A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill
with a baby in her arms, and six youngsters in varying stages of Sabbath
cleanliness, hung upon the words of a man who sat in a large, plush
self-rocker, and read from a highly colored picture book. In the head
of the family Dillingham recognized Richard Sheeley, ex-pugilist, and
present proprietor of the Cant-Pass-It.
“Well, if it ain't Mr. Dillingham!” exclaimed Sheeley, throwing open
the door in answer to their knock. “Soaked through, ain't you? Little
somethin' to warm you up? Sure. Just come in and wait 'til I git on my
shoes and find an umbrella and I'll go over with you. Don't keep a drop
here,” he added in a whisper, behind a hand so large that he evidently
regarded it as sound proof. “Missus won't stand fer it, 'count of the
kids, eh?”
“That's him, Ma, the one I was telling you about,” Richard Sheeley,
Jr.,--yclept “Skeeter”--tugged at his mother's sleeve, nodding his
head at Donald, who was making love to the smallest and shyest of the
daughters of the house.
“She ain't as meek as she looks!” Mrs. Sheeley was saying, as she tried
to get the child from behind her skirts. “She's got her popper's temper
along with his smartness. They ain't either one of them got a grain of
sense when they git mad. I never seen a child with such a temper, did
you, Popper?”
But Sheeley did not heed her; he was busy doing the honors to one he
evidently considered an honored guest.
“Sit right down here, Mr. Dillingham, lemme take the book out of the
chair. I was just reading to the Missus and the kids a book Skeeter
brought home from Sunday School, all about Dan'l and the lions' den.
Tall tale that, Mr. Dillingham. About one of the raciest animal articles
I ever come acrost.”
When they were ready to go, Mrs. Sheeley followed them anxiously to the
door.
“It's a awful stormy night, Popper; you ain't going to stay, are you?”
“Not long. I'll be back to finish the story. So long, kids!” He swung
himself down the wooden steps, between his two well-groomed companions,
looking back now and then at the bright, open doorway, where the smiling
fat woman stood surrounded by half a dozen tow-headed children.
Just as they reached the saloon, the storm, which had evidently only
paused for breath, broke in all its fury. The thunder rolled nearer and
flashes of lightning pierced the darkness.
“Here! The side door!” shouted Sheeley.
“Wait till I strike a match. I'll take the umbrella. Go right up-stairs,
if you don't mind. I want you to see the improvements I been making.
There ain't a saloon this side the city limits that's got the 'quipment
for sparring matches mine has.”
“Get busy with some whisky in the meanwhile,” reminded Dillingham
sharply; “and I say, can't you make a fire somewhere? I'm chattering
like an idiot.”
“Sure I can. There's a stove up there, and a bottle or two of extra fine
liquor. Jes' step right up.”
Half way up the ill-lighted stairs they paused. Above the wind and the
rain, a curious sound had come from below as if someone had stumbled
against something.
“Who is that?” Sheeley demanded sharply, leaning over the banister and
peering down into the gloom.
No answer came, but a draught of wind blew in from somewhere, swaying
the gas-jet.
“Oh! it's a window that's left open,” said Sheeley. “That fool
bartender! I'll just go down and fasten it.”
The lock proved stubborn, and it was with some difficulty that he forced
it into place. Meanwhile the two young men had lit the gas in the large
upper room and were inspecting the elevated stage where boxers were wont
to engage surreptitiously in the noble art of self-defense.
“Take yours straight I believe, Mr. Dillingham?” said Sheeley, rejoining
them; “an' yer gentleman friend?”
“Nothing for me,” said Morley with unnecessary firmness. “I'll just wait
a second until the storm lets up, then be off to town.”
“Do any boxing these days, Dick?” asked Dillingham, pouring himself a
second drink of whisky, as he hovered over the newly kindled fire.
“Oh! I don the mitts occasionally to gratify me friends. My long suit
these days is faro; more money in it.”
Donald, standing at the window, staring out at the wild night, drummed
impatiently on the pane.
“Hurry up, Dill,” he said. “I don't want to keep my mare standing so
long in the rain.”
“Your mare be hanged,” said Dillingham; “just wait ten minutes until I
get thawed out, and I'll go with you.”
Donald had waited ten minutes for Dill before, but never with the
present sense of responsibility, born of his new connection with the
family. He knew that his only chance of getting him home was to humor
him.
How the wind whistled across the window! He wondered what Miss Lady
was doing? Was she sitting by the table in the cozy living-room at
Thornwood, with the lamplight on her hair? Was she at the harpsichord,
singing to the Colonel? Was she standing, as he was standing, at the
window, peering out into the wild night, and thinking,--and longing--?
“What's the matter with a little game of poker?” asked Sheeley, lightly
running a deck of cards up the length of his arm and reversing them with
a deftness that spoke of long familiarity.
“Great idea!” exclaimed Dillingham expansively. “Just pass that bottle,
will you? What's that, Morley? Haven't got time? What in thunder's the
matter with you to-night?”
Donald retorted, with great dignity, that nothing in thunder was the
matter with him, except that he wanted to get back to town.
“Better not start with it storming like this,” urged Sheeley, as a crash
of thunder shook the windows. “It'll let up soon.”
“Tell you what I'll do!” said Dillingham, putting an arm across Donald's
shoulder affectionately, and speaking a trifle unsteadily. “If you'll
play a couple of games I'll go home with you--You ought to be willing to
do that for a fellow that's going to be your uncle. I mean your nephew.”
“And you'll go the minute the rain lets up?”
“Yes, if you'll play with us.”
Donald stood irresolute, watching Dillingham's thin, unsteady fingers
shuffle the cards. He must get him home somehow, for Margery's sake.
Dill never knew when to stop, he was good for the night unless somebody
intervened.
Sheeley caught his eye and nodded significantly.
“All right!” said Donald, dropping into the vacant chair. “Only two
games remember! No whisky, thanks. What's the ante?”
CHAPTER IV
When Miss Lady had championed the cause of the oppressed that afternoon,
she had unknowingly spoiled a criminal in the making. Chick Flathers,
at the advanced age of eleven, had been so impressed by the injustice of
social conditions that he had dedicated himself to a life of crime. He
had already achieved two appearances in the Juvenile Court, and two days
in the Detention Home. He was now fully decided to be a burglar.
To be sure there were extenuating circumstances for Chick. It was
unquestionably a handicap to have opened his eyes for the first time in
an ash barrel, and in Mr. Flathers' ash barrel at that. The transfer in
a patrol wagon to an incubator in the City Hospital had been the next
move, hence back to Mr. Flathers' who, inasmuch as it was _his_ ash
barrel, felt called upon by Providence to adopt the foundling.
The next misfortune that befell him was in being dropped out of the
window on his head, during one of Maria Flathers' absent-minded moments.
This apparently did not affect his head, but in time it seriously
affected his speech. The fact that he had so much to say, without
being able to say it, resulted in a dammed-up current that sometimes
overflowed in temper and viciousness. He talked a great deal, but nobody
was able, or took the pains to try, to understand him. That is, not
until Skeeter Sheeley gave him his nickname and became his official
interpreter.
Their friendship dated from a memorable day when Skeeter had for the
first time heard of the incubator incident, and had promptly accosted
the Flathers' foundling as “Chicken.” The insult had been instantly
resented in a battle so fierce and so bloody, that the details of it
became historic in the annals of Billy-goat Hill. Chick, though of
lighter weight, and feeble muscle, was armed with righteous indignation.
He observed no rules, but fought with arms, legs, teeth and nails. The
odds were against him however, and he had to be assisted from the field,
a vanquished hero.
From that time on, by one of those mysterious laws that govern boydom,
the two were inseparable companions, waging open war on all adjoining
neighborhoods, engaging in predatory expeditions in their own, and, when
interest in life flagged, fighting each other.
Skeeter interpreted all that Chick said, interpreted it freely, and
with imagination, and Chick apparently considered himself honor bound
to accept the interpretation and stand for it, no matter how far it came
from expressing his meaning.
Eleven years of wickedness had thus been swaggered through when Chick
suddenly and unexpectedly fell in love. It was when the beautiful young
lady at the railroad crossing had bent above him like a succoring angel,
that he had been forced to change his classification of the human race.
Hitherto it had been divided into grown people and children, henceforth
it was divided into men and women!
All that Sunday afternoon he went about in a dream. He could not get
over the fact that she had taken his part, that she had put her arm
around him, and smiled at him. Once or twice when nobody was looking, he
put his very dirty hand on his cheek and felt the spot where her fingers
had rested.
But this new and tender emotion was not allowed to interfere with the
special project that Chick had in mind. It was a project so colossal in
its nature, that not even Skeeter was to be admitted to the secret. For
six weeks Chick had been the victim of a gaming system, and to-night he
was to take his revenge.
At supper time Skeeter recognized a convention of civilization and
repaired to the bosom of his family, but Chick being accountable to
nobody, and recognizing no conventions, stole a couple of apples from a
passing cart, and repaired to the dump heap to wait for the dark.
He had not long to wait, for great black clouds were covering the sky,
and he could no longer see the houses at the end of the alley. Carefully
storing his apple cores in his pocket for future trades, he picked his
way over the tin cans and debris, until he reached the Junction. Here he
hesitated. It was there that he and Skeeter had tussled for the whip. It
was here that the young lady had come to his rescue, and said she didn't
believe he was so very bad. Gee! but she was a pretty young lady, and
her hand was so soft, and her voice--
Chick rammed his hands in his pockets and pulled his cap over his eyes.
This was no way for a cove to be feeling when he had a job to do! With
watchful eyes for passers-by, he slipped through an opening in the
fence, and entered the switch-yard. When he emerged he staggered under
the weight of a crowbar which he vainly tried to hide under his ragged
jacket.
Just at the intersection of Bean Alley and the switch-yard, where the
dusk banked up densely in the corners, he stopped again. He was watching
his chance to get across the wide common, undetected. Twice he started,
and twice he shrank back and flattened himself against the wall as some
one passed.
If, to the casual observer, Chick was but a dirty, ragged little boy,
undersized and underfed, and rather frightened, to himself at least he
was a bold desperado, about to avenge himself for a wrong committed.
Thunder muttered ominously, and a drop of rain fell on his face as he
skirted the common, and reached the big, dark saloon at the cross-roads.
Skirting the side wall, he crept to the rear, and felt for the open