Edith and John Part 31

"Good bye," she said.

Going down the stairs he could hear that tremulous little voice saying, "Good bye." All through the dinner he heard it ringing like the distant trembulations of a wind-bell; going out the house he heard it calling after him; all the way to the city he heard it tinkling, tinkling from everything about the fleeting things in the streets, turning all the grime and misery into music. Going to his room it kept trembling, trembling, till that dingy little place was a Paradise. And going into sleep it kept singing--singing "Good bye! Good b-y-e!

G-o-o-d----b--y--e!"

CHAPTER XVIII.

PETER DIEMAN IS AVENGED.

Black and sinister, like The Bastille, rears the bulky rambling building of that famous inst.i.tution where infractors of the law are compensated for their weaknesses. Amidst verdent hills and by the murky river it sits as a ramparted fortress in a savage land. In sunshine and cloud, in fog and smoke and grime, it stands brooding, ever silent, ever sullen; it is a place of the d.a.m.ned, the wonderment of law-abiding men who hap to pa.s.s it by. Beyond the sounds of the teeming river, beyond the noise of forge and hammer, beyond the regular haunts of men, it is like a secluded bee-hive, when the workers are all within. No one hears the hammering, no one hears the sawing, pounding, dinning, breaking, singing, chanting, praying of all of those therein, save the unambitious workers themselves. For it is a penal inst.i.tution.

Grim-visaged men, with loaded gun, stalk through its ringing halls, while haunting faces peer out from behind steel bars. The tread of many feet is hard, in step, on the hardened floors, as the men file to their places, like trained dogs cringing before their masters; the thump of many hammers is like a dreadful funeral march for the lost; the chant of many a tune is heard, in the time of rest, as the only cheerful note issuing therefrom. And above all is the old familiar human smell.

In one corner of a cell, on a cot, lies a man. He is bleary-eyed, and his face is swollen. His feet are bleeding, and his worn-out shoes lie on the floor. His old blue overalls and check shirt are torn, filthy and ready to fall from him. He rolls his head from side to side, and beats his breast with his knotted hands. The spume of an hectic cough hangs around his mouth, and blood flows out his nostrils. He is Billy Barton--dying--dying--alone! While the hammers ring, and the men chant, and the guards pace to and fro; while the clock is ticking for other men to come and go; while the sun is shining somewhere for the happy, the good and the bad alike, and all life outside is palpitating with a vigorous existence, Billy is going upon his final journey.

He was brought from a nasty jail, where mephitic filth was supreme, to this place where brutal men are supreme in their cruelty. Emaciated, gaunt, and made desperate by reason of the abuse heaped upon his crazed head, he was terrible in his obstinacy of prison rules. He was put to work with ball and chain tied about his ankles, when lying down on a feather bed would have been a severe and painful task to him. He was weak. He could not work, let alone stand. He was faint, sick, heartsore.

But no one saw his misery. No one wanted to see it. For why should they?

He was only a vagabond, and why should he receive attention?

He was pushed and pounded and thumped and beaten because he could not work. He was fed on bread and water for his failure; he was straight-jacketed, hung up by the wrists, given the water-cure; thrown into the dungeon and flogged. But the brute rises in man, sometimes, when met by a brute, and Billy struck back. This was the beginning of his end; for the deputy, being not yet satisfied in the full exercise of his authority, threw more of his brutishness into display, and laid Billy low with a cudgel that he carried, and dragged him, like a dog, to his cell, and threw him on his cot to die--alone!

An investigation into poor Billy Barton's death by the Honorable Board of Authorities revealed one of the most peculiar and singular cases that ever came to their discriminating notice. Billy died of heart failure, they announced. Of course, every man dies when his heart ceases to beat.

Even those good and upright members of the Honorable Board of Authorities will die of that disease some day; and no doubt a tombstone will have all their virtues enscribed upon it. Billy Barton's--will simply be, William Barton, that's all.

Who should claim the body? Had he any friends? they punctiliously inquired. Yes; they found one. A man of worth, too--Peter Dieman, the humble junkman; Billy's old friend, of course, who would provide a decent funeral, and see that the last sad rites were said over his corruptible remains. Yes; Peter Dieman would do all this, being very generous, and a philanthropic man; for who would impinge his motives?

The body was, in the true fiction of such events, conveyed in very solemn state to that hovel on the south side of the Monongahela river, near which and within which all of Billy Barton's living time was spent.

All his children were present at the funeral, except that one of ill-repute who had preceded his father upon the long unknown trail. All his former friends were present, with one extra added: Peter Dieman.

Another friend was present, in the person of John Winthrope, as the representative of Edith, who sent the only flowers.

Had Billy Barton been resurrected the time he lay in his coffin, supported on two chairs, he would have seen a change in the furnishings of his earthly home; he would have seen paper on the walls, where once were the s.m.u.tchings of discoloring time; he would have seen a carpet on the floor, pictures on the walls, one of which he would have seen was Madonna and her child; he would have seen many things that were not there when he was its besotted, irresponsible master. Ah, he would have seen his little girls dressed in new frocks, with a simple imitation of pride in their deportment; and his boys he would have seen, although still very rude, in a feeble effort to be vain over their new toggery.

He would also have seen his slattern wife in a new dress, with her hair done up, and a new hope masked behind her stoical face. And he would have seen that other one, his daughter Star, whom he maltreated all her sorrowful years, come to offer up to G.o.d supplication for his soul; and, if his spirit had not yet departed, he would have heard her weeping in her anguish. As he lay in his shroud he would have felt the warm touch of little hands on his hard face, as the little ones stood about his bier taking a last farewell look at "Pap" before the man in black had covered up his face from their view forever; and he would have seen John, in all the freshness and beauty of young manhood, a consoling support to his only child that shed a tear. Still more, he would have seen that exaggerated piece of humanity, Peter Dieman, in all his implacable hatred for him, sitting in one corner, listening with exhultation to the droning voice of the minister saying the ritual words and singing "Rock of Ages."

Solemnly went the funeral cortege through the crowded thoroughfares bearing him away; and as the people looked with awe on his pa.s.sing, remembering, perhaps, that they would take the same long ride some day, little did they reck how he lived and how he died.

To Homewood, a pretty decent place, they bore him, and put him beneath the ground, with the skeltering winds singing his funeral dirge. Above his grave Star and John placed a tombstone, with, "Our Father, William Barton; born Friday, December 13, 1861; died Friday, December 13, 1907,"

as the only legend. No virtues had he to be recorded, like those of the Honorable Board of Authorities. But he was gone--finally gone--out of the turmoil of this world.

Peter Dieman again sat in his little black office in The Die, smoking his scandalous pipe, rubbing his red hands, and squinting his piggish eyes; and giving vent occasionally to devlish outbursts of perfect satisfaction. Nothing consumed his mind so much at present as the reflection over his victory--his victory over Billy Barton, the worthless drunkard.

In his youth Peter went into the contest with Billy for the hand of Kate Jarney, a cousin of Hiram Jarney. Kate, being young and ignorant, selected the most prepossessing face, and took up her lot with that face, and all the horrors that accompanied it. Peter being of a revengeful nature, took up his life alone, a disappointed man, and sought to drown his sorrows in the role of Chief Ward Heeler.

Peter was not such a bad man in his younger days, but remorse over his unrequitted love drove him to diabolical things. Hence his att.i.tude toward all mankind. For twenty years, almost, he was cross, crabbed and oppressive; and the wonder is how he maintained his power in his invidious treatment of his henchmen and his superiors. But this may be explained by his one saving grace of knowing how to string the "ropes"

for the system--Graft--without breaking any of them, and screening the arch conspirators; for which he was amply rewarded. For twenty years, almost, he lived like a bear, spending his days in his black shop, and his nights in a shabby room above, like a miser--always with an irreconcilable fury burning beneath his hairy breast. For twenty years, almost, he brooded while he ama.s.sed a fortune, which gave him but the one comfort that the "some day" might bring. And his day had come at last.

Thus, as he sat in his office smoking and rubbing, the old light came back to him; and he was not slow to act. Leaving the shop in the care of the new clerk (Eli Jerey being yet indisposed) he went out. Finding a purveyor of "houses for sale," he traveled the circuitous rounds with that individual in search of a satisfying heap of stone and mortar.

Selecting one of approved style and with the requisite number of rooms, in the rich men's district of the East End, he purchased. Then, fitting it up with all the dazzle that money could buy, he installed therein the entire Barton family, with one exception, of course; and ere the month was out, so little was his compunction as to propriety, he made the withered love of his youth his wife. And the G.o.ds caused him to smile, at last.

So affecting was this piece of news on Eli Jerey's mind that he forthwith began to arouse himself from his convalescing lethargy; and by another fortnight was down at his old post, with the same cadavorous look in his face, and the same slavish notions in his head. Since Peter had left his office: which he did immediately after his marriage: that little black hole stood silent, smokeless, with the acc.u.mulated filth of years still clinging to it. The little peephole was there, now with no wolfish eyes behind to peer through it, but still a source of much anxiety to Eli, who, so strong was the force of habit in him, even after he knew his master was gone, looked suspiciously at it ever and anon, as if it itself would turn into green eyes and knock him down by their stare, as those without the secret pa.s.sword had often done before.

Otherwise, Eli had peace of soul, since that irritable old curmudgeon had surprised him into getting well.

Being faithful to his trust, he could not do different than he did; and it is well for him. For after Peter had returned from his long-delayed honeymoon, he came to the office only as a visitor. So magnanimous was he now, in his rejuvenated character, that he turned the junk shop and all his business over to Eli, to be managed as he willed. But this change in proprietorship in nowise took from the place the name it had acquired, nor from it the honor of being the repository of all the secrets of the System built up around it, with no apparent connection.

So, instead of Peter being in his den, curled up like a stoat, he delegated, after awhile, to Eli the perfunctory duties of receiving and transmitting messages between himself and the henchmen, with Eli ensconced in the black office.

One day after taking up his inc.u.mbency therein, Eli received a call from Welty Morne.

"Where is Peter?" asked Welty, as he softly entered the sacred precinct of The Die, unawares to Eli.

Remembering his encounter with that young gentleman, Eli bustled up like a porcupine on the approach of an enemy, forgetting that he was to let by-gone be by-gones, and serve his master in a new role.

"Gone," answered Eli, boldly; "I'm boss here. What will you have?"

"Where's he gone?" asked Welty, a little ruffled.

"He's quit these quarters for good," answered Eli.

"Wonder he wouldn't let a fellow know such things," said Welty.

"I'm his messenger; what can I do for you?"

"You! I hope not to that extent!"

"Yes; me--to that extent," retorted Eli.

"Well;" and Welty studied a few moments; then continued: "Convey to him that Monroe wants to get in communication with him at once."

"I will do it," responded Eli.

Whereat, Eli descended into the darkness of his private phone booth, remained a few minutes, and returned, with the information that Peter would see him that evening at eight o'clock at the "Bartonage," as he called his new residence.

"Very well," said Welty, leaving in a sulky temper.

At the hour of eight p. m., Peter was sitting at his home in all his pomp and grandeur, when the starched smile of Monroe irradially floated in upon his complacency in an hitherto unknown expansiveness.

"You old tout," said Monroe feelingly; "you surprise us all by your new stunt."

When Peter laughed, which he did now sometimes, he was the picture of a crying calf, if the simile is permissible; so when he broke his face into one of his cunning signs of mirth, Monroe could not but help feeling amused himself, and accordingly split his barren face up into waves of noncommittal wrinkles.

"Ho, ho, ha, ha," cried Peter, forgetting now to rub his hands, and instead slapped his fat hand on his fat leg; "you old batches will have to fall in line. Look! and see how glorious it all is, Monroe; and to think that I have missed it all these twenty years! Ho, ho, ha, ha, he, he; you ought to try it, Monroe, and get those crimps out of your face!"

Peter laughed at this jolly till tears ran down his cheeks.

"Why, I should think you were happy, Peter, the way you are going on about it," said Monroe, gloomily.