Oliver watched him for a moment, with a feeling amounting almost to indignation. "Were the poverty and the struggle of a great city to force such familiarities upon him," he wondered. Then something in the negro's face, as he wiped the perspiration from his forehead with the back of his hand, produced a sudden change of feeling. "Was this man, too, without work?" Oliver asked himself, as he felt the negro's weariness, and realized for the first time, the common heritage of all men.

"Are you tired, Uncle?" he asked.

"Yes, a little mite. I been a-totin' dis kindlin' from way up yander in Twenty-third Street where the circus useter be. Dey's buildin' a big hotel dere now—de Fifth Avenue dey calls it. I'm a-carryin' mortar for de brick-layers an' somehow dese sticks is monst'ous heavy after workin' all day."

"Where do you live?" asked Oliver, his eyes on the kindling-wood.

"Not far from here, sah; little way dis side de Bow'ry. Whar's yo'r home?" And the old man rose to his feet and picked up his bundle.

The question staggered Oliver. He had no home, really none that he could call his own—not now.

"Oh, a long way from here," he answered, thoughtfully, without raising his head, his voice choking.

The old negro gazed at him for a moment, touched his hat respectfully, and walked toward the gate. At the entrance he wheeled about, balanced the bundle of wood on his shoulder and looked back at Oliver, who had resumed his old position, his eyes on the ground. Then he walked away, muttering:

"'Pears like he's one o' my own people calling me uncle. Spec' he ain't been long from his mammy."

Two street-rats now sneaked up toward Oliver, watched him for a moment, and whispered to each other. One threw a stone which grazed Oliver's head, the other put his hand to his mouth and yelled: "Spad, spad," at the top of his voice. Oliver understood the epithet, it meant that he wore clean linen, polished shoes, and perhaps, now and then, a pair of gloves. He had heard the same outcry in his own city, for the slang of the street-rat is Volapuk the world over. But he did not resent the assault. He was too tired to chase any boys, and too despondent to answer their taunts.

A constable, attracted by the cries of the boys, now passed in front of him swinging his long staff. He was about to tap Oliver's knees with one end of it, as a gentle reminder that he had better move on, when something in the young man's face or appearance made him change his mind.

"Hi, sonny," he cried, turning quickly and facing Olivr, "yer can't bum round here after ten, ye know. Keep yer eyes peeled for them gates, d'ye hear?"

If Oliver heard he made no reply. He was in no mood to dispute the officer's right to order him about. The gates were not the only openings shut in his face, he thought to himself; everything seemed closed against him in this great city. It was not so at home on Kennedy Square. Its fence, was a shackly, moss-covered, sagging old fence, intertwined with honeysuckles, full of holes and minus many a paling; where he could have found a dozen places to crawl through. He had done so only a few weeks before with Sue in a mad frolic across the Square. Besides, why should the constable speak to him at all? He knew all about the hour of closing the New York gates without the policeman reminding him of it. Had he not sat here every night waiting for that cattle-boat? He hated the place cordially, yet it was the only spot in that great city to which he could come and not be molested while he waited for the barges. He always selected this particular bench because it was nearest the gate that led to the bronze horse. He loved to look at its noble contour silhouetted against the sky or illumined by the street-lamps, and was seldom too tired to be inspired by it. He had never seen any work in sculpture to be compared to it, and for the first few days after his arrival, he was never content to end the day's tramping until he stood beneath it, following its outlines, his heart swelling with pride at the thought that one of his own nationality and not a European had created it. He wished that his father, who believed so in the talent of his countrymen, could see it.

Suddenly, while he was still resenting the familiarity of the constable, his ears were assailed by the cry of a dog in pain; some street-rat had kicked him.

Instantly Oliver was on his feet. A small spaniel was running toward him, followed by half a dozen boys who were pelting him with stones.

Oliver sprang forward as the dog crouched at his feet; caught him up in his arms and started for the rats, who dodged behind the tree-trunks, calling "Spad, spad," as they ran. Then came the voice of the same constable.

"Hi, yer can't bring that dog in here."

"He's not my dog, somebody has hurt him," said Oliver in an indifferent tone, examining carefully the dog's legs to see if any bones were broken.

"If that ain't your dog what yer doin' with him? See here, I been a-watchin' ye. Yer got ter move on or I'll run ye in. D'ye moind?"

Oliver's eyes flashed. In all his life no man had ever doubted his word, nor had anyone ever spoken to him in such terms.

"You can do as you please, but I will take care of this dog, no matter what happens. You ought to be ashamed of yourself to see him hurt, and not want to protect him. You're a pretty kind of an officer."

A crowd began to gather.

Oliver was standing with the dog under one arm, holding the little fellow close to his breast, the other bent with fist tight shut as if to defend himself.

"I am, am I? yer moon-faced spad! I'll show ye," and he sprang toward Oliver.

"Here now, Tim Murphy," came a sharp voice, "kape yer hands off the young gintleman. He ain't a-doin' nothin', and he ain't done nothin'. Thim divils hit the dog, I seen 'em myself."

The officer turned quickly and faced a big, broad- shouldered Irish woman, bare-headed, her sleeves rolled up to her elbows, every line in her kindly face replete with indignation.

"Don't put yer hands on him, or I'll go to the lock-up an' tell McManus."

"Oh, it's you, is it, Mrs. Mulligan?" said the officer, in a conciliatory tone.

"Yes, it's me. The young gintleman's right. It's the b'ys ye oughter club into shape, not be foolin' yer time over the dog."

"Well, ye know it's agin the rules to let dogs inside the gates," he retorted as he continued his stroll along the walk, swinging his club as he went, puffing out his chest and cheeks with his old air as he moved toward the gate.

"Yes, an' so it's agin the rules," she called after him, "to have them rapscallions yellin' like mad an' howlin' bloody murder when a body comes up here to git a breath o' air."

"Is the dog hurt, sir?" and she stepped close to Oliver and laid her big hand on the dog's head, as it lay nestling close to Oliver's side.

"No, I don't think so—he would have been if I had not got him."

The dog, under the caress, raised his head, and a slight movement of his tail expressed his pleasure. Then his ears shot forward. A young man about Oliver's own age was rapidly walking up the path, with a quick, springy step, whistling as he came. The dog, with a sudden movement, squirmed himself from under Oliver's arm and sprang toward him.

"Oh, it's you, Mr. Fred, is it?" broke out the woman, "and it's Miss Margaret's dog, too. Of course it's her dog, an' I was that dumb I didn't know it. But it's not me ye can thank for savin' its skin —it's the young gintleman here. Them divils would have killed it but for him."

"Is the dog yours, sir?" asked Oliver, raising his hat with that peculiar manner of his which always won him friends at first sight.

"No, I wish it were. It's Miss Margaret Grant's dog—one of our students. I am taking care of it while she is away. The little rascal ran out and got into the Square before I knew it. I live right across the street—you can see my house from here. Miss Grant will be ever so much obliged to you for protecting him."

"Oh, don't mention it. I got hold of him just in time, or these ruffians would have hurt him. I think the old lady here, however, is most to be thanked. We might both have been locked up," he added, smiling, "if she had not interfered. You know her, it seems."

"Yes, she's Mother Mulligan, as we call her. She's janitress of the Academy of Design, where I draw at night. My name's Fred Stone. Come over to where I live—it's only a step," and he looked straight into Oliver's face, his big blue eyes never wavering.

"Well, I will if you don't think it's too late," and the two young fellows, with a wave of their hands to the old woman, left the Square, the dog bounding before them.

Within the hour—in less time indeed, for the friendly light in the eyes of his new-found friend had shone straight into our boy's soul, warming and cheering him to his finger-tips, opening his heart, and bringing out all his secrets—Oliver had told Fred the story of his fruitless tramps for work; of his mother's hopes and fears; of his own ambitions and his aims. And Fred, his own heart wide open, had told Oliver with equal frankness the story of his own struggles; of his leaving his father's farm in the western part of the State, and of his giving up everything to come to New York to study art.

It was the old, old story of two chance acquaintances made friends by reason of the common ground of struggle and privation on which they stood; comrades fighting side by side in the same trenches for the same end, and both dreaming of the morrow which would always bring victory and never death. A story told without reserve, for the disappointments of life had not yet dulled their enthusiasm, nor had the caution acquired by its many bitter experiences yet checked the free flow of their confidences.

To Oliver, in his present despondent mood, the hand held out to him was more than the hand of a comrade. It was the hand of a strong swimmer thrust into the sea to save a drowning man. There were others then besides himself, he thought, as he grasped it, who were making this fight for bread and glory; there was something else in the great city besides cruelty and misery, money-getting and money- spending—something of unselfishness, sympathy and love.

The two sat on the steps of Fred's boarding-house —that house where Oliver was to spend so many happy days of his after-life—until there was only time enough to catch the barge. Reluctantly he bade his new-found comrade good-by and, waving his hand, turned the corner in the direction of the dock.

The edge of Oliver's cloud had at last caught the light!



CHAPTER VIII

AN OLD SONG



Not only had the sunshine of a new friendship illumined the edge of Oliver's clouds, but before the week was out a big breeze laden with success had swept them so far out to sea, that none but the clearest of skies radiant with hope now arched above his happy face.

A paste-board sign had wrought this miracle.

One day he had been tramping the lower parts of the city, down among the docks, near Coenties Slip, looking up the people who on former visits had said: "Some other time, perhaps," or "If we should have room for another man we will be glad to remember you," or "We know Mr. Cobb, and shall be pleased," etc., etc., when he chanced to espy a strange sign tacked outside a warehouse door, a sign which bore the unheard-of-announcement—unheard of to Oliver, especially the last word, "Shipping Clerk WANTED."

No one, for weeks, had WANTED anything that Oliver could furnish. Strangely enough too, as he afterward discovered, the bullet-headed Dutch porter had driven the last tack into the clean, white, welcome face of the sign only five minutes before Oliver stopped in front of it. Still more out of the common, and still more incomprehensible, was the reply made to him by the head salesman, whom he found just inside the door—a wiry, restless little man with two keen black eyes, and a perfectly bald head.

"Yes, if you can mark boxes decently; can show any references; don't want too much pay, and can come NOW. We're short of a boy, and it's our busy season."

Oh! blessed be Mr. Crocker, thought Oliver, as he picked up a marking-brush, stirred it round and round in the tin pot filled with lamp-black and turpentine, and to his own and the clerk's delight, painted, on a clean board, rapidly and clearly, and in new letters too—new to the clerk—the full address of the bald-headed man's employers:

MORTON, SLADE & CO., 121 PEARL STREET, NEW YORK.

More amazing still were the announcements made by the same bald-headed man after Oliver had shown him Amos Cobb's recommendations: Oliver was to come to work in the morning, the situation to be permanent provided Cobb confirmed by letter the good wishes he had previously expressed, and provided Mr. Morton, the senior partner, approved of the bald- head's action; of which the animated billiard-ball said there was not the slightest doubt as he, the ball, had charge of the shipping department, and was responsible for its efficiency.

All of these astounding, incomprehensible and amazing occurrences Oliver had written to his mother, ending his letter by declaring in his enthusiasm that it was his art, after all, which had pulled him through, and that but for his readiness with the brush, he would still be a tramp, instead of "rolling in luxury on the huge sum of eight dollars a week, with every probability of becoming a partner in the house, and later on a millionnaire." To which the dear lady had replied, that she was delighted to know he had pleased his employers, but that what had pleased her most was his never having lost heart while trying to win his first fight, adding: "The second victory will come more easily, my darling boy, and so will each one hereafter." Poor lady, she never knew how sore that boy's feet had been, nor how many times he had gone with half a meal or none at all, for fear of depleting too much the small store she had given him when he left home.

With his success still upon him, he had sallied forth to call upon young Fred Stone who had grasped his hand so warmly the night he had rescued the dog from the street-boys, and whose sympathy had gone out to him so freely. He had written him of his good fortune, and Fred had replied, begging him to call upon him, and had appointed this same Friday night as the night of all others when he could entertain him best.

But Oliver is not the same boy who said good-by to Fred that moonlight night the week before. His eyes are brighter; his face is a-glow with ill-concealed pleasure. Even his step shows the old-time spring and lightness of the days at home—on his toes part of the time, as if restraining an almost uncontrollable impulse to stop and throw one or two hand- springs just to relieve the pressure on his nerves.

When he reached the bench in the Square where he had sat so many nights with his head in his hands, one of those quick outbursts of enthusiasm took possession of him, the kind that sets young hearts singing with joy when some sudden shift of hope's kaleidoscope opens a wide horizon brilliant with the light of future success. With an exclamation of boyish glee he plumped himself down upon the hard planks of the bench, and jumped up again, pirouetting on his toe and slanting his hat over one eye as if in a spirit of sheer bravado against fate. Then he sauntered out of the iron gate to Fred's house.

Even as he waited on the stone steps of Miss Teeturn's boarding-house for the dowdy servant-girl's return—such dirty, unkempt steps as they were, and such a dingy door-plate, spotted with rain and dust, not like Malachi's, he thought—he could hardly restrain himself from beating Juba with his foot, a plantation trick Malachi had taught him, keeping time the while with the palms of his hands on his shapely legs.

Meanwhile another young enthusiast is coming downstairs three steps at a time, this one bare- headed, all out of breath, and without a coat, who pours out his heart to the first Juba-beating enthusiast as the two climb the stairs together to the second enthusiast's room on the very top floor. He tells him of his delight at seeing him again and of the lot of fellows waiting to welcome him under the skylight; and of what a jolly lot the "Skylarkers" really are; and of Mr. Slade, Oliver's employer, whom Fred knows and who comes from Fred's own town; and of how much Mr. Slade likes a certain new clerk, one Oliver Horn, of Kennedy Square, he having said so the night before, this same Horn being the precise individual whose arm at that very moment was locked in Fred's own and which was now getting an extra squeeze merely for the purposes of identification.

All of this Fred poured into Oliver's willing ear without stopping to take breath, as they mounted the four long flights of stairs that led to the top floor, where, under the roof, there lived a group of Bohemians as unique in their personalities as could be found the great city over.

When the two pairs of feet had at last reached the last flight of steps under the flat roof of the house, the "Skylarkers" were singing "Old Dog Tray" at the top of their voices, to the accompaniment of a piano, and of some other instruments, the character of which our young hero failed to recognize, although the strains had grown louder and louder as the young men mounted the stairs.

As Oliver stood in the open doorway and looked in through the haze of tobacco-smoke upon the group, he instantly became conscious that a new world had opened before him; a world, as he had always pictured it, full of mystery and charm, peopled by a race as fascinating to him as any Mr. Crocker had ever described, and as new and strange as if its members had been the denizens of another planet.

The interior was not a room, but a square low-ceiled hall into which opened some six or more small bedrooms, slept in, whenever sleep was possible, by an equal number of Miss Teetum's boarders. The construction and appointments of this open garret, with two exceptions, were similar to those of all other garrets of its class: it had walls and ceiling, once whitewashed, and now discolored by roof- leaks from a weather-beaten skylight; its floor was bare of carpet, and its well-worn woodwork was stained with time and use. Chairs, however, were scarce, most of the boarders and their guests being seated on the floor.

The two exceptions, already noted, were some crisp, telling sketches, big and little, in color and black-and- white, the work of the artist members of this coterie, which covered every square inch of the leak-stained surface of ceiling and wall, and the yellow-keyed, battered piano which occupied the centre of the open space and which stood immediately under two flaring gas-jets. At the moment of Fred's and Oliver's arrival the top of this instrument was ornamented by two musically inclined gentlemen, one seated cross- legged like a Turk, voicing the misfortunes of Dog Tray, the other, with his legs resting on a chair, beating time to the melody with a cane. This cane, at short intervals, he brought down upon the shoulders of any ambitious member who attempted to usurp his place. The chief object of the gathering, so far as Oliver's hasty glance could determine, was undoubtedly the making of as much noise as possible.

While the young men stood looking into the room waiting for the song to cease prior to Oliver's entry and introduction, Fred whispered hurriedly into his guest's ear some of the names, occupations, and characteristics of the group before him.

The cross-legged man with the long neck, drooping mustache, and ropy black hair, was none other than Bowdoin, the artist—the only American who had taken a medal at Munich for landscape, but who was now painting portraits and starving slowly in consequence. He mounted to this eyry every Friday night, so as to be reminded of the good old days at Schwartz's. The short, big-mustached, bald- headed man swinging the cane, was Bianchi—Julius Bianchi—known to the Skylarkers as "The Pole," and to the world at large as an accomplished lithographer and maker of mezzotints. Bianchi was a piece of the early artistic driftwood cast upon our shores—an artist every inch of him—drawing from life, and handling the crayon like a master.

The pale-faced young fellow at the piano, with bulging watch-crystal eye-glasses and hair tucked behind his ears, was the well-known, all-round musician, Wenby Simmons—otherwise known as "Pussy Me-ow" —a name associated in some way with the strings of his violin. This virtuoso played in the orchestra at the Winter Garden, and occupied the bedroom next to Fred's.

The clean-shaven, well-groomed young Englishman standing behind Simmons and holding a coal- scuttle half full of coal which he shook with deafening jangle to help swell the chorus, was "My Lord Cockburn" so called—an exchange clerk in a banking- house. He occupied the room opposite Fred's.

With the ending of the chorus Fred Stone stepped into the open space with his arm through that of his guest, and the noise was hushed long enough for the entire party to welcome the young Southerner—a welcome which kindled into a glow of enthusiasm when they caught the look of frank undisguised pleasure which lighted his face, and noticed the unaffected bow with which he entered the room, shaking hands with each one as Fred introduced him—and all with that warm, hearty, simple, courteous manner peculiar to his people.

The slight ceremony over—almost every Friday night some new guest was welcomed—Fred seated himself on the floor with his back to the whitewashed wall, although two chairs were at once offered them, and made room for Oliver, who settled down beside him.

As they sat leaning back, Oliver's eyes wandering over the room drinking in the strange, fascinating scene before him, as bewildering as it was unexpected, Fred—now that they were closer to the scene of action, again whispered or shouted, as the suddenly revived noise permitted, into Oliver's alert and delighted ears, such additional facts concerning the other members present as he thought would interest his guest.

The fat man behind the piano astride of a chair, a pipe in his mouth and a black velvet skull-cap on his head, was Tom Waller, the sheep-painter-Thomas Brandon Waller, he signed it—known as the Walrus. He, too, was a boarder and a delightful fellow, although an habitual grumbler. His highest ambition was to affix an N. A. at the end of his name, but he had failed of election by thirty votes out of forty cast. That exasperating event he had duly celebrated at Pfaff's in various continued libations covering a week, and had accordingly, on many proper and improper occasions, renewed and recelebrated the event, breathing out meanwhile, between his pewter mugs, scathing anathemas against the "idiots" who had defeated him out of his just rights, and who were stupid enough to believe in the school of Verboeckhoeven. Slick and shiny Verboeckhoeven, "the mechanic," he would call him, with his fists closed tight, who painted the hair on every one of his sheep as if it were curled by a pair of barber's tongs—not dirty and woolly and full of suggestions as, of course, he —the great Waller, alone of all living animal-painters —depicted it. All of which, to Waller's credit, it must be parenthetically stated, these same "idiots" learned to recognize in after years as true, when that distinguished animal-painter took a medal at the Salon for the same picture which the Jury of N. A.'s had rejected at their Spring Exhibition.

The irreproachable, immaculate young person, with eyes half-closed, lying back in the arm-chair— one which he had brought from his own room—was "Ruffle-shirt" Tomlins. He was the only member who dressed every day for dinner, whether he was going out afterward or not—spike-tailed coat, white tie and all. Tomlins not only knew intimately a lady of high degree who owned a box at the Academy of Music, in Fourteenth Street, and who invited him to sit in it at least once a season, but he had besides a large visiting acquaintance among the people of quality living on Irving Place. A very agreeable and kindly little man was "Ruffle-shirt" Tomlins— so Fred said—the sort of a little man whose philosophy of life was based on the possibility of catching more innocent, unwary flies with honey than he could with vinegar, and who, in consequence, always said nice things about everybody—sometimes in a loud tone enough for everybody to hear. This last statement of Fred's Tomlins confirmed ten minutes later by remarking, in a stage whisper to Waller:

"Did you see how that young Mr. Horn entered the room? Nobody like these high-bred Southerners, my boy. Quite the air of a man of the world— hasn't he?" To all of which the distinguished sheep- painter made no other reply than a slight nod of the head, as he blew a cloud of smoke toward the ceiling —Tomlins's immaculate appearance being a constant offence to the untidy painter.

The member with the stentorian voice, who was roaring out his opinions to Cockburn, Fred continued, was "Fog-horn" Cranch, the auctioneer. His room was next to Waller's. His weaknesses were gay-colored waistcoats and astounding cravats. He varied these portions of his dress according to wind, weather, and sales of the day—selecting blue for sunshiny mornings, black for rainy ones, green for pictures, red for household furniture, white for real estate, etc. Into these color-schemes he stuck a variety of scarf-pins—none very valuable or rare, but each one distinct—a miniature ivory skull, for instance, with little garnets for eyes, or tiny onyx dice with sixes on all sides.

The one man of all the others most beloved by Fred and every other boarder, guest, and habitue that gathered around the piano in this garret-room, and now conspicuous by his absence, he having gone to the circus opposite the Academy of Music, and not likely to return until late—a fact greatly regretted by Fred who made this announcement with lowered voice to Oliver—was a young Irishman by the name of McFudd—Cornelius McFudd, the life of the house, and whom Waller, in accordance with the general custom, had christened "Continuous McFuddie," by reason of the nature of the Hibernian's habits. His room was across the open space opposite Fred's, with windows overlooking the yard.

This condensation of good-nature, wit, and good- humor, Fred went on to say, had been shipped to "The States" by his father, a rich manufacturer of Irish whiskies in Dublin, that he might learn something of the ways of the New World. And there was not the slightest doubt in the minds of his comrades, so Fred assured Oliver, that he had not only won his diploma, but that the sum of his knowledge along several other lines far exceeded that of any one of his contemporaries. His allowances came regularly every month, through the hands of Cockburn, who had known him in London, and whose bank cashed McFudd's remittances—a fact which enabled my lord to a greater extent than the others to keep an eye on the Irishman's movements and expenditures.

Whatever deviltry was inaugurated on this top floor during the day as well as the night, and it was pretty constant, could be traced without much difficulty to this irrepressible young Irishman. If Tomlins found his dress-suit put to bed, with a pillow for a body and his crush-hat for a head; or Cranch found Waller's lay-figure (Waller often used his bedroom as a studio) sitting bolt upright in his easy-chair, with its back to him reading a newspaper—the servant having been told to announce to Cranch, the moment she opened the door, that "a gentleman was waiting for him in his room"; or Cockburn was sent off on some wild-goose chase uptown—it was safe to say that Mac was at the bottom of it all.

If, Fred added impressively, this rollicking, devil- may-care, perfectly sound and hearty young Hibernian had ever been absolutely, entirely, and completely sober since his sojourn in the land of the free, no one of his fellow-boarders had ever discovered it.

Of this motley gathering "Ruffle-shirt" Tomlins, the swell; "Fog-horn" Cranch, the auctioneer; "Walrus" Waller, the sheep-painter; "My Lord" Cockburn, the Englishman; Fred Stone and Cornelius McFudd, not only occupied the bedrooms, but had seats at Miss Teetum's table, four flights below. Bianchi and the others were the guests of the evening.

All this, and more, Fred poured into Oliver's willing ear in loud or soft tones, dependent upon the particular kind of bedlam that was loose in the room at the moment, as they sat side by side on the floor, Oliver's back supported by a pillow which Tomlins had brought from his own bed and tucked behind his shoulders with his own hand.

This courtesy had been followed by another, quite as comforting and as thoughtful. Cockburn, the moment Oliver's back touched the wall, had handed him a tooth-brush mug without a handle, filled to the brim with a decoction of Cockburn's own brewing, compounded hot according to McFudd's receipt, and poured from an earthen pitcher kept within reach of Cockburn's hand, and to which Oliver, in accordance with his habitual custom, had merely touched his lips, he being the most temperate of young gentlemen.

While they talked on, stopping now and then to listen to some outburst of Cranch, whose voice drowned all others—or to snatches of song from Wenby Simmons, the musician, or from Julius Bianchi, Waller's voice managed to make itself felt above the din with an earnestness that gained the attention and calmed all the others.

"You don't know what you're all talking about," he was heard to say. He was still astride his chair, his pipe in his hand. "Inness's picture was the best thing we had in the Exhibition, except Eastman Johnson's 'Negro Life at the South.' Kensett's 'Lake George' was—"

"What—that Inness smear?" retorted "My Lord" Cockburn, who still stood with the coal-scuttle in his hand ready for another chorus. "Positively, Waller, you Americans amuse me. Do you really think that you've got anybody about you who can paint anything worth having—"

"Oh! oh! Hear the high-cockalorum! Oh! oh!"

The sheep-painter raised his hand to command silence.

"Do I think we've got anybody about here who can paint?—you fog-headed noodle from Piccadilly? We've got a dozen young fellows in this very town that put more real stuff into their canvases than all your men put together. They don't tickle their things to death with detail. They get air and vitality and out-of-doors into their work, and—"

"Names! Names!" shouted "My Lord" Cockburn, rattling the scuttle to drown the answers to his questions.

"George Inness for one, and young McEntee and Sanford Gifford, and Eastman Johnson, Page, Casilear —a lot of them," shouted "The Walrus." "Go to the Exhibition and see for yourself, and you—"

The rest of the discussion was lost to Oliver's ears owing to the roar of Cranch's fog-horn, accompanied by another vigorous shaking of the scuttle, which the auctioneer caught away from "My Lord" Cockburn's grasp, and the pounding of Simmons's fingers on the yellow keys of the wheezy piano.

The tribute to Inness had not been missed by Oliver, despite the deafening noise accompanying its utterance. He remembered another green smear, that hung in Mr. Crocker's studio, to which that old enthusiast always pointed as the work of a man who would yet be heard from if he lived. He had never appreciated it himself at the time, but now he saw that Mr. Crocker must be right.

Someone now started the chorus—

Down among the dead men, down.

Instantly every man was on his feet crowding about the piano, Oliver catching the inspiration of the moment and joining in with the others. The quality of his voice must have caught the ear of some of the singers, for they gradually lowered their tones; leaving Oliver's voice almost alone.

Fred's eye glowed with pleasure. His new-found friend was making a favorable impression. He at once urged Oliver to sing one of his own Southern songs as the darkies sung them at home, and not as they were caricatured by the end men in the minstrel shows.

Oliver, at first abashed, and then anxious to contribute something of his own in return for all the pleasure they had given him, hummed the tune for Simmons, and in the hush that followed began one of the old plantation songs that Malachi had taught him, beginning with

De old black dog he bay at de moon, Away down yan ribber. Miss Bull-frog say she git dar soon, Away down yan ribber.

As the melody rang through the room, now full and strong, now plaintive as the cooing of a dove or the moan of a whippoorwill, the men stood stock-still, their wondering eyes fixed on the singer, and it was not until the timely arrival of the Bull-frog and the escape of her lover had been fully told that the listening crowd allowed themselves to do much more than breathe. Then there came a shout that nearly raised the roof. The peculiar sweetness of Oliver's voice, the quaintness of the melody, the grotesqueness of his gestures—for it was pantomime as well as music —and the quiet simplicity and earnestness with which it had all been done, had captivated every man in the room. It was Oliver's first triumph—the first in all his life.

And the second was not far off, for in the midst of all the uproar that followed, as he resumed his place on the floor, Cockburn sprang to his feet and proposed Mr. Oliver Horn as a full member of the Skylarkers' Club. This was carried unanimously, and a committee of two, consisting of "Ruffle-shirt" Tomlins and Waller, were forthwith appointed to acquaint the said member, who stood three feet away, of his election, and to escort him to Tomlins's chair— the largest and most imposing-looking one in the room. This action was indorsed by the shouts and cat-calls of all present, accompanied by earthquake shakings of the coal-scuttle and the rattling of chairlegs and canes on the floor.

Oliver rose to his feet and stood blushing like a girl, thanking those about him in halting sentences for the honor conferred upon him. Then he stammered something about his not deserving their praise, for he could really sing very few songs—only those he had sung at home to help out an occasional chorus, and that he would be delighted to join in another song if any one of the gentlemen present would start the tune.

These last suggestions being eminently distasteful to the group, were immediately drowned in a series of protests, the noise only ceasing when "Fog-horn" Cranch mounted a chair and in his best real estate voice commanded silence.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," thundered the auctioneer, "I have the honor to announce that the great barytone, Mr. Oliver Horn, known to the universe as the 'Musical Cornucopia,' late of the sunny South, and now a resident of this metropolis, will delight this company by singing one of those soul-moving plantation melodies which have made his name famous over two hemispheres. Mr. 'Pussy Me-ow' Simmons, the distinguished fiddling pianist, late of the Bowery, very late, I may remark, and now on the waiting list at Wallack's Theatre—every other month, I am told—will accompany him."

"Hear! Hear!" "Horn! Horn!" "Don't let him get away, Fred." "Song! Song!" was heard all over the room.

Oliver again tried to protest, but he was again shouted down by cries of—

"None of that!" "Can't fool us." "You know a barrel of 'em." "Song! Song!"

Cranch broke in again—"Mr. Horn's modesty, gentlemen, greatly endears him to his fellow-members, and we love him the better for it, but all the same—" and he raised his hand with the same gesture he would have used had it held an auctioneer's hammer— "All in favor of his singing again say 'Aye!' Going! Going! Gone! The ayes have it." In the midst of the cheering Cranch jumped from the chair and taking Oliver by the hand as if he had been a young prima donna at her first appearance, led him to the piano with all the airs and graces common to such an occasion.

Our young hero hesitated a moment, looked about in a pleased but helpless way, and nerving himself tried to collect his thoughts sufficiently to recall some one of the songs that were so familiar to him at home. Then Sue's black eyes looked into his—there must always be a woman helping Oliver—and the strains of the last song he had sung with her the night before he left home floated through his brain. (These same eyes were gazing into another's at the moment, but our young Oliver was unconscious of that lamentable fact.)

"Did you ever happen to hear 'The Old Kentucky Home'?" Oliver asked Simmons. "No? Well, it goes this way," and he struck the chords.

"You play it," said Simmons, rising from the stool.

"Oh, I can only play the chords, and not all of them right—" and he took Simmons's seat. "Perhaps I can get through—I'll try it," he added, simply, and squared himself before the instrument and began the melody.

The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home, 'Tis summer, the darkies are gay. The corn-top's ripe and the meadow is in bloom, While the birds make music all the day.

Weep no more, my lady—oh, weep no more to-day! We'll sing one song for the old Kentucky home, For the old Kentucky home far away.

As the words rolled from his lips Oliver seemed to forget the scene before him. Somehow he could see the light in Sue's eyes, as she listened, and hear her last words. He could hear the voice of his mother, and feel her hand on his head; and then, as the soft vowels and cadences of the quaint melody breathed themselves out, he could catch again the expression of delight on the face of Malachi—who had taught him the song—as he listened, his black cheek in his wrinkled palm. It was a supreme moment with Oliver. The thrill of happiness that had quivered through him for days, intensified by this new heaven of Bohemia, vibrated in every note he uttered.

The effect was equally startling on those about him. Cranch craned his head, and for once lowered his voice to a whisper in speaking to the man next him. Bowdoin, the painter, and one of the guests, left his seat and tip-toed to the piano, his eyes riveted on Oliver's face, his whole being absorbed in the melody. Bianchi and Waller so far lost themselves that their pipes went out, while Simmons was so entranced that he forgot to applaud when Oliver finished.

The effect produced was not so much due to the quality in Oliver's voice—sweet and sympathetic as it was—nor to his manner of singing, nor to the sentiment of the song itself, but to the fact of its being, with its clear, sweet notes, a positive contrast to all of noise and clamor that had gone before. This fact, more than any other, made his listeners hold their breath in wonder and delight. It came like the song of a bird bursting out after a storm and charming everyone with the beauty of its melody, while the thunder of the tempest still reverberated through the air.

In the hush of the death-like stillness that followed, the steady tramp of feet was heard on the staircase, and the next instant the head of a young man, with a rosy face and side-chop coachman whiskers, close-cut black hair and shoe-button eyes, glistening with fun, was craned around the jamb of the door.

It was the property of Mr. Cornelius McFudd!

He was in full evening dress, and as immaculate as if he had stepped out of a bandbox.

Whatever stimulants had permeated his system and fired his imagination had evidently escaped his legs, for they were as steady as those of a tripod. His entrance, in a measure, restored the assemblage to its normal condition. Mr. McFudd raised his hand impressively, checking the customary outbreak that always greeted his appearance on occasions like this, struck a deprecatory attitude and said, solemnly, in a rich, North-of-Ireland accent:

"Gentlemen, it is with the greatest surprise that I find ye contint to waste your time over such riotous proceedings as I know have taken place here to-night, when within a block of yez is a perfarmance that would delight yer souls. Think of a man throwing a hand-spring over—"

At this instant a wet sponge was fired point blank from an open bedroom door, missed McFudd's head by an inch and bounded down the staircase.

"Thank ye, Admiral Lord Cockburn, for yer civility," cried McFudd, bowing low to the open bedroom door, "and for yer good intintions, but ye missed it as yer did yer mither's blessing—and as ye do most of the things ye try io hit." This was said without raising his voice or changing a muscle of his face, his eyes fixed on the door inside of which stood Cockburn.

McFudd continued, "The perfarmance of this acrobat is one of the—"

Cries of "Don't you see you disturb the music?" "Go to bed!" "Somebody sit on McFudd!" etc., filled the room.

"Go on, gentlemen. Continue your insults; defame the name of an honest man who is attimpting to convey to yer dull comprehinsions some idea of the wonders of the acrobatic ring. I'll turn a hand-spring for yez meself that will illustrate what I mane," and Mr. McFudd carefully removed his coat and began sliding up his shirt-cuffs.

At this juncture "My Lord" Cockburn, who had come from behind the door, winked significantly at Waller, and creeping on all fours behind McFudd, just as that gentleman was about lifting his legs aloft, swept him off his feet by a twist of his arm, and deposited him on the small of his back next to Oliver, his head resting against the wall. There Waller stood over him with a chair, which he threatened to turn over him upside down and sit on if the prostrate Irishman moved an inch.

McFudd waved his hand sadly as if in acquiescence to the inscrutable laws of fate, begged the gentlemen present to give no further thought to his existence, and after a moment of silence continued his remarks on the acrobatic ring to Oliver in the same monotonous tone of voice which he had addressed to the room before Cockburn's flank movement had made him bite the dust.

"It may seem to you, Mr.— Mr.—, I haven't your name, sir," and he bent his head toward Oliver.

"Horn, sir," Oliver suggested. "Oliver Horn."

"Thanks, it may seem to you that I'm exaggerating, Mr. Oliver Horn, the wonder of this perfarmance, but-"

The rest of the sentence, despite the Hibernian's well-intentioned efforts, was not addressed to Oliver, but to the room at large, or rather to its furniture, or to be still more exact, to the legs of the piano, and such chairs and tables as the Irishman's prostrate body bumped into on the way to his room. For at that instant Waller, to save Oliver, as he pretended, from further annoyance, had caught the distinguished Hibernian by both feet, and in that position dragged him along the floor, as if he had been a wheelbarrow, McFudd's voice never changing its tone as he continued his remarks on physical culture, and the benefits which would accrue to the human race if they would practice the acrobat's hand-spring.

When Fred and Oliver had closed their bedroom door for the night, the guests having departed and all the regular boarders being supposedly secure in their beds (Fred without much difficulty had persuaded Oliver to share his own bed over night), there came a knock at Fred's door, and the irrepressible Irishman stalked in.

He had removed his vest, high collar, and shoes, and had the air and look of an athlete. The marvellous skill of the acrobat still occupied his mind.

"Don't disturb yourself, my dear Stone, but me deloightful conversation with yer friend, Mr. Horn, was interrupted by that wild beast of a Waller, and I wanted to finish it. I am quite sure I can do it—the trick I was telling ye of. I've been practizing in me room. It's as easy as rolling off a jaunting car."

"No, Mac, old man. Go to bed again," pleaded Fred.

"Not till I show ye, me boy, one of the most beautiful feats of agility—"

"Come off, Mac, I say," cried Fred, catching the Irishman around the waist.

"I'll come nothing! Unhand me, gentlemen, or by the—" and tearing himself free McFudd threw a hand-spring with the ease of a professional, toppled, for a moment, his feet in the air, scraped along the whitewashed wall with his heels, and sweeping the basins and pitchers filled with water from the wash- stand measured his length on the floor. Then came the crash of broken china, a deluge of water, and Fred and Oliver began catching up sponges and towels to stay the flood.

A minute later a man in a long gray beard and longer night-robe—one of the regular boarders— bounded up the stairs two steps at a time and dashed through Fred's open door.

"By thunder, boys!" he cried, "I don't mind how much noise you make, rather like it; but what the devil are you trying to drown us out for? Wife is soaking—it's puddling down on our bed."

By this time every door had been flung open, and the room was filled with half-dressed men.

"It's that lunatic, McFudd. He's been to the circus and thinks he's Martello," cried Fred, pointing to the prostrate Irishman with the sponge which he had been squeezing out in the coal-scuttle.

"Or the clown," remarked Waller, stooping over McFudd, who was now holding his sides and roaring with laughter.

Long after Fred had fallen asleep, Oliver lay awake thinking of the night's pleasure. He had been very, very happy—happier than he had been for many months. The shouts of approval on his election to membership, the rounds of applause that had followed his rendering of the simple negro melodies, resounded in his ears, and the joy of it all still tingled through his veins. This first triumph of his life had brought with it a certain confidence in himself—a new feeling of self-reliance—of being able to hold his own among men, something he had never experienced before. This made it all the more exhilarating.

And the company!

Real live painters who sold their pictures and who had studied in Munich, and who knew Paris and Dresden and all the wonderful cities of which Mr. Crocker had talked. And real musicians, too!—who played at theatres; and Englishmen from London, and Irishmen from Dublin, and all so jolly and unconventional and companionable. It was just as Mr. Crocker had described it, and just what he had about despaired of ever finding. Surely his cup of happiness was full to the brim.

We can forgive him; we who still remember those glimpses behind the scenes—our first and never-to- be-forgotten! How real everything seemed, even the grease-paint, the wigs, and the clothes. And the walking gentleman and the leading old man and low comedian! What splendid fellows they were and how we sympathized with them in their enforced exiles from a beloved land. How they suffered from scheming brothers who had robbed them of their titles and estates, or flint-hearted fathers who had turned them out of doors because of their infatuation for their "art" or because of their love for some dame of noble birth or simple lass, whose name—"Me boy, will be forever sacred!" How proud we were of knowing them, and how delighted they were at knowing us—and they so much older too! And how tired we got of it all—and of them—and of all their kind when our eyes became accustomed to the glare and we saw how cheap and commonplace it all was and how much of its glamour and charm had come from our own inexperience and enthusiasm—and youth.

As Oliver lay with wide-open eyes, going over every incident of the evening, he remembered, with a certain touch of exultant pride, a story his father had told him of the great Poe, and he fell to wondering whether the sweetness of his own song, falling on ears stunned by the jangle of the night, had not produced a similar effect. Poe, his father had said, on being pressed for a story in the midst of a night of revelry in a famous house on Kennedy Square, had risen from his seat and repeated the Lord's Prayer with such power and solemnity that the guests, one and all, stunned and sobered, had pushed their chairs from the table and had left the house. He remembered just where his father sat when he told the story and the impression it had made upon him at the time. He wished Kennedy Square had been present to- night to have heard him and to have seen the impression his song had made upon those gathered about him.

Kennedy Square! What would dear old Richard Horn, with his violin tucked lovingly under his chin, and gentle, white-haired Nathan, with his lips caressing his flute, have thought of it all, as they listened to the uproar of Cockburn's coal-scuttle? And, that latter-day Chesterfield, Colonel John Howard Clayton, of Pongateague, whose pipe-stemmed Madeira glasses were kept submerged in iced finger-bowls until the moment of their use, and whose rare Burgundies were drunk out of ruby-colored soap-bubbles warmed to an exact temperature. What would this old aristocrat have thought of McFudd's mixture and the way it was served?

No! It was just as well that Kennedy Square, at the moment of Oliver's triumph, was fast asleep.



CHAPTER IX

MISS TEETUM'S LONG TABLE



The prying sun peeped through the dingy curtains of Fred's bedroom on the morning after Oliver's revels, stencilling a long slant of yellow light down its grimy walls, and awaking our young hero with a start. Except for the shattered remnants of the basins and pitchers that he saw as he looked around him, and the stringy towels, still wet, hanging over the backs of the chairs, he would not have recognized it as the same room in which he had met such brilliant company the night before—so kindly a glamour does the night throw over our follies.

With the vision of the room and its tokens of their frolic came an uneasy sense of an unpleasant remembrance. The thrill of his own triumph no longer filled his heart; only the memory of the uproar remained. As he caught sight of the broken pieces of china still littering the carpet, and recalled McFudd's sprawling figure, a slight color suffused his cheek.

The room itself, in the light of day, was not only cold and uninviting, but so bare of even the commonest comforts that Oliver shivered. The bottoms were half out of the chairs; the painted wash-stand stood on a square of chilly oil-cloth; the rusty grate and broken hearth were unswept of their ashes; the carpet patched and threadbare. He wondered, as he studied each detail, how Miss Teetum could expect her boarders to be contented in such quarters.

He saw at a glance how much more cosey and restful the room might be made with the addition of a few touches here and there; a colored print or two— a plaster cast—a bit of cheap stuff or some gay-colored cushions. It surprised him, above all, to discover that Fred, who was studying art and should, therefore, be sensitive to such influences, was willing to live amid such desolate surroundings.

When he stepped out into the square hall, the scene of the night's revelry, and glanced about him, the crude bareness and reckless disorder that the merciful glow of the gas-light and its attendant shadows had kindly concealed, stood out in bold relief under the white light of the day now streaming through an oval skylight immediately above the piano. The floor was strewn with the various properties of the night's performance—overturned stools, china mugs, bits of lemon-peel, stumps of cigars, and stray pipes; while scattered about under the piano and between the legs of the chairs, and even upon the steps of the staircase, were the pieces of coal which Fog-horn Cranch and Waller, who held the scuttle, had pounded into bits when they produced that wild jangle which had added so much of dignity and power to the bass notes of the Dead Man's Chorus.

These cold facts aroused in Oliver a sense of repugnance which he could not shake off. It was as if the head of some jolly clown of the night before had been suddenly thrust through the canvas of the tent in broad daylight, showing the paint, the wrinkles beneath, the yellow teeth, and the coarse mouth.

Oliver was about to turn back to Fred's room, this feeling of revolt strong upon him, when his attention was arrested by a collection of drawings that covered almost every square inch of the ceiling. To his astonishment he discovered that what in the smoke of the night before he had supposed to be only hasty sketches scrawled over the white plaster, were in reality, now that he saw them in a clearer atmosphere, effective pictures in pastel, oil, and charcoal. That the basis of these cartoons was but the grimy stain made by the water which had beaten through the rickety sash during the drive and thrash of winter storms, flooding the whitewashed ceiling and trickling down the side-walls in smears of brown rust, did not lessen their value in his eyes.

Closer inspection showed him that these discolorations —some round or curved, others straight or angular—had been altered and amended as the signatures indicated by the deft pencils of Waller, Fred, Bowdoin, and the others, into flying Cupids, Dianas, Neptunes, and mermaids fit to grace the ceiling of a salon if properly enlarged; while the up-and-down smears had suggested the opportunity for caricaturing half the boarders of the house. Every fresh leak and its accompanying stains evidently presented a new problem to the painters, and were made the subject of prolonged study and much consultation before a brush was permitted to touch them, the point apparently being to help the discolorations express themselves with the fewest possible touches.

In addition to these decorations overhead, Oliver found, framed in on the cleaner plaster of the side- walls, between broad bands of black paint, several taking bits of landscape in color and black and white; stretches of coast with quaint boats and dots of figures; winter wood interiors with white plaster for snow and scrapings of charcoal for tree-trunks, each one marked with that sure crispness of touch which denotes the master-hand. Moreover, the panels of all the doors, as well as their jambs and frames, were ornamented with sketches in all mediums, illustrating incidents in the lives of the various boarders who occupied the rooms below, and who—so Fred told him afterward—stole into this sacred spot on the sly, to gloat over the night's work whenever a new picture was reported and the rightful denizens were known to be absent.

As he stood absorbed before these marvels of brush and pencil, scrutinizing each one in turn, his sense of repulsion for the debris on the floor gave way to a feeling of enthusiasm. Not only were the sketches far superior to any he had ever seen, but the way in which they were done and the uses of the several mediums were a revelation to him. It was only when Fog-horn Cranch's big voice roused him to consciousness that he realized where he was. The auctioneer was coming out of his room, resplendent in a striped suit, gaiters, and white necktie—this being his real-estate day.

"My dear fellow," Cranch shouted, bringing his hand down on Oliver's shoulder, "do you know you've got a voice like an angel's?"

Before Oliver could reply, My Lord Cockburn joined them, his first word one of pleasure at meeting him, and his second a hope that he would know him better; then Fred ran out, flinging on his coat and laughing as he came. Under these combined influences of praise and good-cheer Oliver's spirits rose and his blood began once more to surge through his veins. With his old-time buoyancy he put his arm through Fred's, while the two tramped gayly down the four flights of stairs to be ushered into the long, narrow, stuffy dining-room on the basement floor, there to be presented to the two Misses Teetum, who as the young men entered bent low over their plates in unison. This perfunctory salute our young gentleman acknowledged by bowing grandly in return, after which he dropped into a seat next to Fred's— his back to a tin box filled with plates, placed over the hot-air register—drew out a damp napkin from a bone ring, and took a bird's-eye view of the table and its occupants.

The two Misses Teetum sat one at either end— Miss Ann, thin, severe, precise; Miss Sarah, stout, coy, and a trifle kittenish, as doubtless became a young woman of forty-seven, and her sister's junior by eight years. Miss Ann had evidently passed the dead-line of middle age, and had given up the fight, and was fast becoming a very prim and very proper old lady, but Miss Sarah, being out of range, could still smile, and nod her head, and shake her curls, and laugh little, hollow, girlish laughs, and otherwise disport herself in a light and kittenish way, after the manner of her day and age. All of which betrayed not only her earnest desire to please, but her increasing anxiety to get in under matrimonial cover before one of Father Time's sharpshooters picked her off, and thus ended her youthful career.

The guests seated on either side of these two presiding goddesses, Oliver was convinced, as he studied the double row of faces, would have stretched the wondering eyelids of Kennedy Square to their utmost limits.

Old Mr. Lang, who with his invalid wife occupied the room immediately below Fred's, and who had been so nearly drowned out the night before because of McFudd's acrobatic tendencies, sat on Fred's left. Properly clothed and in his right mind, he proved to be a most delightful old gentleman, with gold spectacles and snow-white side-whiskers, and a welcoming smile for everyone who entered. Fred said that the smile never wavered even when the old gentleman had been up all night with his wife.

Across the table, with her eye-glasses trained on Oliver, half concealed by a huge china "compoteer" (to quote the waitress), and at present filled with last week's fruit, caulked with almonds, sat Mrs. Southwark Boggs—sole surviving relic of S. B., Esq. This misfortune she celebrated by wearing his daguerreotype, set in plain gold, as a brooch with which she fastened her crocheted collar. She was a thin, faded, funereal-looking person, her body encased in a black silk dress, which looked as if it had been pressed and ironed over night, and her hands in black silk mitts which reached to her knuckles.

On Mrs. Boggs's right sat Bates—a rising young lawyer with political tendencies—one of the first men to cut his hair so "Zou-Zou" that it stood straight up from his forehead; and next to him Morgan, the editor, who pored over manuscript while his coffee got cold; and then Nelson, and Webster, and Cummings all graded in Miss Ann's mind as being eight, or ten, or twelve-dollar-a-week men, depending on the rooms that they occupied, and farther along, toward Miss Sarah, Cranch and Cockburn—five-dollar boys these (Fred was another), with the privilege of lighting their own coke fires, and of trimming the wicks and filling the bulbs of their own burning-fluid lamps. And away down in the far corner, crumpled up in his chair, crouched the cheery little hunchback, Mr. Crumbs, who kept a book-stall on Astor Place, where Bayard Taylor, Irving, Halleck, Bryant, and many another member of the Century Club used to spend their late afternoons delving among the old volumes on his shelves.

All these regular boarders, including Fog-horn Cranch and Fred, breakfasted at eight o'clock. Waller, the painter, and Tomlins, the swell, breakfasted at nine. As to that descendant of the Irish kings, Mr. Cornelius McFudd, he rose at ten, or twelve, or two, just as the spirit (and its dilutions of the night before) moved or retarded him, and breakfasted whenever Miss Ann or Miss Sarah, who had presided continuously at the coffee-urn from eight to ten, could spare one of her two servants to carry a tray to his room.

Last and by no means least, with her eyes devouring every expression that flitted across the new arrival's face, there beamed out beside Miss Ann, a tail, willowy young person, whom Fred, in answer to an inquiring lifting of Oliver's eyebrows, designated as the belle of the house. This engaging young woman really lived with her mother, in the next street, but flitted in and out, dining, or breakfasting, or spending a week at a time with her aunts, the Misses Teetum, whenever an opportunity offered—the opportunity being a vacant and non- paying room, one of which she was at the time enjoying.

This fair damsel, who was known to the boarders on the top floor as "our Phemy," and to the world at large as Miss Euphemia Teetum—the real jewel in her name was Phoebe, but she had reset it—had been especially beloved, so Fred informed Oliver, by every member of the club except Waller, who, having lived in boarding-houses all his life, understood her thoroughly. Her last flame—the fire was still smouldering —had been the immaculate Tomlins, who had won her heart by going into raptures, in one of his stage whispers, over the classic outlines of her face. This outburst resulted in Miss Euphemia appearing the following week in a silk gown, a Greek fillet and no hoops—a costume which Waller faithfully portrayed on the side-wall of the attic the night of her appearance—the fillet being reproduced by a strip of brass which the artist had torn from his easel and nailed to the plaster, and the classic curves of her hair by a ripple of brown paint.

This caricature nearly provoked a riot before the night was over, the whole club, including even the fun-loving McFudd, denouncing. Waller's act as an outrage. In fact, the Hibernian himself had once been so completely taken off his feet—it was the first week of his stay—by the winning ways of the young lady, that Miss Ann had begun to have high hopes of Euphemia's being finally installed mistress in one of those shadowy estates which the distinguished Hibernian described with such eloquence. That these hopes did not materialize was entirely due to Cockburn, who took pains to enlighten the good woman upon the intangible character of the Hibernian's possessions, thus saving the innocent maiden from the clutches of the bold, bad adventurer. At least, that had been Cockburn's account of it when he came upstairs.

But it was at dinner that same night—for Oliver at Fred's pressing invitation had come back to dinner —that the full galaxy of guests and regulars burst upon our hero. Then came not only Miss Euphemia Teetum in a costume especially selected for Oliver's capture, but a person still more startling and imposing —so imposing, in fact, that when she entered the room one-half of the gentlemen present made little backward movements with the legs of their chairs, as if intending to rise to their feet in honor of her presence.

This prominent figure in fashionable life, who had now settled herself on the right of Miss Ann—the post of honor at the table—and who was smiling in so gracious and condescending a manner as her eye lighted on the several recipients of her favor, was none other than the distinguished Mrs. Schuyler Van Tassell, of Tarrytown, another bird of passage, who had left her country-seat on the Hudson to spend the winter months in what she called the delights of "upper-tandem." She belonged to an ancient family—or, at least, her husband did—he was under the sod, poor soul, and therefore at peace—and, having inherited his estate—a considerable one—was to be treated with every distinction.

These several personages of low and high degree interested our young gentleman quite as much as our young gentleman interested them. He made friends with them all—especially with the ladies, who all agreed that he was a most charming and accomplished youth. This good opinion became permanent when Oliver had paid each in turn the compliment of rising from his seat when any one of them entered the room, as much a habit with the young fellow as the taking off of his hat when he came into a house, but which was so rare a courtesy at Miss Teetum's that each recipient appropriated the compliment as personal to herself.

These sentiments of admiration were shared, and to an alarming degree, by Miss Euphemia herself, who, on learning later that Oliver had decided to occupy half of Fred's room through the winter, had at once determined to remain during the week, the better to lay siege to his heart. This resolution, it is fair to Oliver to say, she abandoned before dinner was over, when her experienced eye detected a certain amused if not derisive smile playing around the corners of Oliver's mouth; a discovery which so impressed the young woman that she left him severely alone ever after.

And so it was that Oliver unpacked his trunk—the same old hair trunk, studded with brass nails, that had held his father's wardrobe at college—spread out and tacked up the various knick-knacks which his mother and Sue and Miss Clendenning had given him when he had left the old home, and began to make himself comfortable on the top floor of Miss Teetum's boarding-house on Union Square.



CHAPTER X

MCFUDD'S BRASS BAND



Our hero had been installed at Miss Teetum's for a month or more, when one night at dinner a tiny envelope about the size of a visiting-card was brought in by the middle-aged waitress and laid beside Simmons's plate. The envelope contained six orchestra seats at the Winter Garden and was accompanied by a note which read as follows: "Bring some of the boys; the piece drags."

The musician studied the note carefully and a broad smile broke over his face. As one of the first violins at the Winter Garden, with a wide acquaintance among desirable patrons of the theatre, he had peculiar facilities for obtaining free private boxes and orchestra chairs not only at his own theatre, but often at Wallack's in Broome Street and the old Bowery. Simmons was almost always sure to have tickets when the new piece needed booming, or when an old play failed to amuse and the audiences had begun to shrink. Indeed, the mystery of Mrs. Schuyler Van Tassell's frequent appearance in the left-hand proscenium box at the Winter Garden on Friday nights—a mystery unexplained among the immediate friends in Tarrytown, who knew how she husbanded her resources despite her accredited wealth—was no mystery at all to the guests at Miss Teetum's table, who were in the habit of seeing just such tiny envelopes handed to Simmons during soup, and duly passed by him to that distinguished leader of society. Should more than two tickets be enclosed, Mrs. Van T. would, perhaps, invite. Mr. Ruffle-shirt Tomlins, or some other properly attired person, to accompany her—never Miss Ann or the little hunchback, who dearly loved the play, but who could seldom afford to go—never anybody, in fact, who wore plain clothes or looked a compromising acquaintance.

On this night, however, Pussy Me-ow Simmons, ignoring Mrs. Van Tassell, turned to Oliver.

"Ollie," he whispered—the formalities had ceased between the members of the Skylarks—"got anything to do to-night?"

"No; why?"

And then, Simmons, with various imaginary poundings of imaginary canes on the threadbare carpet beneath his chair, and with sundry half-smothered bursts of real laughter in which Fred and Oliver joined, unfolded his programme for the evening—a programme which was agreed to so rapturously that the trio before dinner was over excused themselves to their immediate neighbors and bounded upstairs, three steps at a time. There they pulled the Walrus out of his bed and woke up McFudd, who had gone to sleep before dinner, and whom nobody had called. Then having sent my Lord Cockburn to find Ruffle- shirt Tomlins, who by this time was paying court to Miss Euphemia in the front parlor, and having pinned a ticket to Mr. Fog-horn Cranch's door, with instructions to meet them in the lobby the moment he returned, they all slipped on their overcoats, picked up their canes, and started for the theatre.

Six young fellows, all with red blood in their veins, steel springs under their toes and laughter in their hearts! Six comrades, pals, good-fellows, skipping down the avenue as gay as colts and happy as boys— no thought for to-day and no care for to-morrow! Each man with a free ticket in his pocket and a show ahead of him. No wonder the bluecoats looked after them and smiled; no wonder the old fellow with the shaky legs, waiting at the corner for one of the squad to help him over, gave a sigh as he watched McFudd, with cane in air, drilling his recruits, all five abreast. No wonder the tired shop-girls glanced at them enviously as they swung into Broadway chanting the "Dead Man's Chorus," with Oliver's voice sounding clear as a bell above the din of the streets.

The play was a melodrama of the old, old school. There was a young heroine in white, and a handsome lover in top-boots and white trousers, and a cruel uncle who wanted her property. And there was a particularly brutal villain with leery eyes, ugly mouth, with one tooth gone, and an iron jaw like a hull-dog's. He was attired in a fur cap, brown corduroy jacket, with a blood-red handkerchief twisted about his throat, and he carried a bludgeon. When the double-dyed villain proceeded in the third act to pound the head of the lovely maiden to a jelly at the instigation of the base uncle, concealed behind a painted tree-trunk, and the lover rushed in and tried to save her, every pair of hands except Oliver's came together in raptures of applause, assisted by a vigorous hammering of canes on the floor.

"Pound away, Ollie," whispered Simmons; "that's what we came for; you are spoiling all our fun. The manager is watching us. Pound away, I tell you. There he is inside that box."

"I won't," said Oliver, in a tone of voice strangely in contrast with the joyousness of an hour before.

"Then you won't get any more free tickets," muttered Simmons in surprise.

"I don't want them. I don't believe in murdering people on the stage, or anywhere else. That man's face is horrible; I'm sorry I came."

Simmons laughed, and, shielding his mouth with his hand, repeated Oliver's outburst to Waller, who, having first sent news of it down the line, reached over and shook Oliver's hand gravely, while he wiped a theatrical tear from his eye; while my Lord Cockburn, with feet and hands still busy, returned word to Oliver by Tomlins, "not to make a colossal ass of himself." Oliver bore their ridicule good-naturedly, but without receding from his opinion in any way, a fact which ultimately raised him in the estimation of the group. Only when the villain was thrown over the pasteboard cliff into a canvas sea by the gentleman in top-boots, to be devoured by sharks or cut up by pirates, or otherwise disposed of as befitted so blood-thirsty and cruel a monster, did Oliver join in the applause.

The play over, and Simmons having duly reported to the manager—who was delighted with the activity of the feet, but who advised that next time the sticks be left at home—the happy party sailed up Broadway, this time by threes and twos, swinging their canes as before, and threading their way in and out of the throngs that filled the street.

The first stop was made at the corner of Thirteenth Street by McFudd, who turned his troop abruptly to the right and marched them down a flight of steps into a cellar, where they immediately attacked a huge wash-tub filled with steamed clams, and covered with a white cloth to keep them hot. This was the bar's free lunch. The clams devoured—six each—and the necessary beers paid for, the whole party started to retrace their steps, when Simmons stopped to welcome a new-corner who had entered the cellar unperceived by the barkeeper, and who was bending over the wash-tub of clams, engaged in picking out the smallest of the bivalves with the end of all iron fork. He had such a benevolent, kindly face, and was so courtly in his bearing, and spoke with so soft and gentle a voice, that Oliver, who stood next to Simmons, lingered to listen.

"Oh, my dear Simmons," cried the old gentleman, "we missed you to-night. When are you coming back to us? The orchestra is really getting to be deplorable. Miss Gannon quite broke down in her song. We must protest, my boy; we must protest. I saw you in front, but you should be wielding the baton. And is this young gentleman one of your friends?"

"Yes—Mr. Horn. Ollie, let me introduce you to Mr. Gilbert, the actor"—and he laid his hand on Oliver's shoulder—"dear John Gilbert, as we always call him."

Oliver looked up into the kindly, sweet face of the man, and a curious sensation passed over him. Could this courtly, perfectly well-bred old gentleman, with his silver-white hair, beaming smile and gentle voice, the equal of any of his father's guests, be an actor? Could he possibly belong to the profession which, of all others, Oliver had been taught to despise? The astonishment of our young hero was so great that for a moment he could not speak.

Simmons thought he read Oliver's mind, and came to his rescue.

"My friend, Mr. Horn, did not like the play to- night, Mr. Gilbert," he said. "He thinks the death-scene was horrible"—and Simmons glanced smiling at the others who stood at a little distance watching the interview with great interest.

"Dear me, dear me, you don't say so. What was it you objected to, may I ask?" There was a trace of anxiety in his voice.

"Why, the murder-scene, sir. It seemed to me too dreadful to kill a woman in that way. I haven't forgotten it yet," and a distressed look passed over Oliver's face. "But then I have seen but very few plays," he added—"none like that."

The old actor looked at him with a relieved expression.

"Ah, yes, I see. Yes, you're indeed right. As you say, it is quite a dreadful scene."

"Oh, then you've seen it yourself, sir," said Oliver, in a relieved tone.

The old actor's eyes twinkled. He, too, had read the young man's mind—not a difficult task when one looked down into Oliver's eyes.

"Oh, many, many times," he answered with a smile. "I have known it for years. In the old days, when they would smash the poor lady's head, they used to have a pan of gravel which they would crunch with a stick to imitate the breaking of the. bones. It was quite realistic from the front, but that was given up long ago. How did YOU like the business to-night, Mr. Simmons?" and he turned to the musician.

"Oh, admirable, sir. We all thought it had never been better played or better put on," and he glanced again toward his companions, who stood apart, listening breathlessly to every word that fell from the actor's lips.

"Ah, I am glad of it. Brougham will be so pleased —and yet it shocked you, Mr. Horn—and you really think the poor lady minded it? Dear me! How pleased she will be when I tell her the impression it all made upon you. She's worked so hard over the part and has been so nervous about it. I left her only a moment ago—she and her husband wanted me to take supper with them at Riley's—the new restaurant on University Place, you know, famous for its devilled crabs. But I always like to come here for my clams. Allow me a moment—" and he bent over the steaming tub, and skewering the contents of a pair of shells with his iron fork held it out toward Oliver.

"Let me beg of you, Mr. Horn, to taste this clam. I am quite sure it is a particularly savory one. After this my dear young friend, I hope you'll have a better opinion of me." And his eye twinkled. "I am really better than I look—indeed I am—and so, my dear boy, is this clam. Come, come, it is getting cold."

"What do you mean by 'a better opinion' of you, Mr. Gilbert?" stammered Oliver. He had been completely captivated by the charm of the actor's manner. "Why shouldn't I think well of you?—I don't understand."

"Why—because I strangled the poor lady to- night. You know, of course—that it was I who played the villain."

"You!" exclaimed Oliver. "No, I did not, sir. Why, Mr. Gilbert, I can't realize—oh, I hope you'll forgive me for what I've said. I've only been in New York a short time, and—"

The old gentleman cut short Oliver's explanation with a wave of his fork, and looking down into the boy's face, said in a serious tone:

"My son, you're quite right. Quite right—and I like you all the better for it. All such plays are dreadful I feel just as you do about them, but what can we actors do? The public will have it that way."

Another little prejudice toppled from its pedestal, another household tradition of Oliver's smashed into a thousand pieces at his feet! This rubbing and grinding process of man against man; this seeing with one's own eyes and not another's was fast rounding out and perfecting the impressionable clay of our young gentleman's mind. It was a lesson, too, the scribe is delighted to say, which our hero never forgot; nor did he ever forget the man who taught it. One of his greatest delights in after-years was to raise his hat to this incomparable embodiment of the dignity and courtliness of the old school. The old gentleman had long since forgotten the young fellow, but that made no difference to Oliver—he would cross the street any time to lift his hat to dear John Gilbert.

The introduction of the other members of the club to the villain being over—they had stood the whole time, they were listening to the actor, each head uncovered—McFudd again marshalled his troop and proceeded up Broadway, where, at Oliver's request, they were halted at the pedestal of the big Bronze Horse and within sight of their own quarters.

Here McFudd insisted that the club should sing "God Save the Queen" to the Father of his Country, where he sat astride of his horse, which was accordingly done, much to the delight of a couple of night- watchmen, who watched the entire performance and who, upon McFudd's subsequent inspection, proved to be fellow-countrymen of the distinguished Hibernian.

Had the buoyant and irrepressible Irishman been content with this patriotic outburst as the final winding- up of the night's outing, and had he then and there betaken himself and his fellows off to bed, the calamity which followed, and which so nearly wrecked the Skylarks, might have been avoided.

It is difficult at any time to account for the workings of Fate or to follow the course of its agents. The track of an earth-worm destroys a dam; the parting of a wire wrecks a bridge; the breaking of a root starts an avalanche; the flaw in an axle dooms a train; the sting of a microbe depopulates a city. But none of these unseen, mysterious agencies was at work—nothing so trivial wrecked the Skylarks.

It was a German street-band!

A band whose several members had watched McFudd and his party from across the street, and who had begun limbering their instruments before the sextet had ceased singing; regarding the situation, no doubt, as pregnant with tips.

McFudd did not give the cornet time to draw his instrument from its woollen bag before he had him by the arm.

"Don't put a mouthful of wind into that horn of yours until I spake to ye," he cried in vociferous tones.

The leader stopped and looked at him in a dazed way.

"I have an idea, gentlemen," added McFudd, turning to his companion's, and tapping his forehead. "I am of the opinion that this music would be wasted on the night air, and so with your parmission I propose to transfer this orchestra to the top flure, where we can listen to their chunes at our leisure. Right about, face! Forward! March!" and McFudd advanced upon the band, wheeled the drum around, and, locking arms with the cornet, started across the street for the stone steps.

"Not a word out of any o' ye till I get 'em in," McFudd continued in a low voice, fumbling in his pocket for his night-key.

The musicians obeyed mechanically and tiptoed one by one inside the dimly lighted hall, followed by Oliver and the others.

"Now take off your shoes; you've four flights of stairs to crawl up, and if ye make a noise until I'm ready for ye, off goes a dollar of your pay."

The bass-drum carefully backed his instrument against the wall, sat down on the floor, and began pulling off his boots; the cornet and bassoon followed; the clarionet wore only his gum shoes, and so was permitted to keep them on.

"Now, Walley, me boy, do you go ahead and turn up the gas and open the piano, and Cockburn, old man, will ye kindly get the blower and tongs out of Freddie's room and the scuttle out of Tomlins's closet and the Chinese gong that hangs over me bed? And all you fellers go ahead treading on whispers, d'ye moind?" said McFudd under his breath. "I'll bring up this gang with me. Not a breath out of any o' yez remimber, till I get there. The drum's unhandy and we got to go slow wid it," and he slipped the strap over his head and started upstairs, followed by the band.

The ascent was made without a sound until old Mr. Lang's door was reached, when McFudd's foot slipped, and, but for the bassoonist's head, both the Irishman and the drum would have rolled down- stairs. Lang heard the sound, and recognizing the character of the attendant imprecation, did not get up. "It's only McFndd," he said quietly to his suddenly awakened wife.

Once safe upon the attic floor the band who were entering with great gusto into the spirit of the occasion, arranged themselves in a half-circle about the piano, replaced their shoes, stripped their instruments of their coverings—the cornetist breathing noiselessly into the mouth-pieces to thaw out the frost—and stood at attention for McFudd's orders.

By this time Simmons had taken his seat at the piano; Cockburn held the blower and tongs; Cranch, who on coming in had ignored the card tacked to his door, and who was found fast asleep in his chair, was given the coal-scuttle; and little Tomlins grasped his own wash-basin in one hand and Fred's poker in the other. Oliver was to sing the air, and Fred was to beat a tattoo on Waller's door with the butt end of a cane. The gas had been turned up and every kerosene lamp had been lighted and ranged about the hall. McFudd threw off his coat and vest, cocked a Scotch smoking- cap over one eye, and seizing the Chinese gong in one hand and the wooden mallet in the other, climbed upon the piano and faced his motley orchestra.

"Attintion, gentlemen," whispered McFudd.

"The first chune will be 'Old Dog Tray,' because it begins wid a lovely howl. Remimber now, when I hit this gong that's the signal for yez to begin, and ye'll all come together wid wan smash. Then the band will play a bar or two, and then every man Jack o' ye will go strong on the chorus. Are yez ready?"

McFudd swung his mallet over his head; poised it for an instant; ran his eye around the circle with the air of an impresario; saw that the drum was in position, the horns and clarionet ready, the blower, scuttle, tongs, and other instruments of torture in place, and hit the gong with all his might.

The crash that followed woke every boarder in the house and tumbled half of them out of their beds. Long before the chorus had been reached all the doors had been thrown open, and the halls and passageways filled with the startled boarders. Then certain mysterious-looking figures in bed-gowns, water- proofs, and bath-robes began bounding up the stairs, and a collection of dishevelled heads were thrust through the door of the attic. Some of the suddenly awakened boarders tried to stop the din by protest; others threatened violence; one or two grinned with delight. Among these last was the little hunchback, swathed in a blanket like an Indian chief, and barefooted. He had rushed upstairs at the first sound as fast as his little legs could carry him, and was peering under the arms of the others, rubbing his sides with glee and laughing like a boy. Mrs. Schuyler Van Tassell, whose head and complexion were not ready for general inspection, had kept her door partly closed, opening it only wide enough when the other boarders rushed by to let her voice through—always an unpleasant organ when that lady had lost her temper.

As the face of each new arrival appeared in the doorway, McFudd would bow gracefully in recognition of the honor of its presence, and redouble his attack on the gong. The noise he produced was only equalled by that of the drum, which never ceased for an instant—McFudd's orders being to keep that instrument going irrespective of time or tune.

In the midst of this uproar of brass, strings, sheep- skin, wash-bowls, broken coal, pokers and tongs, a lean figure in curl-papers and slippers, bright red calico wrapper reaching to the floor, and a lighted candle in one hand, forced its way through the crowd at the door and stood out in the glare of the gaslights facing McFudd.

It was Miss Ann Teetum!

Instantly a silence fell upon the room.

"Gentlemen, this is outrageous!" she cried in a voice that ripped through the air like a saw. "I have put up with these disgraceful performances as long as I am going to. Not one of you shall stay in my house another night. Out you go in the morning, every one of you, bag and baggage!"

McFudd attempted to make an apology. Oliver stepped forward, the color mounting to his cheeks, and Waller began a protest at the unwarrantable intrusion, but the infuriated little woman waved them all aside and turning abruptly marched back through the door and down the staircase, preceded by the other female boarders. The little hunchback alone remained. He was doubled up in a knot, wiping the tears from his eyes, his breath gone from excessive laughter.

The Skylarkers looked at each other in blank astonishment. One of the long-cherished traditions of the house was the inviolability of this attic. Its rooms were let with an especial privilege guaranteeing its privacy, with free license to make all the noise possible, provided the racket was confined to that one floor. So careful had been its occupants to observe this rule, that noisy as they all were when once on the top floor, every man unlocked the front door at night with the touch of a burglar and crept upstairs as noiselessly as a footpad.

"I'm sorry, men," said McFudd, looking into the astounded faces about him. "I'm the last man, as ye know, to hurt anybody's feelings. But what the divil's got into the old lady? Who'd 'a' thought she would have heard a word of it down where she sleeps in the basement?"

"'Tis the Van Tassell," grunted the Walrus. "She's so mesmerized the old woman lately that she don't know her own mind."

"What makes you think she put her up to it, Waller?" asked Cranch.

"I don't think—but it's just like her," answered Waller, with illogical prejudice.

"My eye! wasn't she a beauty!" laughed Fred, and he picked up a bit of charcoal and began an outline of the wrapper and slippers on the side-wall.

Tomlins, Cranch, and the others had no suggestions to offer. Their minds were too much occupied in wondering what was going to become of them in the morning.

The German band by this time had regained their usual solidity. The leader seemed immensely relieved. He had evidently expected the next apparition to be a bluecoat with a pair of handcuffs.

"Put their green jackets on 'em," McFudd said to the leader quietly, pointing to the instruments. "We're much obliged to you and your men for coming up," and he slipped some notes into the leader's hand. "Now get downstairs, every man o' ye, as aisy as if ye were walking on eggs. Cranch, old man, will ye see 'em out, to kape that infernal drum from butting into the Van Tassell's door, or we'll have another hornet's nest. Begorra, there's wan thing very sure—it's little baggage I'LL have to move out."

The next morning a row of six vacant seats stared Miss Ann out of countenance. The outcasts had risen early and had gone to Riley's for their breakfast. Miss Ann sat at the coffee-urn as stiff and erect as an avenging judge. Lofty purpose and grim determination were written in every line of her face. Mrs. Van Tassell was not in evidence. Her nerves had been so shattered by the "night's orgy," she had said to Miss Ann, that she should breakfast in her room. She further notified Miss Teetum that she should at once withdraw her protecting presence from the establishment, and leave it without a distinguished social head, if the dwellers on the top floor remained another day under the same roof with herself.

An ominous silence and depressing gloom seemed. to hang over everybody. Several of the older men pushed back their plates and began drumming oh the table-cloth with their fingers, a far-away look in their eyes. One or two talked in whispers, their coffee untasted. Old Mr. Lang looked down the line of empty seats and took his place with a dejected air. He was the oldest man in the house and the oldest boarder; this gave him certain privileges, one being to speak his mind.

"I understand," he said, unfolding his napkin and facing. Miss Ann, "that you have ordered the boys out of the house?"

"Yes, I have," snapped out Miss Teetum.

Everybody looked up. No one recognized the tone of her voice, it was so sharp and bitter.

"Why, may I ask?"

"I will not have my house turned into a bear- garden, that's why!"

"That's better than a graveyard," retorted Mr. Lang. "That's what the house would be without them. I can't understand why you object. You sleep in the basement and shouldn't hear a sound; my wife and I sleep under them every night. If we can stand it, you can. You send the boys away, Miss Teetum, and we'll move out."

Miss Ann winced under the shot, but she did not answer.

"Do you mean that you're going to turn the young gentlemen into the street, Miss Ann?" whined Mrs. Southwark Boggs in an injured tone, from her end of the table. "Are we going to have no young life in the house at all? I won't stay a day after they're gone."

Miss Teetum changed color, but she looked straight ahead of her. She evidently did not want her private affairs discussed at the table.

"I shall want my bill at the end of the week, now that the boys are to leave," remarked the little hunchback to Miss Ann as he bent over her chair. "Life is dreary enough as it is."

And so the boys stayed on.

Only one room became vacant at the end of the month. That was Mrs. Schuyler Van Tassell's.



CHAPTER XI

A CHANGE OF WIND



The affair of the brass band, with its dramatic and most unlooked-for ending, left an unpleasant memory in the minds of the members of the club, especially in Oliver's. His training had been somewhat different from that of the others present, and his oversensitive nature had been more shocked than pleased by it all. While most of the other participants regretted the ill-feeling which had been aroused in Miss Teetum's mind, they felt sure—in fact, they knew— that this heretofore kind and gentle hostess could never have fanned her wrath to so white a heat had not some other hand besides her own worked the bellows.

Suspicion first fell upon a new boarder unaccustomed to the ways of the house, who, it was reported, had double-locked herself in at the first crash of the drum, and who had admitted, on being cross-examined by McFudd, that she had nearly broken her back in trying to barricade her bedroom door with a Saratoga trunk and a wash-stand. This theory was abandoned when subsequent inquiries brought to light the fact that Mrs. Van Tassell, when the echoes of one of McFudd's songs had reached her ears, had stated a week before that no respectable boarding-house would tolerate uproars like those which took place almost nightly on the top floor, and that she would withdraw her protection from Miss Euphemia and leave the house at once and forever if the noise did not cease. This dire threat being duly reported to the two Misses Teetum had—it was afterward learned—so affected them both that Miss Ann had gone to bed with a chill and Miss Sarah had warded off another with a bowl of hot camomile tea.

This story, true as it undoubtedly was, did not entirely clear up the situation. One part of it sorely puzzled McFudd. Why did Miss Euphemia need Mrs. Van Tassell's protection, and why should the loss of it stir Miss Ann to so violent an outburst? This question no member of the Skylarks could answer.

The solution came that very night, and in the most unexpected way, Waller bearing the glad tidings.

Miss Euphemia, ignoring them all, was to be married at St. Mark's at 6 P.M. on the following Monday, and Mrs. Van Tassell was to take charge of the wedding reception in the front parlor! The groom was the strange young man who had sat for some days beside Miss Euphemia, passing as Miss Ann's nephew, and who really was a well-to-do druggist with a shop on Astor Place. All of the regular boarders of the house were to be invited.

The explosion of this matrimonial bomb so cleared the air of all doubt as to the guilt of Mrs. Van Tassell, that a secret meeting, attended by every member of the Skylarks, was at once held in Waller's room with the result that Miss Ann's invitations to the wedding were unanimously accepted. Not only would the resident members go—so the original resolution ran —but the non-resident and outside members would also be on hand to do honor to Miss Euphemia and her distinguished chaperone. This amendment being accepted, McFudd announced in a sepulchral tone that, owing to the severity of the calamity and to the peculiarly painful circumstances which surrounded their esteemed fellow-skylarker, the Honorable Sylvester Ruffle-shirt Tomlins, his fellow-members would wear crape on their left arms for thirty days. This also was carried unanimously, every man except Ruffle-shirt Tomlins breaking out into the "Dead Man's Chorus"—a song, McFudd explained, admirably fitted to the occasion.

When the auspicious night arrived, the several dress-suits of the members were duly laid out on the piano and hung over the chairs, and each gentleman proceeded to array himself in costume befitting the occasion. Waller, who weighed 200 pounds, squeezed himself into McFudd's coat and trousers (McFudd weighed 150), the trousers reaching a little below the painter's knees. McFudd wrapped Waller's coat about his thin girth and turned up the bagging legs, of the unmentionables six inches above his shoes. The assorted costumes of the other members were equally grotesque. The habiliments themselves were of proper cut and make, according to the standards of the time—spike-tailed coats, white ties, patent- leather pumps, and the customary trimmings, but the effects produced were as ludicrous as they were incongruous, though the studied bearing of the gentlemen was meant to prove their unconsciousness of the fact.

The astonishment that rested on Mrs. Van Tassell's face when this motley group filed into the parlor and with marked and punctilious deference paid their respects to the bride, and the wrath that flashed in Miss Euphemia's eyes, became ever after part of the traditions of the club. Despite Mrs. Van Tassell's protest against the uproar on the top floor, she had invariably spoken in high terms to her friends and intimates of these very boarders—their acquaintance was really part of her social capital—commenting at the same time upon their exalted social and artistic positions. In fact, many of her own special guests had attended the wedding solely in the hope of being brought into more intimate relations with this distinguished group of painters, editors, and musicians, some of whom were already being talked about.

When, however, McFudd stood in the corner of Miss Teetum's parlor like a half-scared boy, pulling out the fingers of Waller's kid gloves, an inch too long for him, and Waller, Fred, and my Lord Cockburn stumbled over the hearth-rug one after the other, and Oliver, feeling like a guilty man and a boor, bowed and scraped like a dancing-master; and Bowdoin the painter, and Simmons and Fog-horn Cranch, talked platitudes with faces as grave as undertakers, the expectant special guests invited by Mrs. Van Tassell began to look upon her encomiums as part of an advertising scheme to fill Miss Teetum's rooms.

The impression made upon the Teetum contingent by the appearance and manners of the several members —even Oliver's reputation was ruined—was equally disastrous. It was, perhaps, best voiced by the druggist groom, when he informed Mrs. Van T. from behind his lemon-colored glove—that "if that was the gang he had heard so much of, he didn't want no more of 'em."

But these and other jollifications were not long to continue. Causes infinitely more serious were at work undermining the foundations of the Skylarks. The Lodge of Poverty, to which they all belonged, gay as it had often been, was slowly closing its door; the unexpected, which always hangs over life, was about to happen; the tie which bound these men together was slowly loosening. Its members might give the grip of fellowship to other members in other lodges over the globe, but no longer in this one on the top floor of the house on Union Square.

One morning McFudd broke the seal of an important- looking letter bearing a Dublin post-mark on the upper right-hand corner of the envelope, and the family crest on its flap. For some moments he sat still, looking straight before him. Then two tears stole out and glistened on his lashes.

"Boys," he said, slowly, "the governor says I must come home," and he held up a steamer ticket and a draft that barely equalled his dues for a month's board and washing.

That night he pawned his new white overcoat with the bone buttons and velvet collar—the one his father had sent him, and which had been the envy of every man in the club, and invested every penny of the proceeds in a supper to be given to the Skylarks. The invitation ran as follows: