Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York Part 9

[Ill.u.s.tration: STARS OF THE NIGHT, ARE YOU WATCHING HERE?]

The street is empty. Not a sound is heard. Not a footfall. Not a voice.

The world is sleeping, dreaming of its own ambitions. Stars of the night, are you watching here?

"You said you t'ought I was pretty, Swiggsy, an' it made me so glad an'

happy, 'cause I wants you to think I'm pretty--ah! where are you going!

Come back! come back! come back! Don't leave me all alone, please, please don't, for I'm falling again, fast, faster all the time, an' I'll soon fall--"

She opened her eyes wide--wider than ever. She looked into Mr.

Dootleby's face and smiled. She lifted her hand and dropped it heavily into his. Her head dropped on his shoulder. She had fallen--out of human sight!

V.

THE HON. DOYLE O'MEAGHER.

At this particular moment the Hon. Doyle O'Meagher is a busy man.

Tammany Hall's nominating convention is shortly to be held, and Mr.

O'Meagher is putting the finis.h.i.+ng touches upon the ticket which he has decided that the convention shall adopt. The ticket, written down upon a sheet of paper, is before him, together with a bottle of whisky and a case of cigars, and the finis.h.i.+ng touches consist of little pencil-marks placed opposite the candidates' names, indicating that they have visited Mr. O'Meagher and have duly paid over their several campaign a.s.sessments--a preliminary formality which Mr. O'Meagher enforces with strict impartiality. The amount of each a.s.sessment depends entirely upon Mr. O'Meagher's sense of the fitness of things. To dispute Mr.

O'Meagher's sense in this particular is looked upon as treason and rebellion. In the case of the Hon. Thraxton Wimples, the intended candidate for the Supreme Court, the a.s.sessment is $20,000.

Mr. Wimples is a little man of profound learning and ancient lineage.

Mr. O'Meagher is a man of indifferent learning and no lineage to speak of. Mr. Wimples's grandfather had signed the Declaration of Independence, and had moved on three separate occasions that the Continental Congress do now adjourn, while no reason whatever existed, other than the one most obvious but least apt to occur to any one, for supposing that Mr. O'Meagher had ever had a grandfather at all. And yet, as Mr. Wimples, though on the threshold of great dignity and power, walks into Mr. O'Meagher's presence, he find himself all of a tremble, and glows and chills chase each other up and down his spinal column.

"Ah, Mr. O'Meagher," he says, "good-morning! Good-morning! Happy to see you so--er--well. Charming day, so warm for the--er--season."

"Yes," says Mr. O'Meagher, "so it be."

"I received your notification of the high--er--honor, you propose to confer on me."

"Yes," says Mr. O'Meagher, "you're the man for the place."

"So kind of you to--er--say so. You mentioned that the--er--a.s.sessment was--"

"Twenty thousand dollars," says Mr. O'Meagher, with great promptness.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "JUST SO," SAYS MR. WIMPLES, "JUST SO."]

"Just so," says Mr. Wimples, "just so."

"And you've called to pay it," says Mr. O'Meagher, taking up his list and his pencil. "I've been expecting you."

"Ah, yes, to be sure, of course. I was going to propose a--er--settlement."

"A what?" says Mr. O'Meagher sharply.

Mr. Wimples mops his brow. "The fact is," he says, "I don't happen to have so considerable a sum as $20,000 at the--er--moment, and I was thinking of suggesting that I just pay you, say, $10,000 down, and give you two--er--notes."

"'Twont do," says Mr. O'Meagher, shaking his head and fetching his pencil down upon the table with a smart tap, "'twont do at all."

"Eh? Indorsed, you know, by--"

"Mr. Wimples, that $20,000 in hard cash must be in my hands by six o'clock to-night, or your name goes off the ticket."

"O--er--Lud!" says Mr. Wimples, sadly.

"By six P. M."

"But, my dear Mr. O'Meagher--"

"Or your name goes off the ticket."

Mr. Wimples groaned, grasped the whisky bottle, poured out a copious draught, tossed it down his throat, bowed meekly, and withdrew. In the vestibule he met the Hon. Perfidius Ruse, the Mayor of the city, whose term of office was about to expire, and as to whose renomination there was going on a heated controversy. Mr. Ruse was a reformer. It was as a reformer that he had been elected two years before. At that time Mr.

O'Meagher found himself menaced by a strange peril. It had been alleged by jealous enemies that he was corrupt, and they called loudly for reform. At first, Mr. O'Meagher experienced some difficulty in understanding what was meant by corrupt and what by reform. His mission in life, as he understood it, was to name the individuals who should hold the city's offices and to control their official acts in the interest of Tammany Hall, and he had great difficulty in comprehending how it could be anybody's business that he had grown rich performing his mission. But perceiving that a large and dangerous cla.s.s of voters was clamoring for a reformer, he concluded to humor it if he could find a good safe reformer on whom he could rely. In this emergency he had produced the Hon. Perfidius Ruse.

It cannot be said that Mr. O'Meagher regarded the Ruse experiment as entirely satisfactory. Mr. Ruse had certainly reformed several things, and with considerable adroitness and skill, but there were many who said that his reforms had all been made with an eye single to the glory of the Hon. Perfidius Ruse, and with a view to the establishment of a personal influence hostile to the man who made him. The time had now come for the test of strength. Concerning his ultimate intentions, the Hon. Doyle O'Meagher was cold, silent, and reserved.

"How are you, Mr. Mayor?" said the crestfallen Mr. Wimples, as he came upon the reformer in the vestibule. "Going up to see the--er--Boss?"

"I was thinking of it, yes. How's he feeling?"

"Ugly. He's in a dev'lish uncompromising--er--humor. If you were going to ask anything of him I advise you to--er, not."

"Thank you. I only intend to suggest some matters in the interest of reform."

"I wish you well. But--er--go slow."

Mr. O'Meagher did not rise to greet his distinguished visitor. He simply drew a chair close to his own, poured out a gla.s.s of whisky, and said, "h.e.l.lo!"

"I thought I'd just drop in, Mr. O'Meagher," said the Mayor, "to say a word or two about the situation. What are the probabilities?"

"As regards which?"

"H'm, well, the nominations?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "WHO CAN TELL?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.eD MR. O'MEAGHER.]

"Who can tell," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr. O'Meagher. "Who can tell? What is more uncertain, Mr. Ruse, than the action of a nominating convention?"

"To be sure," responded Mr. Ruse. "What, indeed?" Whereupon each statesman looked at the other out of the corners of his eyes.

"There's only one thing I care about," continued Mr. Ruse, "and that is reform. If my successor is a reformer, I shall be satisfied."

"Make yourself easy," replied Mr. O'Meagher. "He'll be a reformer. I've been paying some attention during the last two years to the education of our people in the matter of reform. My success has been flattering. I think I can truthfully say now that Tammany Hall has a reformer ready for every salary paid by the city, and that there's no danger of our stock of reformers giving out as long as the salaries last."

Mr. Ruse hesitated a moment, as if reflecting how he should take these observations. Finally he laughed in a feeble way and said, "Good, yes, very." Then he added, "But, speaking seriously, I do feel that my duty to the public requires me to exert all the influence I have for the protection of reform."