Lady Luck Part 31

"Call me Trombone when you calls confidential," his companion replied.

"By rights I is Pike Canfield, but folks calls me Trombone eveh since me an' de name got famous. Mebbe you is heard of me. I plays de slip horn."

"Sho' I is--many's de time! So you is Trombone, is you? Sho' proud to meet up wid you. Sho' 'bliged fo' de knowledge concernin' de ten-dollah job. Soon as I 'c.u.mulates some payday me an' Lily meets you heah nex'

Sat'day night. Den us 'vests wid de Soopreem Leadeh an' mebbe has a gran' ruckus wid de profits."

That night the Wildcat slept free and chilly on a park bench, covered only with the blanket of fog which rolled in at midnight.

Shortly after dawn, with Lily at his heels, he walked to the entrance of the pier against which lay a cargo s.h.i.+p loading for a famine area in Europe. "Whah at is de man whut hires de han's?" he asked.

Two hours later the foreman of the dock gang was pointed out to him, and in ten minutes, with Lily tied to a barrel of nutritious pickles, the Wildcat took his place in the long line of stevedores that hustled freight out of the pier shed and into the nets under the cargo booms of the s.h.i.+p. "Lily--tonight us eats on credit, an' sleeps inside some place whah de fog weatheh don't git."

All the stevedore crew were members of the Wildcat's own race. Before noon he had affiliated with enough friends to make the matter of noontime lunch a simple business of accepting part of what was offered him, while Lily did the best she could on enough a.s.sorted nutriment to feed six mascots.

Considering the start he had made that morning, the Wildcat realized, with his seventh sandwich, that life isn't so bad if you manage to live through it. When he began the afternoon s.h.i.+ft his ancient philosophy had returned, and to the clatter of the activity about him he contributed his rambling voice. Presently the words of his song recruited a few converts from the gang about him; and by four o'clock, with the freight moving faster than it had for many a day, the hollow s.p.a.ces in the long pier were filled with the echoes that lifted from an intermittent chorus which proclaimed that

"I kin load a steamboat, load it full wid freight; I kin load a steamboat when it's leavin' late.

Dat's de reason I'se as happy as a bee, I don't botheh work, an' work don't botheh me."

Throughout the late hours of the afternoon the eyes of the foreman were on the Wildcat. "Hustlin' n.i.g.g.e.r. Make him a straw boss tomorrow if this keeps up."

2.

Honey Tone realized that rank imposes commensurate obligation before his Temple of Luck campaign had lived a week. Too much rank imposed too much obligation, and so the Swamic Church and the Faith Healing and the Palm Reading Magi and several other verbal branches of his project were discarded before the several deppity soopreem leaders got too soopreem to handle. The backbone of his income was at once the Temple Fund; and this important business demanded and received all of his energy except that demanded by his elaborate pictures of the New World African Colony in Brazil.

The Temple Fund, paying all investors a hundred per cent a week, was popular from the start. On the first dividend day Honey Tone made the grade without difficulty, and all subscriptions were repaid, together with a bonus of a like amount. Immediately after the ceremony of repayment was completed, the backwash of investment began to roll in, and by the evening the promoter counted more than a thousand dollars in his hip pocket treasury. On the next day a new group of subscribers to whom the news had been retailed milled about the doors of the temporary Temple for a chance to register and donate their investments. Honey Tone, operating in a rented house, herded the investors into a room where his voice could pulverize the sediment of reluctance which remained in his hearers' minds, leaving no dregs of doubt that might cloud the nectar of hope.

He donned a serious looking coat, long and black, and swept a broad yellow sash across his chest. On his head rested a Manchu mandarin cap purchased in Chinatown and revised with ornament suitable for the insignia of the Soopreemest. About his waist was the equator part of a Sam Brown belt, and from it dangled a Civil War cavalry sabre whose scabbard had suffered two coats of gilt paint, not quite dry. He retained his ordinary street shoes; life was a battle, and you never could tell when the bugles of fate might blow recall. Street shoes came in handy when there was any heavy running to be done.

In his uniform he addressed the herded investors. "Breth'rin, de books is closed fo' de present week. All whut paid yistiddy gits dey money back, 'long wid de same amout fo' intres' nex', Satidy mawnin'. Dem whut pays de 'scriptions now gits de 'vestment an' de hund'ed per cent intres' de Satidy afteh nex'. De books is now open, de gol' seal c'tificates is ready. Fawm in line an' git yo' money ready.... Ten dollahs, brotheh. Heah's yo' papeh. Now you is a Deppity Soopreem Leadeh, 't.i.tled to de red sash.... Nex' Satidy us 'lects de ten Soopreem Gov'nors fo' de leadin' districts in de New Worl' African Colony at Barzil. Boat leaves wid de 'ficials an' de p'visions nex'

month. 'Lection is by de lucky numbehs. Soopreem 'ficials gits a house an' ten thousan' milrice--dat's Barzil dollahs--ev'y month to travel roun' wid an' see is de distric' doin' O.K.... Fifteen dollahs--dat 't.i.tles you to de Yaller Sash of Trust. Chances is you sho' will be a Soopreem Gov'nor. Nex' brotheh...."

On the following Sat.u.r.day Honey Tone managed to postpone the election of the Soopreem Governors for the ten districts of the colony and to sidestep the various vague promises that he had sown so lavishly throughout the preceding two weeks, but in the department of finance there was no evasion, short of flight, and in the white light that forever beat about him escape for the moment was impossible. He sensed the growing pyramid of final retribution and began to formulate plans whereby the mantle of responsibility might be transferred to other aspiring shoulders.

The c.u.mulative financial problem was a simple matter of geometrical progression, at the far end of which lay a solution consisting of several quarts of blood. He faced a wire-edged razor, seeking a gilt-edged dodge, and so far his brain had failed to formulate the safe way out.

His attempts at transferring the long end of the load to the strutting deppities who hung around the Temple of Luck met with less success.

"Long as you stays Soopreem enough to wra.s.sle wid de financial department, us leaves you run it. You is soopreem now. Stay dat way."

Later on Brother Livingstone approached Honey Tone and warned the leader to stay Soopreem or pay the charges on one life-size mistake.

"Confidential like, Honey Tone, I tells you stay soopreem o' else tell de grave committee de facts fo' yo' tombstone."

The person of the Soopreem Leader became the object of watchful care on the part of three s.h.i.+fts of Deppity Gardeens. Day and night there were two or three watchful waiters on the job.

The fourth pay day was approaching and with it an obligation to pay out more than four thousand dollars. Receipts were falling off. On Wednesday night Honey Tone's bankroll audited less than three thousand dollars. He tried to split the pot with the Deppity Gardeens in return for liberty. In this he failed.

On Thursday night, as near as he could see, all the gates were closed.

He was on a one-way road.

CHAPTER XIX

1.

"All I does is follow mah feet, 'Ceptin' when de boss says, 'Stop an' eat!'

Follow mah feet de whole day through; Follow mah feet 'till I burns a shoe, Shovin' a truck load o' po'k an' beans, Loadin' de boat fo' New O'leans."

Back of his truck on the dock the Wildcat set the pace for his fellows.

The man in front of him found the Wildcat forever at his heels. The man following had a hard time keeping up.

Now and then the Wildcat's feet abandoned the steady trot for a gait which included considerable prancing, embellished with a new series of fancy steps, limited only by the inertia of the freight truck with which the stepper's ambition was r.e.t.a.r.ded.

"On de down-hill drag let yo' hind legs slide; Mawnin', Mistah Debbil, git aboa'd an' ride.

Git behin' me, Satan, on de up-hill road, I'se a one-horse sinner wid a two-horse load."

Late in the afternoon the Wildcat's tactics had converted a group of admirers who had discovered in the prosaic business of rustling freight a first-cla.s.s chance to make a laughing game of it. Meanwhile, they were moving record tonnage.

At evening the pier foreman sent for the Wildcat. "Tomorrow morning you take a gang down to Section Seventeen and start moving flour into the _West King_. There'll be five a day extra in it--that'll buy grub for the goat."

"Cap'n, yessuh--you means I'se fo'man?"

"That's what I mean. Keep your n.i.g.g.e.rs rustlin'."

"Ya.s.s suh! Sho' will!" The Wildcat jerked at Lily's string halter.

"Goat, say you'se 'bliged to de cap'n. Stan' roun' theh, fo' I shows you who's de boss wid a club!"

"Blaaa!" returned Lily.

The pier foreman smiled. "You might round up some more men if you can find 'em," he continued. "We can use a lot more. I'll give you twenty dollars a man for all you can get. Tell 'em ten a day, with grub and quarters furnished here on the dock."

"Cap'n, you means I gits twenty dollars fo' ev'y stevedo' n.i.g.g.e.r whut I 'c.u.mulates?"

"That's it."

"How much is a hund'ed n.i.g.g.e.rs, suh?"

"Two thousand dollars."

"Cap'n, you gits 'em tomorr'. Us kin rule dat many single handed--me 'suadin' an' Lily rammin'. Mebbe two hund'ed. Come on heah, goat! Le's go!"

The Wildcat left the pier with visions of a military formation of a million men, marching steadily toward a place where they were worth twenty dollars apiece to him. In his dream of being king of all labour agents he failed to include the difficulties with which his pathway was beset. The stevedores' strike, gaining strength each day, now included a floating committee whose duty it was to discourage the enlistment of new labour.

The Wildcat borrowed a dollar and ate supper at the lunch counter where he had met Trombone, hoping that he might again encounter that individual. Ranged about him were ten or fifteen hearty eaters; and to this group, at the termination of his own meal, he addressed his invitation to partic.i.p.ate in the business of loading steams.h.i.+ps with outbound freight. "Ten dollahs a day, boy, comf'table place fo'

sleepin', an' all de grub you kin eat."

His oration fell on barren ground. He left the lunch counter without having gained a single recruit. "C'm on heah, Lily. Dese city n.i.g.g.e.rs sho' is triflin'. Whut us needs is fiel' han's, o' else some heavy 'suader like a hoe handle. Us aims to sleep some now. Mebbe tomorr'