Torchy and Vee
doing the Pitman stuff in jazz time, with no call for repeats except
when I'd shoot a string of figures at her. I was handin' myself the
comfortin' thought, too, that I'd drawn a prize.
We breezes along on the report until near lunch time with never a hitch
until I gets to this paragraph where I mentions Camp Mills, and the next
thing I know she has stopped short and is snifflin' through her nose.
"Eh?" says I, gawpin' at her. "Have I been feedin' it at you too
speedy?"
"N--no," says she, "bub--but that's where Stub is--Camp Mills--and it
got to me sudden."
"Oh!" says I. "And Stub is a brother or something?"
"He--he--Well, there!" says she, holdin' out her left hand and
displayin' a turquoise set with chip diamonds.
"Sorry," says I, "but I couldn't tell from the service pin, you
understand, when some wears 'em for second cousins. And anyway, the name
of the camp had to----"
"'Sall right," snuffles Miss Casey. "I had no call spillin' the weeps
durin' business hours. I wouldn't of either, only I had another session
with his old lady this mornin' and she sort of got me stirred up."
"Mother taking it hard, is she?" I asks.
"You've said sumpin," admits Miss Casey, unbuttonin' a locket vanity
case and repairin' the damage done to her facial frescoin' with a few
graceful jabs. "Not but what I ain't strong for Stub Mears myself. He's
all right, Stub is, even if he never could qualify in a beauty
competition with Jack Pickford or Mr. Doug. Fairbanks. He's good comp'ny
and all that, and now he's in the army I expect he'll ditch that
ambition of his to be the champion heavy-weight pool player of the West
Side.
"But to hear Mrs. Mears talk you'd think he was one of the props of the
universe, and that when the new draft got Stub it was a case where
Congress ought to stop and draw a long breath. Uh-huh! She's 100 per
cent. mother, Mrs. Mears is, and it looks like some of it was catchin'
for me to get leaky-eyed just at mention of the camp he's in. Oh, lady,
lady! Excuse it, please, sir."
Which I does cheerful enough. And just to prove I ain't any slave
driver I sort of eggs Miss Casey on, from then until the noon hour, to
chat away about this war romance of hers. Seems Mr. Mears could have
been in Class B, on account of his widowed mother and him being a
plumber's helper when he had time to spare from his pool practicin'.
Livin' in the same block, they'd been acquainted for quite some time,
too.
No, it hadn't been anything serious first off. She'd gone with him to
the annual ball of Union 26 for two years in succession and to such like
important social events. But there'd been other fellers. Two or three.
And one had a perfectly swell job as manager of a United Cigar branch.
Stub had been a great one for stickin' around, though, and when he
showed up in his uniform--well, that clinched things.
"It wasn't so much the khaki stuff I fell for," confides Miss Casey,
gazin' sentimental at a ham sandwich she's just unwrapped, "as it was
the i-dear back of it. It's in the blood, you might say, for I had an
uncle in the Spanish-American and a grandfather in the Civil War. So
when Mr. Mears tells me how, when it comes time for him to go over the
top, the one he'll be thinkin' most of will be me--Say, that got to me
strong. 'You win, Stubby,' says I. 'Flash the ring.'
"That's how it was staged, all in one scene. And later when that Jake
Horwitz from the United shop comes around sportin' his instalment
Liberty bond button, but backin' his fallen arches to keep him exempt, I
gives him the cold eye. 'Nix on the coo business, Mister Horwitz,' says
I, 'for when I hold out my ear for that it's got to come from a reg'lar
man. Get me?' Which is a good deal the same I hands the others.
"But say, between you and I, it's mighty lonesome work. You see, I'd
figured how Stub would be blowin' in from camp every now and then, and
we'd be doin' the Sunday afternoon parade up and down the block, with
all the girls stretchin' their necks after us. You know? Well, he's been
at the blessed camp near three months now and not once since that first
flyin' trip has he showed up here.
"Which is why I've been droppin' in on his old lady so often, tryin' to
dope why he shouldn't be let off, same as the others. Mrs. Mears, she's
all primed with the notion that her Edgar has been makin' himself so
useful down there that the colonel would get all balled up in his work
if he didn't keep Stub right on the job. 'See,' says she, wavin' a
picture post card at me, 'he's been appointed on the K. P. squad again.'
Honest, she thinks he's something like a Knights of Pythias and goes
marchin' around important with a plume in his hat and a gold sword.
Mothers are easy, ain't they? You can bet though, that Stub don't try to
buffalo little old me with anything like that. What he writes me, which
ain't much, is mostly that his top sergeant's a grouch or that they've
been quarantined on account of influenza. So I sends him back the best
advice I've got in stock, askin' him why he don't buck up on his drill,
keep his equipment clean, and shift that potato peelin' work to some of
the new squads.
"Course, I don't spill any of this to Mrs. Mears. Poor soul! She's got
troubles enough, right in her joints. Rheumatism. Uh-huh. Most of the
time she has to get around in a wheel chair. Ain't that fierce? And she
was mighty nervy about sendin' Stubby off. Wouldn't let him say a word
about exemption. No, sir! 'Never mind me, Edgar,' says she. 'You kill a
lot of Huns. I'll get along somehow.' That's talkin', ain't it? And her
livin' with a sister-in-law that has a disposition like a green parrot!
"So I can't find much fault with her when she sort of overdoes the fond
mother act. Seems to me they might let him off now and then, even if he
does miss a few bugle calls, or forgets some of the rules and
regulations. And this bug of hers about wonderin' when and how what he's
doin' for his country is goin' to be reco'nized proper--Well, I don't
debate that with her at all. For one thing I don't get just exactly what
she wants; whether it's for the President to write her a special letter
of thanks, or for Mr. Baker to make Stubby a captain or something right
off. Anyway, she don't feel that Edgar's bein' treated right. He ain't
even had his name in the papers and only a few of the neighbors seem to
know he's a hero. Yep, it's foolish of her, I expect, but I let her
unload it all on me without dodgin'. I've even promised to see what can
be done about it. I--I'd been thinkin', sir, about askin' you."
"Eh?" says I, "Me? Oh, I couldn't think of a thing."
"But if I could, sir," goes on Miss Casey, "would--would you help out a
little? She's an old lady, you know, and all crippled up, and Stubby
he's all she's got left and----"
"Why, sure," I breaks in. "I'd do what I could."
I throws it off casual as I'm grabbin' my hat on my way out to lunch.
And I supposed that would be all there'd be to it. But I hadn't got
more'n half a line on Miss Casey. She's no easy quitter, that young
lady. Having let me in on her little affair, she seems to think it's no
more'n right I should be kept posted. A day or so later she lugs in a
picture of Private Mears, one of the muddy printed post-card effects
such as these roadside tripod artists take of the buddy boys around the
camps.
"That's him," says she. "Looks kind of swell in the uniform, don't he?"
It was a fact. Stubby not only looks swell--but swelling. And it's lucky
them army buttons are sewed on tight or else a good snappy salute would
wreck him from the chin down. He's a sturdy, bulgy party, 'specially
about the leggins.
"That's right, too," says Miss Casey. "Know what I tell him? If he can
fight like he can eat, good-night Kaiser Bill. But at that they've pared
fifteen pounds off him since he's been in the service."
"It's a great life," says I.
"Maybe," sighs Miss Casey, "but I wisht they'd let me have a close-up of
him before they risk loadin' him on a transport. That's all I got
against the Government. You ain't thought of any way it might be worked,
have you?"
I had to admit that I hadn't, not addin' I didn't expect to. And I must
have been stallin' along that line for a week or more until the forenoon
when Vee blows in unexpected durin' a shoppin' trip and announces that I
may take her out to luncheon.
"Fine!" says I. "Just as soon as I give two more letters to Miss Casey."
In the middle of the second one though, there's a call for me to go into
the private office, and when I comes back from a ten-minute interview
with Old Hickory I finds Vee and Miss Casey chattin' away like old
friends. Vee is being told all about Stubby and the hard-boiled eggs he
has for company officers.
"Three months without a furlough!" says Vee. "Isn't that a shame,
Torchy? What is the number of his regiment?"
Miss Casey reels it off, addin' the company and division.
"Really!" says Vee. "Why, that's the company Captain Woodhouse commands.
You remember him, Torchy?"
"Oh, yes! Woodie," says I. "I'd most forgotten him."
"I am going to call him up on the long distance right now," says Vee.
And in spite of all my lay-off signals she does it. Gets the captain,
too. Yes, Woodie knows the case and he regrets to report that Private
Mears's record isn't a good one; three times in the guardhouse and
another week of K. P. coming to him. Under these circumstances he don't
quite see how----
"Oh, come, captain!" puts in Vee coaxin'. "Don't be disagreeable. He's
engaged, you know. Such a nice girl. And then there is his poor old
mother who has seen him only once since he was drafted. Please, Woodie!"
I expect it was the "Woodie" that worked the trick. You see, this
Woodhouse party used to think he was in the runnin' with Vee himself,
way back when Auntie was doin' her best to discourage my little
campaign, and although he quit and picked another several years ago I
don't suppose he minds bein' called Woodie by Vee, even now. Anyway,
after consultin' one of his lieutenants he gives her the word that if
Private Mears don't pull any more cut-up stuff between now and a week
from Wednesday he'll probably have forty-eight hours comin' to him.
And for a minute there I thought both Vee and I were let in for a fond
clinch act with Miss Casey. As it is she takes it out in pattin' Vee's
hand and callin' her Dearie.
"A week Wednesday, eh?" says Miss Casey. "Say, ain't that grand! And
believe muh, I mean to work up some little party for Stubby. It's due
him, and the old lady."
"Of course it is," agrees Vee. "And Torchy, you must do all you can to
help."
"Very well, major," says I, salutin'.
And from then on I reports to Vee. It's only the next night that I gives
her the first bulletin from the front. "What do you know?" says I. "Miss
Casey has a hunch that she might organize a block party for the big
night. I don't know whether she can swing it or not, but that's her
scheme."
"But what on earth is a block party, Torchy?" Vee demands.
"Why," I explains, "it's a small town stunt that's being used in the
city these days. Very popular, too. They get all the people in the block
to chip in for a celebration--decorations, music, ice cream, all
that--and generally they raise a block service flag. It takes some
organizin', though."
"How perfectly splendid!" says Vee. "And that is just where you can be
useful."
So that's how I come to spend that next evenin' trottin' up and down
this block in the sixties between Ninth and Amsterdam. I must say it
didn't look specially promisin' as a place to work up community spirit
and that sort of thing. Just a dingy row of old style dumb-bell flats,
most of 'em with "Room to Rent" signs hung out and little basement shops