Side-stepping with Shorty

But up on the ranch and down in Bedelia I never heard anyone pass remarks on Hank Merrity's looks. He wa'n't no bad man either, but as mild and gentle a beef raiser as you'd want to see. He seemed to be quite a star among the cow punchers, and after I'd got used to his peculiar style of beauty I kind of took to him, too.

The picture didn't r'ile him a bit. He sat there lookin' at it for a good five minutes without sayin' a word, them buttermilk eyes just starin', kind of blank and dazed. Then he looks up, as pleased as a kid, and says, "Wall, I'll be cussed! Mighty slick, ain't it?"

Next he hollers for Reney – that was Mrs. Merrity. She was a good sized, able bodied wild rose, Reney was; not such a bad looker, but a little shy on style. A calico wrapper with the sleeves rolled up, a lot of crinkly brown hair wavin' down her back, and an old pair of carpet slippers on her feet, was Reney's mornin' costume. I shouldn't wonder but what it did for afternoon and evenin' as well.

Mrs. Merrity was more tickled with the picture than Hank. She stared from the paper to him and back again, actin' like she thought Hank had done somethin' she ought to be proud of, but couldn't exactly place.

"Sho, Hank!" says she. "I wisht they'd waited until you'd put on your Sunday shirt and slicked up a little."

He was a real torrid proposition when he did slick up. I saw him do it once, a couple of nights before I broke trainin', when they was goin' to have a dance up to the ranch. His idea of makin' a swell toilet was to take a hunk of sheep tallow and grease his boots clear to the tops. Then he ducks his head into the horse trough and polishes the back of his neck with a bar of yellow soap. Next he dries himself off on a meal sack, uses half a bottle of scented hair oil on his Buffalo Bill thatch, pulls on a striped gingham shirt, ties a red silk handkerchief around his throat, and he's ready to receive comp'ny. I didn't see Mrs. Merrity after she got herself fixed for the ball; but Hank told me she was goin' to wear a shirt waist that she'd sent clear to Kansas City for.

Oh, we got real chummy before I left. He came down to see me off the day I started for Denver, and while we was waitin' for the train he told me the story of his life: How he'd been rustlin' for himself ever since he'd graduated from an orphan asylum in Illinois; the different things he'd worked at before he learned the cow business; and how, when he'd first met Reney slingin' crockery in a railroad restaurant, and married her on sight, they'd started out with a cash capital of one five-dollar bill and thirty-eight cents in change, to make their fortune. Then he told me how many steers and yearlings he owned, and how much grazin' land he'd got inside of wire.

"That's doin' middlin' well, ain't it?" says he.

Come to figure up, it was, and I told him I didn't see why he wa'n't in a fair way to find himself cuttin' into the grape some day.

"It all depends on the Jayhawker," says he. "I've got a third int'rest in that. Course, I ain't hollerin' a lot about it yet, for it ain't much more'n a hole in the ground; but if they ever strike the yellow there maybe we'll come on and take a look at New York."

"It's worth it," says I. "Hunt me up when you do."

"I shore will," says Hank. "Good luck!"

And the last I see of him he was standin' there in his buckskin pants, gawpin' at the steam cars.

Now, I ain't been spendin' my time ever since wonderin' what was happenin' to Hank. You know how it is. Maybe I've had him in mind two or three times. But when I gets that 'phone message I didn't have any trouble about callin' up my last view of him. So, when it come to buttin' into a swell Fifth-ave. hotel and askin' for Hank Merrity, I has a sudden spasm of bashfulness. It didn't last long.

"If Hank was good enough for me to chum with in Bedelia," says I, "he ought to have some standin' with me here. There wa'n't anything I could have asked that he wouldn't have done for me out there, and I guess if he needs some one to show him where Broadway is, and tell him to take his pants out of his boot tops, it's up to me to do it."

Just the same, when I gets up to the desk, I whispers it confidential to the clerk. If he'd come back with a hee-haw I wouldn't have said a word. I was expectin' somethin' of the kind. But never a chuckle. He don't even grin.

"Hank Merrity?" says he, shakin' his head. "We have a guest here, though, by the name of Henry Merrity – Mr. Henry Merrity."

"That's him," says I. "All the Henrys are Hanks when you get west of Omaha. Where'll I find him?"

I was hopin' he'd be up in his room, practisin' with' the electric light buttons, or bracin' himself for a ride down in the elevator; but there was no answer to the call on the house 'phone; so I has to wait while a boy goes out with my card on a silver tray, squeakin', "Mister Merrity! Mis-ter Merrity!" Five minutes later I was towed through the palms into the Turkish smokin' room, and the next thing I knew I was lined up in front of a perfect gent.

Say, if it hadn't been for them buttermilk eyes, you never could have made me believe it was him. Honest, them eyes was all there was left of the Hank Merrity I'd known in Bedelia. It wa'n't just the clothes, either, though he had 'em all on, – op'ra lid, four-button white vest, shiny shoes, and the rest, – it was what had happened to his face that was stunnin' me.

The lip drooper had been wiped out – not just shaved off, mind you, but scrubbed clean. The russet colour was gone, too. He was as pink and white and smooth as a roastin' pig that's been scraped and sandpapered for a window display in a meat shop. You've noticed that electric light complexion some of our Broadway rounders gets on? Well, Hank had it. Even the neck freckles had got the magic touch.

Course, he hadn't been turned into any he Venus, at that; but as he stood, costume and all, he looked as much a part of New York as the Flatiron Buildin'. And while I'm buggin' my eyes out and holdin' my mouth open, he grabs me by the hand and slaps me on the back.

"Why, hello, Shorty! I'm mighty glad to see you. Put 'er there!" says he.

"Gee!" says I. "Then it's true! Now I guess the thing for me to do is to own up to Maude Adams that I believe in fairies. Hank, who did it?"

"Did what?" says he.

"Why, made your face over and put on the Fifth-ave. gloss?" says I.

"Do I look it?" says he, grinnin'. "Would I pass?"

"Pass!" says I. "Hank, they could use you for a sign. Lookin' as you do now, you could go to any one night stand in the country and be handed the New York papers without sayin' a word. What I want to know, though, is how it happened?"

"Happen?" says he. "Shorty, such things don't come by accident. You buy 'em. You go through torture for 'em."

"Say, Hank," says I, "you don't mean to say you've been up against the skinologists?"

Well, he had. They'd kept his face in a steam box by the hour, scrubbed him with pumice stone, electrocuted his lip fringe, made him wear a sleepin' mask, and done everything but peel him alive.

"Look at that for a paw!" says he. "Ain't it lady-like?"

It was. Every fingernail showed the half moon, and the palm was as soft as a baby's.

"You must have been makin' a business of it," says I. "How long has this thing been goin' on?"

"Nearly four months," says Hank, heavin' a groan. "Part of that time I put in five hours a day; but I've got 'em scaled down to two now. It's been awful, Shorty, but it had to be done."

"How was that?" says I.

"On Reney's account," says he. "She's powerful peart at savvyin' things, Reney is. Why, when we struck town I was wearin' a leather trimmed hat and eatin' with my knife, just as polite as I knew how. We hadn't been here a day before she saw that something was wrong. 'Hank,' says she, 'this ain't where we belong. Let's go back.' – 'What for?' says I. – 'Shucks!' says she. 'Can't you see? These folks are different from us. Look at 'em!' Well, I did, and it made me mad. 'Reney,' says I,' I'll allow there is something wrong with us, but I reckon it ain't bone deep. There's such a thing as burnin' one brand over another, ain't there? Suppose we give it a whirl?' That's what we done too, and I'm beginnin' to suspicion we've made good."

"I guess you have, Hank," says I; "but ain't it expensive? You haven't gone broke to do it, have you?"

"Broke!" says he, smilin'. "Guess you ain't heard what they're takin' out of the Jayhawker these days. Why, I couldn't spend it all if I had four hands. But come on. Let's find Reney and go to a show, somewheres."

Course, seein' Hank had kind of prepared me for a change in Mrs. Merrity; so I braces myself for the shock and tries to forget the wrapper and carpet slippers. But you know the kind of birds that roost along Peacock Alley? There was a double row of 'em holdin' down the arm chairs on either side of the corridor, and lookin' like a livin' exhibit of spring millinery. I tried hard to imagine Reney in that bunch; but it was no go. The best I could do was throw up a picture of a squatty female in a Kansas City shirt waist. And then, all of a sudden, we fetches up alongside a fairy in radium silk and lace, with her hair waved to the minute, and carryin' enough sparks to light up the subway. She was the star of the collection, and I nearly loses my breath when Hank says:

"Reney, you remember Shorty McCabe, don't you?"

"Ah, rully!" says she liftin' up a pair of gold handled eye glasses and takin' a peek. "Chawmed to meet you again, Mr. McCabe."

"M-m-me too," says I. It was all the conversation I had ready to pass out.

Maybe I acted some foolish; but for the next few minutes I didn't do anything but stand there, sizin' her up and inspectin' the improvements. There hadn't been any half way business about her. If Hank was a good imitation, Mrs. Merrity was the real thing. She was it. I've often wondered where they all came from, them birds of Paradise that we see floatin' around such places; but now I've got a line on 'em. They ain't all raised in New York. It's pin spots on the map like Bedelia that keeps up the supply.

Reney hadn't stopped with takin' courses at the beauty doctors and goin' the limit on fancy clothes. She'd been plungin' on conversation lessons, voice culture, and all kind of parlour tricks. She'd been keepin' her eyes and ears open too, takin' her models from real life; and the finished product was somethin' you'd say had never been west of Broadway or east of Fourth-ave. As for her ever doin' such a thing as juggle crockery, it was almost a libel to think of it.

"Like it here in town, do you?" says I, firin' it at both of 'em.

"Like it!" says Hank. "See what it's costin' us. We got to like it."

She gives him a look that must have felt like an icicle slipped down his neck. "Certainly we enjoy New York," says she. "It's our home, don'cha know."

"Gosh!" says I. I didn't mean to let it slip out, but it got past me before I knew.

Mrs. Merrity only raises her eyebrows and smiles, as much as to say, "Oh, what can one expect?"

That numbs me so much I didn't have life enough to back out of goin' to the theatre with 'em, as Hank had planned. Course, we has a box, and it wasn't until she'd got herself placed well up in front and was lookin' the house over through the glasses that I gets a chance for a few remarks with Hank.

"Is she like that all the time now?" I whispers.

"You bet!" says he. "Don't she do it good?"

Say, there wa'n't any mistakin' how the act hit Hank. "You ought to see her with her op'ra rig on, though – tiara, and all that," says he.

"Go reg'lar?" says I.

"Tuesdays and Fridays," says he. "We leases the box for them nights."

That gets me curious to know how they puts in their time, so I has him give me an outline. It was something like this: Coffee and rolls at ten-thirty A. M.; hair dressers, manicures, and massage artists till twelve-thirty; drivin' in the brougham till two; an hour off for lunch; more drivin' and shoppin' till five; nap till six; then the maids and valets and so on to fix 'em up for dinner; theatre or op'ra till eleven; supper at some swell café; and the pillows about two A. M.

Then the curtain goes up for the second act, and I see Hank had got his eyes glued on the stage. As we'd come late, I hadn't got the hang of the piece before, but now I notices it's one of them gunless Wild West plays that's hit Broadway so hard. It was a breezy kind of a scene they showed up. To one side was an almost truly log cabin, with a tin wash basin hung on a nail just outside the front door and some real firewood stacked up under the window. Off up the middle was mountains piled up, one on top of the other, clear up into the flies.

The thing didn't strike me at first, until I hears Hank dig up a sigh that sounds as if it started from his shoes. Then I tumbles. This stage settin' was almost a dead ringer for his old ranch out north of Bedelia. In a minute in comes a bunch of stage cowboys. They was a lot cleaner lookin' than any I ever saw around Merrity's, and some of 'em was wearin' misfit whiskers; but barrin' a few little points like that they fitted into the picture well enough. Next we hears a whoop, and in bounces the leadin' lady, rigged out in beaded leggin's, knee length skirt, leather coat, and Shy Ann hat, with her red hair flyin' loose.

Say, I'm a good deal of a come-on when it comes to the ranch business, but I've seen enough to know that if any woman had showed up at Merrity's place in that costume the cow punchers would have blushed into their hats and took for the timber line. I looks at Hank, expectin' to see him wearin' a grin; but he wa'n't. He's 'most tarin' his eyes out, lookin' at them painted mountains and that four-piece log cabin. And would you believe it, Mrs. Merrity was doin' the same! I couldn't see that either of 'em moved durin' the whole act, or took their eyes off that scenery, and when the curtain goes down they just naturally reaches out and grips each other by the hand. For quite some time they didn't say a word. Then Reney breaks the spell.

"You noticed it, didn't you, Hank?" says she.

"Couldn't help it, Reney!" says he huskily.

"I expect the old place is looking awful nice, just about now," she goes on.

Hank was swallowin' hard just then, so all he could do was nod, and a big drop of brine leaks out of one of them buttermilk blue eyes. Reney saw it.

"Hank," says she, still grippin' his hand and talkin' throaty – "let's quit and go back!"

Say, maybe you never heard one of them flannel shirts call the cows home from the next county. A lot of folks who'd paid good money to listen to a weak imitation was treated to the genuine article.

"We-e-e-ough! Glory be!" yells Hank, jumpin' up and knockin' over a chair.

It was an ear splitter, that was. Inside of a minute there was a special cop and four ushers makin' a rush for the back of our box.

"Here, here now!" says one. "You'll have to leave."

"Leave!" says Hank. "Why, gol durn you white faced tenderfeet, you couldn't hold us here another minute with rawhide ropes! Come on, Reney; maybe there's a night train!"

They didn't go quite so sudden as all that. Reney got him to wait until noon next day, so she could fire a few maids and send a bale or so of Paris gowns to the second hand shop; but they made me sit up till 'most mornin' with 'em, while they planned out the kind of a ranch de luxe they was goin' to build when they got back to Bedelia. As near as I could come to it, there was goin' to be four Chinese cooks always standin' ready to fry griddle cakes for any neighbours that might drop in, a dance hall with a floor of polished mahogany, and not a bath tub on the place. What they wanted was to get back among their old friends, put on their old clothes, and enjoy themselves in their own way for the rest of their lives.

X

SHORTY AND THE STRAY

Say, I don't know whether I'll ever get to be a reg'lar week-ender or not, but I've been makin' another stab at it. What's the use ownin' property in the country house belt if you don't use it now and then? So last Saturday, after I shuts up the Studio, I scoots out to my place in Primrose Park.

Well, I puts in the afternoon with Dennis Whaley, who's head gardener and farm superintendent, and everything else a three-acre plot will stand for. Then, about supper time, as I'm just settlin' myself on the front porch with my heels on the stoop rail, wonderin' how folks can manage to live all the time where nothin' ever happens, I hears a chug-chuggin', and up the drive rolls a cute little one-seater bubble, with nobody aboard but a Boston terrier and a boy.

"Chee!" thinks I, "they'll be givin' them gasolene carts to babies next. Wonder what fetches the kid in here?"

Maybe he was a big ten or a small twelve; anyway, he wa'n't more. He's one of these fine haired, light complected youngsters, that a few years ago would have had yellow Fauntleroy curls, and been rigged out in a lace collar and a black velvet suit, and had a nurse to lead him around by the hand. But the new crop of young Astergould Thickwads is bein' trained on different lines. This kid was a good sample. His tow coloured hair is just long enough to tousle nice, and he's bare headed at that. Then he's got on corduroy knickers, a khaki jacket, black leather leggin's, and gauntlet gloves, and he looks almost as healthy as if he was poor.

"Hello, youngster!" says I. "Did you lose the shuffer overboard?"

"Beg pardon," says he; "but I drive my own machine."

"Oh!" says I. "I might have known by the costume."

By this time he's standin' up with his hand to his ear, squintin' out through the trees to the main road, like he was listenin' for somethin'. In a second he hears one of them big six-cylinder cars go hummin' past, and it seems to be what he was waitin' for.

"Goin' to stop, are you?" says I.

"Thank you," says he, "I will stay a little while, if you don't mind," and he proceeds to shut off the gasolene and climb out. The dog follows him.

"Givin' some one the slip?" says I.

"Oh, no," says he real prompt. "I – I've been in a race, that's all."

"Ye-e-es?" says I. "Had a start, didn't you?"

"A little," says he.

With that he sits down on the steps, snuggles the terrier up alongside of him, and begins to look me and the place over careful, without sayin' any more. Course, that ain't the way boys usually act, unless they've got stage fright, and this one didn't seem at all shy. As near as I could guess, he was thinkin' hard, so I let him take his time. I figures out from his looks, and his showin' up in a runabout, that he's come from some of them big country places near by, and that when he gets ready he'll let out what he's after. Sure enough, pretty soon he opens up.

"Wouldn't you like to buy the machine, sir?" says he.

"Selling out, are you?" says I. "Well, what's your askin' price for a rig of that kind?"

He sizes me up for a minute, and then sends out a feeler. "Would five dollars be too much?"

"No," says I, "I shouldn't call that a squeeze, providin' you threw in the dog."

He looks real worried then, and hugs the terrier up closer than ever. "I couldn't sell Togo," says he. "You – you wouldn't want him too, would you?"

When I sees that it wouldn't take much more to get them big blue eyes of his to leakin', I puts him easy on the dog question. "But what's your idea of sellin' the bubble?" says I.

"Why," says he, "I won't need it any longer. I'm going to be a motorman on a trolley car."

"That's a real swell job," says I. "But how will the folks at home take it?"

"The folks at home?" says he, lookin' me straight in the eye. "Why, there aren't any. I haven't any home, you know."

Honest, the way he passed out that whopper was worth watchin'. It was done as cool and scientific as a real estate man takin' oath there wa'n't a mosquito in the whole county.

"Then you're just travelin' around loose, eh?" says I. "Where'd you strike from to-day?"

"Chicago," says he.

"Do tell!" says I. "That's quite a day's run. You must have left before breakfast."

"I had breakfast early," says he.

"Dinner in Buffalo?" says I.

"I didn't stop for dinner," says he.

"In that case – er – what's the name?" says I.

"Mister Smith," says he.

"Easy name to remember," says I.

"Ye-e-es. I'd rather you called me Gerald, though," says he.

"Good," says I. "Well, Gerald, seein' as you've made a long jump since breakfast, what do you say to grubbin' up a little with me, eh?"

That strikes him favourable, and as Mother Whaley is just bringin' in the platter, we goes inside and sits down, Togo and all. He sure didn't fall to like a half starved kid; but maybe that was because he was so busy lookin' at Mrs. Whaley. She ain't much on the French maid type, that's a fact. Her uniform is a checked apron over a faded red wrapper, and she has a way of puggin' her hair up in a little knob that makes her face look like one of the kind they cut out of a cocoanut.

Gerald eyes her for a while; then he leans over to me and whispers, "Is this the butler's night off?"

"Yes," says I. "He has seven a week. This is one of 'em."

After he's thought that over he grins. "I see," says he. "You means you haven't a butler? Why, I thought everyone did."

"There's a few of us struggles along without," says I. "We don't brag about it, though. But where do you keep your butler now, Mr. Gerald?"

That catches him with his guard down, and he begins to look mighty puzzled.

"Oh, come," says I, "you might's well own up. You've brought the runaway act right down to the minute, son; but barrin' the details, it's the same old game. I done the same when I was your age, only instead of runnin' off in a thousand-dollar bubble, I sneaked into an empty freight car."

"Did you?" says he, his eyes openin' wide. "Was it nice, riding in the freight car?"

"Never had so much fun out of a car ride since," says I. "But I was on the war path then. My outfit was a blank cartridge pistol, a scalpin' knife hooked from the kitchen, and a couple of nickel lib'ries that told all about Injun killin'. Don't lay out to slaughter any redskins, do you?"

He looks kind of weary, and shakes his head.

"Well, runnin' a trolley car has its good points, I s'pose," says I; "but I wouldn't tackle it for a year or so if I was you. You'd better give me your 'phone number, and I'll ring up the folks, so they won't be worryin' about you."

But say, this Gerald boy, alias Mr. Smith, don't fall for any smooth talk like that. He just sets his jaws hard and remarks, quiet like, "I guess I'd better be going."

"Where to?" says I.

"New Haven ought to be a good place to sell the machine," says he. "I can get a job there too."

At that I goes to pumpin' him some more, and he starts in to hand out the weirdest line of yarns I ever listened to. Maybe he wa'n't a very skilful liar, but he was a willin' one. Quick as I'd tangle him up on one story, he'd lie himself out and into another. He accounts for his not havin' any home in half a dozen different ways, sometimes killin' off his relations one by one, and then bunchin' 'em in a railroad wreck or an earthquake. But he sticks to Chicago as the place where he lived last, although the nearest he can get to the street number is by sayin' it was somewhere near Central Park.

"That happens to be in New York," says I.

"There are two in Chicago," says he.

"All right, Gerald," says I. "I give up. We'll let it go that you're playin' a lone hand; but before you start out again you'd better get a good night's rest here. What do you say?"

He didn't need much urgin'; so we runs the bubble around into the stable, and I tucks him and Togo away together in the spare bed.

"Who's the little lad?" says Dennis to me.

"For one thing," says I, "he's an honourary member of the Ananias Club. If I can dig up any more information between now and mornin', Dennis, I'll let you know."

First I calls up two or three village police stations along the line; but they hadn't had word of any stray kid.

"That's funny," thinks I. "If he'd lived down in Hester-st., there'd be four thousand cops huntin' him up by this time."

But it wa'n't my cue to do the frettin'; so I lets things rest as they are, only takin' a look at the kid before I turns in, to see that he was safe. And say, that one look gets me all broke up; for when I tiptoes in with the candle I finds that pink and white face of his all streaked up with cryin', and he has one arm around Togo, like he thought that terrier was all the friend he had left.