Book: Somewhere in Red Gap

H >> Harry Leon Wilson >> Somewhere in Red Gap




Lon says "Easy come, easy go!" and moves over to the next table again to
help out with the silver bucket of champagne he's ordered, taking Jeff
Tuttle with him to present to his old friends that he's known for all of
twenty minutes. The New Yorker is now more suspicious then ever of Ben;
his wan beauty is marred by a cynical smile and his hair has come
unglued in a couple of places. Ben is more sensitive than ever to these
suspicions of his new pal so he calls on Jake Berger to match his watch
against the four. Jake takes out his split-second repeater and him and
Ben match coins and this time Ben is lucky enough to lose, thereby
showing his dear old New Yorker that he ain't a crook after all. But the
New Yorker still looks very shrewd and robbed and begins to gulp the
champagne in a greedy manner. You can hear him calling Jake a
confederate. Jake sees it plain enough, that the lad thinks he's been
high-graded, so he calls over our waiter and crowds all five watches
onto him. "Take these home to the little ones," says Jake, and dismisses
the matter from his mind by putting a wine glass up to his ear and
listening into it with a rapt expression that shows he's hearing the
roar of the ocean up on Alaska's rockbound coast.

The New Yorker is a mite puzzled by this, but I can see it don't take
him long to figure out that the waiter is also a confederate. Anyway,
he's been robbed of his watch forever and falls to the champagne again
very eager and moody. It was plain he didn't know what a high-powered
drink he was trifling with. And Ben was moody, too, by now. He quit
recalling old times and sacred memories to the New Yorker. If the latter
had tried to break up the party by leaving at this point I guess Ben
would of let him go. But he didn't try; he just set there soggily
drinking champagne to drown the memory of his lost watch. And pretty
soon Ben has to order another quart of this twelve-dollar beverage. The
New Yorker keeps right on with the new bottle, daring it to do its worst
and it does; he was soon speaking out of a dense fog when he spoke at
all.

With his old pal falling into this absent mood Ben throws off his own
depression and mingles a bit with the table of old New York families
where Lon Price is now paying the checks. They was the real New Yorkers;
they'd never had a moment's distrust of Lon after he ordered the first
time and told the waiter to keep the glasses brimming. Jeff Tuttle was
now dancing in an extreme manner with a haggard society bud aged
thirty-five, and only Jake and me was left at our table. We didn't count
the New Yorker any longer; he was merely raising his glass to his lips
at regular intervals. He moved something like an automatic chess player
I once saw. The time passed rapidly for a couple hours more, with Jake
Berger keeping up his ceaseless chatter as usual. He did speak once,
though, after an hour's silence. He said in an audible tone that the New
Yorker was a human hangnail, no matter where he was born.

And so the golden moments flitted by, with me watching the crazy crowd,
until they began to fall away and the waiters was piling chairs on the
naked tables at the back of the room. Then with some difficulty we
wrenched Ben and Lon and Jeff from the next table and got out into the
crisp air of dawn. The New Yorker was now sunk deep in a trance and just
stood where he was put, with his hat on the wrong way. The other boys
had cheered up a lot owing to their late social career. Jeff Tuttle said
it was all nonsense about its being hard to break into New York society,
because look what he'd done in one brief evening without trying--and he
flashed three cards on which telephone numbers is written in dainty
feminine hands. He said if a modest and retiring stranger like himself
could do that much, just think what an out-and-out social climber might
achieve!

Right then I was ready to call it an absorbing and instructive evening
and get to bed. But no! Ben Sutton at sight of his now dazed New Yorker
has resumed his brooding and suddenly announces that we must all make a
pilgrimage to West Ninth Street and romantically view his old home which
his father told him to get out of twenty-five years ago, and which we
can observe by the first tender rays of dawn. He says he has been having
precious illusions shattered all evening, but this will be a holy moment
that nothing can queer--not even a born New Yorker that hasn't made the
grade and is at this moment so vitrified that he'd be a mere glass crash
if some one pushed him over.

I didn't want to go a bit. I could see that Jeff Tuttle would soon begin
dragging a hip, and the streets at that hour was no place for Lon Price,
with his naturally daring nature emphasized, as it were, from drinking
this here imprisoned laughter of the man that owned the joint we had
just left. But Ben was pleading in a broken voice for one sight of the
old home with its boyhood memories clustering about its modest front and
I was afraid he'd get to crying, so I give in wearily and we was once
more encased in taxicabs and on our way to the sacred scene. Ben had
quite an argument with the drivers when he give 'em the address. They
kept telling him there wasn't a thing open down there, but he finally
got his aim understood. The New Yorker's petrified remains was carefully
tucked into the cab with Ben.

And Ben suffered another cruel blow at the end of the ride. He climbed
out of the cab in a reverent manner, hoping to be overcome by the sight
of the cherished old home, and what did he find? He just couldn't
believe it at first. The dear old house had completely disappeared and
in its place was a granite office building eighteen stories high. Ben
just stood off and looked up at it, too overcome for words. Up near the
top a monster brass sign in writing caught the silver light of dawn. The
sign sprawled clear across the building and said PANTS EXCLUSIVELY.
Still above this was the firm's name in the same medium--looking like a
couple of them hard-lettered towns that get evacuated up in Poland.

Poor stricken Ben looked in silence a long time. We all felt his
suffering and kept silent, too. Even Jeff Tuttle kept still--who all the
way down had been singing about old Bill Bailey who played the Ukelele
in Honolulu Town. It was a solemn moment. After a few more minutes of
silent grief Ben drew himself together and walked off without saying a
word. I thought walking would be a good idea for all of us, especially
Lon and Jeff, so Jake paid the taxi drivers and we followed on foot
after the chief mourner. The fragile New Yorker had been exhumed and
placed in an upright position and he walked, too, when he understood
what was wanted of him; he didn't say a word, just did what was told him
like one of these boys that the professor hypnotizes on the stage. I
herded the bunch along about half a block back of Ben, feeling it was
delicate to let him wallow alone in his emotions.

We got over to Broadway, turned up that, and worked on through that
dinky little grass plot they call a square, kind of aimless like and
wondering where Ben in his grief would lead us. The day was well begun
by this time and the passing cars was full of very quiet people on their
way to early work. Jake Berger said these New Yorkers would pay for it
sooner or later, burning the candle at both ends this way--dancing all
night and then starting off to work.

Then up a little way we catch sight of a regular old-fashioned horse-car
going crosstown. Ben has stopped this and is talking excitedly to the
driver so we hurry up and find he's trying to buy the car from the
driver. Yes, sir; he says its the last remnant of New York when it was
little and old and he wants to take it back to Nome as a souvenir.
Anybody might of thought he'd been drinking. He's got his roll out and
wants to pay for the car right there. The driver is a cold-looking old
boy with gray chin whiskers showing between his cap and his comforter
and he's indignantly telling Ben it can't be done. By the time we get
there the conductor has come around and wants to know what they're
losing all this time for. He also says they can't sell Ben the car and
says further that we'd all better go home and sleep it off, so Ben hands
'em each a ten spot, the driver lets off his brake, and the old ark
rattles on while Ben's eyes is suffused with a suspicious moisture, as
they say.

Ben now says we must stand right on this corner to watch these cars go
by--about once every hour. We argued with him whilst we shivered in the
bracing winelike air, but Ben was stubborn. We might of been there yet
if something hadn't diverted him from this evil design. It was a string
of about fifty Italians that just then come out of a subway entrance.
They very plainly belonged to the lower or labouring classes and I
judged they was meant for work on the up-and-down street we stood on,
that being already torn up recklessly till it looked like most other
streets in the same town. They stood around talking in a delirious or
Italian manner till their foreman unlocked a couple of big piano boxes.
Out of these they took crowbars, axes, shovels, and other instruments of
their calling. Ben Sutton has been standing there soddenly waiting for
another dear old horse-car to come by, but suddenly he takes notice of
these bandits with the tools and I see an evil gleam come into his tired
eyes. He assumes a businesslike air, struts over to the foreman of the
bunch, and has some quick words with him, making sweeping motions of the
arm up and down the cross street where the horse-cars run. After a
minute of this I'm darned if the whole bunch didn't scatter out and
begin to tear up the pavement along the car-track on this cross street.
Ben tripped back to us looking cheerful once more.

"They wouldn't sell me the car," he says, "so I'm going to take back a
bunch of the dear old rails. They'll be something to remind me of the
dead past. Just think! I rode over those very rails when I was a tot."

We was all kind of took back at this, and I promptly warned Ben that
we'd better beat it before we got pinched. But Ben is confident. He says
no crime could be safer in New York than setting a bunch of Italians to
tearing up a street-car track; that no one could ever possibly suspect
it wasn't all right, though he might have to be underhanded to some
extent in getting his souvenir rails hauled off. He said he had told the
foreman that he was the contractor's brother and had been sent with this
new order and the foreman had naturally believed it, Ben looking like a
rich contractor himself.

And there they was at work, busy as beavers, gouging up the very last
remnant of little old New York when it was that. Ben rubbed his hands in
ecstasy and pranced up and down watching 'em for awhile. Then he went
over and told the foreman there'd be extra pay for all hands if they got
a whole block tore up by noon, because this was a rush job. Hundreds of
people was passing, mind you, including a policeman now and then, but no
one took any notice of a sight so usual. All the same the rest of us
edged north about half a block, ready to make a quick getaway. Ben kept
telling us we was foolishly scared. He offered to bet any one in the
party ten to one in thousands that he could switch his gang over to
Broadway and have a block of that track up before any one got wise.
There was no takers.

Ben was now so pleased with himself and his little band of faithful
workers that he even begun to feel kindly again toward his New Yorker
who was still standing in one spot with glazed eyes. He goes up and
tries to engage him in conversation, but the lad can't hear any more
than he can see. Ben's efforts, however, finally start him to muttering
something. He says it over and over to himself and at last we make out
what it is. He is saying: "I'd like to buy a little drink for the party
m'self."

"The poor creature is delirious," says Jake Berger.

But Ben slaps him on the back and tells him he's a good sport and he'll
give him a couple of these rails to take to his old New York home; he
says they can be crossed over the mantel and will look very quaint. The
lad kind of shivered under Ben's hearty blow and seemed to struggle out
of his trance for a minute. His eyes unglazed and he looks around and
says how did he get here and where is it? Ben tells him he's among
friends and that they two are the only born New Yorkers left in the
world, and so on, when the lad reaches into the pocket of his natty
topcoat for a handkerchief and pulls out with it a string of funny
little tickets--about two feet of 'em. Ben grabs these up with a strange
look in his eyes.

"Bridge tickets!" he yells. Then he grabs his born New Yorker by the
shoulders and shakes him still further out of dreamland.

"What street in New York is your old home on?" he demands savagely. The
lad blinks his fishy eyes and fixes his hat on that Ben has shook loose.

"Cranberry Street," says he.

"Cranberry Street! Hell, that's Brooklyn, and you claimed New York,"
says Ben, shaking the hat loose again.

"Greater New York," says the lad pathetically, and pulls his hat firmly
down over his ears.

Ben looked at the imposter with horror in his eyes. "Brooklyn!" he
muttered--"the city of the unburied dead! So that was the secret of your
strange behaviour? And me warming you in my bosom, you viper!"

But the crook couldn't hear him again, haying lapsed into his trance and
become entirely rigid and foolish. In the cold light of day his face now
looked like a plaster cast of itself. Ben turned to us with a hunted
look. "Blow after blow has fallen upon me to-night," he says tearfully,
"but this is the most cruel of all. I can't believe in anything after
this. I can't even believe them street-car rails are the originals.
Probably they were put down last week."

"Then let's get out of this quick," I says to him. "We been exposing
ourselves to arrest here long enough for a bit of false sentiment on
your part."

"I gladly go," says Ben, "but wait one second." He stealthily approaches
the Greater New Yorker and shivers him to wakefulness with another
hearty wallop on the back. "Listen carefully," says Ben as the lad
struggles out of the dense fog. "Do you see those workmen tearing up
that car-track?"

"Yes, I see it," says the lad distinctly. "I've often seen it."

"Very well. Listen to me and remember your life may hang on it. You go
over there and stand right by them till they get that track up and don't
you let any one stop them. Do you hear? Stand right there and make them
work, and if a policeman or any one tries to make trouble you soak him.
Remember! I'm leaving those men in your charge. I shall hold you
personally responsible for them."

The lad doesn't say a word but begins to walk in a brittle manner toward
the labourers. We saw him stop and point a threatening finger at them,
then instantly freeze once more. It was our last look at him. We got
everybody on a north-bound car with some trouble. Lon Price had gone to
sleep standing up and Jeff Tuttle, who was now looking like the society
burglar after a tough night's work at his trade, was getting turbulent
and thirsty. He didn't want to ride on a common street car. "I want a
tashicrab," he says, "and I want to go back to that Louis Chateau room
and dance the tangle." But we persuaded him and got safe up to a
restaurant on Sixth Avenue where breakfast was had by all without
further adventure. Jeff strongly objected to this restaurant at first,
though, because he couldn't hear an orchestra in it. He said he couldn't
eat his breakfast without an orchestra. He did, however, ordering apple
pie and ice cream and a gin fizz to come. Lon Price was soon sleeping
like a tired child over his ham and eggs, and Jeff went night-night,
too, before his second gin fizz arrived.

Ben ordered a porterhouse steak, family style, consuming it in a moody
rage like a man that has been ground-sluiced at every turn. He said he
felt like ending it all and sometimes wished he'd been in the cab that
plunged into one of the forty-foot holes in Broadway a couple of nights
before. Jake Berger had ordered catfish and waffles, with a glass of
Invalid port. He burst into speech once more, too. He said the nights in
New York were too short to get much done. That if they only had nights
as long as Alaska the town might become famous. "As it is," he says, "I
don't mind flirting with this city now and then, but I wouldn't want to
marry it."

Well, that about finished the evening, with Lon and Jeff making the room
sound like a Pullman palace car at midnight. Oh, yes; there was one
thing more. On the day after the events recorded in the last chapter, as
it says in novels, there was a piece in one of the live newspapers
telling that a well-dressed man of thirty-five, calling himself Clifford
J. Hotchkiss and giving a Brooklyn address, was picked up in a dazed
condition by patrolman Cohen who had found him attempting to direct the
operations of a gang of workmen engaged in repairing a crosstown-car
track. He had been sent to the detention ward of Bellevue to await
examination as to his sanity, though insisting that he was the victim
of a gang of footpads who had plied him with liquor and robbed him of
his watch. I showed the piece to Ben Sutton and Ben sent him up a pillow
of forget-me-nots with "Rest" spelled on it--without the sender's card.

No; not a word in it about the street-car track being wrongfully tore
up. I guess it was like Ben said; no one ever would find out about that
in New York. My lands! here it is ten-thirty and I got to be on the job
when them hayers start to-morrow A.M. A body would think I hadn't a care
on earth when I get started on anecdotes of my past.

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