Bunker Bean Part 7

"C'mon, then!"

He was at the desk and Breede dictated interminably. When pauses came he wrote scathing comments on Breede's attire, his parsimony in the matter of food, his facial defects, and some objectionable characteristics as a human being, now perceived for the first time. He grew careless of concealing his att.i.tude. Once he stared at Breede's detached cuffs with a scorn so malevolent that Breede turned them about on the desk to examine them himself. Bean went white, feeling "ready for anything!" but Breede merely continued his babble about "Federal Express" stock, and "first mortgage refunding 4 per cent. gold bonds," and multifarious other imbecilities that now filled a darkened world.

He jealously watched the letters Breede answered and laid aside, and the sheaf of reports that he juggled from hand to hand. His hope had been that the session might be brief. There was no clock in the room and he several times felt for the absent watch. Then he tried to estimate the time. When he believed it to be one o'clock he diversified his notes with a swift summary of Breede's character which only the man's bitterest enemies would have approved. At what he thought was two o'clock he stripped him of the last shreds of moral decency. When three o'clock seemed to arrive he did not dare put down, even in secretive shorthand, what he felt could justly be said of Breede. After that it was no good hoping. He relaxed into the dullness of a big despair, merely reflecting that Bulger's picture of Breede under his heel had been too mus.h.i.+ly humane. What Bean wished at the moment was to have Breede tied to a stake, and to be carving choice morsels from him with a dull knife. He made the picture vivacious.

At what he judged to be four-thirty a spirited rap sounded on the door.

"C'min," yelled Breede.

Entered the flapper. Breede looked up.

"Seddown! View of efforts bein' made b' cert'n parties t' s'cure 'trol of comp'ny by promise of creatin' stock script on div'dend basis, it is proper f'r d'rectors t' state policy has been--"

The flapper had sat down and was looking intently at Bean. There was no coquetry in the look. It was a look of interest and one wholly in earnest. Bean became aware of it at Breede's first pause. At any other time he would have lowered his eyes before an a.s.sault so direct and continuous. Now in his hot rage he included the flapper in the glare he put upon her unconscious father.

He saw that she was truly enough a flapper; not a day over eighteen, he was sure. Not tall; almost "pudgy," with a plump, browned face and gray eyes like old Breede's, that looked through you. He noted these details without enthusiasm. Then he relented a little because of her dress. The shoes--he always looked first at a woman's shoes and lost interest in her if those were not acceptable--were of tan leather and low, with decently high heels. (He loathed common-sense shoes on women.) The hose were of tan silk. So far he approved. She wore a tailored suit of blue and had removed the jacket. The s.h.i.+rtwaist--he knew they were called "lingerie waists" in the windows--was of creamy softness and had the lines of the thing called "style." Her hat was a straw that drooped becomingly. "Some dresser, all right!" he thought, and then, "Why don't she take a look at old Cufflets there, and get him in right?"

Again and again he hardened his gaze upon her. Her eyes always met his, not with any recognition of him as a human being, but with some curious interest that seemed remote yet not impersonal. He indignantly tried to out-stare her, but the thing was simply not to be done. Even looking down at her feet steadily didn't dash her brazenness. She didn't seem to care where _he_ looked. After a very few minutes of this he kept his eyes upon his note-book with dignified absorption. But he could feel her glance.

"--to c'nserve investment rep'sented by this stock upon sound basis rather than th' spec'lative policy of larger an' fluc'chating div'dends yours ver' truly what time's 'at game called?"

Thus concluded Breede, with a sudden noisy putting away of papers in an open drawer at his side.

Bean looked up at him, in open-mouthed fear for his sanity.

"h.e.l.lo, Pops!" said the flapper.

"'Lo, Sis! What time's 'at game called?"

"Three," said Bean, still alarmed.

Breede looked at his watch.

"Jus' got time to make it."

He arose from the desk. Bean arose. The flapper arose.

"Take y' up in car," said Breede, most amazingly.

Bean pulled his collar from about his suddenly constricted throat.

"Letters!" He pointed to the note-book.

"Have 'em ready Monday noon. C'mon! Two-thirty now."

The early hour was as incredible as this social phenomenon.

"Daughter!" said Breede, with half a glance at the flapper, and deeming that he had performed a familiar social rite.

"Pleased to meet you!" said Bean, dazedly. The flapper jerked her head in a double nod.

Of the interval that must have elapsed before he found himself seated in the grandstand between Breede and the flapper he was able to recall but little. It was as if a dense fog shut him in. Once it lifted and he suffered a vision of himself in a swiftly propelled motor-car, beside an absorbed mechanician. He half turned in his seat and met the cool, steady gaze of the flapper; she smiled, but quickly checked herself to resume the stare; he was aware that Breede was at her side. And the fog closed in again. It was too unbelievable.

A bell clanged twice and his brain cleared. He saw the scurry of uniformed figures to the field, the catcher adjusted his mask. The Greatest Pitcher the World Has Ever Known stood nonchalantly in the box, stooped for a handful of earth and with it polluted the fair surface of a new ball. A second later the ball shot over the plate. The batter fanned, the crowd yelled.

All at once Bean was coldly himself. He knew that Breede sat at his right; that on his left was a peculiar young woman. He promptly forgot their ident.i.ties, and his own as well, and recalled them but seldom during the ensuing game.

It is a phenomenon familiar to most of us. The sons of men, under the magic of that living diamond, are no longer little units of souls jealously on guard. Heart speaks to heart naked and unashamed; they fraternize across deeps that are commonly impa.s.sable, thrilling as one man to the genius of the double-play, or with one voice hurling merited insults at a remote and contemptuous umpire. It is only there, on earth, that they love their neighbour. There they are fused, and welded into that perfect whole which is perhaps the only colourable imitation ever to be had on earth of the democracy said to prevail in Heaven.

There was no longer a Bean, a Breede, a flapper. Instead were three merged souls in three volatile bodies, three voices that blended in cheers or execration. At any crisis they instinctively laid gripping hands upon each other and, half-rising, with distended eyes and tense half-voices, besought some panting runner to "Come on! Come _on_, you!

Oh, come _on_!" There were other moments of supreme joy when they were blown to their feet and backs were impartially pounded. More than once they might have been observed, with brandis.h.i.+ng fists, shouting, "Robber! Robber! _Robber!!!_" at the unperturbed man behind the plate who merely looked at an indicator in his hand and resumed his professional crouch quite as if nothing had happened.

And there were moments of snappy, broken talk, comments on individual players, a raking over the records. It was not Breede who talked to Bean then. It was one freed soul communicating with another. He none too gently put Breede right in the matter of Wagner's batting average for the previous year and the price that had been paid for the new infielder. And Breede in spirit sat meekly at his feet, grateful for his lore.

Of an absent player, Breede said he was too old--all of thirty-five.

He'd never come back.

"They come back when they learn to play ball above the ears," retorted Bean with crisp sapience. "How about old Cy Young? How about old Callahan of the Sox? How about Wagner out there--think he's only nineteen--hey? Tell me _that_!"

He looked pityingly at the man of millions thus silenced.

Two men scored from third and second, thanks to a wild throw.

"Inside play, there?" said Breede.

"Inside, nothing!" retorted Bean arrogantly. "Matty couldn't get back to second and they _had_ to run. If that Silas up there hadn't gone foamy in the fighting-top and tried to hit that policeman over by the fence with the ball, where'd your inside play been? D'you think the Pirates are trying to help 'em play inside ball? Inside, nothing!"

Again Breede looked respectful, and the flapper listened, l.u.s.trous-eyed.

The finish was close. With two men out in the last half of the ninth and two strikes called on the batter, a none too certain single brought in the winning run. The clinging trio shrieked--then dazedly fell apart.

Life had gone from the magic. The vast crowd also fell apart to units, flooding to the narrow gates.

Outside Breede looked at Bean as if, faintly puzzled, he was trying to recall the fellow's face. One could fancy him saying, "Prob'ly some chap works in m' office."

Father and daughter entered the car. Bean raised his dented hat. Breede was oblivious; the flapper permitted herself a severe double nod. The motor chugged violently. Bean, moving on a few steps, turned. The flapper was looking back. She stared an instant then most astonis.h.i.+ngly smiled, a smile that seemed almost vocal with many glad words. Bean felt himself smile weakly in response.

He walked a long way before he took a car, his eyes on the pavement, his mind filled with a vision. When the flapper smiled it did something to him, but what it was he couldn't tell. She had a different face when she smiled; her parting lips made a new beauty in the world. He thought the golden brown of her hair rather wonderful. It was like the golden brown of the new dog. He recalled little details of her face, the short upper lip, the forward chin, the breadth of the brow. There was something disconcerting about that brow and the eyes like her father's--probably have her own way! Then he remembered that he must have noticed a badge pinned to the left lapel of a jacket that had been fas.h.i.+oned--with no great difficulty, he thought--to give its wearer the appearance of perfect physical development. He couldn't remember when he had precisely noted this badge, perhaps in some frenzied moment in the game's delirium, but it was vividly before him now--"VOTES FOR WOMEN!" What did that signify in her character? Perhaps something not too pleasant.

Still--he lived again through the smile that had seemed to speak.

Three days later, at the close of an afternoon's grinding work, the grim old man at the desk looked up as Bean was leaving the room.

"S'good game!"

"Fine!" said Bean, as he closed the door.