“I told my story, but it had no weight in court. The girl had never been away from home, according to her father and the servants, except mornings for a short ride, when it was proven that she had met me. More than twenty people testified that I had been to the cottage every night. They had seen me riding out, according to my custom, and they had seen me ride back in the morning.
“As a matter of fact, I had taken a ride on horseback every night and every morning, but never in the direction of the cottage while she was there.
“At the trial there were people who testified in my behalf, and many people believed in my innocence. Among them was a black servant, who said that the lady had had a secret lover before she ever saw me, and the girl’s stepmother testified that the girl had acted queerly for many months; that she used to ride to the postoffice every morning and night, because she feared that her letters would fall into the hands of her father.
“In spite of all this, my guilt was made to appear perfectly clear, and the jury brought in a verdict of murder in the first degree, and, as I told you before, I was sentenced to be hanged.
“The Sheriff had had a horse taken a few nights before when they searched my cottage, and when his dogs had begun to bark and give the alarm, he said to the court, he had fired the contents of his shotgun at a man who was galloping away from his barn. He told the court that the man he had fired at was me. In the morning the horse was found in the Sheriff’s field, with blood on its side and mane. The prosecuting attorney brought out at the trial that the horse was used to convey the body of the murdered girl to the place which I had secured as a grave for her.
“No motive was ever given for my having killed her. If I had ruined her, there would even then have been no motive, as the girl was of a higher class of society than I, and as her father had lots of money, it would have been to his advantage to hush the matter up, rather than to try to make trouble for me.
“That was the argument of my lawyer. He showed that I had everything to gain by having the girl alive, if she had liked me well enough to meet me in that lonely cottage, and I had everything to lose by making away with her.”
“A darned queer thing. I remember readin’ all about it,” interrupted John Hogan, while the man from Number 9 moistened his dry lips with his tongue, and looked over his shoulder in the frightened way he had.
“Well,” said Bill Wiley, “if the woman was alive, why didn’t she show up and clear you? If it was in the papers, she should have seen it.”
“It was in the papers,” said Hogan, “and a picture of him was in the New York World.”
“I have that right here,” said the man, touching his breast.
“How did you get out of Sing Sing after twenty-five years, when you got life?” asked Ikey, as he wiped the perspiration from his forehead.
“The woman came back, I suppose,” put in Higgins.
“Look at these,” said the man from Number 9. The four men bent eagerly forward, each with his hand outstretched to take the packet of papers which the man held in his trembling hands. “Look at this postmark—‘1885, Panama.’ ”
John Hogan gently took the yellow letter and unfolded it, while the other men bent forward, their eyes fairly bulging from their sockets. It read: ‘My Dear Mr. Frayer; Please forgive us for the condition in which you found your house. My husband came for me on the night of the 21st of September, and he stopped to take a horse for me to ride from the Sheriff’s place. The Sheriff shot at him, and he was wounded in the arm—a very bad scratch. Did you think that some one had been killed? The wound bled a great deal, but I bound it up so well that he was all right until he could see a doctor in New York City. He says I would make a good surgeon. We left New York on the following Monday and came on one of the Panama Railroad steamers to Panama. Our destination is Chile. Please accept this trifle from my husband and me.’
“This is it,” said the man, with a harsh laugh, and he drew from the faded envelope a slip of paper.
“A check for one thousand dollars,” said the four listeners in turn, and as each man looked at the check the man from Number 9 gave another harsh laugh.
“This is the key to the cottage,” said he, drawing from the envelope a rusty Yale lock latchkey. Then John Hogan read on: “I trust to you to keep my whereabouts a secret. I am never coming back to New York again. Let us hear from you. We expect to live at No. 12 Sacramento Street, Valparaiso, Chile.
“I know my people will make a search for me, but I feel sure that you will keep silent about me. I am very happy. Your grateful friend, Ada Bermugues.”
John Hogan threw the letter to Ikey and looked into space for some time, while the man from Number 9 drew a table toward him and placed upon it some other papers which he took from the inside pocket of his coat. The four men bent forward and watched him as, one by one, he unfolded the various letters and papers which were in some way connected with the story of his life. One was a pretentious-looking document with two red seals. It was his acquittal from the Governor of New York for the crime he had never committed, and was dated May 1st, 1910. Another was the petition which Ada Bermugues had presented to the Governor in behalf of the man who had been imprisoned for her supposed murder. There was not a word spoken while the papers were being perused. One would read a letter or newspaper clipping, and in silence hand it to another, until all were read and reread. The men made a weird picture in the soft moonlight, as they sat, with anxious, set faces. “You see,” the man from Number 9 continued, when the last paper was read and folded by Higgins, from whose forehead great beads of perspiration dropped, “the woman came back after a few years and lived in New York City. She didn’t know that I had ever been put in jail, because she never went about any one she had ever known before. About three months ago her father died, and she read of his death in the newspapers. Then she went to their family lawyer and made herself known to him, and when he told her about me she went straight to the Governor and had the case opened, and, after a lot of red tape, I was released. I found that letter which she wrote me from Panama twenty-five years ago in the pocket of the rain coat that I wore just before the sheriff arrested me. As I look back now, I remember that these three letters were handed to me just before the Sheriff put his hand on my shoulder to tell me I was under arrest.”
The man from Number 9 picked up the three letters indicated. “One,” he went on, “is, you will see, a bill from a horseshoer; one is from a tailor, and the other from her. I left the raincoat in my office that morning and forgot all about the letters. When I was let out of Sing Sing a cousin of mine took me to his home in my old home town. He told me that he had all the things that were in the office at the time of my arrest, and among them was the raincoat, with the letters in the pocket that might have gained me my freedom. My cousin had never looked in the pockets, and, therefore, didn’t know that they were there.”
“My God!” said John Hogan; “and the Bible says that not even a sparrow shall fall to the ground without His knowledge.” “Bible, your foot!” grunted Ikey. “If God knows everything, why didn’t he make this man think about the three letters in the pocket of the rain coat? Why didn’t He put it into the Sheriff’s mind to hunt for evidence the way they do in the story-books? He never did anything to God that most other men ain’t doing every day. He tried to do a good act. There was a girl in some trouble, and he helped her out by giving her the key of his house. It helped her, because she got away from her folks. They must have been cussed mean, like mine were when I got away from them. God can’t give back to this man his youth and health. He can’t give him the sons and daughters that he might have had if he had been left his freedom. He can’t give him anything now that will compensate for the twenty-five years in Sing Sing.” “But there’s another life,” said the man from Number 9 with awful calmness. “I have had visions of it, and have prayed to God on my bare knees, and asked Him to bring the girl back, and He brought her, didn’t He?” “Yes,” said John Hogan, “He did after twenty-five years.” “I prayed that she’d come back and tell me that she regretted that she hadn’t loved me, and she did.” “And she just said that because she thought it would make you feel good. She was sorry for you. Women can feel sorry for their worst enemies if they are in trouble,” said Ikey, cynically. “I prayed to God for peace, and He gave me peace; and I got used to Sing Sing, and would have been content to live there the rest of my life, if the girl hadn’t come back,” went on the man from Number 9.
“God can’t do more for a man than give him contentment, and I had that for many years. I had no desires like I used to have when I was a young man. I had nothing to lose. There was nothing around me that I would want to covet. I envied no human being, and no one envied me. Why, I used to lie in my narrow cell at night and wonder to myself why I was ever foolish enough to covet the silly things that I used to covet before I went to jail, and gradually everything that was most dear to me became only a memory, and the simple things of my prison life became dear to me. I was a sort of leader among the prisoners, and the worst ones among them believed that I was innocent.” “That was the potency of right and truth,” said Higgins, interrupting him for the first time.
“Schopenhauer says that truth is the only God there is, and that’s all I believe in,” said Ikey.
“After what we guys heard to-night,” said John Hogan, “I’m beginning to think that old Schuppy was more of a prophet than we give him credit for.” “You have invited me over here from Number 9,” said the man, “and I must ask you men not to say things that might have a tendency to kill my faith, because that’s all I have left.” “You have more than we have,” said Higgins, “and we are going to try to strengthen your faith, rather than weaken it.”
“We’ll try to,” said Ikey. “Better go to bed now,” said John Hogan; “you look tired. Ikey’s room is the coolest in the house. Show him his bed.” “Good night. Thank you for your kindness, men,” said the man from Number 9, as he followed Ikey to his room. “Good night,” said Higgins and Hogan. “Poor devil!” said Bill Wiley, as the man disappeared into Ikey’s room.
“He’s got the right dope on religion,” said John Hogan, “and is happy in it.” “He bears no ill-feeling for the woman who ruined his life,” said Higgins. “Why pity him? He’s happy because he believes in a living God.” “That check he’s got must be worth good money by now,” said Ikey, returning. “Why don’t the darn fool cash it in?”
THE CANAL ZONE ARCHITECT’S WEDDING
N Germany, before the days of the American occupation at Panama, there lived with her mother a beautiful, golden-haired, blue-eyed girl named Hulda Schneider. The Schneiders were very poor, but they had held their own, for they had been fighters. But of what use are fighters there nowadays, except as bodyguards to the Kaiser’s numerous off-spring? Hulda had tastes inherent in such people, and, having no means of gratifying them, she chafed in her environment. “I’ll tell you what to do,” said a sophisticated girl friend, who had lived for a time at Hoboken, N. J. “Put an ad in a New York City newspaper, saying that you are young and pretty and just dying to make some good American happy.”
“Shall I get a millionaire, do you think?” asked the innocent Hulda.
“You may,” said her adviser. “If you don’t, you may get a Jew, and that’s almost the same thing.”
“But I don’t want a Jew,” said Hulda. “I want an American who is rich, young and handsome.”
Accordingly, an advertisement was sent to a New York Sunday paper announcing that a good-looking girl in Germany was pining to marry a rich American. Meanwhile, blue-eyed, golden-haired Hulda settled down to await a reply.
Now we must go back about seven hundred years, to the time when the Danes invaded Ireland. There was one Dane in particular, named Vickenstadt, who married a descendant of Brian Boru. It so happened that a descendant of this Dane and the great Brian read Hulda’s advertisement and decided to answer it. He was an ambitious man, of temperate habits and aesthetic tastes. He studied hard, for he was wont to say, “If there’s one thing in the world that I like better than another, it is intelligence.” He was a draftsman by profession, but he called himself “architect of the Canal Zone.” To use his own words, he was “well fixed,” and what he most desired was a golden-haired, blue-eyed, slender young girl to share his fortune and his ancient name. As a matter of fact, his name had undergone some radical changes during the intervening years, and was now written Brian McVickins. His associates called him “Mickey” Vickens for short, and by this cognomen he was generally known. He was an American citizen, but first saw the light of day in a little town in County Clare fifty years before the incidents in this story occurred.
‘Tis a far cry from Hulda’s home town on the Rhine to Ancon, C. Z., but the finger of fate is ever pointing this way and that, else “Mickey” Vickins would never have seen her advertisement on that unlucky Sunday morning. “Be jabers,” said he, “here’s the last thing I want now. I’ll answer this ad this very day, or my name is not Brian Boru Vickingstadt. If the others object to me Irish accint, divil a bit the difference ’ill this one know, and by the toime she gets to know the ropes she’ll be so attached to me that she’ll hate to leave me. The German wimmin do be that way. I’ll write under me right and proper name, an’ shure they’ll know I’m Danish anyway.” So he sat down and wrote that he was of Danish descent, an architect, an American, well fixed financially, and thirty-four years of age.
“I’d better tell her what sort of a complected man I am whilst I’m about it,” so he wrote, “dark-complected, with blue eyes an’ fair skin.” “Me hair is turnin’ fast,” said he to himself, as he gazed at his reflection in the looking-glass, “but,” he added, “if she objects, a bit of dye will fix that all right.” He told her that it would be six months before he would be able to procure “married quarters,” and he advised her to go to school where English was being taught so that she might be able to converse with him should she decide to accept him as her future husband. “An’ bedad! I haven’t been with the Jews in Chicago for nothing,” said the scheming wooer, “an’ me plan ought to be to ask her to give me the address of the schoolmaster, an’ I’ll send the old blaguard the money in checks. Thin I’ll have a hold upon the creature in case she has some young lads to meet her. Shure a man can never be after thinkin’ what a young heifer might be havin’ in her mind.” At length the letter was finished and was duly dispatched to the waiting Hulda. There was a clipping enclosed which read that Brian Boru Vickingstadt had lectured to a large audience on the Panama Canal at Hoboken, N. J. There was a postscript added, to the effect that the writer wished to communicate with the mother of the fair Hulda. That he had persuasive powers may be inferred from the fact that Hulda’s mother answered the letter as soon as it was received. The schoolmaster wrote that Hulda could begin her studies at once, and that great pains would be taken to fit her to become the wife of so prominent a person as the “architect of the Canal Zone.” There was a picture of the girl included.
“I like the man already,” said Hulda’s mother. “He is too old,” said Hulda. “Just think, thirty-four, while I am only twenty.” “It is the right age, just,” said the mother. “The husband should have the age already when the wife is that young and foolish like you are.” Hulda, however, had sent her picture and a long letter to another applicant. He wrote that he was a farmer, and lived near Montclair, N. J.; that he had one thousand dollars saved, was twenty-six years old, sober, and a church member.
After some weeks the schoolmaster received twenty-five dollars from the “architect of the Canal Zone” for Hulda’s instruction, and Hulda’s mother received a sum of money, all of which was duly acknowledged in the most legal manner on legal-looking paper. Now the Vickingstadt exulted in having won the prize. He took the girl’s picture and visited the places where “the boys” were in the habit of assembling. “What do ye think of that for a colleen?” asked he of one and all. “By Jove, she is a perfect Juno,” said one. “Say! she’s all right; a good-looker, and some style,” spoke up another. “Where did you pick it up?” queried a third. “That picture does not belong to none of your relatives,” another boldly asserted, “she’s too refined-lookin’.” “Divil a bit,” acknowledged the “architect;” she’s the gurrl I’m goin’ to marry whin I go on me vacation in September. Shure, that’s why I come across the Isthmus. I’m gittin’ a house here to bring me bride to.” “How could an old mug like you get a good-looker like that to marry you? ‘Mickey Vickins’ is a romancer,” declared one of the highbrows. “That must be the picture of some young lady in whose family he worked when he first came from Ireland,” spoke up another highbrow. And so the matter furnished food for discussion for some time. The “architect” was now living at Cristobal, where he had an extensive acquaintance among “the boys.” He knew every one of the dry-dock gang by name, and to each one in turn he showed the picture of the fair Hulda. The members of the dry-dock gang became greatly interested in the Vickingstadt’s wooing, and discussed the affair among themselves in the following manner: “ ‘Mickey Vickins’ is goin’ to be married, all right.” “Shure thing; got his name in for married quarters! An’ say, she shure is a peach.” “Yes, he’ll bring some old biddy down with him from New York. No one else would marry an old mutt like him.” “He stole that picture from one of them penpushers that he used to room with over at Ancon,” etc., etc.
Meanwhile the “architect” winked foxily and tucked away the letters from Hulda’s mother and the schoolmaster with his choicest treasures, which consisted of his discharge from the United States Army and his correspondence school diploma. Unknown to her mother, Hulda received money from two other men, which she acknowledged in the following manner:
“I received your letter and its contents. I long to see you. I know I shall love you, and I hope to make you a good wife. Good night, sweetheart.”
She had a dream of her landing at New York that was very rosy. She decided to have her three lovers meet her at the dock; she could then pick out the one she liked best, and say “Guten nacht” to the others. She did not know, poor girl, with what she would have to contend on arriving in the “land of the free and home of the brave.” Neither did two of the applicants for her hand. The Vickingstadt knew, however, from past experience, and he said to himself: “I’m goin’ about it in the right way, for many’s the young heifer from the ould dart I’ve helped to get out of the pin on Ellis Island.”
THE CANAL ZONE ARCHITECT’S WEDDING.
(PART II.)
HEN the big liner docked which brought Hulda from the port of Hamburg one might have seen three anxious-looking men standing on the pier. Hulda had been the pet of the ship during the trip. She booked a passage second class, but, because of her good looks and varied accomplishments, she was invited to the saloon to play and sing. There was a halo of romance about her, as she was on her way to New York to become a bride, and it was said that a young scion of a wealthy family or board had fallen desperately in love with her—a circumstance which greatly enhanced her importance in the minds of the other passengers.
Hulda appeared on the dock a few minutes after the big steamer had tied up, with two trunks filled to overflowing with finery and $8 in her pocket-book. Like the majority of the fair sex, Hulda, when questioned by the immigration inspector, fibbed about her age, saying she was but 17, instead of 20. This at once led to complications, for, when two of her lovers lined up to claim her, each was confronted with a grave problem. Neither of them knew how to get a 17-year-old girl past the immigration authorities. The farmer from New Jersey was first to assert his claim to the fair Hulda, but he did not come prepared to have the knot tied; he brought no aged mother or aunt, so his claim was disregarded. He shook his head sadly and said, “Well, here’s where I’m out $284, but perhaps ’tis just as well, for I think she is a little too fine for a farm in Jersey, anyhow.”
The next applicant, a Southern gentleman from Savannah, now stepped forward. He showed many letters he had received from Hulda and displayed an earnestness, too, which would have helped him anywhere in the world except on that pier. It was evident that Hulda admired him greatly, and when he told the interpreter he had property which had been valued for taxes at $60,000 it was with difficulty that the girl could keep herself from running into his arms. But he was obliged to leave without her, and Ellis Island stared her in the face.
It was at this juncture that the “architect of the Canal Zone” came forward to claim her. “I think this young lady belongs to me,” he told the immigration inspector, with a thin little smile. “I have been taking an interest in her for several months, and I’ve her mother’s consent to marry her.” The papers were carefully examined, and the interpreter told Hulda that this was the man who had the proper claim upon her. “According to your mother’s letters,” he said, “he is your guardian, and if you do not marry him he has the right to send you back to Germany.”
“Gott in Himmel! I must go back now?” said poor Hulda, bursting into tears.
“The neighbors would say that the man in New York didn’t like you and turned you down,” said the wily interpreter, “so if I were you I’d stay and marry this nice, clean-looking old man. He has a good position down where the Americans are digging the canal, and I bet you he has plenty of money. Get some of it away from him, and in a few weeks, if you want to, you can get a divorce. Over here in America, if a man and his wife can’t agree, they go to a judge and get a divorce.”
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” said Hulda, her face brightening, “I’ll go up to the big city of New York with him and will then run away.”
“Oh, but you will have to marry him right here in the presence of these men, and I shall have to stay and interpret the ceremony.”
During this conversation the “architect” stood apart, quietly awaiting the verdict. There were many interested spectators, who gazed admiringly upon the graceful girl and wondered what it was all about.
Hulda wept copiously, and, the heart of the Vickingstadt being touched, he made an attempt to console her, saying, “Darling thrish, I’ll make you happy. I’ll give you jewels and laces galore. What makes you take on so?”
“Go away, you old devil,” said Hulda. “If you attempt to kiss me I’ll jump into the water.”
“The Lord be praised and glorified,” ejaculated the Vickingstadt, taken all aback. “Is that the English that was taught you by the blaguard schoolmaster, after me payin’ me good money for you?”
Hulda, red in the face, showed plainly that the fighting blood of the Schneiders was up. The interpreter interposed and said to Hulda, “You must smile and look pleased, or you will be sent back. The minister is waiting, and you will have to look as if you were tickled to death over it.”
Thereupon he took Hulda by the arm and led her to where the “architect” stood with the Lutheran clergyman.
“Shall I have to say to him I love him?” queried Hulda of the interpreter.
“You sure will,” was the rejoinder.
“I can’t,” said Hulda, “it will be a lie; I hate him already,” she added desperately.
In the end, however, they were married, and in accordance with the rites of the Lutheran Church, to which Hulda belonged.
It will have been noticed that she did not like to swear to a lie, which was a point in her favor. It will also be seen that the holy institution of matrimony was being used for fraudulent purposes. If it had been the United States mail that had been used in a like manner Hulda, the “architect,” the interpreter and all concerned would have been found guilty of a misdemeanor, and the immigration authorities would have had to account for compounding a felony. Both of the contracting parties swore to unseeming lies, and the Lord’s anointed was in attendance to see that no word was left out or substituted to make the lies less patent. The bridegroom swore to endow Hulda with all his worldly goods, when, as a matter of fact, he only intended to give her a few dollars now and then. The bride swore, between sobs, that she would love, honor and obey her husband until death should them part, notwithstanding that the uppermost thought in her mind was to run away from him as soon as she should enter the city. Hulda’s feelings can better be imagined than described when the final words were said. She was married according to the laws of the universe and to the satisfaction of the immigration authorities.
It is certain that fate plays strange pranks with some people, for, no sooner than Hulda and the Vickingstadt had been pronounced man and wife, than there appeared on the scene the man from Savannah, accompanied by two prominent New Yorkers and the German Consul.
“Too late,” said a bystander.
“That’s a damn shame,” said a sailor, who had witnessed the whole tragedy.
Hulda was so overwhelmed by the turn of events that when she saw her true beloved return she ran to him, clasped him about the neck and then fainted. The young man naturally looked embarrassed, but he, with others, assisted her to regain consciousness. The bridegroom adopted a martyr-like pose, and when the girl had recovered sufficiently to sit in a chair he addressed the interpreter as follows:
“Tell that crazy gurl that it is a very ondutiful wife she is after makin’ herself. Tell her that from now until the ind of me life she must cut all feelin’s of love from her heart for that man or any other man. Tell her that I have houses in three cities and property in Panama. Tell her that my income is $3,000 gold a year, besides what I make by me lectures. Tell her that I neither drink, smoke nor chew. An’, thin, in the name of Hivin! what more does she want? Tell her I’ll take her to Colon to-morrow, there be a ship sailin’.”
This was related to the bewildered girl, and she was requested to go with her husband.
“Be jabbers, ’tis a policeman that I’ll be after gittin’ to watch her to-night,” he said to himself as he half led, half pulled her to a coach. “If I don’t, ’tis elope she will with that blaguard Southern gintleman. An’, after me spindin’ so much money upon her, an’ ’tis ashamed I’d be to show me face on the Zone if I didn’t take the colleen back with me.”
After much discussion and interpreting, Hulda was prevailed upon to accompany her husband to a hotel. Here people were paid to watch her, while the bridegroom went to dispatch a telegram to the steamship agency, which read: “reserve bridal soute on ship sailing to-morrow for Colon.”
When Hulda was taken on board the next day she had been outwardly appeased by a present from her husband of a diamond ring and $100 in bright gold pieces, but a fire of hatred, fed by a vanquished purpose, smoldered in her breast.
THE CANAL ZONE ARCHITECT’S WEDDING.
(PART III.)
T was a Sunday afternoon when the ship on which this ill-assorted pair took passage reached its dock at Cristobal. “The boys” were out in force to see what “Mickey” Vickins’ bride looked like. There was a murmur of suppressed admiration when she walked down the ladder, and each took a long breath when he saw the “architect” walking behind the fair girl with every appearance of ownership. “The Vickingstadt has put it all over us,” said one man, laughing. “She certainly is a beautiful girl,” exclaimed another. “ ‘Mickey Vickins’ never told the truth before, but he told it this time,” said one of the dry-dock gang, “so I am out $25, for I bet a feller last night that ‘Mickey’ ’ud bring back a kitchen mechanic. The joke is on me, all right.”
And then “the boys,” with one voice, shouted, “What’s the matter with ‘Mickey’ Vickins? He’s all right!”
They gave three hearty cheers for “Mickey” Vickins and his bride, and then something happened. The much-admired Hulda, not understanding what it was all about, and in her haste to get ashore, did not notice where she was going, and ran into the arms of a man from her own country, who, upon looking at her closely, embraced her and tenderly kissed her.
“God be praised and glorified! What am I up against now?” exclaimed the astounded and disgusted Vickingstadt. The man proved to be Hulda’s brother-in-law, who, when her sister had died, left Germany for parts unknown.
“Who is that old man?” he asked fiercely, pointing to the unfortunate “architect.” Hulda talked at some length in her own tongue, wrung her hands, cried and begged her brother-in-law to take her away from her husband.
“Come, darlint,” said the unsuspecting “Mickey” Vickins, “come along. Shure, I’m not understanding what you do be sayin’ to your Dutch friend, but I won’t have the dry-dock gang hear it, or they’ll harrish the life out of me, the blaguards.”
“Go away, you old devil!” said Hulda, in very good English, which was readily understood by the crowd.
“Praises be, ’tis call the polis I’ll be after doin’ if you don’t come with me to our beautiful home that’s all ready for us.”
“You scoundrel, you kidnapped her from her own lover on the dock in New York City,” shouted the brother-in-law.
“I did not,” said the husband.
“You did,” said Hulda.
At this the little man became angry and tried to pull her away from her countryman. In the meantime, the crowd having closed in about the angry trio, shouted, “Go to it, ‘Mickey,’ ” when several policemen interfered.
“ ‘Mickey’ kidnapped her, all right,” said one of his friends, laughing.
“Who’d ever thought it?” said another.
“He’ll have to go to jail for it, poor devil,” smilingly spoke a third.
Meanwhile, the “architect” was busy showing his marriage certificate to a policeman, who, upon examining it, ordered Hulda to go home with her husband, at the same time telling the brother-in-law to go about his business or he would arrest him. Then the Vickingstadt seized the arm of the sulky Hulda and, amid cheers of the crowd, walked off the dock in triumph.
* * *
One Sunday morning about three months after her arrival Hulda ordered her servant to prepare sauerkraut for dinner. “Mickey” Vickins ordered corned beef and cabbage, and threw the sauerkraut out with his own hands. After Hulda had given the order she went for a walk, and came back with an appetite for the good old German dish, to find the Irish substitute awaiting her. She flew into a rage at once, and, unknown to the Vickingstadt, sent for her brother-in-law. When he arrived she poured the whole terrible tale of woe into his willing ear. After the “architect” had finished his nice boiled dinner he tiptoed to his wife’s bedroom and found it deserted. “The Lord be praised,” he said to himself, “where did the colleen go to?”
A small window opened from Hulda’s room on to the back veranda, and he was just in time to witness the condolences of the brother-in-law, along with certain other little tendernesses which made him feel sick at heart. As this is not a novel, I must refrain from summing up his feelings, and shall confine myself to facts. I happened to look through my window just as he tiptoed from his front door, after having looked at his wife conversing with her brother-in-law. He looked as if he wished me to speak, and I bade him a “good morning.”
“I am your neighbor beyant, ma’am,” said he, coming close to the window and speaking in a whisper. “I want for you to come with me an’ see a sight that’ll freeze the blood in your veins, if you’re an honest woman, which I think ye are.”
Without saying a word I opened the door and stepped lightly upon the sidewalk beside him.
“What has happened?” I asked.
“Somethin’ fierce,” he replied. “Shure the blood is curdlin’ in the veins of me; but don’t open your mouth, for I don’t want the blaguards disturbed.”
“Ah! there are thieves in your house,” said I, in a whisper.
“Worse nor that,” said he.
A shiver went through me. “Has some one been murdered?” I queried, halting at the threshold of his door.
“Yis,” he answered in a husky voice, and relapsing completely into the vernacular, “the sowl in me is murthered.”
I walked behind him mechanically. He entered the bedroom on tiptoe, and bade me follow him. It did not occur to me then that I had, rather unconsciously, been lured from my own domicile to the bedroom of a man to whom I had never spoken before. It seemed perfectly proper that I should follow this little old man, just as if it had been a little old white-haired woman. He tiptoed to the little window and pointed to something outside. I fully believed that I was to see something awful, so I closed my eyes, almost involuntarily, it would seem, as I walked to where he stood. When I opened them they looked upon the lovely Hulda and the brother-in-law. Her cheek was close to his cheek; she was looking into his eyes, and both were smiling. I smiled, too, and looked on approvingly, for I had believed for three months that my neighbors were father and daughter.
“Isn’t that purty conduct for a well-brought-up Dutch gurl, an’ the wife of as good a man as ever wore shoe leather?” he asked. His voice sounded hollow and strange. At the word “wife” I turned and fled, for the full significance burst upon me.
“Come back,” he called, “an’ tell me what you think of it.”
I paid no attention to the request, and gained my own apartment very much out of breath, but in a few minutes the little man returned and said that the girl was having a fit. So I followed him again, This time there was no mystery; I knew only too well that there had been a quarrel. When I returned to the bedroom the fair Hulda lay stretched upon the floor in what appeared to be a swoon. There was a black girl bathing her forehead with bayrum, and all about was dire confusion.
“You had no right to tell me to cook that cabbage, and you had no right to throw away that sauerkraut,” said the negro servant, as she helped me to lift her mistress from the floor to the bed.
“Shure, there’s nothing in the world as bad for a woman in her condition as sauerkraut,” answered the little man, meekly.
On hearing the words “sauerkraut” Hulda became quite hysterical and began to kick and to abuse the “architect.”
“What am I to do at all, at all?” said he, as he endeavored to stroke her head, in return for which she pinched and tried to bite him. “God be praised and glorified,” ejaculated the husband. “I thry to plaze the creature, an’ she has everything that I can get for her. Say, Hulda, is it your brother-in-law you want?”
THE CANAL ZONE ARCHITECT’S WEDDING
(PART IV.)
T this point there came an interruption in the person of the doctor who had been called. He was very red in the face, and as he prepared to take Hulda’s temperature he asked of her husband, “What is all this ruction about? How many more times must I witness these scenes? Why don’t you give the girl up? Some day she’ll stick a knife in your back, and then she will be sent to prison for life.”
“Glory be to God!” shouted the “architect”. “Ain’t the woman me wife?”
“You ought to be ashamed to tell it,” said the doctor. “You, with one leg in the grave and the other on the brink. I am going to send her to the hospital now, and you are to leave her there. The girl is too young to be married to an old fellow like you.”
“I’m only 34,” replied the Vickingstadt.
“You’re a cheerful idiot of a liar,” retorted the doctor.
In the end two men came with a stretcher, and Hulda was taken from her husband’s house, never to return to live with him again. The medico followed, banging the door behind him.
“He’s of me own race,” said “Mickey” Vickins, “an’ he do be mad to see how young me wife is, because ‘blood is thicker than water’ an’ he hates to hear the lads laughin’ at me misfortunes. We of the Irish race do be very outspoken with each other, an’ that’s why we get the name of being such fighters; but I observe that we can’t beat the Dutch, bad luck to them. Well, she’s gone, and ’tis a rest I’ll be after havin’ now,” said he, “for the floor is that hard that me bones ache.”
He had peace in his home after this, but he received letters from Culebra telling him he must support his wife. One day Hulda returned and rifled his boxes in the hope of procuring the deeds to his property, but, instead, she found his citizenship papers, correspondence school diploma and an honorable discharge from the United States Army. These she tore into shreds and left them where her husband could readily find them. She had taken up her residence at the home of her brother-in-law in Colon, and many evil tongues were wagging. The “boys” teased the Vickingstadt, and he was terribly crushed as a result, for he disliked to hear Hulda criticised. “God forgive her,” he would say, “I tried to be an ideal man. I was lovin’, an’ she said I was too lovin’. I never tasted a drop of liquor, an’ she said that wasn’t natural. I never smoked or chewed tobacco, an’ she said she’d rather have me do both, because smokin’ and chewin’ was good for the breath. Now, what do you think of that? ’Tis a hard thing to understand the ladies, bad cess to them. I never could understand them.”
I had been given an opportunity to review this international marriage exhaustively, and I decided that neither Hulda nor the “architect” were to blame. It was poverty that forced the girl to seek a husband in a foreign land, and it was an undeveloped sense of the artistic and romantical that lured the Vickingstadt from his proper sphere. Circumstances helped, as you will have perceived. Hulda’s one aim now was to have her husband dismissed from the service, so she wrote letters to Culebra accusing him of having starved her. He sent canceled checks to prove that he gave her more money than the average man gives his wife, and it became necessary for an inspector to investigate the affair for the good of every one. The latter was wise in his day and generation, and he reported to Culebra that Mrs. Brian McVickins did not love her husband. Two clerks had been kept busy attending to the contradictory reports of the pair, and, in order to lighten expenses for the Canal Commission, Brian McVickins was requested to resign.
About this time he came to me and informed me that he was the father of a little girl. “But, shure, ’tis pots and pans they threw at me whin I wint to see the little creature. May the Lord forgive them. The doctor tells me that she’s the dead spit of me, an’ ’tis take her away I would, only poor Hulda won’t have anything else to love after I’m gone.”
He spoke with that assurance with which married men are apt to speak when referring to their wives, and he appeared to think that I thought him much beloved by Hulda. He hated to acknowledge defeat in the game of love, because he possessed the vanity common to his sex. I made no comment, and he rambled on: “The law doesn’t expect me to do anything for her at all, at all, but I’ll always be after sindin’ a little money for the poor child, an’ ’tis glad I am that she looks like me, instead of like the Dutch, bad luck to them. It’s the Lord that will bless you for the kind words you said about the matter, and ’tis never a word you said against the poor, misguided gurl. The poor gurl ain’t been to blame at all, at all; ’twas the vanity of me in middle age wantin’ a young colleen with golden hair and a slim figure for a wife. May the Lord forgive me.”
With that, he thanked me for the counsel I had given him, which, as a matter of fact, he had never taken, and, after wringing my hand until it hurt, went his way with bowed head. Six months before, he was a dapper little man, with a quick, light step, and he did not look a day older than fifty, but now his eyes were sunken, his cheeks were wrinkled, and he had the general air of a man who was terribly tired. I have not heard from him since.
Soon after this, Hulda departed for the United States. Unaccompanied and carrying her baby and a suitcase, she walked up the steamer’s ladder with tired tread and an air that suggested trouble. Friends of her husband who stood upon the pier shook their heads and said sadly, “ ‘Tis a goldurned shame, for she shure was a good-looker when “Mickey” brought her down.”
Her eyes were now red and tired-looking, her cheeks were hollow and her mouth had the expression of bitterness that comes from disappointment. One might easily picture her looking for a cheap room and having the rooming-house women conjecture that she had never been married. She would look for work, too, and, notwithstanding her accomplishments, she would probably find it in some one’s kitchen. In her shabby maternity dress of cheap gingham she was a sorry contrast to the gay passengers who ran hither and thither, frantically waving farewells to their friends on the dock. She alone sat apart and hugged her child to her breast. “A tragic figure,” observed a man with a pitying smile. As the ship pulled out, a kindly sunbeam fell upon her, and for a moment lighted up the golden tints in her still beautiful hair.
GRAFT.
FEW years ago, on one of the dingy streets of Panama, I occupied a room furnished with a canvas cot, a chair, a very shaky little table for the kerosene lamp, and a dry goods box, which I used for a desk. One day a young widowed friend, who was employed by the Canal Commission, called upon me and invited me to visit her. She lived in a beautiful house, with other female employees, some distance from the city. “I have a large room,” she said, “and if you can succeed in keeping the ‘gumshoe’ men from knowing that you are there, you will be able to save a great deal of money by it. Think of it! Fifty dollars in two months! You will be able to get that picture hat which you wanted so badly, and we shall be glad to have you with us.”
After giving the matter some serious thought I decided to accept the invitation of my kind-hearted friend, the young widow. The inmates of the house consisted of five young girls, my friend, the young widow; a still younger widow, and a widow by courtesy. I was assigned to a small bed in a corner of the widow’s room, and warned by all to ’ware the “gumshoes.” The local sleuth was described to me circumstantially, and I was enjoined to explain my presence—should such a person come prowling around—by pretending that I was a seamstress.
Except for the fear of the above-mentioned gentleman, my life at this time was very peaceful. The atmosphere of the house was almost heavenly, the ladies appearing to live in the utmost amity—until the arrival of the man—not the “gumshoe,” but one from Rockland, Maine, named Luther M. Pettingill, called “Pet” for short. He came to court the fairest of the younger girls, Adelaide, who could cook fish-cakes a la Bangor, and other Down East delicacies in a way calculated to touch the toughest Yankee heart. Though “Pet” was not handsome, Adelaide grew to be very fond of him, and in time she announced that they were engaged. This announcement took, the household rather by surprise, naturally, and one night while the lovers were out riding the matter was discussed at length in the widow’s room. It then first became apparent to me that “Pet’s” visits—who came morning, noon and night—were not greatly relished by the other girls. It appeared that he came around early, not only to eat breakfast, but to help prepare it. Before his advent, Sunday morning was a time of delightful relaxation, when the ladies would sit around in their kimonos and “just talk.” Every one helped in the preparation of the breakfast and indulged in pleasantries while they worked, which greatly lightened the labor. Now, all this was changed. The table in the dining-room (fixed up with the widow’s things) would be spread for Adelaide and her lover, and they sat long over the fish-cakes and beans, while we waited on the veranda like “hired help.” They would talk at great length of the folks “down our way”; of “Pet’s” Uncle Henry; of old Cap’n Eli; of the “Grange,” and many other thrilling topics, to say nothing of Aunt Patience, who, it seemed, had taken Mr. Pettingill when he was a cute little darling and had raised him to man’s estate. It appeared as though the lovers were absolutely unconscious of the fact that eight half-starved females were waiting to break their fast.
I tried my best to smooth things over; for, on account of my own peculiar position in the household, I had a fellow-feeling for “Pet.” Some of the younger girls proposed going to the Quartermaster and demanding that Mr. P. be requested, through his chief, to discontinue his visits to the house. But the others did not approve of this course, because there were other beaux who came and went at reasonable hours, and who might cease their visits altogether on account of the utter tactlessness of Mr. Pettingill. So, it was decided to suffer in silence. This pleased me immensely, as my graft from the taxpayers of the U. S. A. would most likely end if an investigation was made into the affairs of that household. Then, too, there were casual escorts to Saturday-night dances, who also might be affected if an inquiry was called for.
Meanwhile Adelaide continued to produce her culinary masterpieces, with the able assistance of “Pet,” who waxed fatter and merrier, happily unconscious of the storm that was brewing. Adelaide had now engaged the services of a young female from Jamaica who, in appropriate livery, held sway in the kitchen, almost to the exclusion of all others. Gwendoline (for that was her name) waited upon the lovers in the most approved fashion, while we—when we were given the chance—waited upon ourselves in a way that was truly Bohemian. In procession, we conveyed the various dishes to the table, and between courses we laid the plates on the crex-covered floor. Gradually my fear of detection wore away, as the time approached when I was to realize my dream of a picture hat.
On the last Monday of my stay with the young ladies my hat was brought home. This day also marked a radical change in the affairs of the household, “graft,” and in Mr. Pettingill, who was obliged to seek a new course of diet among his less favored bachelor acquaintances. On this morning the girls went about their business as usual. “Pet” had breakfasted, as was his wont, and had departed whistling, as his digestion was good and his heart light in consequence. I spent some time “trying on” the hat, and, naturally, failed to observe the doings of Gwendoline, until at almost eleven o’clock I noticed that the clothes-lines were filled to overflowing with snow-white garments. I noted some dainty lingerie dresses, but I was too busy with my own thoughts to take particular interest in a mere clothes-line. Soon, however, I was startled by my friend, the young widow, who burst into the room like a cyclone. She threw herself upon the couch and burst into tears.
“What is the matter?” I asked in bewilderment.
“Why, we’re the laughing stock of the whole town,” she replied. “Those men over there in the bachelor quarters are laughing to kill themselves, and making all kinds of jokes at our expense. Adelaide is an awful girl to bring this ridicule upon us.”
Just then the young widow and two of the girls burst in. “Isn’t that a disgraceful exhibition?” questioned one of them. “Why, one of those awful men asked me who owned them, and then all the others laughed. I’m ashamed to pass by them on the way to the office this afternoon.”
Having now a hint at the cause of the tempest, I took a good look through the window at the clothes-line—and, lo! there burst upon my view an array of faded khaki trousers, gingham shirts and balbriggan undergarments—all in an advanced state of patches—merrily dancing to the light tropical zephyrs which filled them and caused them to act in quite a human manner.
“Did you ever see anything so disgusting?” asked the young widow. Of course, I tried to make light, and suggested to the ladies a picture of Aunt Patience patiently patching the offensive garments, but they shook their heads in disgust and chided me for my levity. Adelaide was called in and requested to take the horrid things from the line. She listened to what the ladies had to say, and then, without replying, turned to leave the room.
“If the clothing was not so terribly patched it would not seem so vulgar,” said one of the girls.
“I cannot imagine anyone of refinement caring for a man who could wear such rags,” said the younger widow. “My husband never wore anything but silk.”
Adelaide heard the comments in silence and quietly left the room.
“I am going to complain about this,” said the young widow.
“You had better use the telephone,” said some one. “You can say more that way.”
She dashed down to the telephone and the following dialogue took place, afterward repeated to me by a friend:
Widow—“Hello! Is this the Quartermaster?”
Q. M.—“Yes. What can I do for you?”
Widow—“Please send a man over to take the clothes in.”
Q. M. (stuttering)—“Wha-at?—what’s the matter with the clothes?”
Widow?—“Just take a look at the line—LOOK at it.”
Q. M. (after a pause)—“I don’t see anything wrong with it—it looks good to me.”
Widow—“Heavens! But look at those awful clothes on the line, will you?”
Q. M.—“There DOES seem to be a discordant note in that line, but I can do nothing for you. If I were seen monkeying around that finery I might be deported.”
Widow—“Well, you needn’t make fun of me.”
Q. M.—“I would like to oblige you, but I cannot meddle with such matters.”
Widow—“Well, perhaps you can tell me this: Have such clothes any right on our line?”
Q. M.—“Certainly not. They look terribly out of place, as the house is a home for young lady employees and charming widows like yourself.”
Now, this was more than the widow could stand, and, hanging up the receiver, she rushed back to us with many complaints of the Q. M.’s discourtesy.
“We’ll take it up with Culebra,” chorused the girls, whereupon I proceeded to pack my suitcase, thinking the time propitious for my departure. But, too late. The news of the flutter in the dovecote had already reached the ears of a certain vigilant person, whose business it was to report on and to adjust all matters of such weighty importance. This gentleman now appeared before us and gravely proceeded to question each one in turn. His manner was solemn and ponderous, as to almost make us fancy ourselves on the witness stand in a murder trial. Adelaide, the offending one, was questioned last, and, strange to say, culprit though she was, bore the inquisition with less embarrassment than any of the others, fortified, perhaps, by the knowledge of the steadfast affection of the husky Mr. Pettingill. At any rate, she came through the ordeal with much credit to herself, without adding any laurels to the brow of her inquisitor.
“Pending the verdict of Culebra,” he said pompously, as he finished his notes, “I would suggest that the gentleman cease his visits for a while.” He also suggested that the clothes be removed from the line. This was done immediately by Gwendoline, amidst the jeers of the bachelors next door. After these directions were given he stalked out with measured, judicial tread, and a sigh of relief went up as the door closed behind him.
At six o’clock that night I came away with a deep feeling of regret. As I was riding to the station I observed the disconsolate form of “Pet” seated upon the steps of his quarters, with his face buried in his hands, the setting sun forming a lustrous halo about his bowed head, while faintly on the evening air was wafted o’er him, unnoticed, the distant rattle of the knives and plates of the I. C. C. Hotel.
THE STORY OF VERE DE VERE.
E know not in our poor philosophy what hidden chords are touched by unseen hands.
More than a hundred years ago there lived in the Sunny South a handsome cavalier, who was noted for his riches, daring and cruelty. It is recorded that, whenever a man opposed him, he coolly ran him through with his broadsword; and whenever a female repulsed him he disgraced her, if he had an opportunity, or else some one who was near and dear to her.
The greatest artist of his time painted his portrait, and it hangs to-day in one of the public institutions of his native State. Tradition has it that he once killed a gypsy lad who happened to win the love of a young gypsy girl with whom he imagined himself to be in love, and that a gypsy woman cursed him for the deed and wrote his horoscope with the blood of the murdered youth as follows: “That his line would cease with one girl, who would live long enough to disgrace his name; that many years of her life would be spent in a vile prison among negroes in a foreign land for a crime like the one he had then committed.”
This view behind the curtain seems to have had a strong effect upon the cruel cavalier, for he decided to marry and settle down like the people around him. His wife was a woman of gentle character, and her influence wrought a great change in the morals of her husband, for it was said that he became quite religious, and, when a little girl was born to him, with many tears and prayers he dedicated the child to God.
Meantime the years rolled on. The cavalier died, and, as daughter after daughter was born of his line, his name became extinct. Then, too, poverty, the great leveler, had come upon the family. His portrait, his signature to a famous document, and the tale of the gypsy’s curse were all that remained of the cavalier. Those who watched for the fulfillment of the curse died and were forgotten; and at last a daughter was born, fifth in line from him. Her mother departed this world at her birth; her father, some months later, and it devolved upon the neighbors to care for the orphaned child. As she grew to womanhood people remarked that she bore a strong resemblance to the portrait of her great-grandfather on her mother’s side, and by a special act of the Legislature she was given his name.
At 17, being pretty, gracious, sensible and womanly, with a genius for music, a great future was predicted for her; but, in the parlance of the day, “she went wrong.” Her betrayer was the son of one of the most opulent families in the State, and, at his mother’s request, the girl was sent to a distant Southern city. Here, after a few months, necessity compelled her to take up a residence in the underworld, and the friends of her childhood thenceforth knew her no more. She had been the ward of every one at home, and was, therefore, the ward of no one; and her disappearance was only a nine days’ wonder.
In spite of her degraded calling, men admired her, and, because of a certain haughtiness in her bearing toward them, she was called “Vere de Vere,” and it was known that she was sought with honest intention by men who declared that they loved her for her womanliness and the music of her laugh. The creatures of the world stood in awe of her, because of her dignity, and they feared her because of her violent temper. So, she lived her scarlet life, apparently without regret, until one day an old man from her native State happened in and amused his listeners by telling weird stories which, he said, had been told him by his grandmother. He related the story of Vere de Vere’s ancestor, without knowing that one of his listeners was the only person upon whom the curse might fall. Nor did he know that when Vere de Vere fainted he had touched a chord of sensibility rarely found in the nature of women of her sort.
On the morning of the following day Vere de Vere told her associates that she desired to go to work and earn an honest living. “This is not the right life for me,” said she to her incredulous auditors. “I was born to a higher life. I shall be good; I shall marry, and I shall have children,” with which announcement she left them, to begin life anew.
How fresh and beautiful the morning seemed to her as she hurried toward a park! What do you know of fresh, green, delightful mornings? she said to herself as she sat down and took a deep breath. A bird twittering in a branch above her head, and a pair of squirrels playing in the grass beside her, made her smile and forget. A man in passing leered at her and attempted to speak, but she checked him abruptly with the information that he had made a mistake. “I shall wear black for a time,” she thought. Then she began to wonder what she could do. She could sew beautifully. A light came into her eyes at the thought of the creations that she had designed for her underworld revels. She could embroider, paint china and play the violin.
She bought a newspaper and looked through the list of advertisements. The following attracted her attention: