Divided Skates

“Oh! that’s all right, my lad. You’ll have a chance. Don’t fear.”

“What do you mean, sir? What can I do?” asked Towsley eagerly.

“Did you ever hear, as you went along the street, somebody start humming or whistling a tune? any kind of a tune, but a catchy one the best. In a little while you’ll hear another person pick it up and hum or whistle, just the same way; so on, till nobody knows how many have caught and heard the wandering melody and passed it onward through a crowd. Did you ever notice anything like that?”

“Heaps of times. I’ve done it myself. Started it or picked it up, either.”

“Well, that’s like kindness. Pick it up, pass it along. Let everybody who hears it, catch on; understand? So, that’s what I mean. You may never have a chance to do anything especially for me – and you may have dozens; but that doesn’t matter. Keep it moving. The first time you have an opportunity to be decent to somebody else, why – just be decent, and say to yourself: ‘That’s because the doctor picked me out of a snow-drift.’ The Lord will keep the account all straight, and settle it in His own good time. We don’t have to worry about that part, fortunately; else our spiritual book-keeping would get sadly mixed.”

They were both silent for a brief while, and the words made a deep impression upon Towsley’s heart; a warm and gentle heart at all times, though not always a wise one in its judgments.

“Well, my boy. I’m waiting for your story, and I’m a pretty busy man. Along about time for giving out the papers you wouldn’t care to be hindered needlessly, would you?”

A brilliant smile broke over the sharp little face upon the pillow.

“No, I wouldn’t, and you don’t. Well, here it is;” and very briefly, but graphically, the alley vagrant sketched the story of his acquaintance with Miss Armacost and his flight from her house.

The doctor listened without interruption till after the tale was done; then he asked:

“How about that wandering melody of kindness, eh, my boy?”

“I don’t know what you mean. I mean – I – I – ”

Down in his warm heart Towsley did know, though he hated to acknowledge it. He tried to justify himself in his own eyes as well as in those of the good physician.

“She hadn’t any right to take away my clothes. All the clothes I had. She took away my name, too.”

“Were they very good clothes, Towsley?”

“No. But they were mine!” fiercely.

“And the name. Is it a very honorable name, laddie?”

“It’s just as honorable as I make it, sir! I needn’t be an Alley boy always, just because – because – nobody knows who my folks were.”

“No, indeed. That you need not. That you will not be, for you’ve the spirit to succeed. Only you need a little of the spirit of generosity, too. The wandering melody again, you see. We can never quite get away from it. Now, I’m going on my rounds through the wards. I’ll stop in, after an hour or so, and see if you have any errand for me to do. Good-by. Take a nap, then think it over. I’ll be back again.”

Towsley didn’t nap at all. He lay wide-eyed and full of thought, staring at the white ceiling overhead, and occasionally touching a pansy which nurse Brady had laid beside him on his pillow. As he fondled and looked at the flower, more and more it gradually began to assume the face and features of a delicate little old lady whom he knew. It was a white pansy, with faint lavender patches on its lateral and lower petals; dashed, like all its kind, by little touches of darker hue. Yes, it was a face – Miss Lucy’s face. Those two white upper leaves were her snowy curls under her every-day lace cap. The eyes, the keen, whimsical little mouth – all were there; and the newsboy looked and remembered – till the eyes seemed to gather tears and the pursed-up mouth to tremble like a child’s – like Sarah Jane’s, when she had been denied a share in her brothers’ games.

Had there been tears in Miss Lucy’s eyes, last night, behind those gleaming glasses? Had it been out of love, after all, that she had given him her dead nephew’s pretty garments and her dead nephew’s aristocratic name?

It was all very puzzling, and Towsley felt unequal to solving the riddle, although it was he who always was first among the fellows to find the answers to the printed riddles on the children’s page of the weekly Express. He shut his eyes a moment, to see things a little better, and after the ceiling and the pansy were thus put out of sight he did begin to understand quite clearly.

Tears? He hated them. There should never any be shed for him, that he could prevent. On that point he made up his mind, and he shut his lids down tighter, so that nothing should alter his sudden resolution.

What was that sound?

Towsley’s eyes opened with a snap. He was sure that they had not been closed a second, but the nurse laughed when he so declared; he always afterward believed that some sort of magic had been used to change things about in that little hospital bedroom.

For there on the tiny dresser was lightly tossed a rich fur robe that looked as if it had just slipped off somebody’s slender shoulders. It was an old-fashioned robe, Towsley saw that, and the bonnet which had fallen to the floor beside it was quite out of style, also.

“Regular old timer, ain’t it! And she’s an old timer, too, but – the tears! Shucks! He wished nobody would ever cry. He hated tears!” again thought Towsley. And then he stole his hand around the neck of the little old lady who was kneeling beside his cot, and remarked, generously:

“Oh! I say, Miss Lucy, please don’t. It’s all right. I didn’t behave very – very gentlemanly, I guess, but if you like I’m willing to try it over again. I’ll be your little boy if you want me, and if I have to be ‘Lionel,’ just make it Towsley, too, can’t you?”

“Oh! you darling! I didn’t know that it could be possible; that in so short a time a stranger child could creep so closely into my affection. I’ve been hearing such a lot about you, from Molly, you know. Oh! my dear, I am so thankful that you did not perish. So thankful that my eyes have been opened to see how lonely and selfish a life I’ve led. Just to think, to think, that I have at last a dear little human boy to love and to love me! All day I’ve thought about you and seemed to feel that it was Lionel, our own Lionel, who had wandered out into the storm to suffer so; and – and – ”

This was too much for the gamin. He was still that. He had not yet been transformed into the gentleman he aspired to become, and in a way that was more honest than courteous he forestalled another hysterical outburst on the part of his overwrought benefactress.

“Hold on, Miss Lucy. It’s all right. I ain’t dead nor dyin’. It’s the wandering melody of the kindness, as the doctor said. Don’t you know? He was good to me, and I’ll be good to you, and you’ll be good to somebody else; and that’s the way it goes. I can tell you of a lot of fellows to be kind to. Whistling Jerry, and Battles, and Shiner. Oh! there are a plenty to fill the house full, but there won’t any of them stand being cried over. It would scare the life out of ’em. A kick or a blow – that they wouldn’t mind, being used to it, you see, but tears – they’d scat! like kittens with a dog after them. They would, indeed.”

“Oh!” gasped Miss Lucy, rising from her knees – “Oh! but I’ve nothing to do with these – these boys with the objectionable names. It is yourself only, my child, whom I want to live with me. Just you; to be my one, only, little precious boy.”

“Then, I guess we’d better drop it. I was only trying to be good to you.”

CHAPTER V.

LIONEL TOWSLEY GOES HOME

“Towsley, boy! you’re quite well enough to go home. Especially as there is, just outside the hospital gate, a red-plumed sleigh waiting, with great fox robes big enough to wrap a dozen newsboys in; with horses in a tinkling harness, and more red plumes at their heads; and a coachman named Jefferson sitting up front with a mighty fur collar on and a Christmas favor in his hat, and – I’ve lost my breath, telling the wonders! For you, my snow-bank youngster!”

The genial doctor entered the room just in time to witness the little scene between Miss Armacost and her protégé; and knowing both parties fairly well, he judged that the best way out of a difficulty was to get rid of the difficulty. Which he did in the manner above.

For there was never a newsboy on Newspaper Square, not even the independent Master Towsley, who could resist the charm of a sleigh ride; especially in a city where sleighing was a rare occurrence, and where enormous prices were asked and obtained for any sort of vehicle that would glide over the snow.

Towsley forgot everything but the prospect before him. Even the objectionable velvet suit and girlish hat would be endurable under the circumstances. What if some fellow of his own craft did see and laugh at him? He laughs best who laughs last, and in this case that would be the boy in the sleigh. So he clapped his hands and cried out, excitedly:

“Oh! may I? And will Miss Lucy please go away, and somebody send me back my clothes?”

“Certainly. Everybody shall clear out except you and me,” said the physician, pulling a brown paper parcel from beneath his arm and tossing it upon the foot of the cot.

So Miss Armacost and nurse Brady went away and the doctor closed the door behind them. Then he unfastened the mysterious parcel and spread before Towsley’s wondering gaze a complete suit for a boy of Towsley’s size. Everything was there, down to the shoes and stockings, though all were of coarse material.

“Oh, ginger! Ain’t that prime? For me? Are they for me, doctor?”

“If they fit.”

“Oh! they’ll fit. Anything fits me.”

“Velvet knickers and plumed hats?”

The lad, who had tried to spring out of bed, and had succeeded only in climbing out rather slowly and shakily, looked up with a twinkle in his eye; then he answered very seriously:

“Yes, sir; even them. I’d hate ’em. I’d hate to have the fellows see me in ’em; but I’d wear them forever, rather than make her cry again. I can’t get over that. To s’pose that she, a rich lady living on the Avenue, should cry over an Alley kid! It ain’t nice to think about, her saying I’ve got to be her only, ‘one precious.’ I’ll about die of lonesomeness; but – it’s the wandering kindness, you know, sir. I’ll pass it on, and maybe it’ll all come right. Do you s’pose she’ll make me sit in front of a window and be dressed up, and make myself a show for the fellows to come and gibe at?”

“Those shoes all right, eh? Look here, Towsley. I’m not a ‘supposing’ sort of a man. I’ve no time to speculate over things. I have to take them as they come and keep hustling. That’s pretty much the way it is in the newspaper business, isn’t it?”

“Yes. You just believe it.”

“I do. Well, though I rarely give away advice – that being a luxury I dare not afford, in general – I’m going to present you with a bit now, as a kind of keepsake: Don’t you stop to worry or ‘s’pose’ anything. Life’s too short. Just keep hustling. Do right, as near as you can, straight along and all the time, and let results take care of themselves or leave them to the Lord who will do it for us. And remember one other thing: If you do a kindness to anybody you have to like them. Fact; you can’t help it. You will like them, whether or no. Now I didn’t care a nickel about you till I tumbled over you in the snow-drift. Never heard of you, indeed. But then I had a chance to help you, and right away I liked you. So I’ve been down-town, this afternoon, and bought you this outfit. Between you and me, Towsley, I shouldn’t care for the velvets, either. But they must have been all that Miss Armacost had on hand and so she gave them to you. These I’m not giving; I’m simply advancing. Men like us don’t care to accept what we can’t pay for, you know. Anything that Miss Lucy will offer you, you’ll have a chance to repay: by love, and attention, and the deference that a son of her own house would render a gentlewoman who befriended him. But you’ll have no further use for me, and so I’m merely lending you this suit. If you should ever be able, as you may, to collect what I’ve spent on it – about five dollars – you just remember the wandering kindness and send it along. I’d get a scrap of paper, if I were you, and write it down: ‘Five dollars received of Dr. Frank Winthrop’; and when you use something for some needy person, consider that it is so much toward the liquidation of the debt and write it opposite: ‘Paid Dr. Frank Winthrop, so and so.’ Understand?”

“Yes. I will repay, too. Though I’d rather do it to you, yourself.”

“Doubtless. Yet that doesn’t matter. The real thing is to be systematic and exact in our charities. Slovenliness or carelessness in such things is worse than a bad habit – it’s a sin. Now, how are you? A trifle queer in the legs, eh? Things in the room look a bit hazy? That’s all right. Effect of an active boy lying in bed. The air will set you straight. My! but you are a dandy in that suit! Fits you like a duck’s bill in the mud, doesn’t it?”

Towsley laughed, so gayly and loudly that anxious Miss Lucy tiptoed to the outside of the closed door and asked, eagerly:

“Can’t I come in yet?”

The jolly doctor gave a nod of his head and Towsley opened to admit his friend. In all his little life he had never been so well, so completely clothed as he was at that moment; and the consciousness of being suitably dressed went far toward giving him the ease of manner which belonged to the “gentleman” whom he aspired to become.

The alteration in his appearance was so great and his bow so correctly made that Miss Lucy cried out in delight and surprise, and was about to throw her arms about the child and caress him before them all.

But the wise doctor prevented that, by saying in his quick way:

“All ready, Miss Armacost; and I fancy your horses and coachman won’t be sorry. If this young fellow gives you any trouble just let me know. I’ll attend to his case, short order; with a dose of picra or some other disagreeable stuff! But I wish you both the compliments of the season and – this way out, please. Say good-by to nurse Brady, Towsley Lionel Armacost, and don’t forget that but for her care you might not be starting on a sleigh-ride now.”

Then he was gone, and they had to hurry along the halls and down the stairs to follow him toward that outer door, before which stood the chestnuts, jingling their bells and pawing balls of the light snow, in their impatience to be trotting over the white roads and up to the park where other horses were flying about, as merry, apparently, as the people whom they carried.

So with a mere nod of his head, old Jefferson whisked the newsboy into a corner of the cushioned seat and Miss Armacost followed without assistance; but her doing so made Towsley remember something and sent a blush to his pale cheek. That was, the manner in which real gentlemen helped their women folk on any similar occasion.

“To Druid Hill!” said Miss Lucy, briefly; and Jefferson drove briskly away.

For some time neither of the occupants of that warm back seat said a word. Each was too thoroughly engrossed by his and her own thoughts; but finally Miss Lucy stole a glance toward her small companion and inquired:

“Do you like sleighing, Lionel?”

“Yes, Miss Armacost. Only – it all seems like – like make-believe. I keep wondering when I’ll wake up. And I wish – I wish Battles and Shiner were here. I don’t believe that Shiner ever had a sleigh-ride in his life – Never; not once.”

“Indeed?” asked the lady, coldly.

“No, ma’am. I mean, no, Miss Lucy. And he ain’t much more’n a baby, Shiner ain’t. Not near as old as I am.”

“How old are you, my dear?”

“I guess I’m going on eight. Molly thinks I am. You know Molly; the girl that took me to your house or run me into you on her skate. She’s a dreadful nice girl, Molly is; but I don’t believe she ever had a sleigh-ride, either. Poor Molly.”

The lad’s eyes were shining from his own pleasure; his pale face was rapidly taking on a healthy glow; he was a very presentable little fellow, indeed, in his modern suit of well-shaped clothing, so Miss Armacost thought, but – he was also spoiling her ride for her as thoroughly as he could. Spoiling it without the slightest intention or desire on his own part to do so.

“Molly spent the greater part of yesterday with me, Lionel.”

“She did? What for?”

“Because I was in trouble, of more sorts than one; and her kind heart sent her – in the first place. After she came I begged her to stay. I am already very fond of Molly; she is so gay and cheerful.”

Towsley’s face became radiant.

“Oh, jimmeny! Ain’t that prime! Have you adopted her, too?”

“No, indeed. She has no need for such an action on my part. She has both parents living. But our plumbing went to wreck, yesterday, in the unlooked-for cold snap, and her father came to our rescue. He had to work there all day, and when he found I was grieving so about your – your running away into the storm, he told Molly and she came. She very kindly brought me some of their own dinner, hot and steaming; and I assure you it did taste fine! I was almost really hungry, for once.”

“That’s just like Molly. She’s an awful generous girl, Molly is.”

Miss Lucy was about to suggest that some other adjective than “awful” would better apply to “generous,” but refrained. It would not do, she considered, to begin too sternly or suddenly in the reconstruction of her charge. She simply replied:

“Yes. She is generous and lovable. She has excellent common sense.”

Towsley found his tongue and launched into praise of the whole family of Johns, with such graphic pictures of their daily life that Miss Armacost felt well acquainted with the entire household. Then the little fellow became absorbed in the excitement of the ride, and the novelty of dashing around and around the lake, in that endless line of prancing horses and skimming vehicles, set his tongue a-chatter ceaselessly.

Miss Lucy listened, in a sort of charm. The few children whom she knew were apt to be rather quiet in her presence, but not so this lad from the back alley. He enjoyed everything, saw everything, described everything, like a keen reporter of the papers he had used to sell.

“Look-a-there! and there! and there! Did you see that? That was a regular clothes-basket, set on a pair of runners! Sure; it all goes. Snow doesn’t come down here very often. Why, up north, in New York, or Boston, or such places, they have sleighing whenever they’ve a mind to! but not down here. Folks daren’t lose a chance, dare they? See! There’s a regular old vender’s wagon, that a lot of young folks have hired, and they’re old cow-bells they’ve put on the horses. Ki! look-a-there! look-a-there! Them’s woman’s college girls – sure! Whew! regular hay-riggers, ain’t they! They must have took all their money to pay for it! And – shucks! just see them bobs!”

In his excitement the little boy stood up and pointed frantically toward a group of boys who had brought out their long sleds and were hastening toward that hill of the park where coasting would be permitted. Unconsciously he attracted a deal of attention from the throngs of pleasure-seekers, and Miss Armacost felt herself unpleasantly conspicuous. Yet there was not an eye which beheld him that did not brighten because of his happiness; and in spite of her annoyance at the gaze of her fellow townsmen, the owner of the chestnuts felt also a sort of pride in its cause.

But at last she ordered the coachman homeward, and they rode slowly out of the park, down the beautiful Avenue toward the Armacost mansion and Towsley’s new home. He sank back into his place with a profound sigh of mingled pleasure and regret:

“To think they never had a sleigh-ride!”

“Humph! How many have you had, before this one, Lionel?”

“Why – why – why – none.”

“I thought so. Have you pitied yourself?”

“No, ma’am. I mean, no, Miss Lucy.”

“Then save your sympathy. One cannot miss what one has never enjoyed. For myself, I see little good of this snow. It’s made no end of trouble and expense to house owners, and filled the streets with stuff which the city will have to remove, and – ”

“It’s made a heap of fun, hasn’t it? Won’t it give idle men a lot of shovelling to do? I’ve always heard them saying how glad they were when a snow-storm came; those tramps around the city buildings. I’m sure I think it’s jolly. Only I wish – ”

“Well, what?”

“That I had as much money as I wanted. I’d hire the big picnic stage and have it put on runners, and I’d go ’round Newspaper Square, and the Swamp, and the asylums and – and places – and I’d give every little kid that never had a ride, I’d give him one to-morrow, as sure as I live. Oh! I wish I had it!”

Miss Armacost lost all manner of patience with this boy. If he’d only be contented with enjoying himself and let his neighbors rest. But here they were at home. How odd it looked, to see those great heaps of snow which had been shovelled from the sidewalk and piled up in banks before the houses, between the curbstone and the driveway. And over in the “Square” which filled the centre of the block the children of the bordering houses had all come out with sleds and happy laughter, and were making the old silence ring.

“Maybe, after all, anything which pleases the children is not an unmitigated annoyance,” observed Miss Armacost, reflectively.

Jefferson brought the horses to a standstill and stepped down to loosen the robes about his mistress and help her alight, if need be. But Towsley had been before him. He had pulled off his hat, thrust it under his arm, and extended his hand toward the lady, to assist her, as courteously and gracefully as any grown gentleman could have done; even if not with quite so much strength.

Repressing a smile at the difference in size between her assistant and herself, Miss Armacost quietly placed her hand within his and stepped to the sidewalk. This was slippery in spots, as Towsley observed, and he remarked:

“Better let me hold your hand till you get clear up the steps, hadn’t you, Miss Lucy?”

“Yes, dear, I think I would much better.” Then when the lad reached the top and she had rung for admittance, she turned to him with a lovely smile:

“Welcome home, Lionel Towsley Armacost.”

“Thank you, Miss Lucy. I hope we won’t neither of us ever be sorry I’ve come.”

She liked his answer; liked it far more than she would have done one full of enthusiasm. So they went in together, well pleased, and as the boy had been so lately a hospital patient, he was sent early to bed and to sleep.

As she had done before, Miss Lucy visited him afterward, and enjoyed without restraint the sight of her adopted son, lying so peacefully upon his pillow. For there were now no soiled stains of the street to mar his beauty, and the little hands upon the coverlet were as dainty as need be.

But even in slumber Towsley had an uncomfortable effect upon the lady’s thoughts: reminding her of the many other little lads who had shared his poverty yet not his present good fortune. She had never considered her house as an especially large one till his small person served to show the size of the empty rooms, and how tiny a space one child could occupy.

Miss Lucy sat so long that she grew chilled. Then she reflected that she might easily become ill, which would be most unfortunate now, since she had taken a child to care for. So she rose rather stiffly and started for her own room; though she had not taken a dozen steps in its direction before she came to a sudden, startled pause. Somebody was ringing her door-bell. Ringing it persistently, without waiting for any response.

“Oh, dear! That must be somebody in trouble! Or, possibly, a special delivery message from the post-office or express; though I’m sure I have nobody near and dear enough to call upon me in that manner. Yes, yes, I’m coming!” she cried to the invisible visitor, though she knew perfectly that her voice could not reach him.

At that hour, Jefferson and Mary, who slept in the house, were both in bed, and their mistress would not disturb them. She preferred to hurry to the door herself and learn what was wanted. But when she reached and opened it there was nobody waiting. Even though she drew her shoulder shawl closer about her and stepped out upon the marble stoop to look, there was nobody in sight. In that quiet neighborhood all lights had long since been extinguished, and there was no sign of life in any of the stately homes bordering the snowy Square.