing people in furs were thereat the head of the slide, notably Beatrice, chatting shyly with a blondgiant in a Mackinaw, who leaned very close to her as they prepared tocoast and devoured her beauty with his large, blue eyes. Now theysettled on the toboggan, just these two, although Johnson Boller'sastral self seemed to be with them. The blond giant whispered something,and they slid down--down--down!
And they struck something, and Johnson Boller was on his feet in themiddle of the Circass
ian chamber, demanding:
"What's that? What was that?"
Somewhere, Anthony was muttering and moving about. Somewhere else,Wilkins was chattering; but the main impression was that the roof hadfallen in--and Johnson Boller, struggling into his bathrobe, stumbled tothe door and burst into the brilliant living-room.
In the center of the room, flattened upon the floor, was Anthony'ssubstantial little desk. Papers were around it and blotters and letterswithout number, and the old-fashioned inkwell had shot off its top andset a black streak across the beautiful Oriental carpet.
Two chairs were on their sides, also, but the striking detail of thepicture was furnished by David Prentiss. That young man was sprawledcrazily, just beyond the desk, and beside him, holding him down withboth hands, was Wilkins, tastefully arrayed in the flowered silk pajamasAnthony had discarded last year as too vivid.
"I've got him, sir!" Wilkins' pale lips reported, as his masterappeared. "I have him fast."
"What'd he do?" Johnson Boller asked quickly. "Pull a knife on you,Wilkins?"
"He'd not time for that, sir," Wilkins said grimly. "I think he stumbledover a chair and took the desk along with him, trying to get out. Ialways wake just as the clock strikes two, and stay awake ten minutes ormore, and that's how I came to hear him and get him. He was just gettingto his feet when I ran in and turned on the lights, and he----"
"Let him up!" Anthony said sharply.
"But don't let go of him!" Johnson Boller said harshly. "I missed thetime by an hour, but I was right otherwise, Anthony. He's got the silverand your stick-pins and rings on him, and--what the dickens is hewearing?"
Silence fell upon them for a little, as David struggled to his feet andlooked about with a strange, trancelike stare--for there was some reasonfor Mr. Boller's query.
David, apparently, had dressed for the street. He wore shoes not lessthan five sizes too long; he wore a bright brown sack coat which camealmost to his knees, and blue trousers which were turned up until theyall but met the coat. He had acquired a rakish felt hat, too, whichrested mainly on the back of his neck.
"He got them clothes out of the junk-closet at the end of the corridor,sir," Wilkins said quite breathlessly. "He must have been roaming theplace quite a bit, to have found them, and----"
"What were you trying to do, David?" Anthony snapped.
"I don't know, sir," David said vaguely, passing a hand over his eyes ina manner far too dramatic to be convincing.
"Where did you get those clothes?"
"I have no idea, sir," David murmured.
"Don't lie to me!" Anthony snapped. "What----"
"I'm not lying, sir," David said in the same vague, far-away tone. "Imust have been asleep, Mr. Fry. I remember having a terrible dream--itwas about father and it seemed to me that he was dying. There weredoctors all about the bed and father was calling to me, and it seemed tome that I must get to him, no matter what stood in the way. I remembertrying to go to him, and then--why, I must have fallen there, sir, andwakened."
For an instant the vagueness left his eyes and they looked straight atAnthony.
"May I go to father now?" he asked. "That--that dream upset me."
"Morning will do for father," Anthony said briefly.
"But I have a feeling that something terrible's going to happen if Idon't go----"
Anthony Fry laid a kindly hand on his shoulder.
"Get back to bed, youngster," he smiled. "You're nervous, I suppose,being in a strange bed, and all that sort of thing. And incidentally,get off those clothes and give them to Wilkins."
David gulped audibly.
"I'll pass them out to Wilkins, if I must, sir," he said in thequeerest, choking voice--and he turned from them and shuffled down thecorridor to the north bedroom of Anthony Fry's apartment.
"Curious kid!" Anthony muttered.
"Not nearly as curious as you are," said Johnson Boller. "You didn'teven go through his pockets and get out the stuff while he was here, andwe could see just what he'd taken! You let him go in there and dump thepockets before he gives up the clothes and----"
Anthony permitted himself a grin and a yawn.
"My dear chap, go back to bed and forget it," he said impatiently. "Theboy was stealing nothing. He may have been trying to escape; he may havebeen walking in his sleep. Consciously or subconsciously, he's certainlygiving us a demonstration of humanity's tendency to dodge itsopportunities."
Johnson Boller gave it up and returned, soured, to his Circassian walnutbedstead--soured because, if there was one thing above all others thathe abominated, it was being routed out in the middle of the night.
Five minutes or more he spent in muttering before he drifted away again,this time to arrive at somebody's grand ball in Montreal. It was atremendous function, plainly given in honor of Beatrice's arrival intown, yet she was not immediately visible. Johnson Boller's dreampersonality hunted around for some time before it found her in theconservatory.
Behind thick palms, Beatrice sat with a broad-shouldered person in theuniform of a field-marshal; he had a string of medals on his chest, andhe was devouring her beauty with his hungry eyes. Nay, more, he leanedclose to Beatrice and sought to take her hand, and although she shrankfrom him in terror, there was a certain fascinated light in her ownlovely black eyes; she clutched her bosom and sought to escape, but----
"Oh, my Lord!" said Johnson Boller, awakening to stare at the darkceiling.
Somewhere a window slammed.
He listened for a little and heard nothing more; then, having the roomnearest the elevators, he heard one of them hum up swiftly and heard thegate clatter open. And then there were voices and some one knocked onthe door of the apartment with a club, as it seemed. Somebody elseprotested and pressed the buzzer--and by that time Wilkins had paddeddown the hall and was opening the door.
Johnson Boller caught:
"Police officer! Lemme in quick! You've got a burglar in there!"
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