Jack And The Check Book Part 12

"Jove! it's cold!" He s.h.i.+vered, as he gazed around him, the room bathed in the gathering shadows of twilight. "And to think that it was only last summer that I was complaining because this place was so infernally hot!"

His teeth chattered as he spoke, and he suddenly bethought himself of his fur-lined overcoat hanging in the closet, his very last possession, and one he had worn persistently of late, not so much because the temperature of the town required it as to maintain publicly an appearance of prosperity.

"I'll take one last wear out of you," he said, as he put it on, "and to-morrow I'll put you in cold storage at the house of mine Uncle. He already has my watch, my scarf-pin, and everything else that I have that is negotiable--he might as well top his collection off with you."

The thought that the useful old garment was still good enough to act as a satisfactory bit of security for a temporary accommodation at the neighboring p.a.w.nshop cheered him up somewhat, and he went out, seeking a comfortable spot where with his last half-dollar he could a.s.suage the growing pangs of hunger. As he left the house he noticed that the snow was beginning to fall, so he decided not to go very far afield for his meal. A cheap restaurant half-way down the block, on the avenue, attracted his eye, and he went in and ordered his dinner--twenty-five cents' worth of roast beef and a cup of coffee for himself, and the balance to tip the waiter. He ate slowly, though this was not his habit, merely because the place was warm and bright, and as he lingered over his coffee he wrote a sonnet on life on the back of the bill of fare.

Then, his account paid, he started back to his apartment. As he left the cafe the wheezing notes of a minute hand-organ playing "The Good Old Summer-time" fell upon his ear. It sounded very much like a talking-machine in the last stages of bronchitis, and then, suddenly, in the midst of a "B-flat" that sounded more like a sneeze than a note, a heartrending picture of misery and desolation smote upon his vision. On the corner, exposed to all the icy winds that blew up the avenue, and over the cross-streets from the river, huddled up into a seeming ma.s.s of rags, over which the falling snow was drifting, was the form of an aged woman, turning the crank of a battered and broken organ with fitful twists of her poor blue hands.

"Holy smoke!" cried Jack, as his eye fell upon the old woman's bent figure. "And I have been sympathizing with myself for the last four hours!"

In an instant he had whipped off his overcoat--the fur-lined coat that had been his only hope for immediate financial relief--and had thrown it across the poor old shoulders.

"Excuse me, madam," he said, as the old woman stopped grinding the organ to look gratefully up into his face. "If I had any money I'd give it to you, but I'm dead broke myself, and I can't help you that way. But, by thunder! I can't stand seeing you freeze!"

"Oh, I cannot take your coat, sir," the old woman began.

"Yes, you can," said Jack. "If you don't want it as an act of charity, let me have a quarter to buy my breakfast to-morrow morning, and you can have the coat for the time being. I'll rent it to you over-night for a quarter. You can return it in the morning. I live right across the street at the Redmere."

The old woman muttered a scarcely audible word of thanks.

"Heaven will reward you for this," she began.

"That's all right," said Jack, cheerfully. "I'm not looking for dividends of that particular kind. I'll consider it a good bargain if you'll just rent this old horse-blanket for the night for twenty-five cents. Then n.o.body will be under obligation to anybody else."

The old woman smiled even as she s.h.i.+vered, and diving down into the mysterious depths of her ragged garments produced a handful of pennies which she handed to the unexpected philanthropist.

"I will return the coat in the morning," she said. "Good-night!"

And again the withered hand began to turn the crank, and the suffering organ, as Jack sped across the way to the Redmere again, began to wheeze as before, taking a turn this time at that popular melody, "There'll Be a Hot Time in the Old Town To-night."

"Poor old hag!" muttered Jack as, without removing his clothes, he climbed into bed and covered himself in addition with the bath-rug. "I may be ninety-seven different kinds of an a.s.s, but here's to the Heart of Folly! I couldn't let that old creature freeze to death under my very window."

And warmed by the thought of a kindly deed done he turned over and went to sleep.

So weary was the poor lad after the troublesome experiences of a day so full of worry that he slept heavily and far into the next morning.

Indeed, it required all the elbow power of Mike, the janitor, hammering with his great fist upon the door, to awaken him.

"h.e.l.lo, there! What the d.i.c.kens do you want?" cried Jack, sleepily, aroused at last from his slumbers by a thunderous kick upon the door from the janitorial foot.

"Ut's me, sorr," replied Mike.

"Oh, it's you, is it?" said Jack, opening the door. "What's the trouble now? Orders from the landlord to stop my sleeping?"

"No, sorr," replied the janitor. "Sure an' I'm just afther bringin' yez a package lift at the door."

"Confound you, Mike!" growled Jack, with a glance at the clock. "n.o.body can economize with a noise trust like you around. If you had only let me sleep an hour longer I could have saved the price of a breakfast!"

"Well, the lady that lift this bundle tould me to give ut yez without anny delay," returned Mike. "And whin annybody gives me a dollar to get a move on I get ut."

"A lady gave you a dollar to hand this bundle to me?" demanded Jack, incredulously.

"She did that," said Mike. "She come drivin' up in her limybean motor-car, and give me the package, and tould me not to let anny weeds grow under me slippers."

Jack rubbed his eyes in astonishment, and gazed wonderingly at the brown-paper package. What could it be? Certainly not his fur coat. A limousine car and the lady of the wheezy hand-organ did not seem to go together. In an instant, consumed with curiosity, he tore off the brown-paper covering, and found within a white pasteboard box, oblong in shape, and tied up with blue ribbon. Attached to the middle was a note, which, on being opened, revealed the following message to Jack's staring eyes:

THE UNITED STATES FAIRY COMPANY 8976 WALL STREET NEW YORK, _December 12, 1910_.

DEAR JACK,--I return your cloak herewith with many thanks for your kindness to

Yours gratefully, t.i.tANIA J. G.o.dMOTHER, President The United States Fairy Co.

"Well, I'll be blowed!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the lad as he read. "The old lady a fairy? I don't know about this--it has a phony look to me!"

As he spoke he cut the blue ribbon with his penknife and opened the box.

The mystery, instead of being solved, now became all the deeper, for as far as Jack's eye was able to see the box was empty.

The janitor grinned unsympathetically.

"Quare toime for an April-fool joke!" he said, as he left the room.

For a few moments Jack was as silent as the Sphinx, and then, with a sudden surge of wrath that any one should play such a trick upon him, he gave the box a kick that sent it flying across the room. It landed on a chair, the cover fell off, and then, mystery of mysteries, three-quarters of the chair disappeared wholly from sight. Again Jack rubbed his eyes in amazement, and slowly, like a trapper pa.s.sing along a forest trail, he crept over to where the chair stood and put out his hand to feel for its missing parts. In a moment he was rea.s.sured as to their existence, for he could feel the outlines of the missing sections, but something apparently lay across them. It was a soft, silky material, tangible enough, but absolutely invisible. It felt like a cloak, and as Jack pa.s.sed his hands along its folds he found that it had sleeves, b.u.t.tons, b.u.t.tonholes, and a hood at the back of its collar, not to mention several capacious pockets within.

"Huh!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "It feels like an invisible ulster. I wonder--"

An idea flashed across his mind, acting upon which he seized the cloak, and rushed into his bedroom, where, standing before the mirror on his bureau, he put it on, b.u.t.toning it all the way up to his neck. This done, he glanced at himself in the gla.s.s.

_Only his head, which had remained uncovered, was reflected there!_

"Well of all--" he began, astounded at the vision before him, or rather the lack of it. Hastily he pulled the hood over his head, and immediately, as far as the eye could see, he completely vanished.

And then Jack knew what had happened.

The fairy G.o.dmother had given him one of the choicest possessions of her kingdom--the famous invisible cloak!

Ten minutes later Jack found himself pa.s.sing through the Subway gate at Forty-second Street, entirely un.o.bserved by anybody, and therefore relieved of the necessity of paying his fare. The invisible cloak was doing its duty n.o.bly, but a moment later the lad had an example of its dangers as well as of its virtues, for as he sat quietly by the door of the car trying to collect his fl.u.s.tered thoughts, a very stout German gentleman got aboard the train and sat down heavily upon him. He did not stay, however, but on the contrary, with a startled cry of alarm, rose up as quickly as he had sat down.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "DERE ISS SOMEDINGS IN DOT SEADT, ALRETTY YET!"]

"Dere iss somedings in dot seadt, alretty yet!" he cried to the guard, excitedly.

Jack slipped noiselessly out of the seat, and the guard, after feeling around in it for a second or two, turned with scorn upon the astonished Teuton, and in language of a slightly unparliamentary cast advised him to change his diet.

"You'll be seein' t'ings next!" he said.

Jack shook with internal laughter as the amazed son of the Rhine sat cautiously down again, his face showing a deal of relief to find that his first spooky impression was not correct, all of which for the remainder of the trip down-town he openly expressed with considerable volubility. Finally he was interrupted by the raucous voice of the guard crying:

"Wall Street!"

Now Jack had not consciously started out to go to Wall Street, but the announcement of the train's arrival there gave him a thrill.