Chapter 2

MR. WITTLEWORTH GETS SHAVED.

"Next gentleman!" said Andre Maggimore, one of the journeyman barbers in the extensive shaving saloon of Cutts & Stropmore, which was situated near the Plutonian temples of State Street, in the city of Boston.

"Next gentleman!" repeated Andre, in tones as soft and feminine as those of a woman, when no one responded to his summons.

"My turn?" asked a spare young man of sixteen, throwing down the Post, with a languid air, and rising to his feet.

"Yes, sir," replied Andre, politely; and if the speaker had been out of sight, one would have supposed it was a lady who spoke. "Have your hair cut?"

"No; shave."

The barber seemed to be startled by the announcement, though there was not the faintest smile on his face to discourage the candidate for tonsorial honors. The young man looked important, threw his head back, pursed up his lips, and felt of his chin, on which there was not the slightest suspicion of a beard visible to the naked eye. Mr. Fitzherbert Wittleworth would not have been willing to acknowledge that he had not been shaved for three weeks; but no one could have discovered the fact without the aid of a powerful microscope.

Mr. Wittleworth spread out his attenuated frame in the barber's chair, and dropped his head back upon the rest. Andre looked as grave and serious as though he had been called to operate upon the face of one of the venerable and dignified bank presidents who frequented the shop. He was a journeyman barber, and it was his business to shave any one who sat down in his chair, whether the applicant had a beard or not. If Andre's voice was soft and musical, his resemblance to the gentler sex did not end there, for his hand was as silky and delicate, and his touch as velvety, as though he had been bred in a boudoir.

He adjusted the napkin to the neck of the juvenile customer with the nicest care, and then, from the force of habit, passed his downy hand over the face upon which he was to operate, as if to determine whether it was a hard or a tender skin. Several of the customers smiled and coughed, and even the half-dozen journeymen were not unmoved by the spectacle.

"What are you going to do, Fitz?" asked the occupant of the adjoining chair, who had just straightened himself up to be "brushed off."

"I'm going to have a shave," answered Mr. Wittleworth, as confidently as though the proceedings were entirely regular.

"What for?"

"To have my beard taken off, of course. What do you shave for?"

"Put on the cream, and let the cat lick it off."

"That's a venerable joke. I dare say the barber did not gap his razor when he shaved you. I always feel better after I have been shaved," added Mr. Wittleworth, as Andre laid a brush full of lather upon his smooth chin.

Those in the shop chuckled, and some of them were ill-mannered enough to laugh aloud, at the conceit of the young man who thus announced to the world that his beard had grown. Even the proprietors of the extensive shaving saloon looked uncommonly good-natured, though it was not prudent for them to rebuke the ambition of the prospective customer.

Andre lathered the face of the juvenile with as much care as though it had been that of the parsimonious broker at the corner, who shaved only when his beard was an eighth of an inch in length. Not satisfied with this preparatory step, he resorted to the process used for particularly hard beards, of rubbing the lather in with a towel wet in hot water; but Andre did not smile, or by word or deed indicate that all he was doing was not absolutely necessary in order to give his customer a clean and an easy shave. Then he stropped his razor with zealous enthusiasm, making the shop ring with the melody of the thin steel, as he whipped it back and forth on the long strip of soft leather, one end of which was nailed to the case, and the other end held in his hand. The music was doubtless sweet to the listening ears of Mr. Wittleworth, if not as the prelude of an easy shave, at least as an assurance that all the customary forms had been scrupulously complied with in his individual case.

Slapping the broad-bladed razor on his soft hand, the barber approached the young man in the chair. With a graceful movement he brought the instrument to bear gently on the face.

"Does it pull, Fitz?" asked the tormentor in the next chair.

"Of course not; Andre always gives a man an easy shave," replied Mr. Wittleworth.

"Certainly; but some people have tough beards and tender faces."

"If your beard is as soft as your head, it won't hurt you to shave with a handsaw," retorted Mr. Wittleworth.

The laugh was at the expense of the tormentor, and he retreated from the shop in the "guffaw," and Fitz was permitted to finish his shave in peace--in peace, at least, so far as this particular tormentor was concerned, for a more formidable one assailed him before his departure. Andre went over his face with the nicest care; then lathered it again, and proceeded to give it the finishing touches. He was faithful to the end, and gave the juvenile patron the benefit of the entire length and breadth of his art, omitting nothing that could add dignity or perfection to the operation. It was quite certain that, if there was anything like an imperceptible down on his face at the commencement of the process, there was nothing left of it at the end.

Mr. Wittleworth's hair was oiled, moistened with diluted Cologne water, combed, brushed, parted, and tossed in wavy flakes over his head, and was as fragrant, glossy, and unctuous as the skill of Andre could make it.

"One feels more like a Christian after a clean shave," said Mr. Wittleworth, as he rose from the chair, and passed his hand approvingly over his polished chin. "Barbers, good barbers, do a missionary work in the world."

"What are you doing here, Fitz?" demanded a stern-looking gentleman, who had just entered the shop, and stepped up behind the juvenile customer.

"I came in to get shaved," replied Mr. Wittleworth, abashed by the harsh tones.

"Shaved!" exclaimed Mr. Checkynshaw, the stern-looking gentleman, well known as the senior partner of the great banking house of Checkynshaw, Hart, & Co. "Shaved!"

"Yes, sir; I came here to be shaved, and I have been shaved," replied the young man, trying to assume an air of bravado, though he was actually trembling in his boots before the lofty and dignified personage who confronted and confounded him.

"Is this the way you waste your time and your money? I sent you to the post-office, and you have been gone over half an hour."

"I had to wait for my turn," pleaded Mr. Wittleworth.

"When I send you to the post-office, you will not loiter away your time in a barber's shop, you conceited puppy. I'll discharge you!"

"Discharge _me_!" exclaimed Mr. Wittleworth, stung by the epithet of the banker. "I think not, sir."

The young gentleman placed his hat upon his head, canting it over on one side, so as to give him a saucy and jaunty appearance. Mr. Checkynshaw, whose clerk, or rather "boy," he was, had often scolded him, and even abused him, in the private office of the banking-house, but never before in a place so public as a barber's shop in 'Change Street, and in 'change hours. He felt outraged by the assault; for Mr. Wittleworth, as his employer had rather indelicately hinted, had a high opinion of himself. He straightened himself up, and looked impudent--a phase in his conduct which the banker had never before observed, and he stood aghast at this indication of incipient rebellion.

"You think not, you puppy!" exclaimed the banker, stamping his feet with rage.

"I think not! It wouldn't be a prudent step for you to take," answered Mr. Wittleworth, stung again by the insulting appellations heaped upon him. "I know rather too much about your affairs to be cast out so thoughtlessly."

"I will discharge you this very day!" replied the banker, his teeth set firmly together.

"I think you will find that the affairs of Messrs. Checkynshaw, Hart, & Co. will not go on so smoothly without me as they do with me," added Mr. Wittleworth, as he canted his hat over a little more on one side, and pulled up his shirt collar.

"Without you!" gasped the banker, confounded by the assumption of his employee.

"Perhaps you will find it so, after you have done your worst."

"Conceited puppy! I took you into my office out of charity! Go to your place. Charity can do no more for you."

"If you can afford to discharge me, I can afford to be discharged," replied Mr. Wittleworth, as he stroked his chin, and walked out of the shop.

"The young vagabond!" muttered Mr. Checkynshaw. "I took him to keep his mother from starving. Andre," he added, imperiously.

The barber with the effeminate voice and the silky hands turned from the customer he was shaving, and bowed politely to the magnate of the house of Checkynshaw, Hart, & Co.

"Andre, my daughter Elinora goes to a juvenile party this evening, and wishes you to dress her hair at four o'clock."

"Yes, sir; with Mr. Cutts's permission, I will attend her at that hour."

Mr. Checkynshaw looked as though Mr. Cutts's permission was not at all necessary when he desired anything; but Mr. Cutts did not venture to interpose any obstacle to the wish of a person so influential as the banker. Mr. Checkynshaw turned to leave, went as far as the door, and then returned.

"Andre," he continued, "you spoke to me of a boy of yours."

"My adopted son, sir," replied the barber.

"I don't care whether he is your son, or your adopted son. What sort of a boy is he?"

"He is a very good boy, sir," answered Andre.

"Can he read and write?"

"Very well indeed, sir. The master of his school says he will take the medal at the close of the year."

"I shall discharge that puppy, and I want a good boy in his place. Send him to me at half past two this afternoon."

"I beg your pardon, Mr. Checkynshaw. Perhaps I spoke too soon, sir; but I did not want a place for him till next vacation."

"Send him up, and I will talk with him," said the banker, imperatively and patronizingly, as he hurried out of the shop.

He was met at the door by a girl of fifteen, who modestly stepped out of the way to let the magnate pass. She was dressed very plainly, but very neatly, and in her hand she carried a tin pail. The loud talk of the barber's shop politicians and the coarse jests of rude men ceased as she walked behind the long line of chairs to that where Andre was at work. She was rather tall for her age; her face was pretty, and her form delicately moulded. She was all gentleness and grace, and rude men were awed by her presence.

Andre smiled as sweetly as a woman when he saw her, and his eye followed her as she went to the stove, and placed the pail by its side.

"Maggie, send Leo to me as soon as you go home," said he, in the softest of his soft tones, as she left the shop.