Michael O'Halloran Part 66

Mr. Minturn seized the boy's arm, shoved him inside his door and closed it. Mickey pulled away and turned a belligerent face upward.

"Now nix on knocking me down with _your_ 'whats!'" he cried. "I just been hammered meller with his, and dragged into his room, and shut up, and scared stiff, about twenty minutes ago."

"_The devil you say!_" exploded Mr. Minturn.

"No, I said Chaffner!" insisted Mickey. "Chaffner of the _Herald_. I'm going to write a poetry piece for his front page, some day soon now. I been selling his paper all my life."

"And so you're a friend of Chaffner's?"

"Oh not bosom and inseparable," explained Mickey. "I haven't seen so awful much of him, but when I do, we get along fine."

"And he said----?" questioned Mr. Minturn.

"Just what I been afraid of all the time," said Mickey. "That these investigations at times got into places you didn't _look_ for, and made awful trouble; and that my boss _might_ get it with his."

"Mickey, you will promise me something?" asked Mr. Minturn. "You see I started Mr. Bruce on this trying to help him to a case that would bring him into prominence, so if it should go wrong, it's in a way through me. If you think Douglas is unlike himself, or worried, will you tell me? Will you?"

"Why surest thing you know!" cried Mickey. "Why I should say I would!

Gee, you're great too! I think I'll like you awful well when we get acquainted."

Mickey was busy when Bruce entered, and with him was Leslie Winton.

They brought the breath of spring mellowing into summer, freighted with emanations of real love, touched and tinctured with joy so habitual it had become spontaneous on the part of Leslie Winton, and this morning contagious with Douglas Bruce. Mickey stood silent, watched them closely, and listened. So in three minutes, from ragged sc.r.a.ps and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns effervescing from what was running over in their brains, he knew that they had taken an early morning plunge into At.w.a.ter, landed a black ba.s.s, had a breakfast of their own making, at least in so far as gathering wild red raspberries from the sand pit near the bridge; and then they had raced to the Multiopolis station to start Mr.

Winton on a trip west to try to sell his interest in some large land holdings there, the care of which he was finding burdensome.

"Heavens, how I hope Daddy makes that sale!" cried Leslie. "I've been so worried about him this summer."

"I wondered at you not going with him," said Douglas.

"He didn't seem to want me," said Leslie. "He said it was a flying trip and he was forced to be back before some reports from his office were filed; so he thought I wouldn't enjoy it; and for the first time in my life he told me distinctly that he didn't have _time_ for me. Fancy Daddy! I can't understand it."

"I've noticed that he has been brooding and preoccupied of late, not at all like himself," said Douglas. "Have you any idea what troubles him?"

"Of course! He told me!" said Leslie. "It's Mr. Swain. When Daddy was a boy, Mr. Swain was his father's best friend, and when grandfather died, he asked him to guide Daddy, and he not only did that, but he opened his purse and started him in business. Now Mr. Swain is growing old, and some of his investments have gone wrong; just when political changes made business close as could be, he lost heavily; and then came the war. There was no way but for Daddy to stay here and fight to save what he could for him. He told me early last fall; we talked of it again in the winter, and this spring most of all--I've told you!"

"Yes I know! I wish I could help!" said Douglas.

"I do too! I wish it intensely," said Leslie. "When father comes, we'll ask him. We're young and strong, and we should stand by. I never saw Daddy in such a state. He _must_ sell that land. He _said_ so. He said last night he'd be forced to sell if he only got half its value, and that wouldn't be enough."

"Enough for what?" asked Douglas.

"To help Mr. Swain," said Leslie.

"He's going to use his fortune?" queried Douglas.

"I don't know that Daddy has holdings large enough to deserve the word," said Leslie. "He's going to use what he has. I urged him to; it's all he can do."

"Did you take into consideration that it may end in his failure?" asked Douglas.

"I did," said Leslie, "and I forgot to tell him, but I will as soon as he comes back: he can have all mother left me, too, if he needs it."

"Leslie, you're a darling, but have you ever had even a small taste of poverty?" asked Douglas.

"No! But I've always been curious, if I did have, to see if I couldn't so manage whatever might be my share, that it would appear to the world without that peculiar state of grime which always seems to distinguish it," said the girl. "I'm not afraid of poverty, and I'm not afraid of work; it's dishonour that would kill me. Daddy accepted obligations; if they involve him, which includes me also, then to the last cent we possess, we pay back."

Mickey drew the duster he handled between vacuum days across a table and steadily watched first Douglas, then Leslie, both of whom had forgotten him.

"That should be good enough for Daddy; what about me?" asked Douglas.

"If ever I get in a close place, does the same hold good?"

"If I know what you are doing, surely!"

"I knew you were a 'Bearer of Morning' first time I saw you," said Douglas. "But we are forgetting Mickey."

Mickey promptly stepped forward, putting away the duster to be ready for errands.

"How are you this morning?" asked Douglas.

"Fine!" answered Mickey. "I've taken my family to the country, too!"

"Why Mickey! without saying a word!" cried Douglas.

"Well it happened so fast," said Mickey, "and I didn't want to bother you when your head was so full of your old investigation and your own moving."

"Did you hear that Leslie?" he asked. "Mickey dislikes my investigation as much as the man who comes out short is going to, any day now. So you've moved Peaches to the country? You should have told me, first."

"I'm sorry if you don't like it," said Mickey. "You see my room was getting awful hot. I never was there days this time of year, and nights I slept on the fire-escape; all right for me, but it wouldn't do for Lily. Why should I have told you?"

"Because Miss Winton had plans for her," explained Douglas. "She intended to take her to At.w.a.ter, and she even contemplated having her back examined for you."

Mickey's eyes danced and over his face spread a slow grin of comprehension.

"Well?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Douglas.

"Nothing!" said Mickey.

"Well?" demanded Douglas.

Mickey laughed outright. Then he sobered suddenly and spoke gravely, directly to Miss Winton.

"Thank you for thinking of it, and planning for her," he said. "I was afraid you would."

"Thank me for something you feared I would do! Mickey, aren't you getting things mixed?"

"Thank you for thinking of Lily and wanting to help her," explained Mickey, "but she doesn't need you. She's mine and I'm going to keep her; so what I can do for her will have to be enough, until I can do better."

"I see," said Leslie. "But suppose that she should have attention at once, that you can't give her, and I can?"

"Then I'd be forced to let you, even if it took her from me," agreed Mickey. "But thank the Lord, things ain't that way. I didn't take my say-so for it; I went to the head nurse of the Star of Hope; she's gone to the new Elizabeth Home now; she loves to nurse children best. All the time from the first day she's told me how, and showed me, so Lily has been taken care of right, you needn't worry about that. And where she is now, if she was a queen-lady she couldn't have grander; honest she couldn't!"