Young Wallingford

Up in Hen Moozer’s General Merchandise Emporium and Post-Office Wallingford arranged for a show window, and from behind its dusty panes he had the eternal pyramid of fly-specked canned goods removed. In its place he constructed a semi-circular amphitheater of pale blue velvet, bought from Moozer’s own stock, and in its center he placed the priceless bit of Etruscan ware, the first splendid art object from the to-be-famous Blakeville Etruscan studios!

In the meantime, Jonas Bubble had found willing subscribers to the stock of the Bubble Bank, and already was installing an impregnable vault in his vacant brick building at the intersection of Maple Avenue and Blake Street. By this time every citizen had a new impulse of civic pride, and vast commercial expansion was planned by every business man in Blakeville. Even the women felt the contagion, and it was one of the sorrows of Miss Forsythe’s soul that her vacation arrangements had already been made for the summer, and that she should be compelled to go away even for a short time, leaving all this inspiriting progress behind her. It would be just like Mrs. Moozer to take advantage of the situation! Mrs. Moozer was vice-president of the Women’s Culture Club.

The Bubble County Bank collected its funds, took possession of its new quarters and made ready for business. Jonas Bubble, changing his attire to a frock suit for good and all, became its president. J. Rufus had also been offered an office in the bank, but he declined. A directorship had been urged upon him, but he steadfastly refused, with the same firmness that he had denied to Jonas Bubble a share in his pottery or even his drainage project. No, with his five thousand dollars’ worth of stock he felt that he was taking as great a share as a stranger might, with modesty, appropriate to himself in their municipal advancement. Let the honors go to those who had grown up with the city, and who had furnished the substantial nucleus upon which their prosperity and advancement might be based.

He intended, however, to make free use of the new banking facilities, and by way of showing the earnestness of that intention he drew from his New York bank half of the sum he had cleared on his big horse-racing “frame up,” and deposited these funds in the Bubble Bank. True enough, three days after, he withdrew nearly the entire amount by draft in favor of one Horace G. Daw, of Boston, but a week later he deposited a similar amount from his New York bank, then increased that with the amount previously withdrawn in favor of Horace G. Daw. A few days later he withdrew the entire account, replaced three-fourths of it and drew out one-half of that, and it began to be talked about all over the town that Wallingford’s enterprises were by no means confined to his Blakeville investments. He was a man of large financial affairs, which required the frequent transfer of immense sums of money. To keep up this rapid rotation of funds, Wallingford even borrowed money which Blackie Daw had obtained in the same horse-racing enterprise. Sometimes he had seventy-five thousand dollars in the Bubble Bank, and sometimes his balance was less than a thousand.

In the meantime, J. Rufus allowed no opportunities for his reputation to become stale. In the Atlas Hotel he built a model bath-room which was to revert to Jim Ranger, without money and without price, when Wallingford should leave, and over his bath-tub he installed an instantaneous heater which was the pride and delight of the village. It cost him a pretty penny, but he got tenfold advertising from it. By the time this sensation had begun to die he was able to display drawings of the quaint and pretty vine-clad Etruscan studio, and to start men to digging trenches for the foundations!

CHAPTER XXI

THE GREAT VITTOREO MATTEO, MASTER OF BLACK MUD, ARRIVES! BRAVA! HE DEPARTS! BRAVA!

One day a tall, slender, black-haired, black-mustached and black-eyed young man, in a severely ministerial black frock suit, dropped off the train and inquired in an undoubted foreign accent for the Atlas Hotel. Even the station loungers recognized him at once as the great and long-expected artist, Signor Vittoreo Matteo, who, save in the one respect of short hair, was thoroughly satisfying to the eye and imagination. Even before the spreading of his name upon the register of the Atlas Hotel, all Blakeville knew that he had arrived.

In the hotel office he met J. Rufus. Instantly he shrieked for joy, embraced Wallingford, kissed that discomfited gentleman upon both cheeks and fell upon his neck, jabbering in most broken English his joy at meeting his dear, dear friend once more. In the privacy of Wallingford’s own room, Wallingford’s dear Italian friend threw himself upon the bed and kicked up his heels like a boy, stuffing the corner of a pillow in his mouth to suppress his shrieks of laughter.

“Ain’t I the regular buya-da-banan Dago for fair?” he demanded, without a trace of his choice Italian accent.

“Blackie,” rejoiced Wallingford, wiping his eyes, “I never met your parents, but I’ve a bet down that they came from Naples as ballast in a cattle steamer. But I’m afraid you’ll strain yourself on this. Don’t make it too strong.”

“I’ll make Salvini’s acting as tame as a jointed crockery doll,” asserted Blackie. “This deal is nuts and raisins to me; and say, J. Rufus, your sending for me was just in the nick of time. Just got a tip from a post-office friend that the federal officers were going to investigate my plant, so I’m glad to have a vacation. What’s this new stunt of yours, anyhow?”

“It’s a cinch,” declared Wallingford, “but I don’t want to scramble your mind with anything but the story of your own life.”

To his own romantic, personal history, as Vittoreo Matteo, and to the interesting fabrications about the world-famous Etruscan pottery, in the village of Etrusca, near Milan, Italy, Blackie listened most attentively.

“All right,” said he at the finish; “I get you. Now lead me forth to the merry, merry villagers.”

Behind the spanking bays which had made Fannie Bubble the envied of every girl in Blakeville, Wallingford drove Blackie forth. Already many of the faithful had gathered at the site of the Blakeville Etruscan Studios in anticipation of the great Matteo’s coming, and when the tall, black-eyed Italian jumped out of the buggy they fairly quivered with gratified curiosity. How well he looked the part! If only he had had long hair! The eyes of the world-famous Italian ceramic expert, however, were not for the assembled denizens of Blakeville; they were only for that long and eagerly desired deposit of Etruscan soil. He leaped from the buggy; he dashed through the gap in the fence; he rushed to the side of that black swamp, the edges of which had evaporated now until they were but a sticky mass, and said:

“Oh, da g-r-r-a-a-n-da mod!”

Forthwith, disregarding his cuffs, disregarding his rings, disregarding everything, he plunged both his white hands into that sticky mass and brought them up dripping-full of that precious material – the genuine, no, better than genuine, Etruscan black mud!

A cheer broke out from assembled Blakeville. This surely was artistic frenzy! This surely was the emotional temperament! This surely was the manner in which the great Italian black-pottery expert should act in the first sight of his beloved black mud!

“Da gr-r-r-r-r-a-a-n-da mod!” he repeated over and over, and drew it close to his face that he might inspect it with a near and loving eye.

One might almost have thought that he was about to kiss it, to bury his nose in it; one almost expected him to jump into that pond and wallow in it, his joy at seeing it was so complete.

It was J. Rufus Wallingford himself who, catching the contagion of this superb fervor, ran to the pail of drinking-water kept for the foundation workmen, and brought it to the great artist. J. Rufus himself poured water upon the great artist’s hands until those hands were free of their Etruscan coating, and with his own immaculate handkerchief he dried those deft and skilful fingers, while the great Italian potter looked up into the face of his business manager with almost tears in his eyes!

It was a wonderful scene, one never to be forgotten, and in the enthusiasm of that psychological moment Mrs. Moozer rushed forward. Mrs. Moozer, acting president of the Women’s Culture Club in the absence of Miss Forsythe, saw here a glorious opportunity; here was where she could “put one over” upon that all-absorptive young lady.

“My dear Mr. Wallingford, you must introduce me at once!” she exclaimed. “I can not any longer restrain my impatience.”

His own voice quavering emotions of several sorts, Wallingford introduced them, and Mrs. Moozer shook ecstatically the hand which had just caressed the dear swamp.

“And so this is the great Matteo!” she exclaimed. “Signor, as acting president of the Women’s Culture Club, I claim you for an address upon your sublime art next Saturday afternoon. Let business claim you afterward.”

“I hav’a – not da gooda Englis,” said Blackie Daw, with an indescribable gesture of the shoulders and right arm, “but whata leetle I cana say, I s’alla be amost aglad to tella da ladees.”

Never did man enjoy himself more than did Blackie Daw. Blakeville went wild over this gifted, warmly temperamental foreigner. They dined him and they listened to his soul-satisfying, broken English with vast respect, even with veneration; the women because he was an artist, and the men because he represented vast money-earning capacity. Even the far-away president of the Women’s Culture Club heard of his advent from a faithful adherent, an anti-Moozer and pro-Forsythe member, and on Saturday morning J. Rufus Wallingford received a gushing letter from that enterprising lady.

My Dear Mr. Wallingford:

I have been informed that the great event has happened, and that the superb artist has at last arrived in Blakeville; moreover, that he is to favor the Women’s Culture Club, of which I have the honor to be president, with a talk upon his delightful art. I simply can not resist presiding at that meeting, and I hope it is not uncharitable toward Mrs. Moozer that I feel it my duty to do so; consequently I shall arrive in time, I trust, to introduce him; moreover, to talk with him in his own, limpid, liquid language. I have been, for the past month, taking phonograph lessons in Italian for this moment, and I trust that it will be a pleasant surprise to him to be addressed in his native tongue.

Wallingford rushed up-stairs to where Blackie was leisurely getting ready for breakfast.

“Old scout,” he gasped, “your poor old mother in Italy is at the point of death, so be grief-stricken and hustle! Get ready for the next train out of town, you hear? Look at this!” and he thrust in front of Blackie’s eyes the fatal letter.

Blackie looked at it and comprehended its significance.

“What time does the first train leave?” he asked.

“I don’t know, but whatever time it is I’ll get you down to it,” said Wallingford. “This is warning enough for me. It’s time to close up and take my profits.”

The next east-bound train found Blackie Daw and Wallingford at the station, and just as it slowed down, Blackie, with Wallingford helping him carry his grips, was at the steps of the parlor car. He stood aside for the stream of descending passengers to step down, and had turned to address some remark to Wallingford, when he saw that gentleman’s face blanch and his jaw drop. A second later a gauzy female had descended from the car and seized upon J. Rufus. Even as she turned upon him, Blackie felt the sinking certainty that this was Miss Forsythe.

“And this is Signor Matteo, I am sure,” she gushed. “You’re not going away!”

“Yes,” interposed Wallingford, “his grandmother – I mean his mother – in Genoa is at the point of death, and he must make a hasty trip. He will return again in a month.”

“Oh, it is too bad, too bad indeed!” she exclaimed. “I sympathize with you, so deeply, Signor Matteo. Signor…”

The dreaded moment had come, and Wallingford braced himself as Miss Forsythe, cocking her head upon one side archly, like a dear little bird, gurgled out one of her very choicest bits of phonograph Italian!

Blackie Daw never batted an eyelash. He beamed upon Miss Forsythe, he displayed his dazzling white teeth in a smile of intense gratification, he grasped Miss Forsythe’s two hands in the fervor of his enthusiasm – and, with every appearance of lively intelligence beaming from his eyes, he fired at Miss Forsythe a tumultuous stream of utterly unintelligible gibberish!

As his flow continued, to the rhythm of an occasional, warm, double handshake, Miss Forsythe’s face turned pink and then red, and when at last, upon the conductor’s signal, Blackie hastily tore himself away and clambered on board, waving his hand to the last and erupting strange syllables which had no kith or kin, Miss Forsythe turned to Wallingford, nearly crying.

“It is humiliating; it is so humiliating,” she admitted, trapped into confession by the suddenness of it all; “but, after all my weeks of preparation, I wasn’t able to understand one word of that beautiful, limpid Italian!”

CHAPTER XXII

IN WHICH J. RUFUS GIVES HIMSELF THE SURPRISE OF HIS LIFE

Wallingford had kept his finger carefully upon the pulse of the Bubble Bank by apparently inconsequential conversations with President Bubble, and he knew its deposits and its surplus almost to the dollar. Twice now he had checked out his entire account and borrowed nearly the face of his bank stock, on short time, against his mere note of hand, replacing the amounts quickly and at the same time depositing large sums, which he almost immediately checked out again.

On the Saturday following Blackie Daw’s departure all points had been brought together: the drainage operation had been completed; walls had been built about the three springs which supplied the swamp; the foundation of the studio had been completed, and all his workmen paid off and discharged; and the surplus of the Bubble Bank had reached approximately its high-water mark.

On Sunday Wallingford, taking dinner with the Bubbles, unrolled a set of drawings, showing a beautiful Colonial residence which he proposed to build on vacant property he had that day bought, just east of Jonas Bubble’s home.

“Good!” approved Jonas with a clumsily bantering glance at his daughter, who colored deliciously. “Going to get married and settle down?”

“You never can tell,” laughed Wallingford. “Whether I do or not, however, the building of one or several houses like this would be a good investment, for the highly paid decorators and modelers which the pottery will employ will pay good rents.”

Jonas nodded gravely.

“How easily success comes to men of enterprise and far-sightedness,” he declared with hearty approbation, in which there was mixed a large amount of self-complacency; for in thus complimenting Wallingford he could not but compliment himself.

On Monday Wallingford walked into the Bubble Bank quite confidently.

“Bubble, how much is my balance?” he asked, as he had done several times before.

Mr. Bubble, smiling, turned to his books.

“Three thousand one hundred and sixty-two dollars and fifty-eight cents,” said he.

“Why, I’m a pauper!” protested Wallingford. “I never could keep track of my bank balance. Well, that isn’t enough. I’ll have to borrow some.”

“I guess we can arrange that,” said Jonas with friendly, one might almost say paternal, encouragement. “How much do you want?”

“Well, I’ll have to have about forty-five thousand dollars, all told,” replied Wallingford in an offhand manner.

He had come behind the railing, as he always did. He was leaning at the end of Mr. Bubble’s desk, his hands crossed before him. From his finger sparkled a big three-carat diamond; from his red-brown cravat – price three-fifty – sparkled another brilliant white stone fully as large; an immaculate white waistcoat was upon his broad chest; from his pocket depended a richly jeweled watch-fob. For just an instant Jonas Bubble was staggered, and then the recently imbibed idea of large operations quickly reasserted itself. Why, here before him stood a commercial Napoleon. Only a week or so before Wallingford’s bank balance had been sixty thousand dollars; at other times it had been even more, and there had been many intervals between when his balance had been less than it was now. Here was a man to whom forty-five thousand dollars meant a mere temporary convenience in conducting operations of incalculable size. Here was a man who had already done more to advance the prosperity of Blakeville than any one other – excepting, of course, himself – in its history. Here was a man predestined by fate to enormous wealth, and, moreover, one who might be linked to Mr. Bubble, he hoped and believed, by ties even stronger than mere business associations.

“Pretty good sum, Wallingford,” said he. “We have the money, though, and I don’t see why we shouldn’t arrange it. Thirty-day note, I suppose?”

“Oh, anything you like,” said Wallingford carelessly. “Fifteen days will do just as well, but I suppose you’d rather have the interest for thirty,” and he laughed pleasantly.

“Yes, indeed,” Jonas replied, echoing the laugh. “You’re just in the nick of time, though, Wallingford. A month from now we wouldn’t have so much. I’m making arrangements not to have idle capital on hand.”

“Idle money always yells at me to put it back into circulation,” said Wallingford, looking about the desk. “Where are your note blanks?”

“Er – right here,” replied Mr. Bubble, drawing the pad from a drawer. “By the way, Wallingford, of course we’ll have to arrange the little matter of securities, and perhaps I’d better see the directors about a loan of this size.”

“Oh, certainly,” agreed Wallingford. “As for security, I’ll just turn over to you my bank stock and a holding on the Etruscan property.”

For one fleeting instant it flashed across Mr. Bubble’s mind that he had sold this very property to Wallingford for the sum of one thousand dollars; but a small patch of stony ground which had been worth absolutely nothing before the finding of gold in it had been known to become worth a million in a day, as Wallingford had once observed when looking across the great swamp, and now the mine he had sold to Wallingford for a song was worth almost any sum that might be named. Hen Moozer, when consulted, was of that opinion; Jim Ranger was of that opinion; Bud Hegler was of that opinion; the other directors were of that opinion; every one in Blakeville was of that opinion; so Wallingford got his forty-five thousand dollars, and the Bubble Bank held in return a mortgage on Wallingford’s bank stock, and on forty acres of genuine Etruscan black mud.

“By the way, Mr. Bubble,” said Wallingford, tucking the bills of exchange into his pocket, “I’m going to take a little run into New York to-day. Would you mind putting the plans for my new house into the hands of the two contractors here for them to figure on?”

“With pleasure. Hope you have a good trip, my boy.”

Well, it was all over, but he was not quite so well satisfied as he had been over the consummation of certain other dubious deals. Heretofore he had hugely enjoyed the matching of his sharp wits against duller ones, had been contemptuous of the people he out-manœuvered, had chuckled in huge content over his triumphs; but in this case there was an obstacle to his perfect enjoyment, and that obstacle was Fannie Bubble. He was rather impatient about it.

He started early for the train, instructing Bob Ranger to be there to drive back the bays, and drove around by way of Jonas Bubble’s house. As he was about to hitch his horses the door opened, and Fannie, dressed for the afternoon, but hatless, came flying out, her head bent and her hands back over it. She was crying, and was closely pursued by Mrs. Bubble, who brandished a feather duster, held by the feather end. Wallingford ran to open the gate as Fannie approached it, closing it and latching it in time to stop her stepmother.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“She’s a lazy, good-for-nothing, frivolous huzzy!” declared Mrs. Bubble in hot wrath.

“I’ve been looking for just that kind,” asserted Wallingford. “She’ll do for me. Fannie, get into the buggy. I came down to take you for a ride to the depot.”

“If she goes away from this house she don’t come back till she gets down on her knees and begs my forgiveness!” shrieked the woman.

“If she does that I’ll have her sent to a bugitorium,” declared Wallingford. “She don’t need to come back here. I’ll take care of her myself. You’ll go with me, won’t you, Fannie?”

“Anywhere,” she said brokenly.

“Then come on.”

Turning, he helped her into the buggy and they drove away, followed by the invectives of Mrs. Bubble. The girl was in a tumult of emotion, her whole little world clattering down about her ears. Bit by bit her story came out. It was sordid enough and trivial enough, but to her it was very real. That afternoon she had planned to go to the country for ferns with a few girls, and they were to meet at the house of one of her friends at one o’clock. Her stepmother had known about it three days in advance, and had given her consent. When the time came, however, she had suddenly insisted that Fannie stop to wash the dishes, which would have made her a half-hour late. There followed protest, argument, flat order and as flat refusal – then the handle of the feather duster. It was not an unusual occurrence for her stepmother to slap her, Fannie admitted in her bitterness. Her father, pompous enough outside, was as wax in the hands of his termagant second wife, and, though his sympathies were secretly with the girl, he never dared protect her.

They had driven straight out the west road in the excitement, but Wallingford, remembering in time his train schedule, made the straightest détour possible to the depot. He had barely time to buy his tickets when the train came in, and he hurried Fannie into the parlor car, her head still in a whirl and her confusion heightened by the sudden appreciation of the fact that she had no hat. The stop at Blakeville was but a brief one, and as the train moved away Fannie looked out of the window and saw upon the platform of the little depot, as if these people were a part of another world entirely, the station agent, the old driver of the dilapidated ’bus, Bob Ranger and others equally a part of her past life, all looking at her in open-mouthed astonishment. Turning, as the last familiar outpost of the town slipped by, she timidly reached out her hand and laid it in that of Wallingford.

The touch of that warm hand laid on his electrified Wallingford. Many women had loved him, or thought they did, and he had held them in more or less contempt for it. He had regarded them as an amusement, as toys to be picked up and discarded at will; but this, somehow, was different. A sudden and startling resolve came to him, an idea so novel that he smiled over it musingly for some little time before he mentioned it.

“By George!” he exclaimed by and by; “I’m going to marry you!”

“Indeed!” she exclaimed in mock surprise, and laughed happily. “The way you said it sounded so funny.”

She was perfectly content.

CHAPTER XXIII

WALLINGFORD GIVES HIMSELF STILL ANOTHER STUPENDOUS SURPRISE

Mrs. Wallingford, gowned and hatted and jeweled as Fannie Bubble had never been, and had never expected to be, tried the luxurious life that J. Rufus affected and found that she liked it. She was happy from day’s end to day’s end. Her husband was the most wonderful man in the world, flawless, perfect. Immediately upon their arrival in the city he had driven in hot haste for a license, and they were married before they left the court-house. Then he had wired the news to Jonas Bubble.

“We start on our honeymoon at once,” he had added, and named their hotel.

By the time they had been shown to the expensive suite which Wallingford had engaged, a reply of earnest congratulation had come back from Jonas Bubble. The next day had begun the delights of shopping, of automobile rides, of the races, the roof gardens, the endless round of cafés. This world was so different, so much brighter and better, so much more pleasant in every way than the world of Blakeville, that she never cared to go back there – she was ashamed to confess it to herself – even to see her father!