The Rich Little Poor Boy Part 11

Johnnie wanted to ask if all gardeners wore hairy trousers. Then thought of a subject even more interesting. "Mister,"--he put a note of genuine sympathy into his voice--"how'd you come t' lose your eye?"

"My eye?"--Grandpa's habit again. "Wal, this is how"-- He frowned with the eye he had left, and pursed his lips till his mustache stood out fearsomely.

"Yes?" encouraged Johnnie, whose mind was picturing all sorts of exciting events in which the tall man, as the hero, fought and was injured, yet conquered his enemies.

"Sonny," the other went on sadly, "I jes' natu'lly got my eye pinched in the door."

Pinched in the door! Johnnie stared. _Pinched in the door?_ How could that happen? What might a man be doing that such an accident should come to pa.s.s? He put his free hand to one of his own eyes, fingering it inquiringly.

Before he could come to any conclusion, the one-eyed man had halted before the blazing, gla.s.sed-in front of a restaurant that fairly dazzled the sight. It was, as Johnnie saw, such a place as only millionaires could afford to frequent. In the very front of it, behind that plate window, stood men in white, wearing spotless caps, who were cooking things in plain view of the street. And inside--for the one-eyed man now boldly opened a door and entered, drawing Johnnie after him--were more men in white, and women similarly garbed. The high walls of the great room were white too, like the hall of a sultan's palace. And seated at long tables were splendidly attired men and women, enjoying their supper as calmly as if all this magnificence were nothing to them--nothing, though the tables were of marble!

However, every man and woman in the wonderful place showed marked excitement on the appearance of Johnnie and his escort. They stopped eating. And how they stared! They bent to all sides, whispering. For a moment, Johnnie felt sure that, ragged as he was, the palace did not want him, and that he was about to be ordered out. He hung back, wishing with all his heart that he had done his hanging back earlier, outside the door, for instance.

Then, relief; for he recognized that all the interest was kindly. One of the ladies in white--a beautiful, stately person--showed them grandly to chairs at either side of a table; a second lady brought them each a gla.s.s of ice water, and condescended to listen to their wants in the supper line. About them people smiled cordially.

The one-eyed man was now bareheaded. And Johnnie, just as he was leaning back, prepared to enjoy himself to the full, suddenly noted, and with a pang, that his host, shorn of his headgear, was far less attractive in appearance than when covered; did not seem the strange, rakish, picturesque, almost wild figure of a moment before, but civilized, slick, and mild.

For one thing, that shut eye was in full view, which subtracted from the brigandish look of his countenance; for another, the s.h.a.ggy trousers were--naturally--in total eclipse. Then he had mouse-colored hair which matched his mustache, whereas it should have been black--or bright red.

To make matters worse, the hair had recently been wet-combed. It was also fine and thin, especially over the top of the head, from where it had been brought straight down upon the forehead in a long, smooth, shining bang which (and this not a quarter-inch too soon) turned to sweep left. Contrasting with the oily appearance of the bang were some hairs at the very crown of the head. These--a few--leaned this way and that, making a wild tuft.

Johnnie wished with his whole heart that the stranger would again put on his hat.

Another feature thrust itself upon Johnnie's notice. Out from the front of his host's throat, to the ruination of such scant good looks as he had, protruded an Adam's apple that was as large and tanned and tough-looking as his nose. On that brown prominence a number of long pale hairs had their roots. These traveled now high, now low, as the one-eyed man drank deep of the ice water. And Johnnie felt that he understood the sad quiet of this queer, tall person. In his case the stork had been indeed cruel.

The hat was swinging from a near-by hook--one of a double line of hooks down the long room. Under the hat was a sign. Johnnie read it; then centered his stare on the hat. At any moment he expected to witness something extraordinary. That was because across the placard, in neat, black letters, were the words: _Watch your Hat and Coat_.

He reached to touch the one-eyed man. "Say, Mister!" he whispered, "Y'

see what it says? Well, what'll happen if we watch?"

"Huh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the other, slewing that one green eye round to glance upward. "That's jes' it! If y' watch, _nuthin'll_ happen!"

It was a good thing to know at the moment. For the second lady was back, bringing supper with her--a smoking dish of mingled meat and vegetables, another of pork and beans, a cup of coffee, a gla.s.s of milk, an orange, and bread and b.u.t.ter.

b.u.t.ter! Johnnie could scarcely believe his eyes. He almost thought this was one of Buckle's meals, and that the b.u.t.ter would melt, figuratively speaking, before his longing look. But it stayed, a bright pat, as yellow as his own hair, on a doll's dish of a plate. And as Johnnie had not tasted b.u.t.ter for a very long time, he proceeded now, after the manner of the male, to clear that cunning little dish by eating the choicest thing first.

As for the one-eyed man, his knife, held in his left hand, was going up and down between the dish of beans and his mouth with mechanical regularity. At the bean dish, he covered the long blade with a ruddy heap. Then balancing it all nicely, he swung it ceiling-ward, met it half-way by a quick duck of the mouse-covered head, and swept it clean with a dextrous, all-enveloping movement.

Johnnie was hungry too. The b.u.t.ter gone, along with its complement of bread, he attacked his share of the meat and vegetables, using, however (which was to Cis's credit), a fork. The dish was delicious. He forgot even the placard.

So far the one-eyed man had proven to be anything but a talkative person. Under the circ.u.mstances this was just as well. Johnnie could not have shared just then in a conservation. Twice during the meal he reached down and let out the strap a hole or two. And for the first time in his life he was grateful for the roominess of Barber's old clothes.

Half an hour, and Johnnie was, as he himself expressed it, "stuffed like a sausage." The orange, he dropped into his shirt-band to find a place with the books, there being no s.p.a.ce for it internally.

"Full up, eh?" demanded the one-eyed man, mopping at his mustache so hard with a paper napkin that Johnnie expected to see the hairy growth come away from its moorings under the leathery nose.

"It was a feast!" p.r.o.nounced Johnnie, borrowing from the language of his friend Aladdin. A moment later he gasped as he saw his host carelessly ring a fifty-cent piece upon the gorgeous marble of the table top. Then the meal had cost so much as that! As he trotted doorward in the wake of the spurred heels, his boy's conscience faintly smote him. He almost felt that he had eaten too much.

"My goodness!" he murmured, his glance missing the variegated mosaic of the floor.

But still another moment, and the one-eyed man had halted at a desk which stood close to the front door, and was throwing down a one-dollar bill, together with some silver.

Johnnie knew something was wrong. His host was forgetful, absent-minded.

He realized that he must interfere. "You jus' paid the lady!" he warned in a hasty whisper.

The other nodded sadly as he settled the big hat. "Yeppie," he returned.

"But y' see, sonny, it's this-away: if you got jes' one eye, w'y, they make y' pay twicet!"

Another gasp. It was so grossly unfair!

However it had all proved to him beyond a doubt that here was a man of unlimited wealth. On several occasions Uncle Albert's millionaire had treated Johnnie to candy and apples. But now the riches of that person seemed pitifully trivial.

They fared forth and away in the same order as they had come.

But not so silently. Food, it seemed, was what could rouse the one-eyed man to continued speech. He began to ask questions, all of them to the point, most of them embarra.s.sing.

"Say, what in the name o' Sam Hill y' got cached inside that shirt?"--this was the first one.

"Books," returned Johnnie, promptly, "and the orange."

"Y' kinda cotton t' books, eh?" the other next observed.

"Not cotton," replied Johnnie, politely. "They're made of paper."

"Y' don't tell me?--And what y' want me t' call y'?"

"My--my--my," began Johnnie, trying to think and speak at the same time, with small success in either direction. Then feeling himself pressed for time, and helpless, he fell back upon the best course, which was the simple truth. "My name's Johnnie Smith," he added.

The truth was too simple to be believed, "Aw, git out!" laughed the one-eyed man, with a comical lift of the mustache. "And I s'pose y' live with the Vanderbilt fambly, eh?"

Johnnie's eyes sparkled. There was in the question a certain something--an ignoring of bare facts--which made him believe that this man and he were kindred souls.

"No, I don't live with 'em," he hastened to say. "But I talk to Mister Vanderbilt ev'ry day on the tel'phone."

The stranger seemed neither doubtful nor amazed. Johnnie liked him better and better. Taking a fresh hold of the other's h.o.r.n.y hand, he chattered on: "I talked to Mister Astor yesterday. He asked me t' go ridin' with him, but I had t' take a trip t' Niagarry."

"Hope y' didn't hurt his feelin's none,"--the tone was grave: that one green eye looked anxious.

Johnnie only shook his head. He did not care to go further with the discussion of the Astor-Smith friendship.

However, the one-eyed man himself turned the conversation, "Goin' back home t'night?" he wanted to know.

Johnnie raised startled eyes. "N-n-no," he returned. "I-i-if I was to, I'd have to take a terrible lickin'."

"Mm." The one-eyed man seemed to understand; then, presently, "Your paw?--or your maw?"

"No relation at _all_," protested Johnnie. "Just the man where I live."

"He feeds y' O. K.," put in the other. "I was noticin' back yonder in the chuck-house how plump y' are."