"All right," says I: "but this'll cost Cliffy just twenty."

"I'll pay it," says Mr. Robert.

"It's a whizz," says I, wavin' the cane. "Come on, you Sneezowskis! I'll show you where the one fifty per grows on bushes."

What did I do with 'em? Ah, say, it was a cinch! I runs 'em down seven flights of stairs, marches 'em three blocks up town, and then rushes up to a big stiff in a green and gold uniform that's hired to stand outside a flower shop and open carriage doors. He and me had some words a couple of months ago, because I b.u.t.ted him in the belt when I was in a hurry once.

"Here," says I, rushin' up and jammin' the cane into his hand, "hold that till I come back!" and before he has time to pipe off the bunch of Polackers that's come to a parade rest around us, I makes a dive in amongst the cars and beats it down Broadway.

Nah, I don't know what becomes of him, or the Zinskis either. All I know is that I'm twenty to the good, and that Cousin Clifford's been shipped back to Bubble Creek, glad to get out of New York alive. But, as I says to Mr. Robert, "What do you look for from a guy that b.u.t.tons his ears up in flannel?"

CHAPTER X

BACKING OUT OF A FLUFF RIOT

They will turn up, won't they? Here I was only yesterday noontime loafin' through the arcade, when who should I get the hail from but Hunch Leary, with a bookful of rush messages and his cap down over his ears.

Now I ain't sayin' he's the toughest lookin' A. D. T. that ever sat on a call bench, for maybe I've seen worse; but with his bent-in nose, and his pop eyes, and that undershot jaw--well, he ain't one you'd send in to quiet a cryin' baby. Hunch didn't pose for that picture of the sweet youth on the blue signs outside the district offices. They don't pick him out for these theater-escort snaps, either.

Which shows how far you can go on looks, anyway; for, if I was going to trust my safety-vault key with anyone, it would be Hunch. Not that they'll ever use him to decorate any stained-gla.s.s window; but I never look for him to land on the rock pile.

Course, I don't see much of Hunch and the rest these days; but it ain't a case of dodgin' old friends on my part, so me and him hangs up against a radiator in the main corridor and talks it over. I wants to know if Stiff Miller is still manager down at No. 11 branch, and who's wearin' the red stripe yet; while Hunch he puts over a few polite quizzes as to how I'm gettin' on with the Corrugated people.

We hadn't been ga.s.sin' but five minutes or so, and there's ten more due on the clock before lunch hour is over, when I looks up to see our Mr.

Piddie going by and givin' me the frown. I knew what that meant. It's another call-down. He has plenty of time to work up his case; for I takes the limit and don't hang up my hat until the life-insurance chimes has done their one-o'clock stunt. And I'm hardly settled behind the bra.s.s gate before Piddie is down on me with the old mushy-mouthed reproof.

"One is known," says he, "by the company one keeps."

"I'm no New Theater manager," says I. "What's the answer?"

"I observed you loitering in the lower corridor," says he. "That is all."

"Oh!" says I. "You seen me conversin' with Mr. Leary, eh?"

"Mr. Leary!" says Piddie, raisin' his eyebrows.

"Well, Hunch, then," says I. "Tryin' to get up a grouch because you wa'n't introduced? Don't take it hard. He's kind of exclusive, Mr. Leary is."

Piddie swallows that throat pippin of his two or three times before he can get a grip on his feelings enough to go on with the lesson of the day. "I merely wish to remark," says he, "that evil communications corrupt good manners."

"How about court Judges, then," says I, "and these slum missionaries'?

G'wan, Piddie! Back to the copybook with your mottoes! I'm a mixer, I am! Would I be chinnin' here with you if I wa'n't?"

He sighs, Piddie does, and struts away to freeze the soul of some new lady typist by looking over her shoulder. As an act of charity, they ought to let Piddie fire me about once a month. He'll die of grief if he don't get the chance sometime.

And blamed if he don't come near gettin' his heart's desire before the day was over!

It all begins about three o'clock, when Piddie comes turkeyin' out of the telephone booth all swelled up with importance and signals me to come on the carpet.

"Torchy," says he, "I presume you know where the Metropolitan Building is?"

"They ain't moved it since lunchtime, have they?" says I.

"That will do!" says he. "Now listen very carefully."

You'd thought from his preamble that I was going to be sent up to regulate the clock, or see if the tower was still plumb; but all it simmers down to is that I'm to take a leather doc.u.ment case, hunt up Mr.

Ellins, who's attendin' a directors' meetin' over there, and deliver some papers that he's forgot to have his private secretary lug along.

"And kindly refrain," he tacks on at the last, "from stopping to talk with any suspicious characters on the way."

"Say, Piddie," says I, "if I was you I'd have that printed on a card.

Some day you're going to forget to rub that in."

Well, I hustles across the square, locates Old Hickory, and delivers the goods without droppin' 'em down a manhole or doin' any of the other awful things that Piddie would have warned me against if he'd had more time. I tucks the empty case under my arm and was for makin' a record trip back, just to surprise Piddie; but while I'm waitin' for that flossy lever juggler on the express elevator to answer my red-light signal I hears this riot break loose on the floor below.

And say, I wa'n't missin' any lively disturbance like that; for it listens like a mob scene from one of them French guillotine plays.

Mostly it's female voices that floats up, and they was all tuned to the saw-filin' pitch. A pasty-faced young gent wearin' a green eye-shade and an office coat comes beatin' it up the marble steps, and I fires a question at him on the fly.

"Is it a gen'ral rough-house number," says I, "or have the suffragettes broke loose again?"

"You're welcome to find out for yourself," he pants, dashin' up another flight.

"Thanks for the invite," says I. "Guess I will."

And, say, talk about your ma.s.s plays around a shirtwaist bargain counter! Why, the corridor was full of 'em, all tryin' to rush the door of 1,323 at once. For a guess I should say that half the manicure artists, lady demonstrators, and cloak models between 14th and 34th was on the spot. Oh, they was a swell bunch, with more fur turbans and Marie Antoinette ringlets on view than you could see collected anywhere outside of Murray's!

They was sayin' things, too! I couldn't catch anything but odd words here and there; but the gen'ral drift of their remarks seems to be that someone has welshed on 'em. First off I thought it must be one of these skirt bucket-shops that has been closed out by the renting agent; but then I gets a look at the sign on the door and sees that it's the Peruvian Investment Company, which sounds like one of them common twenty per cent. a month games.

And it's a case of lockout, with the lady customers ragin' on the outside, and n.o.body knows what's takin' place behind the ground gla.s.s.

That wa'n't excitin' enough to lure me from a steady job for long, though, unless some one was goin' to do more'n look desp'rate and talk spiteful.

"Ah, why not smash something?" I sings out. "Didn't any lady think to bring a brick in her vanity bag?"

A couple turns around and glares at me; but it encourages one to begin hammerin' on the gla.s.s with her near-gold purse, and just as I'm about to leave this turns the trick. The door swings open all of a sudden, and there stands a tall, well-built gent, with a green felt hat pushed back on his head, a five-inch cigar juttin' out of one corner of his mouth, and his thumbs stuck in the pockets of a sporty striped vest. On account of the curly brown Vand.y.k.e, he's kind of a foreign-lookin' party; but someway them smilin', wide-open eyes of his has a sort of familiar look.

For a high pressure storm center he seems mighty placid. As he throws open the door he steps back into the middle of the room, rests one elbow against the rail of a wired-in cashier's coop, and removes the cheroot so he can spring a comfortin' smile on the crowd. It's a brainy play.

The rush line stops like it has gone up against a bridge pier, and then spreads out in a half-circle.

"Well, ladies," says he, "what can we do for you to-day?"

Do I know who it is then? Well, do I! Maybe it has been months since I've heard the voice, and maybe he does wear a set of face herbage that I'd never seen before; but I ain't one to forget the only real A-1 cla.s.sy boss I ever had; not that soon, anyway. It's Mr. Belmont Pepper, as sure as I've got a t.i.tian thatch on my skull!

Do I linger? That's what! Why, I've been waitin' for him to show up again like a hired girl waits for Thursday afternoon. It's Mr. Pepper, all right; but it looks like he's been let in bad, for after one or two gasps in chorus that bunch of lady grouches gets their second wind and closes in on him with a whoop.