Part 15

"Ain't your cheeks cold, though, Jimmie? It's right sharp out, ain't it? And Essie in her thin coat! You--you're a little late to-night, ain't you, Jimmie?"

He drew his loose-jointed figure up from over the bedside; and his features, half-formed as a sculptor's head just emerging from the marble, took on the easy petulance of youth, and he wiped the moist lips' print off his downy cheek with the back of his hand.

"Ah, there you go again! You been layin' here frettin' and countin' the minutes again, ain't you? Gee, it makes a fellow sore when he just can't get home no sooner!"

"No, no, Jimmie; I been layin' here sleepin' sound ever since I went to bed. I woke up for the first time just now. I'm all right, Jimmie, only--only--"

"Honest, ma, you ought to ask the company to put me in short-pants uniform, day duty, carrying telegrams of the day's catechism to Sunday-school classes."

"I--Don't fuss at me, Jimmie! I--I guess I must 'a' had one of them smothering spells, and I didn't wait up for Essie and Joe to-night. I'm all right now, Jimmie--all right."

He placed his heavy hand on her brow in half-understanding sympathy.

"Geewhillikins, why don't you tell a fellow? You want some of that black medicine, ma. You--gee!--you ain't lookin' kinda blue-like round the gills, are you? Old man Gibbs said we should send for him right away if--"

"No, no, Jimmie; I'm all right now."

"Look! I brought you a carnation one of the operators gimme--one swell little queen, too. You want some of that black medicine, ma?"

"I'm all right now, Jimmie. It was just earlier in the evening I kinda had a spell. Ain't that pink pretty, though! Here, put it in the glass, and gimme a French kiss. Always ashamed like a big baby when it comes to kissin', ain't you? Ashamed to even kiss your old ma!"

"Aw!" He shuffled his feet and bent over her, with the red mounting above the gold collar of his uniform.

"And such a mamma-boy you used to be before you had to get out and hustle--such a mamma-boy, and now ashamed to give your old ma a kiss!"

"Ashamed nothin'! Here, ma, I'll smooth your hair for you the wrong way like Essie used to do when you came home from the store dead after the semiannual clearings."

"No, no, Jimmie; these days I ain't got no more hair left to smooth."

"You look good to me."

"Aw, Jimmie, quit stringing your old ma. How can a stack o' bones look good to anybody?"

"You do."

"Your papa used to say so, too, Jimmie; but in them days my hair was natural curly--little cute, springy curls like Essie's. The first day he seen me he fell for 'em; and the night before he died, Jimmie, with you and Essie asleep in your folding-cribs and me little thinkin' that the next week I'd be back in the department clerking again, he took me in his arms and--"

"Yes, yes; I know, ma--but didn't old man Gibbs say not to get excited? Lay back and don't talk, ma. I can feel your heart beatin' way down in your hands."

"You're all tired out, ain't you, Jimmie?--too tired to listen to my talk; but you're going to wait up for your sister's young man to-night, ain't you, my boy? Go wet your hair and smooth it down. You'll wanna see him, Jimmie."

"Fine chance."

"Sure he's coming to-night, Jimmie. I got their supper all waitin'; and, see, there's my flowered wrapper at the foot of the bed, so I can get up and go in when--"

"Aw, cut out the comedy, ma! She ain't comin' straight home after the show any more'n a crooked road; and if she does he ain't coming with her."

"Jimmie, she promised sure to-night."

"Didn't she promise last night and the night before and the night before that?"

"But this afternoon when she left for the matinee, Jimmie, I wasn't feelin' so well, and she promised so sure."

"Them girl ushers down there is too lively a bunch for her, ma. Ushin' in a theayter is next to bein' in the chorus--only--"

"Jimmie!"

"Sure it is--only it ain't so good one way, and it ain't so bad another. This new-fangled girl ushin' gets my goat, anyways. It ain't doin' her any good."

"Oh, Gawd, Jimmie, don't I know it? I hated to see her take it--her so little and cute and pretty and all! Night-work ain't nothin' for our Essie."

"Sure it ain't!"

"But what could we do, Jimmie? After I gave out, her six a week in the notions wasn't a drop in the bucket. What else could we do, Jimmie?"

"Just you wait, ma! This time next year life'll be one long ice-cream soda for you and her. Wait till my dynamo gets to charging like I want her to--I'll be runnin' this whole shebang with a bang!"

"You're a good boy, Jimmie; but a kid of seventeen ain't expected to have shoulders for three."

"Just the samey, I showed a draft of my dynamo to the head operator, ma, and he's comin' up Sunday to have a look. Leave it here on the table just like it is, ma. You'll be ridin' in your Birdsong self-charging electric automobile yet!"

She let her fingers wander up and down his cheek and across his shoulders and into his uneven nappy hair.

"Poor Jimmie! If only you had the trainin'! Miss Maisie was up from the store to-day in her noon-hour and seen it standing here next to my bed; and she thought it was such a pretty-lookin' dynamo, with its copper wires and all."

"You didn't let her--"

"No--honest, Jimmie! See--it ain't been touched; I didn't even let her go near the table's edge. She wanted to know when I was comin' back to the store--she says the corsets have run down since they got the new head saleslady, Jimmie."

"If I'd 'a' been here I'd 'a' told her you ain't going back."

"Sometimes I--I think I ain't, neither, Jimmie."

"What?"

"Nothin'."

"When you get well, ma, then I--"

"Then I'm going back on my job, Jimmie. Eighteen years--not countin' the three years your papa lived--at doing one thing sort of makes you married to it. I got my heart as set as always, Jimmie, on gettin' you in at the Electric Training School next door. If I hadn't broke down--"

"Nix for mine, ma!"

"Every day I sit by the window, Jimmie, and see the young engineers and electricians who board there goin' to work; and it breaks my heart to think of you, with your mind for inventions, runnin' the streets--a messenger boy--just when I was beginnin' to get where I could do for you."

"Aw, cut that, ma! Don't I work round on my dynamo every morning till I go on duty? Wouldn't I look swell with an electricity book under my arm? I'd feel like Battling John drinking tea out of an egg-shell."

"The trainin'-school's the place for you, Jimmie. If you'd only take the dynamo over to the superintendent and show him where you're stuck he'd help you, Jimmie. I been beggin' you so long, and if only you wasn't so stubborn!"

"I ain't got the nerve buttin' in over there; it's for fellows who got swell jobs already."

"There's classes for boys, too, Jimmie; the janitor told me. Just go to-morrow and show your dynamo. It won't hurt nothin', and maybe they'll know just what the trouble is--it's only a little thing, Jimmie--three times in succession it worked last night, didn't it? It won't hurt to go, Jimmie--just to go and show it."

"Nix; I ain't got the nerve. You just wait! I ain't got the trainin'; but didn't I sell my double lens the day after I got the patent? Didn't I make that twenty-five just like battin' your eye?"

"The janitor says you was robbed in it, Jimmie."

"We should worry! Didn't we get a rockin'-chair and a string of beads and a tool-chest out of it?"

"It ain't you worries me so much, Jimmie. Here, put your head here on the pillow next to me, Jimmie. My heart's actin' up to-night. It ain't you worries me you're a man like your papa was and can hit back; but Essie--if only Essie--"

"You don't handle her right, ma; you're too easy-going with her. Since she went on her new job she's gettin' too gay--too gay!"

"Jimmie!"

"Sure she is. Like I told her last night when she came in all hours from dancing--if she didn't take that war-paint off her face I'd get her in a corner and rub it off till--"

"I've begged her and begged her, Jimmie, just as hard as I ever begged you about the dynamo, to wash her face of it. It's eatin' me, Jimmie--eatin' me! There wasn't a girl in the store that didn't envy that girl her complexion. Oh, Gawd, Jimmie, it ain't paint alone--it's where it can lead to."

"She needs an old-time spankin'."

"Them girls down at the theayter where she works put them ideas in her head. It's only of late with her, Jimmie. Wasn't she like a little baby when I had her across from me in the notions?"

"She's gotta keep her face clean or I'll--"

"She needs somebody strong like her papa was to handle her, Jimmie. She's stubborn in ways, like you, and needs somebody older, my boy--somebody strong that can handle her and love her all at once."

"She's gotta quit sneakin' home at all hours. She don't pay no attention to me; but she's gotta quit or I--I'll go down and smash up that whole theayter crowd of 'em!"

"If she'd 'a' had a father to grow up under it would 'a' been different. He was one of the strongest men in the power-house, Jimmie. Mechanics make strong men, my boy, and that's why my heart's set on you, Jimmie, takin' up where he left off."

"It's that job of hers, ma; it ain't no hang-out for her down there round the lights. She's gettin' too gay. I'll smash that ticket-speculator to gelatin if he don't show up or leave her alone!"

"'Sh-h-h, Jimmie! He's her young man; she says he's a upright and honorable young man with intentions."

"Where she hidin' him, then?"

"He--he's bashful about comin', Jimmie. Last night on her knees right here by this bed she told me, Jimmie, with her eyes like saucers, that he's said everything but come right out and ask her."

"What's the matter? Is he tongue-tied?"

"A fine fellow, she says, Jimmie--up to date as a new dime, makin' from thirty to forty a week. Get that, Jimmie? Gawd--forty a week! On forty a week, Jimmie, what they could do for themselves and for you!"

"I wanna look him over first. I knew a fellow in that game got forty a week and ninety days once, too."

"Jimmie!"

"There's a bunch of speculators used to hang round the Forty-second Street telegraph office, with one eye always on the cop and the other always open for rubes. They was all hunchbacks from dodging the law."

"He ain't one of them kind, Jimmie."

"Then why don't he have a roof over his head instead of doing sidewalk business?"

"Ticket-speculatin' is like any other business, Essie says. Profit is profit, whether you make it on a sheet of music, a washboard, or a theayter ticket."

"Then why don't he show his face round here, instead of runnin' her round night after night when she ought to be home sleepin'?"

"Gawd, Jimmie! I don't know, except what she says. I just feel like I couldn't stand her not bringing him to-night--like--like I couldn't stand it, Jimmie."

"Lay easy there, ma."

"They're young, I guess, and gotta have life; but I lay here with it in front of me all night, long after she gets home and is sleepin' here next to me as light as a daisy. She's so little and pretty, Jimmie."

"I wanna get my glims on him--"

"What, Jimmie?"

"I wanna see him."

"Me, too, Jimmie. I wouldn't care much about anything else if I could see him once; and if he is big and strong like your father was--"

"That gang don't come big and strong. They got big heads and little necks."

"The kind of fellow that would know how to treat you when you got stubborn, and would put his hand on your shoulder and not try to drive you. If he was a man like that, Jimmie, the kind you and Essie needs, I--I'd stop fightin'; I'd fold my hands and say to God: 'Ready! Ready right this minute!'"

"Ready for what, ma?"

"Ready, Jimmie, my boy. Just hands folded and ready--that's all."

"Aw, cut it, can't you, ma? I--ma, quit scarin' a fellow. Quit battin' your eyes like that. Tryin' to flirt with me, ain't you, ma? Quit it, now! Lemme get you some of that black medicine--you're gettin' one of your spells. Lemme run down-stairs and send Lizzie Marks for old man Gibbs?"

"No, no, Jimmie--don't leave me! Hold me, my boy, so I can feel your face. Don't cry, Jimmie; there ain't nothin' to cry about."

"Cut the comedy, ma! I ain't cryin'; I'm sweatin'."

"Jimmie, are--you--there? I feel so--so heavy."

"Sure I am, ma--right here, holding you in my arms. Feel! There's the scar where old Gibbs sewed my face the time I got hit with a bat--feel, ma--see, it's me."

"What's that, Jimmie, on the foot of the bed movin'?"

"See, ma--that's your flowered glad-rag. You're go-goin' to put it on when Essie and her gen'l'man friend come in. It ain't movin'; I shoved it."

"Don't muss it, Jimmie."

"No. See, I smoothed out its tail--it's a sash for you, ma."

"Jimmie, you won't leave me? It gets so dark and--the mice--"

"You couldn't pry me away with a crowbar, ma! I'll hold you till you yell leggo. Lemme go for old Gibbs, ma; you're breathing heavy as a pump."

"No, no, Jimmie; don't leave me."

"Sure I won't; but you're all twitchin' and jumpin', ma. Just leave me run down and send Lizzie Marks for him."

"No, no, Jimmie; I'm all right."

"Sure, ma? You--you're actin' up so funny."

"It ain't nothin'--only I'm an old woman, Jimmie. All of a sudden I got old and broke. It ain't the same in the department, Jimmie, with Essie gone from the notions across the aisle. Always when we were overstocked in the corsets she--she--Essie--"

"Aw, ma, you ain't talkin' straight. Lemme have old man Gibbs."

"I'm talking straight, Jimmie. Ain't I layin' right here in your arms and ain't my hair caught round one of your brass buttons?--quit pullin', Jimmie! Essie's hair is so bright, Jimmie. I can see it shinin' in the dark when she's sleepin'."

"Some hair the kid's got! Remember the night you took me and her to--"

"'Sh-h-h-h! Ain't that them coming? Ain't it, Jimmie? I ain't equal to gettin' up, Jimmie. Bring 'em in here and tell--"

"Like fun it's them! Whatta you bet right now they're holding down a table for two at the Palais du Danse? Swell joint!"

"Oh, Gawd, Jimmie!"

"I was kiddin', ma--only kiddin'. Open your eyes, ma. Gwan! Be a sport and open up! Remember, ma, when I was a kid, how I used to make you laff and laff, makin' a noise like a banjo--plunka-plunk-plunk-plunk-plunka-plunk?"

"Yes, Jimmie."

"I knew I'd get a laff out of you--plunka-plunk-plunka-plunk!"

"Yes, Jimmie, my boy! Go on! I like to lay here and remember back. Essie was always grabbin' your spoon--I used to slap her little hands and--"

"Ma, open your eyes! Don't go off in one of 'em again."

"See, they're open, Jimmie! I can see your gold buttons shinin' and shinin'--I ain't sleepin'; I'm only waitin'."

"She ain't had time to get home yet, ma. They gotta pick up programs and turn in lost articles and all."

"Put your arms round me, Jimmie. I keep slippin' and slippin'."

"Lemme run for old man Gibbs, ma? Please!"

"No, no, Jimmie. Sing like you used to when you was a little kid, Jimmie; I used to laff and laff."

"Plunka-plunk-plunk-plunk!"

"'Sh-h-h! There's the chimes--you won't never tell me the right time nights, when I ask you, Jimmie."

"It ain't late, ma."

"'Sh-h-h! What time is that? Listen!"

"It's early. Don't you count chimes, ma--it's a sign of snow to count 'em, and Essie's got her thin jacket on. Listen! This is a swell one I know: Plunk! Plunk! Plunk! Plunk!"

"'Sh-h-h, Jimmie! One--two--three--four--five--six--seven--eight--nine--ten--"

"See, it ain't late."

"'Leven! You can't cheat me; I heard the last one."

"'Leven already? Well, whatta you know about that? Them chimes is always ahead of themselves."

"Jimmie, my boy, quit playin' with your old ma."

"They'll be comin' soon now."

"Don't leave me, Jimmie."

"Sure, I won't--see!"

"Jimmie! Jim-mie--"

"Ma! Ma, for Gawd's sakes, open your eyes! Ma darlin'--please--please--"

"Sing, Jimmie, like--a banjo."

"Plunka-plunk-plunka-plunk!"

* * * * *

On that last boom of eleven the Stuyvesant Theater swung its doors outward as the portals of a cuckoo clock fly open on the hour, and women in fur-collared, brocaded coats, which wrapped them to the ankles, and carefully curved smiles that Watteau knew so well and Thackeray knew too well, streamed out into the radium-white flare of Broadway, their delicate fingers resting lightly on the tired arms of tired business men, whose faces were like wood-carving and whose wide white shirt-fronts covered their hearts like slabs.

Almost before the last limousine door had slammed, and the last tired business man had felt the light compelling pressure of the delicate finger-tips on his arm and turned his tired eyes from the white lights to the whiter lights of cafes and gold-leaf hotels, the interior of the Stuyvesant Theater, warm and perfumed as the interior of a jewel-box, blinked into soft darkness. Small figures, stealthy _espions_ of the night, padded down thick-carpeted aisles flashing their pocket searchlights now here, now there, folding rows of velvet seats against velvet backs, reaching for discarded programs and seat-checks, gathering up the dainty debris of petals fallen from too-blown roses, an occasional webby handkerchief, an odd glove, a ribbon.

Then the dull-red eyes above the fire-exits blinked out, the sea of twilight deepened, and the small searchlights flashed brighter and whiter, glow-worms in a pit of night.

"For Pete's sakes! Tell Ed to give back them lights; my lamp's burnt out."

"Oh, hurry up, Essie! You girls up there in the balcony would kick if you was walkin' a tight rope stretched between the top stories of two Flatiron Buildings."

"It's easy enough for you to talk down there in the orchestra, Lulu Pope. Carriage shoes don't muss up the place like Subway shoes."

"Gimme the balcony in preference to the orchestra every time."

"What about us girls 'way up here in the chutes? Whatta you say about us, Lulu Pope--playin' handmaids to the gallery gods?"

"Chutes the same. I used to be in the chutes over at the Olympic, and six nights out of the week I carried water up the aisles without a stop. Lookin' each row in the eye, too!"

"Like fun!"

"Sure's my name's Lulu Pope! Me an' a girl named Della Bradenwald used to play Animal or Vegetable Kingdom every entr'acte with the fireman."

"Oh-h-h! Say, Loo, you oughtta see what I found up here in Box E!"

"Leave it to Essie Birdsong for a find! What is it this time--the diamond star the blonde queen in Upper E was wearin'?"

"A right-hand, number five and a half--white stitchin'."

"Can you beat it? And you ain't never had a claim yet at the box-office."

"I knew my luck would break, Lulu. My little brother Jimmie says if you break a comb your luck breaks with it. I broke one this morning. Whatta you bet now I begin to match every one of my five left-hand gloves, without a claim from the office?"

"Lucky kid!"

Conversation curved from gallery to loge box, and from loge to balcony.

"Gee! Look at this amber butterfly! I seen it in her hair when I steered her down the aisle. She must be stuck on something about this show--third time this week, and not on paper, neither."

"Amber, is it, Sadie? I'll trade you for the tortoise-shell one I found in G 4; amber'll go swell with my hair."

"Whatta you bet she claims it?"

"Nix."

"Say, did you hear Wheelan flivver her big scene to-night? I was dozin' in the foyer and she tripped over her cue so hard she woke me up."

"I should say so! I was standing next to the old man, and he let out a line of talk that was some fireworks; he said a super in the mob scene could take her place and beat her at pickin' up cues."

"Ready, Sadie?"

"Yes; wait till I turn in one gent's muffler and a red curl."

"Are you done up there, too, Essie?"

"Yes; but you needn't wait for me, Loo. If you're in a hurry I'll see you down in the locker-room."

Seats slammed; laughter drifted; searchlights danced and flashed out as though suddenly doused with water; and the gold, crystal, velvet, and marble interior of the Stuyvesant Theater suddenly vanished into its imminent wimple of blackness.

In the bare-walled locker-room Miss Essie Birdsong leaned to her reflection in the twelve-inch wavy mirror and ran a fine pencil-line along the curves of her eyebrows.

"Is this right, Loo?"

"Swell! Your eyes look two shades darker."

"Gee!"

Miss Birdsong smiled and leaned closer.

"The girls all out, Loo?"

"Yeh; hurry up and lemme have that mirror, Ess--Harry gets as glum as glue if I keep him waiting."

Miss Pope adjusted a too-small hat with a too-long pheasant's wing cocked at a too-rakish angle on her brass-colored hair, and powdered at her powdered cheek-bones.

"Here--you can have the mirror first, Loo. I--I ain't in a hurry to-night. You and Harry better go on and not wait round for me."

Miss Pope placed her long, bird-like hands on her slim hips and slumped inward at the waist-line; her eyes had the peculiar lambency of the blue flame that plays on the surface of cognac and leaves it cold.

"What's hurtin' you, Ess? The whole week you been makin' this play to dodge me and Harry. If you don't like our company, Doll-doll, me and Harry can manage to worry along somehow."

"Oh, Lulu, it--it ain't that, and you know it."

"You're all alike. Didn't my last chum, Della Bradenwald, do the same thing? I interdooced her to a gen'l'man friend of mine, a slick little doorman for a two-day show, and what did she do? Scat! After the second day it was good-by, Loo-Loo! They went kitin' it off together and dropped me and Harry like parachutes!"

"Loo, darlin', honest, me and Joe just love goin' round dancin' with you and Harry; but--but--"

"Then what's hurtin' you?"

"It's ma again, Loo. She looked like she was ready for one of her spells when I left; she's been worse again these two days, and the doctor says we mustn't get her excited--her heart's bum, Loo."

"Say, I used to have heart failure myself, and I know a swell cure--Hartley's Heart's Ease. Honest, when I was over at the Olympic I used to go dead like a tire. Lend me your eyestick, Ess."

"You'll laff, Loo; but she's daffy for me and Joe to come home after the show; she's never seen him at all, and--"

"Oh, Gawd, I gotta flashlight of Joe!"

"When ma and I was clerkin' the girls and fellows always used to come to our flat, Loo; and, say, for fun! Ma was as lively as any of us in those days; and we'd have sardine sandwiches, and my kid brother used to imitate all kinds of music and actors; and we used to laff and laff until they'd knock on the ceiling from up-stairs and ma'd pack the whole lot of 'em home. Why don't you and Harry come up to-night, too, Loo? And we'll have a little doin's."

"Nothin' doin', Beauty. There's a Free-for-All Tango Contest round at the Poppy Garden to-night; and, believe me, I wouldn't mind winning that pink ivory manicure set. All I gotta ask is one thing, Ess! Bring me a snapshot of Joe doing the fireside act!"

The glaze of unshed tears sprang over Miss Birdsong's eyes like gauzy clouds across a summer sky.

"I--that's just it, Loo. I can't get him to come. Sometimes I think maybe it's just because he's stringing me along; and I--he--he was your friend first, Loo. Ain't he ever said anything to you about me--about--aw, you know what I mean, Loo?"

"He's hipped on you, girl. I know Joe Ullman like I know the floor-plan of this theater."

"Honest, Loo, do you think so?"

"Sure! Gawd! I knew Joe when I was making sateen daisies in a artificial-flower loft on Twenty-second Street; and him and my brother was clerkin' in a cigar store on Twenty-third and running a neat little book on the side."

"A book?"

"Yes, dearie--a pretty picture-book."

"Joe never told me."

"He ain't always been the thirty-dollar-a-week kid he is now--take it from me. Just the same, you can thank me for interdoocing you to the sharpest little fellow that's selling tickets on the sidewalks of this great and wicked city."

"I always tell him he ought to save more--taxis and all he has to have, that spendy he is!"