No, not that. They could get only a little of what she and I had. They could take our belongings, that"s all. And they hadn"t got those yet.
But I had begun to hate those neighbors with a fierce, unreasoning hatred. In silence they dictated, without a.s.sisting. For a dozen years I had lived with them, played with them, been an integral part of their lives, and now they were worse than useless to me. There wasn"t one of them big enough to receive me into his home for myself alone, apart from the work I did. There wasn"t a true brother among them.
Our lives turn upon little things. They turn swiftly. Within fifteen minutes I had solved my problem in a fashion as unexpected as it was radical.
CHAPTER IV
WE EMIGRATE TO AMERICA
Going down the path to town bitterly and blindly, I met Murphy. He was a man with not a gray hair in his head who was a sort of man-of-all-work for the neighborhood. He took care of my furnace and fussed about the grounds when I was tied up at the office with night work. He stopped me with rather a shamefaced air.
"Beg pardon, sor," he began, "but I"ve got a bill comin" due on the new house--"
I remembered that I owed him some fifteen dollars. I had in my pocket just ten cents over my carfare. But what arrested my attention was the mention of a new house.
"You mean to tell me that you"re putting up a house?"
"The bit of a rint, sor, in ---- Street."
The contrast was dramatic. The man who emptied my ashes was erecting tenements and I was looking for work that would bring me in food. My people had lived in this country some two hundred years or more, and Murphy had probably not been here over thirty. There was something wrong about this, but I seemed to be getting hold of an idea.
"How old are you, Murphy?" I asked.
"Goin" on sixty, sor."
"You came to America broke?"
"Dead broke, sor."
"You have a wife and children?"
"A woman and six childer."
Six! Think of it! And I had one.
"Children in school?"
I asked it almost in hope that here at least I would hold the advantage.
"Two of them in college, sor."
He spoke it proudly. Well he might. But to me it was confusing.
"And you have enough left over to put up a house?" I stammered.
"It"s better than the bank," Murphy said apologetically.
"And you aren"t an old man yet," I murmured.
"Old, sor?"
"Why you"re young and strong and independent, Murphy. You"re----" But I guess I talked a bit wild. I don"t know what I said. I was breathless--lightheaded. I wanted to get back to Ruth.
"Pat," I said, seizing his hand--"Pat, you shall have the money within a week. I"m going to sell out and emigrate."
"Emigrate?" he gasped. "Where to?"
I laughed. The solution now seemed so easy.
"Why, to America, Pat. To America where you came thirty years ago." I left him staring at me. I hurried into the house with my heart in my throat.
I found Ruth in the sitting-room with her chin in her hands and her white forehead knotted in a frown. She didn"t hear me come in, but when I touched her arm she jumped up, ashamed to think I had caught her looking even puzzled. But at sight of my face her expression changed in a flash.
"Oh, Billy," she cried, "it"s good news?"
"It"s a way out--if you approve," I answered.
"I do, Billy," she answered, without waiting to hear.
"Then listen," I said. "If we were living in England or Ireland or France or Germany and found life as hard as this and some one left us five hundred dollars what would you advise doing?"
"Why, we"d emigrate, Billy," she said instantly.
"Exactly. Where to?"
"To America."
"Right," I cried. "And we"d be one out of a thousand if we didn"t make good, wouldn"t we?"
"Why, every one succeeds who comes here from somewhere else," she exclaimed.
"And why do they?" I demanded, getting excited with my idea. "Why do they? There are a dozen reasons. One is because they come as pioneers--with all the enthusiasm and eagerness of adventurers. Life is fresh and romantic to them over here. Hardships only add zest to the game. Another reason is that it is all a fine big gamble to them.
They have everything to gain and nothing to lose. It"s the same spirit that drives young New Englanders out west to try their luck, to preempt homesteads in the Northwest, to till the prairies. Another reason is that they come over here free--unbound by conventions. They can work as they please, live as they please. They haven"t any caste to hamper them. Another reason is that, being on the same great adventure, they are all brothers. They pull together. Still another reason is that as emigrants the whole United States stands ready to help them with schools and playgrounds and hospitals and parks."
I paused for breath. She cut in excitedly:
"Then we"re going out west?"
"No; we haven"t the capital for that. By selling all our things we can pay our debts and have a few dollars over, but that wouldn"t take us to Chicago. I"m not going ten miles from home."
"Where then, Billy?"
"You"ve seen the big ships come in along the water-front? They are bringing over hundreds of emigrants every year and landing them right on those docks. These people have had to cross the ocean to reach that point, but our ancestors made the voyage for you and me two hundred years ago. We"re within ten miles of the wharf now."
She couldn"t make out what I meant.