McAllister and His Double

The sun sank; the chimneys deadened against the sky-line. When Wilkins, ten minutes later, stole in to see if his master needed his assistance, he found McAllister staring into the darkening west.

II

The bell on St. Timothy's tolled twelve o'clock as McAllister's hansom, straight from the Alhambra, clacked into the moonlit silence of Marlborough Square. A soft breath of distant gardens hung on the cool air. The chimneys rose from the house-tops sharp against a pale blue sky glittering with stars. Here and there a yellow window gleamed for a moment under the eaves, then vanished mysteriously. It was a night for lovers,—calm, still, ecstatic,—for hayfields under the harvest moon,—for white, ghostly reaches of the Thames,—for poetry,—for the exquisite enjoyment of earth's nearest approach to heaven.

The trap above McAllister's head opened.

"Beg pardon, sir. W'ere did you s'y, sir?"

"I said Pondel's," replied McAllister, rather sharply. He knew the cabby must think him a lunatic, but he didn't care. He intended to do the decent thing. Hang it! The fellow could mind his own business.

The hansom crossed the street and reined up in the shadow. All was dark, silent, deserted. Only the brass plate beside the door reflected strangely the moonlight across the way.

"'Ere's Pondel's, sir." The cabby got down and crossed the sidewalk to the door.

"All shut hup!" he commented. "Close at six."

A dark figure emerged quickly from, a neighboring shadow.

"'Ere! Wot is it you want?" demanded the bobby, accosting the cabman with tentative and potential roughness.

"Gent wants Pondel's. I dunno w'y. Ax 'im yerself!" responded cabby in an injured tone.

The bobby turned to the hansom.

"This shop's closed at six o'clock," he announced. "Wot do you want?"

McAllister felt ten thousand times a fool. The beauty of the night, the odoriferous quiet, the peace of the deserted square, all made his errand seem monstrously idiotic. The universe was wheeling silently across the housetops; respectable men and women were in their beds; only night-hawks, lovers, policemen were abroad. It was as if a worm were raising objection to some cardinal law. Why should he try to upset the order and regularity of the London night, clattering into this slumbering section, startling a respectable somnolent policeman, making an ass of himself before his cabby—because somewhere a fellow was working overtime on his trousers. He imagined that as soon as he had made his explanation the bobby and the driver would collapse with merriment, and hale him to a mad-house. But McAllister set his teeth. He was fighting for a principle. He wouldn't "welch" now. He clambered out of the hansom.

"I want to find Pondel, because he's got some fellows working on my clothes, and I don't propose to have anybody working for me on Sunday. Understand? It's Sunday. I don't intend to have folks working on my clothes when they ought to be in bed."

He spoke brokenly, defiantly, catching his breath between words, almost ready to cry; then waited for his auditors to fall upon each other's necks in derisive mirth. He forgot, however, that he was in London. The situation was one apposite to American humor, but evoked no sense of amusement in the policeman. He treated McAllister's explanation with vast respect. Our hero gained confidence. The bobby regretted that the place seemed closed; ventured to express his approval of the clubman's altruistic effort; dilated upon it to the cabby, who was correspondingly impressed. McAllister, immensely cheered, held forth on the wrongs of labor at some length, and, finding a sympathetic audience, produced cigars. The three proved, as it were, a little group of humanitarians united in a common purpose. Then, suddenly, inconsequently, inexcusably, a man coughed. The sound was muffled, but unmistakable. It came from a point directly beneath their feet. The bobby rapped sharply on the pavement several times.

"Hi there, you!" he called. "Hi there, you in Pondel's. Come an' open hup!"

They could hear a dull murmur of conversation, the cough was repeated, a bench dragged across a floor, some fastening was slowly loosed, and a yellow gleam of light shot up through the shadow as a scuttle opened in the sidewalk. A lean, scrawny figure thrust itself upward, sleepily rubbing its eyes, collarless, its shirt open at the breast, its hair tousled, coughing. McAllister, now confident that he had the support of his companions, addressed the ghost, in whom he recognized Pedler, the journeyman from behind the curtains. The clubman's face, however, was concealed in shadow from the other.

"You're working for Pondel, aren't you?"

The ghost coughed again, and shivered, although the air was warm.

"Yes," it answered huskily.

"Are you working on some clothes for a gentleman who's sailing on Monday?"

"Yes," it repeated.

"Then don't, any more," chirped McAllister encouragingly. "Those clothes are for me, and I don't want you to work any longer. You ought to be in bed."

"Wotcher givin' us?" grumbled Pedler. "G'wan! Leave us alone!" He started to descend. But the bobby stepped forward.

"Look 'ere," he said roughly. "Don't you understand? It's just as the gentleman s'ys. You don't 'ave to work any more to-night. You can go 'ome."

"I s'y, wotcher givin' us?" repeated the other. "I cawn't go 'ome. Mr. Pondel's horders is to st'y 'ere until the clothes is finished. M'ybe it's as you s'y, but I cawn't go 'ome."

At this juncture a child began to cry drowsily below, and a woman's voice could be heard striving to comfort it.

"You don't mean you've got a baby down there!" exclaimed McAllister.

"Only little Annie," replied Pedler. "An' the old woman."

"Anyone else?"

"Aggam."

"Let's go down," suggested the bobby. "I can make 'em understand." The ghost descended, dazed, and McAllister, the bobby, and last of all, the cabman, followed down a creaking ladder into a sort of vault under the cellar. A small oil wick gave out a feeble fluctuating light. On one side, cross-legged, sat a shrivelled-up, little old man, his brown beard streaked with gray, stitching. He did not look up, but only worked the faster. A thin woman crouched on a broken chair, holding a little girl in her lap.

"There, there, Annie, don't cry. The bobby's not arter you. It's all right, darlin'!"

Strewn about the cement floor lay the bolts of Lancaster which McAllister had selected, together with patterns, scissors, and unfinished garments.

"Excuse the child, sir," apologized the woman. "She's just a bit sleepy."

"Well," said McAllister, his indignation rising at the scene, and shame burning in his cheeks, "go right home. I won't have you working on these clothes any more." How he wished Pondel was there to get a piece of his mind!

Jim looked wearily at Aggam.

"Wot d'ye s'y, Aggam?"

The other kept on stitching.

"I gets my horders from Pondel," he replied, shortly, "an' I don't tyke no horders from no one helse!"

"But look here," cried McAllister, "the clothes are mine, ain't they? Pondel hasn't anything to do with it! And I tell you to go home."

"Yes," grunted Aggam. "An' then you loses your job, does yer? I don't want no toff mixin' into my affairs. I minds my business, they can mind theirs!"

"I s'y, that's no w'y to speak to the gentleman!" exclaimed the bobby in disgust. "'E's only tryin' to do yer a fyvor! 'Aven't yer got no manners?"

"I minds my business, let 'im mind 'is'n!" repeated Aggam stolidly.

"Well, I must s'y," ejaculated the cabby, "they're a bloomin' grateful lot!"

The tall man seemed to resent this last from one of his own station.

"I appreciates wot the gent wants," he said weakly, "but it's just like Aggam s'ys. Wot can we do? The gent cawn't tell us to go 'ome!"

The child began to cry again. McAllister was exasperated almost to the point of profanity.

"Don't you want to go home?" he exclaimed.

The woman laughed a hollow, mirthless laugh.

"Annie an' me 'ave st'y'd 'ere all the evenin' just to be with Jim. 'E's awful sick. An' 'e'll 'ave to st'y 'ere all d'y to-morrer. Do we want to go 'ome!"

Her husband dashed his shirt-sleeve across his eyes.

"Don't Nell," he muttered. "I ain't sick. I can work. You go 'ome with the kid."

McAllister thrust a handful of bank-notes toward her.

"Where does old Pondel live?" he inquired of the bobby.

"Out in Kew somewheres," replied the officer.

The woman was staring blankly at the money. Suddenly she dropped the little girl and began to sob. Jim broke into a fit of harsh coughing. The cabman climbed up the ladder. The temperature of the vault seemed insufferable to McAllister.

"I suppose you'll go home if Pondel says so?" he suggested.

"Just watch us!" growled Aggam.

"Take that child home, anyhow, and put it to bed," ordered the clubman. "I'll be back in an hour or so."

As he climbed up through the scuttle into the sweet, soft moonlight, and started to enter the hansom, the bobby held out his hand.

"Excuse me, sir. I 'ope you'll pardon the liberty, but, would you mind, I've got a brother in America—Smith's the naime—'e lives in a plaice called Manitoba. Do you 'appen to know 'im?"

"I'm sorry," replied our friend, grasping the other's hand. "I never ran across him."

"Where to now?" asked the cabby.

"To Kew," replied McAllister.

They swung out of the square, leaving the bobby standing in the shadow of Pondel's.

"I'll look out for 'em while you're gone," called the latter encouragingly.

They crossed Bond Street, followed Grosvenor Street into Park Lane, and plunging round Hyde Park corner, past the statue to England's greatest soldier, they entered Kingsbridge. McAllister, all awake from his recent experience, saw things that he had never observed before—bedraggled flower-girls in gaudy hats, with heart-rending faces; drunken laborers staggering along upon the arms of sad-featured women; young girls, slender, painted, strolling with an affectation of light-heartedness along the glittering sidewalks. On they jogged, past narrow streets where, amid the flare of torches, the entire population of the neighborhood swarmed, bargained, swore, and quarrelled; where little children rolled under the costers' carts, fighting for scraps and decaying vegetables; and where their passage was obstructed by the throngs of miserable humanity for whom this was their only park, their only club. It being Saturday night, the butchers were selling off their remnants of meat, and their shrill cries could be heard for blocks. Several times the horse shied to avoid trampling upon some old hag who, clutching her wretched purchase to her breast, hurried homeward before a drunken lout should snatch it from her. McAllister had never imagined the like. It was with a sigh of relief that they left the Hammersmith Road behind and at last reached the residential districts. In about an hour they found themselves in Kew. A cool breeze from the country fanned his cheek. On either hand trim little villas, with smooth lawns, lined the road, and the moonlit air was fragrant with the smell of damp grass, violets, and heliotrope. Here and there could be heard the tinkle of a cottage piano, and the laughter of belated merry-makers on the verandas.

They located Mr. Pondel's villa without difficulty. Standing back some thirty yards from the street, its well-kept garden full of flowering shrubs and carefully tended beds of geraniums, it was a residence typical of the London suburb, with fretwork along the piazza roof, a stone dog guarding each side of the steps, and salmon-pink curtains at the parlor windows. The door stood open, a Japanese lamp burned in the hallway, and the murmur of voices floated out from the door leading into the parlor. McAllister once again felt the overwhelming absurdity of his position. Over his shoulder, as he stood by the hyacinths at the door, floated the same big moon in the same soft heaven. Damp and fragrant, the wind blew in from the lawn and swayed the portières in the narrow hall, behind which, doubtless, sat the lordly Pondel, friend of noblemen, adviser of royalty, entrenched in his castle, a unit in an impregnable system. The whinny of the cab-horse beyond the hedge recalled to McAllister the necessity for action. He realized that he was losing moral ground every instant.

The bell jangled harshly somewhere in the back of the house. A man's voice—Pondel's—muttered indistinctly; there was a feminine whisper in response; someone placed a glass on a table and pushed back a chair. A clock in the neighborhood struck two, and Pondel emerged through the portières—Pondel in a wadded claret-colored dressing-gown embroidered with birds of Paradise, in carpet slippers, with a meerschaum pipe, watery eyes, and slightly disarranged hair. It was rather dim in the hallway, and he did not recognize his visitor.

"What is it? What do you want?" The inquiry was abrupt and a little thick.

"Good evening, Mr. Pondel," stammered McAllister. "I hope you'll excuse me for disturbing you at this hour. It's about the clothes."

"W'o is it?" Pondel peered into his guest's flushed face. "W'y Mr. McAllister, what are you doin' way out 'ere? Excuse my appearance—a little pardonable neglishay of a Saturday evenin'. Come right in, won't you? Great honor, I'm sure. Though, if you'll believe it, I once 'ad the honor of a call from his Grace the Duke of Bashton right in this very 'all. Excuse me w'ile I announce your presence to Mrs. Pondel."

McAllister said something about having to go at once, but Pondel shuffled through the curtains, almost immediately sweeping them back with a lordly gesture of welcome.

"This way, Mr. McAllister." Our miserable friend entered the parlor. "Elizabeth, hallow me to present Mr. McAllister—one of my oldest customers."

Elizabeth—a fat vision of fifty-five, with peroxide hair, and a soft pink of unchanging hue mantling her elsewhere mottled cheeks—arose graciously from the table where she and her husband had been playing double-dummy bridge, and courtesied.

"Chawmed, I'm sure. What a beautiful evenin'! Won't you si' down?" murmured the enchantress.

McAllister took a chair, and Pondel pressed whiskey and water upon him. Oh, Mr. McAllister, needn't be afraid of it; it was the real old thing; Lord Langollen had sent him a dozen. Lizzie would take a nip with 'em—eh, Lizzie? A gen'elman didn't take that long trip every evenin', and a little refreshment would not only do him good, but, as the Yankees said, would show there was no 'ard feelin', eh? He must really take just a drop. Say when!

Lizzie poured out a glass for the much-embarrassed guest. She was in a flowered kimona, even more "neglishay" than her husband, but the bower in which the goddess reclined was a perfect pearl of the decorator's art. Cupids, also "neglishay," toyed with one another around a cluster of electric burners in the ceiling, gay streamers of painted blossoms dangling from their hands and floating down the walls. Gilt chairs, a white and gilt sofa, and a brown etching in a Florentine frame on each wall, were the most conspicuous articles of furniture. At the windows the brilliant salmon-pink curtains bellied softly in the breeze that stole into the chamber and diluted the gentle odor of Parma violets which exuded from the dame in the kimona. To Pondel, McAllister's presence was an evidence of his power; and his pride, tickled mightily, put him in an exquisite good humor. Certainly the occasion required from him, the host, a proper felicitation.

"'Ere's to our better acquaintance," said the tailor, raising his glass sententiously. "Lizzie, drink to Mr. McAllister!"

The three drank solemnly. Then the voluble tailor addressed himself to the task of entertaining his distinguished guest. McAllister could catch at no opening to explain his visit. Pondel chatted gayly of Paris, the Continent, and familiarly of the races and the beau monde. Apparently he knew (by their first names) half the nobility of England, and he endeavored to place his customer equally at his ease with them. He ventured that he knew how most young Americans spent their time in London and Paris; dropped with a wink, that in spite of his present uxoriousness he had been a bit of a dog himself, and ended by suggesting another toast to "A short life and a merry one." The lady of the kimona, grammatically not so strong as her husband, contented herself with expansive smiles and frequent recurrence to the tumbler.

"I must explain my visit," finally broke in McAllister. "It's about the clothes."

Pondel smiled condescendingly.

"My dear Mr. McAllister, you don't need to worry in the slightest. They'll be done promptly to-morrow evenin', take my word for it."

McAllister flushed. How in Heaven's name could he ever make the tailor understand?

"I've decided I don't want 'em!" he stammered.

Pondel's glass went to the table with a bang, and he gazed blankly at his customer. The clubman, not realizing the implication, did not proceed.

"That's all right," finally responded Pondel a trifle coldly. "There's no hurry about settlement. You can take a year, if necessary."

Mrs. Pondel slipped unobtrusively out of the room, leaving a trail of perfume behind her.

"Oh!" exclaimed our friend, catching his breath: "It isn't that. But you see I can't have those men working over night and to-morrow on my account. It's—it's against my principles."

Pondel brightened. A load had been taken from his heart. So long as McAllister's bank account was good, any idiosyncrasy the American might exhibit did not matter. He had always regarded McAllister, however, as a man of the world, and had esteemed him accordingly. He perceived that he had been mistaken. His customer was merely a religious crank. He had had experience with them before.

"Pooh! That's all right," said he resuming his former cordiality. "Why, they like to earn the extra money. They're all devoted to my interests, you know."

"Well, I don't want them to work any longer on my clothes," repeated McAllister helplessly.

"I understand," replied Mr. Pondel, rather loftily. "I'm afraid, however, it's too late to stop them now. The cloth 'as been cut, and they would not stop contrary to my direction."

"That's the point," returned McAllister, "I want you to change your orders."

"But, my dear sir," expostulated the tailor, "you can't expect me to go to London this time of night! Besides, they're nearly done by this time. It's impossible!"

"I'll manage that," exclaimed McAllister. "I've been down to the shop already, and they're waiting for me now to come back with your permission to go home; they wouldn't go without it."

"Dear, dear!" replied the tailor, changing his tactics. "How much interest you have taken in their welfare! How kind and thoughtful of you! No, they're faithful men; they wouldn't think of disobeying orders. But what a shame I didn't know of it before! Why, they might 'ave been at 'ome and in their beds. However, I sha'n't forget 'em at the end of the month. Mr. McAllister, I respect you. I have never known of a more unselfish act. Permit me to say it, sir, you are a Christian—a true Christian. I wish there were more like you, sir!"

McAllister arose to his feet. His one thought now was to escape as quickly as possible. The sight of Pondel's smiling countenance filled him with unutterable disgust. Suppose the fellows at the club could see him sitting in this pursy tailor's parlor, with his scented wife, and gilded chairs—

The tailor, however, was anxious to restore the cordiality of their relations, and slopped over in his eagerness to show how kind he was to his men, and how considerate of their well-being. He took McAllister's arm familiarly as he showed him to the door.

"Yes," he added confidentially, "this is a very good locality. Only the best people live in this neighborhood. Rather a neat little property." He proffered McAllister a cigar. The clubman wanted to kick him for a miserable, dirty cad.

"Right back!" he said to the cabby, hardly replying to the tailor's good-night.

London was asleep. Even the streets through which he had driven to Kew were hushed in preparation for the sodden Sunday to come. The moon had lowered over the housetops, and St. Timothy's was in the shadow as once again he drew up in front of Pondel's.

"Back already, sir?" The bobby stepped out to meet him.

"Yes," replied McAllister wearily. "And those fellows down there are going home."

The bobby rapped on the scuttle. Once more Pedler's head protruded above the sidewalk.

"Mr. Pondel says you're to go home," said McAllister.

"The gent's been all the way to Kew for you," interjected the bobby.

"Hi, Aggam!" exclaimed Jim, huskily. "Th' gentleman says we are to go 'ome, Mr. Pondel says." He disappeared. Aggam could be heard muttering below. Presently the light was extinguished, and both emerged from the scuttle and put on their coats. McAllister felt sleepily exultant. Pedler pushed the scuttle into place.

"Well," said McAllister after an awkward pause, "can I give you a lift? Which way do you go? I tell you what: you come back with me to the hotel, and then the hansom can take you both home."

Pedler and Aggam looked doubtfully at one another.

"Oh, come on, you fellows!" exclaimed McAllister, all his natural good spirits returning with a rush. "Get in there, now!"

Pedler and Aggam climbed in, and McAllister directed the driver to go to the Metropole, after stuffing a sovereign into the hand of his friend, the policeman. The stars were still marching across the sky, and the breeze had freshened. Every window was dark; no one was astir. They heard only the echoes of their horse's hoof-beats. Yet the restless silence that precedes the dawn was in the air.

"I lives miles aw'y from 'ere," said Pedler after a meditated period.

"So do I," supplemented Aggam.

"I don't care," replied McAllister. "I've had this cab all night, anyhow, and I want to celebrate. You see, this is the first time I ever got ahead of my tailor."

Another long pause ensued. They were not a talkative lot, surely. McAllister's flow of language absolutely deserted him. He could think of no subject of conversation whatever. Pedler finally came to his assistance.

"I'm thirty-seven year old, an' this is the fust time I've ever ridden in a 'ansom."

"Jiminy!" exclaimed McAllister. "You don't say so! What luck!"

"Fust time for me, too," added Aggam.

After this burst of confidence the three rode in utter silence. At the Metropole the clubman jumped out and bade his companions good-night.

As the cabby gathered up the reins preparatory to a fresh start, Aggam leaned forward rather apologetically.

"You must hexcuse me," he remarked, "but I don't want to sail hunder false colors, and I feel as if I hort to s'y that while I'm a Socialist, I 'ave no particular sympathy with Sabbatarianism."

"Well, neither have I," replied McAllister encouragingly, an answer which probably puzzled Mr. Aggam for a fortnight.

McAllister's Marriage

"How's that? Ye-es, I believe I am. At least the train passes through," responded McAllister doubtfully, apprehensive of undesirable complications.

The old fellow produced from his waistcoat-pocket a ticket which he placed in the child's hand. Then he turned her around and gave her a little push up the steps.

"Wall, jest keep an eye on Abby, will ye?"

"Good-by, Uncle!" cried the little girl, climbing laboriously up to where the clubman stood and making a little bow, which he gravely returned.

"I don't know . . ." he began.

"That's all right," explained the farmer. "Her aunt'll meet her. Jest see she don't bother no one. Lemme pass ye her duds."

The octogenarian forthwith handed up to McAllister a cloth valise, a pasteboard box, and a large paper bag.

"Her lunch is in the bag," said he. "Don't let her drink none o' that ice-water. My wife says it hez germs into it."

"But I don't . . ." gasped our friend.

"Be keerful o' that box," interrupted her uncle. "There's two dozen hen's eggs in it. If she's good, you might buy her a cent's worth o' peppermints to Portland." He fumbled uncertainly in his breeches' pocket.

"Do you expect me . . ." ejaculated McAllister.

"Give my love to yer aunt," added the other as the train started. "Good-by!" And pulling a large red pocket-handkerchief from his coat-tails he fanned the air vaguely as they moved slowly away from him.

"Oh, isn't it nice!" cried the little girl, who appeared quite at ease with her new acquaintance.

"Ye-es—certainly—of course," he replied, wondering what he should do with his charge. "I suppose we had better go in and sit down, don't you think?"

He stood aside waiting for her to precede him into the parlor car.

"What a lovely place!" she exclaimed as her eyes rested upon the rosewood and the velvet chairs. "Am I really to ride in this?"

"Why, where should you ride, to be sure?" he inquired, beginning to regain his self-possession.

"The car had iron seats before," she informed him.

"How extraordinary!"

"This is an ever so much prettier train," she added. "I'm afraid I'll hurt the plush." She took out a diminutive handkerchief and spread it out to sit upon. The clubman with an amused expression swung round another chair and sat down opposite.

"My name's Abigail Martha Higgins," she said, taking off her little straw hat. "I live in Bangor with my aunt. That old man was Uncle Moses Higgins. Aunt doesn't love his wife."

"Dear me!" sympathized McAllister.

"My father and mother are in heaven," she continued in matter-of-fact tones. "Up there. Wouldn't you hate to live up in the sky and do nothin'?"

"I certainly should," he answered with gravity.

"We all came down from there, you know. Do you think we were born all in one piece, or put together afterward?"

McAllister pondered.

"What's your name?"

"McAllister," he replied.

"That's a funny name!" she commented. "It sounds like McCafferty—that's Deacon Brewer's hired man's name."

"Do you think so?" asked the clubman apologetically, feeling that his parents had done him an irreparable injury.

"I'll call you Mister Mac," added the child, "and you may call me Abby, 'cause I'm only eight. Do you live to Boston?"

"No; New York. An awful way off."

"Have they got a Free-Will Meetin'-house there?" she inquired knowingly.

"I'm sure I don't know," he answered, feeling wofully ignorant of all matters of real importance.

"Then it must be a very small place," she decided. "All big places have a Free-Will Meetin'-house, Uncle Moses says."

At this moment Wilkins approached to inquire if his master wanted anything.

"Is there a Free-Will Meetin'-house in New York?" inquired the clubman.

"Yes, sir; I believe so, sir. That is to say, a Baptist place of worship, sir," he answered solemnly.

"Is that your brother?" inquired Abby.

"No—" hesitated McAllister, doubtful as to what the valet's equivalent would be in his little friend's world.

"What's your name?" inquired Abby.

"Wilkins, miss," answered the valet.

"What a lovely name!" cried Abby. "It's much nicer than his'n."

Wilkins stepped back a few paces aghast.

"That box is chuck full of eggs," announced Abby. "I wonder where the hens get them."

"I give it up," said the clubman.

"We have a black horse on our farm," she continued. "It used to be a girl, but now it's a boy."

"Indeed!" exclaimed McAllister.

"Yes, aunt had her tail cut off. Boys have short hair, you know—that's how you tell."

At this Wilkins disappeared rapidly into the background.

"Uncle Moses' wife don't love children," the child continued. "She has the rheumatiz in her thigh."

"But she must like you, Abby," urged her new friend.

"No, she don't. She don't love me 'cause I love Aunt Abby, an' Aunt Abby don't love her."

"I see," said McAllister.

The clubman soon became acquainted with Abby's entire family history, and rapidly realized that the mind of a child was a thing undreamed of in his philosophy. As she pattered on he conversed gravely with her, trying to answer her multitudinous questions. All her world was good save Uncle Moses' wife, and her confidence in the clubman was entire. She admired his clothes, his watch-chain, and his scarf-pin, and ended by directing him to read to her, which McAllister obediently did. None of the magazines seemed to contain suitable articles, so with some misgivings he purchased various colored weeklies, remembering vaguely his own delight in the misadventures of certain chubby ladies and stout gentlemen upon rear pages, perused furtively when waiting at the barber's to get his hair cut as a child. For half an hour her interest remained tense, but then she wearied of using her eyes, and, patting McAllister's fat chin, ordered him to tell her a story. Here was a new difficulty. He had never told a story in his life, but there was no help for it, no escape, as she climbed into his lap.

"Begin with once onup-a-time," she ordered.

"Well," he obeyed "Once 'onup' a time there was a man who lived in a club——"

"A what?" sharply interrupted Abby.

"A big white house with heaps of rooms," he corrected. "And as he had nobody dependent on him, all he had to do was to eat and sleep and look at the sky."

"Didn't he have any children?"

"Nobody in the world," answered McAllister.

"Poor man!" sighed Abby. "Didn't he keep any hens?"

"Not even a hen!"

"I know a big house just like that," said Abby. "Old Captain Barnard used to live in it. Wasn't he lonely?"

"Sometimes."

"Did anyone live with him?"

"His hired man," answered the clubman with a smile, looking down the car to where Wilkins sat in solitary grandeur. "And by and by he got so old and so fat that nobody would marry him, while the wives of other men he knew forgot to ask him to dinner."

"Poor dear man!" murmured Abby, "I should think he'd have wished he hadn't been born."

"Sometimes he did," answered the story-teller. "And he longed for some people to really care for him, and for some little children to keep him company."

"Did he have a cow?"

"No, not even a cow."

Abby laughed sleepily.

"But didn't he ever have any fun?"

"He thought he did, but he didn't, really."

"I'm awful sorry for him!" said Abby. "If I met him I would give him my white hen."

"He used to pay for dinners for people, and send them flowers and candy and go to see them——"

"Sunday afternoons?"

"Yes; Sunday afternoons."

"He was really very nice," said Abby.

"Do you think so?" asked McAllister eagerly.

"Why, of course. Don't you think so?"

"So-so," said the clubman.

"But he never hurt anyone?"

"No, never."

"And gave the hired man plenty of victuals?"

"Much more than was good for him," said McAllister with conviction.

"I like that man," said Abby. "He was a good man."

"But some people said he was an idle fellow," insisted McAllister.

"But that didn't do anybody any harm," said Abby.

"No, certainly not."

"And he wasn't cross?"

"No, almost never."

"Then," said Abby, "he was a good man, and I will marry him if he asks me."

And with that she dropped her head on his arm and fell fast asleep.

"Can't I hold the young—person, for you, sir?" inquired the valet in a whisper.

"Certainly not," responded McAllister.

Over the flitting pines circled the crows, black dots against the deep blue; lazy cows stood knee-deep in fields frosted with daisies and watched seemingly without interest the passing train; little puffs of white in serried ranks moved slowly out of the north, never approaching nearer, dissolving at the meridian; on the near horizon a line of indigo mountains tumbled southward; white farm-houses swept slowly by; at dusty crossings gray-whiskered farmers sat loosely holding the reins in amiable conformity with the injunction painted upon weather-worn signs to "Look out for the engine"; at times the train passed over rocky bedded streams dammed for milling, and once or twice across rivers half choked with logs upon which men ran like water-bugs; then through red brick towns, and towns with square granite stores and offices, and towns of white and green, marking the three disconnected periods of the architectural development of Maine; and everywhere the pines.

In the midst of a stretch of thick woods the engine began to whistle frantically. A brakeman, followed closely by a conductor, hurried through the car. The wheels ground harshly and the train gradually ceased to move. Ahead could be heard the loud pounding of the engine and the roar of escaping steam. Volumes of smoke, white and black, rolled over the pines and cast rapidly changing shadows upon the ground. Wilkins, who had gone forth to seek information, now returned.

"There's a freight wreck just a'ead, sir. The conductor says as how we shall be delayed 'ere at least nine hours."

McAllister glanced down at the little form in his arms. It had not moved. Gently he carried her along the aisle, out upon the platform, and down the steps to the ground. Still she did not awake. Up the track he could see groups of excited passengers gesticulating around grotesque piles of wreckage upon which a locomotive lay with its wheels in the air. Beside the track stretched a pine grove, its soft carpet of needles flecked with sunlight. At the foot of one giant tree, on a bed of gray moss, the clubman laid his little charge and threw himself at her feet. An irritable family of nervous crows flapped noisily away to the other side of the track, assembled in angry consultation in a hemlock, deputed a spy, who cautiously reconnoitred, and, on the latter's report, returned. At a safe distance Wilkins sat upon a windfall, and with one eye upon his sleeping master smoked rapidly one of McAllister's cigars.

II

"Yes, Miss Higgins got yer telegram," answered Deacon Brewer, as they drove slowly along the river in the dusty heat of the early July morning. "Ef she hadn't I reckon she'd 'a' gone nigh crazy."

They were in an open two-seated buck-board. McAllister, holding Abby in his lap, occupied the front seat with the Deacon, while Wilkins sat behind with the valise and the pasteboard box.

"It was a tiresome delay and really a very fortunate escape," responded McAllister. "Abby behaved beautifully."

"She's a good child," said the Deacon. "Her mother was a fine woman, and she's goin' to be just like her."

"Are we nearly home?" asked the little girl, rubbing her eyes.

"'Most," answered the Deacon. "Are ye hungry?"

"I got her some bread and milk at a farm-house," explained McAllister, "but none of us have had any breakfast yet."

"Wall, I reckon Miss Higgins'll be prepared for ye," said the Deacon. "She's a liberal woman an' a smart woman, but all the same, the farm's going to be sold for taxes next week."

Abby had fallen asleep, but the clubman started and looked anxiously at her at this piece of intelligence.

"She don't know nuthin' about it," said the farmer. "Miss Higgins can't run a hard-scrabble farm, nor no one can and make a livin' out'n it. It ain't worth five dollars an acre."

"What will she do?" asked the clubman.

"Darn ef I know," responded the other. "She kin help around some, I guess. Deacon Giddings has a powerful lot of company. 'N any woman kin sew. She kin make out, I reckon."

"But the child?" whispered McAllister.

"Her Uncle Moses'll hev to take her," answered the Deacon.

"Jiminy!" ejaculated the clubman, recalling the little girl's description of her uncle's wife. "She won't like that."

"Beggars can't be choosers," said the Deacon dryly.

A turn in the road brought them within view of a small, low farm-house, with good-sized barn, lying in a field between the woods and the river, here about a quarter of a mile in width. The pines grew close to the road upon the left, but upon the other side the land had been well cleared to the Penobscot's bank. Huge piles of stones, ten or twelve feet long, five or so broad, and four or five feet high, were monuments to the energy and industry of some former owner.

"Gosh, how Henery worked to clear this farm!" remarked the Deacon. "He hove stone for twenty years, an' then died. Look at them trees!"

He pointed dramatically to a large orchard containing row upon row of young apple-trees.

At the sound of the wheels a woman came slowly out of the side door and watched their approach. She had the pale, sickly countenance of the wife of the inland Maine farmer, and her limp dress ill concealed the angularity of her form. Her eyes showed that she had passed a sleepless night. McAllister leaped out and lifted Abby down. The woman neither spoke to nor kissed the child, but clutched her tightly in her arms. Then she nodded to the new-comers.

"I'm obliged to ye, Deacon Brewer," she said. "Is this the man who sent the telegram? Won't ye come in and set down?"

"Oh, yes," cried Abby ecstatically. "Get out, Mr. Wilkins! I want to show you the black horse, and all the hens."

"I must be gettin' back," muttered the Deacon.

"Could you let us have a bite of breakfast?" inquired McAllister. "My train doesn't go until twelve o'clock." To return to Bangor at this particular time did not suit him.

"Such as it is," replied Miss Higgins.

"Could you arrange to call out for me in an hour or so?" asked McAllister.

"I reckon I kin," said the Deacon with some reluctance. "I'll hev ter charge ye fifty cents."

"Of course," said McAllister.

Wilkins took down the parcels, and the Deacon drove slowly away.

"I'll scrape somethin' together in a few minutes," said Miss Higgins. "How much was that telegram?"

"Oh, that's all right!" said the abashed clubman.

"No, it ain't. Money's money. Was it ez much ez a quarter?"

McAllister acknowledged the amount.

"I thought so," commented Miss Higgins. "It was wuth it." She had the money all ready and handed it to McAllister.

Etiquette seemed to demand its acceptance.

"Did you say your name was McAllister? Who's this man?"

"His name is Wilkins."

"Well," said Aunt Abby, "one of ye might split up that log, if ye don't mind, while I get the breakfast."

She turned into the house.

McAllister looked doubtfully at the wood-pile.

"Let Mr. Wilkins chop the wood!" shouted Abby; "I want to show you the ba-an."

"Wilkins," said McAllister, "wood-chopping is an art sanctified in this country by tradition."

"Very good, sir," answered Wilkins.

Abby grasped McAllister's hand and tugged him joyfully over the poverty-stricken farm. They visited the orchard, the pig-sty, the hen-house, admired the horse that had been a girl, and ended at the water's edge.

"We ketch salmon here in the spring," explained Abby; "and smelts."

Across the eddying river quiet farms slept in the hot sunshine. Two men in a dory swung slowly up-stream. At their feet the clear water rippled against the stones. In his mind the clubman pictured the stifling city and the squalor of relative existence there.

"It's beautiful, Abby," he said.

"It's the loveliest place in the whole world," she answered, holding his hand tightly. "And I shall never, never go away."

Behind them came the shrill tones of Aunt Abby's voice bidding them to breakfast. Wilkins, coatless, was bearing some mangled fragments of log toward the kitchen. His beaded face spoke unutterable dejection.

"Well, set daown; it's all there is," said Miss Higgins.

McAllister sat, and Abby climbed into a high chair. Wilkins remained standing.

"Ain't ye goin' to set?" inquired Miss Higgins.

Wilkins reddened.

"Well, ye be the most bashful man I ever met," remarked the lady. "Set daown and eat yer victuals."

"Sit down," said McAllister, and for the second time master and man shared a meal.

The little room was bare of decoration except for some colored lithographs and wood-cuts, which for the most part represented the funeral corteges of distinguished Americans, with a few hospital scenes and the sinking of a steamship. A rug soiled to a dull drab made a sort of mud spot before the fireplace; a knitted tidy, suggestive of the antimacassar, ornamented the only rocker; at one end stood the stove, and hard by two fixed tubs. Everything except the carpet was scrupulously clean.

Miss Higgins brought to the table a dish of steaming boiled eggs, half a loaf of white bread, and a vegetable dish with a large piece of butter.

"I'll have some coffee for ye in a minute," she remarked as she placed the dishes before them.

McAllister broke some of the eggs into a tumbler and cut the bread.

"What might be your business?" inquired Miss Higgins.

"Er—well—" hesitated McAllister. "I've travelled quite a bit."

"I had a cousin in the hardware line," remarked the hostess reminiscently. "He travelled everywheres. Has it ever taken you ez fur as St. Louis?"

"No," said McAllister. "My line never took me so far."

"Andrew died there—of the water. What's your business?" continued Miss Higgins to Wilkins.

"I'm with Mr. McAllister, ma'am."

"Oh! same firm?"

Wilkins coughed violently and evaded the interrogation.

"Mr. Wilkins handles gents' clothing, underwear, haberdashery, and notions," interposed McAllister gravely.

Wilkins swayed in his seat and grew purple around the gills.

"Oh, Mr. Wilkins!" cried Abby, "what's the matter? You will burst! Take a drink of water."

The valet obediently tried to do as she bade him.

"How much is land worth around here?" asked the clubman. "And what do you raise?"

Miss Higgins looked at him suspiciously.

"We raise pertaters, some corn and oats, and get a purty fair apple crop in the autumn."

"Must have been hard work clearing the farm," added McAllister, "if one can judge by the piles of stones."

"Work? I guess 'twas work!" sniffed Miss Higgins. "You travellin' men hain't got no idee of what real work is. There ain't a stone in the nineteen acres of farm land. Henery picked 'em all up by hand."

"Are you Abby's guardian?" asked McAllister.

"Yes," said Miss Higgins. "I'm all the folks she's got, except Moses, down to Portsmouth, and a lot of good he is with that wife he's got!"

Wilkins now asked awkwardly to be excused.

"That friend of yourn seems to be a dummy!" remarked Miss Higgins after the valet had disappeared.

"He isn't much in the social line," admitted his master. "But he knows his business."

"I'm goin' out to show Mr. Wilkins the beehive," cried Abby, slipping down from her chair. "Come right along, won't you?"

"I'll be there in just a minute," said McAllister.

Abby grabbed up her sunbonnet and ran skipping out of the kitchen.

"She's a dear little girl," said McAllister. "I hope she'll have a chance to get a good education."

"Education behind a counter in Bangor is all she'll get," answered her aunt.

They sat in silence for a moment, and then McAllister, feeling the craving induced by habit, drew an Obsequio from his pocket, and asked:

"Do you object to smoking?"

Miss Abby bristled.

"I don't want none o' them se-gars in this house, so long's I'm in it!" she exclaimed. "Ain't out-doors good enough for you, without stinkin' up the kitchen?"

"I didn't mean any offence," apologized McAllister. "I'll wait till I go out, of course."

"One of the devil's tricks!" sniffed Miss Abby.

McAllister, terribly embarrassed, got up and stepped to the window. The coffee had been execrable, but a benign influence animated him. Down the slope toward the gently flowing Penobscot little Abby was leading Wilkins by the hand. The boy-horse kicked his heels in a daisy-flecked pasture beyond the barn.

"What did you say the farm was worth?" asked the clubman.

"There's a hundred and eighty-one acres o' woodland, and the cleared land just makes two hundred. It ought to be worth eighteen hundred dollars."

"I know a man who wants a farm. He says some day all this river front will be valuable for a summer resort. I'm authorized to buy for him. I'll give you sixteen hundred and fifty. Is it a bargain?"

Miss Abby turned pale.

"Oh, I don't know! It seems dreadful to sell it, after all the years Henery put into cleanin' of it up. I was hopin' somehow that maybe I could get work on the farm from them as bought it and keep Abby here for a while longer."

"That's all right," said McAllister. "My principal is buying it on a speculation. You can stay indefinitely."

"How about rent?" asked Miss Abby.

"You can take care of the farm, and he won't charge you any rent."

The terms having been finally arranged to Miss Abby's satisfaction, McAllister drew a small check-book from his pocket and filled out a voucher for the amount.

"We can sign the papers later," said he with a smile.

Miss Abby took the slip of paper doubtfully.

"How do I know I ain't gettin' cheated?" she asked. "Suppose this should turn out to be no good?"

"Then you'd have the farm," said McAllister.

He fumbled in his pocket until he found a clean letter-back and with his stylographic pen rapidly wrote the following:

"I hereby give and convey the Henry Higgins farm, heretofore purchased by me, to my friend Abigail Martha Higgins, in consideration for much of value of which no one knows but myself. In witness whereof I sign my name and affix a seal."

He found a used postage-stamp that still had a trifle of gum on its back and made use of it as a fragmentary seal.

While in some doubt as to the legal sufficiency of this instrument, McAllister felt that its intendment was unmistakable. Having replaced his pen, he carefully folded the document and thrust it into his pocket. Just at this moment Miss Higgins announced the return of Deacon Brewer, who was wheeling slowly into the gate. Toward the orchard McAllister could see, as he stepped to the door, little Abby still tugging along Wilkins, whose massive and emotionless face was glistening with the heat.

"Hit's very 'ot, sir!" he remarked tentatively to his master. "I've been to see the 'ives."

"How funny Mr. Wilkins talks!" said Abby. "He told me he knew a boy once who got stung, and said the bee bit 'im in 'is 'ead! Do all drummers talk like that?"

"Drummers!" exclaimed Wilkins.

"Aunt said you were both drummers; I s'pose you left your drums somewhere. I don't like 'em; they make too much music. They have them in the circus parade in Bangor every year."

"Be you folks ready to start?" inquired Deacon Brewer. "Purty nice view of the water from here, ain't they? There's a good well on the place, too, and a few boat-loads of manure would give you crops to beat—all. Don't know enybody thet wants to speckalate a little in farmin' land, do ye? This here is a good, likely place. Reckon you kin buy it cheap."

"Sh-h!" said McAllister, laying his finger on his lips.

"No one sha'n't ever buy this farm," said Abby; "I'm goin' to live here always."

"Wall," said the Deacon, "better be movin'. I don't like to keep the mare standin' in the sun."

"Are you goin' away?" cried Abby in agonized tones. "You'll come back soon, won't you?"

"I hope so, very soon," said McAllister. "Don't you want to show me the boy-horse before I start?"

"Oh, yes, yes!" she cried, seizing his hand.

The stout clubman and the little girl walked slowly across the grass-grown drive to the daisy field beside the barn, talking busily.

"Your friend's bought this farm," announced Miss Abby to Wilkins.

"'Oly Moses!" ejaculated the valet.

"By gum!" exclaimed the Deacon. "What did he give?"

"Sixteen hundred and fifty dollars."

"Gee!" said the Deacon.

"An' we're to stay on rent-free 's long 's we want!"

"I swan!" commented the pillar of the local Baptist Church. "Some folks doos hev luck!"

He went over to adjust a bit of harness.

"It'll keep 'em out o' the poor farm," he muttered. "But, by gosh, thet feller must be a fool!"

Over in the daisy field, McAllister, to the wonder of the boy-horse, pulled the despised cigar from his pocket, cut off the end, and began to smoke with infinite satisfaction.

"What a beautiful, beautiful, lovely ring!" exclaimed Abby joyfully, examining with delight the embossed paper of red and gold.

"Do you remember about the lonely man who lived in the big white house I told you of?" asked McAllister.

"Of course I do," sighed Abby. "Poor man! he was so good, and nobody loved him."

"Do you love him?" asked McAllister.

"Dear man! I love him, all my heart!" cried the child.

"Then the man is very, very happy," said McAllister softly.

Overhead a single black crow, wheeling out of a stumpy pine, circled to investigate this strange love-scene. Satisfied of its propriety, he cawed loudly and resettled himself upon the shaking topmost bough.

McAllister drew the golden band from his cigar and took the folded paper from his pocket.

"Here's a love-letter," said he. "Your aunt will read it for you when I've gone."

Abby took it sadly.

"Now hold up your left hand," said McAllister, smiling. As he slipped the paper circle over her fourth finger he said gravely:

"'With this ring I thee wed, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow.' Give me a kiss."

She did so, in wonder.

"Now we are married," said he.