SUMMER STORMS
Of course, in a way, the thing was simple. The was, in a sense, and uncomplicated. What he wanted to do was to point out to the girl all that on her. He to touch her heart, to with her, to her to her war-aims, and to her—before three o’clock when that would be into the pitcher’s box to off the against the Pittsburg Pirates—to let be and Augustus Biddle. But the problem was, how the to the opportunity to start. He couldn’t at the girl in a street-car; and, if he let go of his and over her, somebody would step on his neck.
The Girl Friend, who for the five minutes had her hat, now by looking up and the of the upper of passengers. Her Archie’s in a of recognition, and he feebly, to register and good-will. He was to see a come into her eyes. Her pink. At least, it was pink already, but it pinker. The next moment, the car having stopped to up more passengers, she jumped off and started to across the street.
Archie was taken aback. When on this he had it to a of otter-hunting and a moving-picture chase. He her off the car with a that his on the was slipping. Preoccupied with these thoughts, he did not that the long man who had his had too. His were on the of the Girl Friend, who, having at a into Sixth Avenue, was now it in the direction of the leading to one of the of the Elevated Railroad. Dashing up the stairs after her, he himself as from a strap, upon the now familiar flowers on top of her hat. From another the the long man in the suit.
The train on. Once or twice, when it stopped, the girl to or remain. She rose, then again. Finally she walked out of the car, and Archie, following, himself in a part of New York to him. The of this appeared to out a existence, not by taking in one another’s washing, but by selling one another second-hand clothes.
Archie at his watch. He had early, but so with had been the period that he was to that the hour was only just two. The was a one. With a full hour the start of the game, much might be achieved. He after the girl, and came up with her just as she the into one of those New York side-streets which are by children, cats, loafers, and empty meat-tins.
The girl stopped and turned. Archie a smile.
“I say, my dear sweet creature!” he said. “I say, my dear old thing, one moment!”
“Is that so?” said the Girl Friend.
“I your pardon?”
“Is that so?”
Archie to tremors. Her were gleaming, and her mouth had a perfectly line of scarlet. It was going to be difficult to be to this girl. She was going to be a hard audience. Would be able to touch her heart? The itself that, properly speaking, one would need to use a pick-axe.
“If you me a of minutes of your valuable time—”
“Say!” The lady herself up menacingly. “You tie a can to and disappear! Fade away, or I’ll call a cop!”
Archie was at this of his motives. One or two children, playing close at hand, and a who was trying to keep the from down, pleased. Theirs was a and to the moments which had it in the past the calling of a had been the preliminary. The a fellow-loafer, himself against the same wall. The children, the meat-tin which their game had centred, closer.
“My dear old soul!” said Archie. “You don’t understand!”
“Don’t I! I know your sort, you arbutus!”
“No, no! My dear old thing, me! I wouldn’t dream!”
“Are you going or aren’t you?”
Eleven more children joined the ring of spectators. The silently, like crocodiles.
“But, I say, listen! I only wanted—”
At this point another voice spoke.
“Say!”
The word “Say!” more almost than any word in the American language, is of a of of expression. It can be genial, it can be jovial, it can be appealing. It can also be truculent. The “Say!” which at this upon Archie’s ear-drum with a which him in the air was truculent; and the two and twenty-seven children who now the audience were well satisfied with the of the performance. To their ears the word had the right ring.
Archie round. At his a long, strongly-built man in a suit.
“Well!” said the man, nastily. And he a large, toward Archie’s. It to the latter, as he against the wall, that the man’s must be of india-rubber. It appeared to be longer every moment. His face, being freckled, was a brick-red in colour; his in an snarl, a gold tooth; and him, in an of way, two red hands about the size of two of mutton. Archie him with a apprehension. There are moments in life when, on our way, we see a face, look into eyes, and with a of say to ourselves, “We have a friend!” This was not one of those moments. The only person Archie had in his life who looked less was the sergeant-major who had him in the early days of the war, he had got his commission.
“I’ve had my on you!” said the man.
He still had his on him. It was a hot, gimlet-like eye, and it the of Archie’s soul. He a little against the wall.
Archie was disturbed. He was no poltroon, and had proved the on many occasions the days when the entire German army to be on him personally, but he and from anything in the nature of a public scene.
“What,” the man, still the of the conversation, and shifting his left hand a little his back, “do you by this lady?”
Archie was he had asked him. This was what he wanted to explain.
“My dear old lad—” he began.
In of the that he had asked a question and a reply, the of Archie’s voice to be more than the man endure. It him of the last of restraint. With a he his left in a in the direction of Archie’s head.
Archie was no in the art of self-defence. Since his early days at he had learned much from leather-faced of the science. He had been this man’s with close attention, and the not have his of action more if he had sent him a note. Archie saw the all the way. He aside, and the against the wall. The man with a of anguish.
“Gus!” the Girl Friend, forward.
She her arms the man, who was a hand which, always of an out-size, was now to still dimensions.
“Gus, darling!”
A Archie. So had he been with his mission that it had to him that the love-lorn might have taken it into his to the girl as well in the of in a word for himself. Yet such had been the case. Well, this had definitely it. Two were again in complete reconciliation, but a of good that was. It would be days the misguided Looney Biddle would be able to with a hand like that. It looked like a already, and was still swelling. Probably the was sprained. For at least a week the left-handed of his time would be about as much use to the Giants in any professional as a cold in the head. And on that hand the of all the money Archie had in the world. He now that he had not the fellow’s enthusiasm. To have had his through a would not have been pleasant, but the outcome would not have been as as this. With a Archie prepared to withdraw, to be alone with his sorrow.
At this moment, however, the Girl Friend, her lover, a for him, with the of him from the earth.
“No, I say! Really!” said Archie, backwards. “I to say!”
In a series of events, all of which had been a thick, this, in his opinion, the maximum of thickness. It was the ragged, of the limit. To with a fellow-man in a public had been bad, but to be with by a girl—the was not on the board. Absolutely not on the board. There was only one thing to be done. It was undignified, no doubt, for a to up the old and leg it in the of the enemy, but there was no other course. Archie started to run; and, as he did so, one of the the mistake of him by the of his coat.
“I got him!” the loafer.
There is a time for all things. This was not the time for anyone of the male to the of Archie’s coat. If a of Dempsey, Carpentier, and one of the Zoo had to his progress at that moment, they would have had to it a move. Archie wanted to be elsewhere, and the blood of of Moffams, many of had a in the free-for-all mix-ups of the Middle Ages, him at any attempt to his plans. There was a good of the loafer, but it was all soft. Releasing his when Archie’s took him on the shin, he a in what would have been the middle of his if he had one, a like a sheep, and against the wall. Archie, with a coat, the corner, and Ninth Avenue.
The of the move gave him an advantage. He was the the of the out of the street. Continuing to travel well, he past a large which had up across the road, and moved on. The noise of those who was loud and in the rear, but the him from their sight, and it was this which Archie, the old campaigner, to take his next step.
It was perfectly obvious—he was aware of this in the of the chase—that a couldn’t it at twenty-five miles an hour along a main of a great city without remark. He must take cover. Cover! That was the wheeze. He looked about him for cover.
“You want a suit?”
It takes a great to your New Yorker. The small tailor, in his doorway, in no way at the of Archie, he had pass at a walk some five minutes before, returning like this at top speed. He that Archie had that he wanted to something.
This was what Archie had done. More than anything else in the world, what he wanted to do now was to into that shop and have a long talk about gents’ clothing. Pulling himself up abruptly, he past the small tailor into the interior. A of him. Except for a small a counter, all the available space was by suits. Stiff suits, looking like the when by the police, from hooks. Limp suits, with the of having from exhaustion, about on chairs and boxes. The place was a cloth morgue, a Sargasso Sea of serge.
Archie would not have had it otherwise. In these of a have hid.
“Something in tweeds?” the business-like of this haven, him into the shop, “Or, maybe, yes, a serge? Say, mister, I got a sweet thing in that’ll fit you like the paper on the wall!”
Archie wanted to talk about clothes, but not yet.
“I say, laddie,” he said, hurriedly. “Lend me your ear for a jiffy!” Outside the of the pack had imminent. “Stow me away for a moment in the undergrowth, and I’ll anything you want.”
He into the jungle. The noise in volume. The had been for a by the of another dray, moving northwards, which had level with the and up the fairway. This had now been overcome, and the original searchers, their ranks by a dozen more of the classes, were on the again.
“You done a murder?” the voice of the proprietor, interested, through a of cloth. “Well, boys will be boys!” he said, philosophically. “See anything there that you like? There some sweet there!”
“I’m them narrowly,” Archie. “If you don’t let those me, I shouldn’t be if I one.”
“One?” said the proprietor, with a touch of austerity.
“Two,” said Archie, quickly. “Or possibly three or six.”
The proprietor’s returned.
“You can’t have too many suits,” he said, approvingly, “not a like you that wants to look nice. All the girls like a that nice. When you go out of here in a I got up there at the back, the girls’ll be all over you like a honey-pot.”
“Would you mind,” said Archie, “would you mind, as a personal to me, old companion, not that word ‘girls’?”
He off. A had the of the shop.
“Say, uncle,” said a voice, one of those voices that only the most have, “you a past here?”
“Young feller?” The appeared to reflect. “Do you a in blue, with a Homburg hat?”
“That’s the duck! We him. Where did he go?”
“Him! Why, he come past, quick as he go. I what he was for, a day like this. He the at the of the block.”
There was a silence.
“Well, I he’s got away,” said the voice, regretfully.
“The way he was travelling,” the proprietor, “I wouldn’t be if he was in Europe by this. You want a suit?”
The other, a wish that the would go to and take his entire stock with him, out.
“This,” said the proprietor, tranquilly, his way to where Archie and a saffron-coloured outrage, which appeared to be a relation of the family, “would put you fifty dollars. And cheap!”
“Fifty dollars!”
“Sixty, I said. I don’t speak always distinct.”
Archie the with a horror. A man with an taste in clothes, it got right in among his nerve centres.
“But, honestly, old soul, I don’t want to your feelings, but that isn’t a suit, it’s just a incident!”
The to the door in a attitude.
“I I that back,” he said.
Archie gulped.
“How about trying it on?” he said. “I’m not sure, after all, it isn’t ripe.”
“That’s the way to talk,” said the proprietor, cordially. “You try it on. You can’t judge a suit, not a like this, by looking at it. You want to put it on. There!” He the way to a at the of the shop. “Isn’t that a at seventy dollars?...Why, say, your mother would be proud if she see her boy now!”
A of an hour later, the proprietor, a little of bills, with a look the of which on the counter.
“As a little as I’ve had in my shop!” Archie did not this. It was, he thought, only too true.
“I only wish I see you walking up Fifth Avenue in them!” the proprietor. “You’ll give ’em a treat! What you going to do with ’em? Carry ’em under your arm?” Archie strongly. “Well, then, I can send ’em for you you like. It’s all the same to me. Where’ll I send ’em?”
Archie meditated. The was black as it was. He from the of being next day, at the of his misery, with these reach-me-downs.
An idea him.
“Yes, send ’em,” he said.
“What’s the name and address?”
“Daniel Brewster,” said Archie, “Hotel Cosmopolis.”
It was a long time since he had his father-in-law a present.
Archie out into the street, and to walk a now peaceful Ninth Avenue. Out of the that him, black as the from to pole, no single of came to him. He not, like the poet, thank gods there be for his soul, for his was to a splinter. He alone and in a world. With the best intentions, he had succeeded only in landing himself the ribstons. Why had he not been with his wealth, of it on that with Reggie? Why had he the Girl Friend, her! He might have that he would only make an of himself. And, he had done so, Looney Biddle’s left hand, that left hand which and wilted, was out of action, in a sling, like a battleship; and any the Giants might have had of the Pirates was gone—gone—as surely as that thousand which should have a birthday present for Lucille.
A birthday present for Lucille! He in of spirit. She would be to-night, dear girl, all and happiness, what he was going to give her tomorrow. And when to-morrow dawned, all he would be able to give her would be a smile. A of things! A situation! A good egg, he did not think!
It to Archie that Nature, to her of to suffering, was with him. The sky was overcast, and the sun had to shine. There was a of in the afternoon, which in with his mood. And then something on his face.
It says much for Archie’s pre-occupation that his thought, as, after a drops, as though the clouds were for approval, the whole sky to like a shower-bath, was that this was an additional which he was called upon to bear, On top of all his other he would to the skin or have to about in some doorway. He richly, and for shelter.
The rain was setting about its work in earnest. The world was full of that rending, which the more storms. Thunder crashed, and out of the heavens. Out in the the up off the like fountains. Archie them from his in the entrance of a shop.
And then, suddenly, like one of those which were up the sky, a up his mind.
“By Jove! If this up, there won’t be a ball-game to-day!”
With he out his watch. The hands pointed to five minutes to three. A came to him of a and rain-checks up at the Polo Grounds.
“Switch it on, you blighters!” he cried, the clouds. “Switch it on more and more!”
It was five o’clock that a man into a jeweller’s shop near the Hotel Cosmopolis—a man who, in of the that his was near the and that he water from every of his clothes, appeared in the spirits. It was only when he spoke that the in the the who had looked in that to order a bracelet.
“I say, old lad,” said this man, “you that little what-not you me lunch?”
“The bracelet, sir?”
“As you with a which you credit, my dear old jeweller, the bracelet. Well, produce, exhibit, and it forth, would you mind? Trot it out! Slip it across on a dish!”
“You me, surely, to put it and send it to the Cosmopolis to-morrow?”
The man the on his chest.
“What I and what I wish now are two and things, friend of my college days! Never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day, and all that! I’m not taking any more chances. Not for me! For others, yes, but not for Archibald! Here are the doubloons, produce the bracelet. Thanks!”
The the notes with the same which Archie had in the day in the of the second-hand clothes-shop. The him genial.
“A nasty, wet day, sir, it’s been,” he observed, chattily.
Archie his head.
“Old friend,” he said, “you’re all wrong. Far otherwise, and not a like it, my dear old in gems! You’ve put your on the one of this p.m. that and respect. Rarely in the of a lifetime have I a day so in nearly every shape and form, but there was one thing that saved it, and that was its old wetness! Toodle-oo, laddie!”
“Good evening, sir,” said the jeweller.
