The Hills of Refuge Part 11

"Ah, then she is a little sister?"

"No, only a niece," Charles interrupted, "but I love her and I think she loved me at one time, and may still, perhaps. They say that children soon forget those they love, and, as I shall never see Ruth again, she is sure to forget me; but I shall never forget her. Do you know, old man, that that very little angel has seen me drunk. She has crept into my arms and hugged me tight when I was too drunk to know she was near. I came to myself one day when she was crying in alarm because she could not wake me up. Oh, if I could blot that out! Perhaps when Ruth is grown she will recall that, scene more vividly than any other a.s.sociated with me. It is odd, but I don't feel as if I shall ever drink a drop again--the desire has left me completely. I don't know why, but it has."

"Our talk is on the wrong line to-night," Mason said, sympathetically.

"You said once that it was absolutely impossible for you ever to go back to your old friends, and if that is so this talk is doing you no good at all."

"No, it is doing no good," Charles admitted. "When I think of those old days my very soul seems torn apart. Lost opportunities--the 'what might have been' but wasn't! Yes, let's talk of the present. What chance for work now?"

Mason lighted his pipe, which he had been carefully filling. "There is a chance, but not here in New York. To tell you the truth, I rather like the idea, for it is the only thing I have seen in which we could stay together."

"A chance? What is it?" Charles demanded, putting the picture back into its place.

"You may laugh, but this monotony is killing me, and I am thinking seriously of taking the plunge," Mason said, as he puffed away. "I want you to come, but not if you don't like it. This morning I met a man in Union Square who told me he was taking a week off from a job with a traveling circus and menagerie. It is now in Philadelphia. It will be in Newark, New Jersey, the day after to-morrow. He says men who are willing to do hard manual labor can always get employment, good food, fair sleeping-quarters on the train, and two dollars a day promptly paid.

I've always liked outdoor work. The thing fairly charms me, for I want to see more of the country, but I don't want to throw you over. I've got used to you. I'd be lost without you. I've never had a real pal before."

Charles lighted his own pipe. He frowned as if in deep reflection. "I'm going to be frank," he said, presently. "I am like you. I like the idea of that sort of life immensely, and I am dying of dry rot. But I am wondering, would a man--well, a man like me, for instance--be as safe there as here."

"Safer, in my opinion," Mason declared, eagerly. "In a roundabout way I dug it out of the chap that many of the hangers-on were fellows who, for different reasons, were dodging officers of the law. He said he did not like that feature of the life, but that you don't have to a.s.sociate with them unless you like. Gosh! you know, I like the idea, and I wish you did!"

"Newark, day after to-morrow," Charles said, thoughtfully. "That's close. Well, I'll think it over. It looks inviting, doesn't it? Yes, I'll think it over. What will we have to do?"

Mason laughed. "Feed the animals; drive stakes and pull them up; help about the big tent-kitchen; dress up like Turks or some other outlandish creature and march in the street processions, and Heaven only knows what else."

"It is getting interesting," Charles smiled. "I'll let you know soon.

Keep it in view. It is the only thing in sight, and we will starve at this rate."

The two friends happened to be in Madison Square the following afternoon, and were attracted by the sight of several groups of people gathered around some "soap-box" orators in the s.p.a.ce set aside by the city for such meetings. Speeches were made daily by the men and women on religion, science, philosophy and every form of politics from cra.s.s anarchy to ideal socialism. For the most part, the speakers were of foreign birth or the descendants of foreigners. Presently they were drawn into a group that was gathering about a blond-bearded philosopher who had the ascetic face of a mystic and who was telling how he had forsaken a life of practical activity and had found infinite peace. Men in the group who openly avowed themselves to be atheists began to laugh and jeer and ask pertinent questions. The speaker replied to them. A fierce argument arose. The noise of the discussion attracted persons in the other groups and Mason and Charles found themselves hemmed in by the close-pressing human ma.s.s. Charles, who was deeply interested in the man's theory of renunciation, suddenly felt his friend nudging him with his elbow. Looking into his face he detected a queer expression in it.

"Let's get out," Mason said, in a low voice. There was no mistaking the insistent note of warning which it held, and, sure now that something was wrong, Charles quickly a.s.sented and began worming his way through the crowd. It was difficult to do so, for the spectators were all deeply interested in the argument and did not care to stand aside. As they laboriously moved forward, inch by inch, Charles noticed that Mason now and then cast a furtive backward glance into the throng, as if anxious to avoid some one.

"Come on, come on!" he kept urging. Finally they were free and on the open sidewalk. "Come on!" Mason repeated, his eyes on the ground.

"What is the matter?" Charles asked, bewildered.

Looking back toward the crowd, Mason suddenly lowered his head again and said, warningly: "Don't look back. I see him watching us. He followed us out of the crowd." Mason swore under his breath. "I don't like the looks of this a bit--not a bit!"

Further along he explained. "I was looking over that bunch of men just now when all at once I saw a short man a little behind us watching you like a hawk. He evidently didn't think we were together. He never let your face leave him for a minute. I saw his eyes gleaming, as if he had just discovered you and was studying your features."

"And you think--" Charles did not finish.

"He looked to me like a detective in plain clothes. I have seen some of them, and he was of that type. He couldn't hide his interest. You know your picture has been published. It looked to me like this fellow was comparing you to it in his mind. I don't know, but I am sure we must dodge him if we can."

"I ought not to have come out like this," Charles sighed, gloomily.

"I've been a fool."

"Never mind, come on," Mason said, looking back. "I don't see him now.

We'll give him the shake."

They went up to Central Park; they sat there on one of the benches till sundown, and then went back to their room. Both were very grave and neither had much to say.

CHAPTER XIII

At seven o'clock Mason proposed that he should go out and get something for them to eat, while Charles stayed in the house to avoid the possibility of being seen by any one who might be searching for him.

Charles consented, but when his friend was gone his sheer loneliness became all but unbearable. The tawdry room with its cheap gas-fixtures of rusted cast iron, the machine-made oil-paintings, the tattered, dust-filled carpet, the cracked furniture, seemed a sort of prison cell in which he was confined. Not since his disappearance from Boston had the outlook seemed so hopeless. He told himself that it would only be a question of a day or so now before he would be caught and taken back to his old home. He shuddered at the thought of the scandal in the mind of the public. William, who no doubt had felt somewhat secure for the past two weeks, would find himself on that black brink again. Celeste--poor, gentle, sensitive Celeste--would suffer now in reality, and little Ruth!

Why, the child might even ask to see him there in jail, and what reason could he give her for his incarceration? He paced the floor back and forth. How long Mason was in returning! Had anything detained him?

Presently Mason came back. He brought nothing with him. He looked too much concerned to have thought of his errand.

"Say, it's serious," he began. "I didn't have time to go to the restaurant. As I went out, old man, I saw that same fellow standing in front of our door, across the street. He was in the shadow, but I saw him and recognized him by his build. I couldn't doubt it, for when he saw me come out he bolted. He turned and went straight to the corner and down the avenue. I've been watching outside ever since to see if he was coming back."

"Then he followed us," Charles said.

"Every step of the way to the Park. He had us under his eye while we were there, and he dogged our steps back here. Say, you've got to listen to me."

"I'm ready," Charles said, gloomily. "You can decide better than I can."

"Here is my idea," Mason said. "He evidently intends to get a warrant for you, but it may not be possible till to-morrow. We must get away from here to-night--at once. There is no time to lose. We are going to Newark."

"The circus?" Charles said, inquiringly.

"Yes, but we must not be followed by that fellow, or any one else. Now I'll pack a few things, and you do the same. Make a small parcel. Don't bother with your bag. Thank G.o.d, our rent is paid. We are not going by train. That would be risky. We are going to walk most of the way through the country. It will be safer than in the trains that may be watched by the police. Hurry now!"

Mason was soon ready. "Listen," he said, impressively. "I'm going outside now. You bring both parcels with you. I'll stroll along the street and make sure that the coast is clear. When you come out, if you see me with a newspaper in my hand it will mean that you are to follow me, and you do it. If I have no paper you are to go back and wait here till I come."

Ten minutes later Charles descended the stairs. He deemed it lucky that he met no one. A clock below was striking ten. Outside he looked up and down the street. Presently he saw Mason on the first corner. He was in front of a laundry, a newspaper in hand. He saw that Mason had seen him, for he turned suddenly and began to walk westward. Charles followed for several blocks. Presently Mason stopped in a spot where there was little light, and waited for him to come up.

"Coast is clear, I think," Mason softly chuckled. "That skunk thinks his game is safe till to-morrow, for he doesn't dream we are on to him."

"Where are we going now?" Charles asked, vastly relieved by his friend's confident tone, and the sudden sense of the freer life into which they were going like two children of Fate.

"We must cross the Hudson somewhere," Mason answered. "We could take the ferry at One Hundred and Thirtieth Street. It is less apt to be watched than the others, but still I want to avoid even that chance of detection. There are some small boat-houses near One Hundred and Eighty-first Street. I've hung about them a good deal. If we can get there unnoticed we can be taken across in a row-boat or small launch--easy enough to pretend to be camping out over there. Hundreds are doing it this summer. We could take a car up, Subway or surface, but I think we ought to make for the river-front and do it afoot. It is a long walk, but it is safe."

"It suits me," Charles agreed, and side by side they continued in their westward course.

Reaching Broadway, they walked northward till they came to Fiftieth Street; then they turned to the river-front. It was a fine night. The Albany excursion-boats, brilliantly lighted, were pa.s.sing. Hundreds of smaller craft, yachts, sailboats, launches, and canoes, dotted the surface of the broad stream, and from some of them came strains of band music, the strident notes of a clarinet, merry voices singing to the accompaniment of stringed instruments.

"Fine! Fine!" Mason kept muttering. "We ought to have done this before.

You can't beat it at this time of the year."

They were pa.s.sing a small restaurant and Mason paused. "We've got to eat," he laughed. "I like the looks of this snug joint. What do you say?"

Charles consented. The haunting sense of danger was gone. He was hungry.

They went in. The hour was too late, the single attendant said, for anything to be served except sandwiches and coffee. They ordered a supply, drank two cups of coffee each, and ate their sandwiches as they walked on.

They were soon in the neighborhood of Columbia University and Grant's Tomb. The moonlight on the river, the abrupt cliffs of the Palisades beyond, on the top of which gleamed the lights of an amus.e.m.e.nt park, drew Charles into a reminiscent mood which suddenly became painful in the extreme. He told himself that it was no wonder that Mason could be cheerful. He had a home and relatives to whom he could return when he wished, but with Charles the wide world was his only home. He was so bound by his promise to his brother that he could not reveal his entire past even to Mason, who had proved himself worthy of all confidence.