The Rich Little Poor Boy Part 31

"Well, then, what?" he asked, leaning forward encouragingly. "Go on, Cis! Tell me!"

"Johnnie Smith,"--impressively--"you're sitting beside a young lady that's going to be married!"

Johnnie gasped. "_Married?_" He fell back from her, the better to stare.

He had expected an important communication; but he was not prepared for anything so astounding as this.

She nodded. "Right away."

Going to be married! So that was why she seemed so different, so changed! that was why she had been wearing her hair up, and fussing so often with her nails! why she cared no longer for Edwarda! why she could not see the people of his thinks! It was simple enough, now that he understood. Of course with a wedding in view, naturally she was grown-up; and a girl, whenever she got grown-up, could not let her braids hang down her back. And as for fine hands-- "Y' mean y've heard from the _Prince_?" he demanded.

She laughed. "No-o-o-o! Oh, Johnnie, you silly!"

He knit his brows and regarded her reprovingly. "Well," he argued, "y'

always told me how much y' love him."

"But I didn't ever know him even! And that was a long time ago!--No, it's some one else, and really a Prince, because he's so splendid! Oh, Johnnie, guess! Guess the most wonderful person ever! Guess a knight!

Like Galahad! Oh, he's _exactly_ like Galahad!" Now she gazed past him.

There were tears on her eyelashes. Her parted lips were trembling. "I'm too happy almost to live!" she added. Then down went her forehead to rest on her knees, and he saw that she was trembling all over.

There was a long silence. Just at first he had felt inclined to taunt her a little for being so changeable in her affections, so flighty; and it had hurt his opinion of her, this knowledge that she could be disloyal. But now he was curious. Who was really a Prince? and splendid?

and like Galahad?

He saw a figure, tall and dark, majestically seated upon a great, bay horse. A cap shaded proud, piercing eyes. A uniform set the rider wholly apart from all the ordinary men hurrying by in both directions. Who in the city of New York was so like a knight as one of those brave, superb, unapproachable, almost royal, creatures, a mounted policeman? ("Fine Irishers," as Mrs. Kukor called them.)

Then Johnnie was reminded of something. "Cis, will y' be married with a red carpet?" he whispered.

She looked up, turning on him a smile so sweet and glowing that it was like a light. "I don't know," she whispered back. "Maybe--if I want one--I think so." Down went her head again.

Now another picture. The carpet was laid. It stretched across the smooth pavement under a long, high, gray canopy. A red carpet and a gray canopy meant just one thing: great wealth. And Johnnie saw Cis following where that carpet led, beside her one of the four richest men in the world.

This man was Mr. Astor (or Mr. Vanderbilt, or Mr. Rockefeller, or Mr.

Carnegie--any one of the quartette would do). The mounted policeman was still a part of the happy scene, but only in an official capacity, since from the back of his prancing bay he was keeping off the vast crowd that was swarming to see the bridal couple.

And, naturally, the policeman, in spite of his fine uniform, was not to be compared for a moment to the bridegroom. New York had many policemen; it had only one Mr. Astor (or Mr. Vanderbilt, or Mr. Rockefeller, or Mr.

Carnegie). Also, the future surroundings of a Mrs. Policeman--what were they when put alongside what Cis would have when she was Mrs.

Any-one-of-the-Four? A house as big as the Grand Central Station--that was a certainty. With it would go silk dresses and furs with dozens of little tails to trim them; jewels of the sort Aladdin had sent the Sultan for the Princess Buddir al Buddoor; books in as great a number as Cis cared to buy, all from that store in Fifth Avenue; automobiles like those owned by the Fifty-fifth Street rich man; dishes of ma.s.sy gold.

"And I betcher I'll ride in one of her cars," he thought; "and I'll read her books!" And at once the future looked rosy and promising.

She began to whisper again, her chin on a knee: "He's got a place for me all picked out! I won't have to go to the factory any more! I'll have pretty clothes, and good things to eat every meal, and see plays and moving-pictures every week, and just have nothing to do but keep house, and sew, and----"

The startled expression on Johnnie's face stopped her. "Keep house?" he repeated, disgusted. "_Sew?_" These were not matters which should trouble the bride of a millionaire! "What're y' goin' t' do things like _that_ for?"

She blinked at him, rebuffed and puzzled. "Why not? I like to sew."

"Aw,"--the palace of his vision was down now, had vanished like Aladdin's own--"what's your new name goin' t' be?" He felt unaccountably cross.

"Johnnie! What's the matter with you? And you mean you don't know? you can't guess? You haven't _noticed_? And you right here all the time?"

Surprise stiffened Johnnie's countenance. "Oh!" he cried, amazed and glad. "Oh, Cis, I know now! You're goin' t' marry One-Eye!"

Girls, as he knew, were very strange; and surely this one was not the least so. It was a conclusion that came to him now, and forcibly. For at his solemn, heart-felt, happy question, what this girl did was to fall back against her pillow, shouting with laughter, waving both arms, even kicking out her feet in the craziest manner. And "One-Eye!" she repeated; "One-Eye!" Then was swept into another paroxysm of mirth.

Presently, "Well, go on! Tell me!" Johnnie said with proper masculine severity.

"Oh, Johnnie, you _are_ so funny!" she declared breathlessly. "One-Eye!

That _old man_! Oh, never, never, never, _never_!" The last never was only a squeak.

"When y' git done laughin'--" he prompted; and waited, lips set, and lids lowered with displeasure.

"Somebody a _thousand_ times nicer than One-Eye!" she went on. "A _million_ times nicer! And, oh, Johnnie, how I _love_ him!"

Johnnie's heart sank, heavy with the great pity that now welled up in his heart. He knew whom she meant; but he knew, too, that, sweet and pretty and lovable as she was, and no doubt capable of winning the affections of a mounted policeman or a millionaire, she had not the slightest chance in the world of marrying the handsome, the good, the wise, the peerless and high-born Mr. Perkins. "St! st! st!" he mourned.

He sighed, leaned against the side of the shelf, propped his yellow head on a big hand, and watched her sadly.

"Mrs. Algernon G.o.dfrey Perkins!"--Cis spoke as if in an ecstatic dream.

"A. G. P.! _Oh_, but they're lovely initials!"

He was glad when she leaned her head on her knees again, for then she could not see his face. "Gee!" he murmured.

"It was you brought him to me!" went on Cis. "I'll never forget that, Johnnie! It means my whole life! Just think of that! A whole, long, wonderful life with _him_!"

"Aw, but, Cis! Are y' sure y' got a chance?"--his voice was tender with sorrowful concern.

She sat up. "Johnnie Smith, what're you talking about?" she demanded. "A _chance_! Why, he loves me! He says so! Over and over and over! And look here!" She thrust a finger under the collar of her dress and drew out a length of white ribbon, narrow and s.h.i.+ning. Mid-way of it, playing along the satin, was a ring--a gold ring set all the way round with tiny, white, glistening stones. "Mr. Perkins, he gave me this," she added, and caught the ring to her lips.

"Mrs. Perkins!" Now his eyes were big with the wonder of it all! That Waldorf-Astoria apartment--Cis was to live in it! There could no longer be any doubt of it. The ring was solid proof. Almost reverently he reached to take it in his fingers. "The same as Aladdin loved the Princess!" he said slowly.

Cis gave a toss of her brown head. "Oh, Aladdin!" she scoffed. "This is really and truly, Johnnie! There's no make-believe about it!"

What all this meant to her, to Mr. Perkins, and to him, he realized then. But he could not be happy over it because of a new fear. "Oh, Cis!" he cried, leaning close to speak low. "Don't y' know what's goin'

t' happen? If y' tell Big Tom 'bout this, he'll kill y'! And, oh! oh!

He'll kill _him_! Mister Perkins!"

"s.h.!.+ s.h.!.+" She put an arm about him. "It's going to be all right! Who'll tell Big Tom? Don't you worry. _I_ don't. I'm not his daughter. Mr.

Perkins is going to find me a guardian. It'll be a lady, I think. Anyhow then I'll do just what the guardian says. You know, guardians 're awfully stylish. Girls have them in books, and in the movies. Yesterday somebody was telling at the factory about----"

She had caught his interest, taking it from that fresh worry. His arms about her, his head resting against her shoulder, they talked on and on, in whispers. When Barber came stomping in, and ordered them to be quiet, Johnnie forsook the little blue room; but he could not sleep, and stole to the roof for a breath of fresh air.

The night was the most beautiful he had ever seen. Or was it the joy in his own heart that made everything seem so perfect? How deeply blue were the patches of star-sprinkled sky showing between clouds of dazzling white! How sweet and live was the air driving cityward from the sea! And the moon! As it came slipping from cloud to cloud, as round as the washtub, and nearly as large, it seemed to Johnnie to have a face that he could see plainly. And that face, full and fat, was laughing!

CHAPTER XXIII

ROSES THAT TATTLED