"It"s not the Lord that"s taking her," Miss Lady cried impatiently, "it"s you that are sending her, Mr. Flathers. Can"t you see that you are killing your baby?"
He looked at her in amazed horror.
"Yes, you are!" went on Miss Lady fiercely, "you are selling her food to another baby; you are letting her mother work so hard that she can scarcely nourish herself. Just look at Mrs. Flathers! Anybody can see that if she had better food and less to do she"d be a different person."
"Oh, Maria was real pretty onct," Phineas said somewhat resentfully, "but when a man marries one of them slim little blondes he never knows what he"s gittin". They sort of shrink up on yer an" git faded an"
stringy."
"Yes, but think what she got," said Miss Lady determined to press the matter home. "Myrtella says you were a strong, handsome young man, who could have turned your hand to almost anything, and look at you now! A broken-down loafer, sitting around the saloons, talking religion while your baby starves. I don"t wonder Myrtella is ashamed of you, I am ashamed of you, and if this poor little girl ever lives to grow up, she will be ashamed of you, too!"
"No, no," cried Phineas brokenly, his head in his hands, "she won"t be that--if the Lord,--I mean if she lives, I"ll be a better man, Mis"
Squeerington, indeed I will. n.o.body ever will know in the world how much I want children of my own. That"s why I "dopted Chick--that"s one reason I took in this new one. Seemed like as if my baby went--"
"We"ll try to keep her," Miss Lady said with a rush of sympathy. "I"ll do everything I can but you must help, Mr. Flathers. You are willing to do your part, aren"t you?"
His emotions, used to responding to false stimulants, being now appealed to by the one genuine feeling in him, threatened to become uncontrolled.
"There, there!" Miss Lady said, "if you really want to save her, I think there"s a way."
"Not a Orphan"s Home?" asked Phineas, lifting one eye from the baby"s petticoat where his head had been buried.
"No, a clean home of her own. There"s no reason why you shouldn"t go to work, Mr. Flathers, and support your family decently. I"ll take Chick home with me. Myrtella will be glad to have him for a little visit. Mrs.
Ivy is going to send the other baby to the Foundling"s Home. Then you"ll only have to look after Mrs. Flathers and the baby; you surely can do that, can"t you?"
"Yes "m, I kin do that. "Course any man kin do that. But I been out of a regular job so long, you"d sorter help me find something to start on?"
"I"ll get you something to do, if you will only stick to it. Perhaps Mrs. Sequin can give you work at her new house. She gave our old colored man, Uncle Jimpson, a place."
"Jes" so it ain"t garden work, nor gittin" up coal, nor nothin" that brings on rheumatism."
"Have you rheumatism?"
"No, mam, Praise G.o.d! I have escaped this far by bein" kereful. You know what it means, Mis" Squeerington, when a man with a family gits down with the rheumatism. There"s Jires, now--"
"Yes, and Mr. Jires does more for his family lying flat on his back than you do for yours, up and walking around! You"re not fooling me one bit, Mr. Flathers, and there"s no use trying to fool yourself. You either mean seriously to go to work or you don"t. Which is it?"
Phineas Flathers" strong impulse was to flee the scene. He saw his liberty vanishing before the awful prospect held out by this pretty young lady who could be so sympathetic one moment and so stern the next.
But the tiny claw-like fingers of Loreny held him fast. He looked at his imprisoned thumb and smiled tenderly. Then he faced Miss Lady squarely for the first time.
"You help me git a job, Miss, an" I"ll promise to take keer of this here baby."
"What you need," came the murmur of Mrs. Ivy"s voice from the next room, where she was taking leave of Maria Flathers, "is more beauty in your home, something to uplift you and inspire you. I am going to send you one of our traveling art galleries, you may keep the pictures a whole week, long enough to learn the t.i.tles and the names of the painters.
Just think what it will mean to lift your tired eyes to a beautiful, serene Madonna! And couldn"t you have more color in your home? We find color so stimulating. Scarlet geraniums for instance. Wouldn"t you like some scarlet geraniums?"
"I dunno where we"d put "em at," Maria said wearily, shifting the weight of the Boarder to her other arm. Then her face hardened suddenly, and she wheeled into the kitchen.
"Flathers," she said, "it"s him coming round the house now. He said he"d be back before six, an" wouldn"t stand no foolin". What you goin" to do, Flathers?"
Before Miss Lady and Mrs. Ivy could make their exit, the way was blocked by a heavy-set, muscular, one-eyed man who placed a hand on either side of the door jamb and unnecessarily announced that there he was. Frantic efforts on the part of Phineas to signify to the newcomer by winks and gestures, that the presence of guests would prevent his talking business, were without effect.
"You ladies"ll have to excuse me," said the intruder cheerfully, "but I can"t fool with this bunch no longer. It"s pay, or git out, this time and no mistake."
Maria began to cry, and forgot to jolt the Boarder, and the Boarder who insisted upon being jolted every instant he was not sleeping or eating, began to cry also. Whereupon Loreny, who had been laid upon the kitchen table, heard the noise and felt called upon to add her voice to the chorus.
By this time Chick and his colleagues, scenting excitement from afar, had followed its trail and now presented themselves breathless and interested to await developments. "Puttin" out" was not a particular novelty in Bean Alley, but the presence of guests added a picturesque feature.
"If you can wait a week longer," said Phineas with some attempt at dignity, "I"ll be in a position to settle up to date. I"m expectin" to git a job--"
At this the rent man threw back his head and laughed, and the youngsters back of him laughed, and even the Boarder stopped crying a moment to see what had happened.
"But he really is," insisted Miss Lady, coming to Phineas" a.s.sistance.
"He"s going to work the first of the week. Surely you can wait a week longer."
"I can, Miss!" said the man in the door, gallantly. "I been waiting a week longer on Flathers for more"n two months. There ain"t absolutely no use in arguing the matter further. It"s pay up, or git out, _to-day_."
"Well, if this ain"t the limit!" said Phineas, with the air of one who had reached it many times before, but never such a limitless limit as this.
"But if we pay this month"s rent for him, can"t you let him make up the back rent later?" argued Miss Lady, trying to comfort Maria who threatened to become hysterical.
"When you"ve known Flathers as long as I have, you won"t talk about him paying up."
"But you can"t put them out like this, with that little baby and no place to go!"
"There"s the Charity Organization, and the Alms House," suggested Mrs.
Ivy, wiping her eyes through sympathy.
"I"d hate to drive "em to that," said the man doggedly, "but I got my own family to consider, and I ain"t what I once was, since I lost my eye."
"Poor man," sighed Mrs. Ivy; "how fortunate It was the left one! How did it happen?"
"Shot out," said the man, nothing loath to enter into particulars. "In a sc.r.a.p between a pair of young swells that was hangin" round my place.
Shot out in cold blood when I wasn"t lookin"."
"But, my good man, didn"t you prosecute?" asked Mrs. Ivy. "You know we have a Legal Aid Society for just such cases as yours."
[Ill.u.s.tration: Maria began to cry, and forgot to jolt the Boarder]
"Yes"m, but one of the young gentlemen skipped the country, lit out fer foreign parts, took to the tall timber, as you might say."
"But he was not the one who did the shooting, was he?" asked Miss Lady, a sudden bright spot on either cheek, and the steady determination in her eye that had been Flathers" undoing.
"I ain"t never been able to say which one done it," said the man, faltering under her steady gaze.
"Perhaps it was worth your while not to say?"
The man shot a quick glance of suspicion at her, then his eye came back to Phineas.
"Of course, I don"t want to push him into the Poor House, and if he expects to get work--"