Caesar's Column Part 22

"There was still greater applause; Christina's eyes swam with happiness; her mother began to cry; Christina seized the manager's hand, and the old scamp posed, as he received the thanks of those present, as if all this were the outcome of his own generosity, and as if he were indeed the best and n.o.blest of men. I have no doubt that if I had not interfered he would have kept her on the five dollars a week, and the silly little soul would have been satisfied.

"I followed them home. I again listened to their happiness. And then I heard the mother tell the father that they must both go out to-morrow and find a better place to lodge in, for they were rich now. A bright thought flashed across my mind, and I hastened away.

"The next morning, at daybreak, I hurried to the same detective I had employed the day before; he was a shrewd, but not unkindly fellow. I explained to him my plans, and we went out together. We took a carriage and drove rapidly from place to place; he really seemed pleased to find himself engaged, for once in his life, in a good action. What I did will be revealed as I go on with this story.

"At half past eight o'clock that morning the Jansen family had finished their breakfast and talked over and over again, for the twentieth time, their wonderful turn of fortune, and all its incidents, including repeated counting of their marvelous h.o.a.rd of money. Then Christina was left in charge of the children, and the father and mother sallied forth to look for a new residence. The neighbors crowded around to congratulate them; and they explained,--for, kindly-hearted souls, they did not wish their old companions in poverty to think that they had willingly fled from them, at the first approach of good fortune,--they explained that they must get a new home nearer to the theater, for Christina's sake; and that they proposed that she should have teachers in music and singing and acting; for she was now the bread-winner of the family, and they hoped that some day she would s.h.i.+ne in opera with the great artists.

"Did the neighbors know of any place, suitable for them, which they could rent?

"No, they did not; they rarely pa.s.sed out of their own poor neighborhood.

"But here a plainly dressed man, who looked like a workman, and who had been listening to the conversation, spoke up and said that he had observed, only that morning, a bill of 'To Rent' upon a very neat little house, only a few blocks from the theater; and, as he was going that way, he would be glad to show them the place. They thanked him; and, explaining to him that the business of renting houses was something new to them, for heretofore they had lived in one or two rooms--they might have added, very near the roof--they walked off with the stranger. He led them into a pleasant, quiet, respectable neighborhood, and at last stopped before a small, neat three-story house, with a little garden in front and another larger one in the rear.

"'What a pretty place!' said the mother; 'but I fear the rent will be too high for us.'

"'Well, there is no harm in inquiring,' said the workman, and he rang the bell.

"A young man, dressed like a mechanic, answered the summons. He invited them in; the house was comfortably, but not richly furnished.

They went through it and into the garden; they were delighted with everything. And then came the question they feared to ask: What was the rent?

"'Well,' said the young man, pleasantly, I must explain my position.

I am a printer by trade. My name is Francis Montgomery. I own this house. It was left to me by my parents. It is all I have. I am not married. I cannot live in it alone; it is too big for that; and, besides, I think I should get some income out of it, for there are the taxes to be paid. But I do not want to leave the house. I was born and raised here. I thought that if I could get some pleasant family to take it, who would let me retain one of the upper rooms, and would board me, I would rent the house for'--here he mentioned a ridiculously low price. 'I do not want,' he added, 'any expensive fare. I am content to take "pot-luck" with the family. I like your looks; and if you want the house, at the terms I have named, I think we can get along pleasantly together. I may not be here all the time.'

"The offer was accepted; the workman was dismissed with thanks. That afternoon the whole family moved in. The delight of Christina was unbounded. There was one room which I had forseen would be a.s.signed to her, and that I had adorned with some flowers. She was introduced to me; we shook hands; and I was soon a member of the family. What a curious flock of little white-heads, of all ages, they were--st.u.r.dy, rosy, chubby, healthy, merry, and loving toward one another. They brought very little of their poor furniture with them; it was too shabby for the new surroundings; they gave it away to their former neighbors. But I noticed that the father carefully carried into the kitchen an old chair, time-worn and venerable; the back was gone, and it was nothing but a stool. The next day I observed a pudgy little boy, not quite three years old (the father's favorite, as I discovered), driving wrought nails into it with a little iron hammer.

"'Stop! stop! my man!' I exclaimed; 'you must not drive nails in the furniture.'

"I looked at the chair: the seat of it was a ma.s.s of nailholes. And then Christina, noticing my looks of perplexity, said:

"'Last Christmas we were very, very poor. Papa was out of work. We could scarcely get enough to eat. Papa saw the preparations in the store windows for Christmas--the great heaps of presents; and he saw the busy parents hurrying about buying gifts for their children, and he felt very sad that he could not give us any presents, not even to little Ole, whom he loves so much. So he went into the blacksmith shop of a friend, and, taking up a piece of iron that had been thrown on the floor, he made that little hammer Ole has in his hand, and a number of wrought nails; and he brought them home and showed Ole how to use the hammer and drive the nails into the chair; and when he had driven them all into the wood, papa would pry them out for him, and the work would commence all over again, and Ole was happy all day long.'

"I found my eyes growing damp; for I was thinking of the riotous profusion of the rich, and of the costly toys they heap upon their children; and the contrast of this poor man, unable to buy a single cheap toy for his family, and giving his chubby boy a rude iron hammer and nails, to pound into that poor stool, as a subst.i.tute for doll or rocking-horse, was very touching. And then I looked with some wonder at the straightforward honesty of the little maid, who, in the midst of the new, fine house, was not ashamed to talk so frankly of the dismal wretchedness and want which a few days before had been the lot of the family. She saw nothing to be ashamed of in poverty; while by meaner and more sordid souls it is regarded as the very abas.e.m.e.nt of shame and crime.

"Ole was pounding away at his nails.

"'Does he not hurt himself sometimes?' I asked.

"'Oh yes, she said, laughing; 'at first he would hit his little fingers many a hard rap; and he would start to cry, but papa would tell him that "_men_ never cry;--and then it was funny to see how he would purse up his little red mouth, while the tears of pain ran down from his big round eyes, but not a sound more would escape him.'

"And I said to myself: 'This is the stuff of which was formed the masterful race that overran the world under the names of a dozen different peoples. Ice and snow made the tough fiber, mental and physical, which the hot sun of southern climes afterward melted into the viciousness of more luxurious nations. Man is scourged into greatness by adversity, and leveled into mediocrity by prosperity.

This little fellow, whose groans die between his set teeth, has in him the blood of the Vikings.'

"There was one thing I did out of policy, which yet went very much against my inclinations, in dealing with such good and honest people.

I knew that in all probability I had been traced by the spies of the Oligarchy to this house; they would regard it of course as a crazy adventure, and would naturally a.s.sign it to base purposes. But it would not do for me to appear altogether different, even in this family, from the character I had given myself out to be, of a reckless and dissipated man; for the agents of my enemies might talk to the servant, or to members of the household. And so the second night I came home to supper apparently drunk. It was curious to see the looks of wonder, sorrow and sympathy exchanged between the members of the family as I talked ramblingly and incoherently at the table. But this feint served one purpose; it broke down the barrier between landlord and tenants. Indeed, paradoxical as it may seem, I think they thought more of me because of my supposed infirmity; for 'pity is akin to love;' and it is hard for the tenderer feelings of the heart to twine about one who is so strong and flawless that he demands no sympathy or forbearance at our hands. I ceased to be the rich owner of a house--I was simply one of themselves; a foolish journeyman printer; given to drink, but withal a kindly and pleasant man. Two days afterwards, Christina, who had looked at me several times with a troubled brow, took me aside and tried to persuade me to join a temperance society of which her father was a member. It was very pretty and touching to see the motherly way in which the little woman took my hand, and coaxed me to give up my vice, and told me, with eloquent earnestness, all the terrible consequences which would flow from it. I was riot foolish enough to think that any tender sentiment influenced her. It was simply her natural goodness, and her pity for a poor fellow, almost now one of their own family, who was going to destruction. And indeed, if I had been a veritable drunkard, she would have turned me from my evil courses. But I a.s.sured her that I would try to reform; that I would drink less than previously, and that, on the next New Year's day, I might be able to summon up courage enough to go with her father to his society, and pledge myself to total abstinence. She received these promises with many expressions of pleasure; and, although I had to keep up my false character, I never afterwards wounded her feelings by appearing anything more than simply elevated in spirit by drink.

"They were a very kind, gentle, good people; quite unchanged by prosperity and unaffected in their manners. Even in their poverty the children had all looked clean and neat; now they were prettily, but not expensively, dressed. Their religious devotion was great; and I endeared myself to them by sometimes joining in their household prayers. And I said to myself: If there is no G.o.d--as the miserable philosophers tell us--there surely ought to be one, if for nothing else than to listen to the supplications of these loving and grateful hearts. And I could not believe that such tender devotions could ascend and be lost forever in empty and unresponsive s.p.a.ce. The impulse of prayer, it seems to me, presupposes a G.o.d."

CHAPTER XXV.

MAX'S STORY CONTINUED--THE DARK SHADOW

"But a cloud was moving up to cover the fair face of this pleasant prospect; and yet the sun was s.h.i.+ning and the birds singing.

"Christina was very busy during the day with her teachers. She loved music and was anxious to excel. She had her lessons on the piano; she improved her mind by a judicious course of reading, in which I helped her somewhat; she went twice a week to a grand Italian maestro, who perfected her in her singing. And she took long walks to the poor neighborhood where she had formerly lived, to visit the sick and wretched among her old acquaintances, and she never left them empty-handed.

"At the theater she grew more and more popular. Even the rudest of the audience recognized instinctively in her the goodness which they themselves lacked. Every song was an ovation. Her praises began to resound in the newspapers; and she had already received advances from the manager of one of the grand opera-houses. A bright future opened before her--a vista of light and music and wealth and delight.

"She did not escape, however, the unpleasant incidents natural to such a career. Her mother accompanied her to every performance, and was, in so far, a s.h.i.+eld to her; but she was beset with visitors at the house; she was annoyed by men who stopped and claimed acquaintance with her on the streets; she received many gifts, flowers, fruit, jewelry, and all the other tempting sweet nothings which it is thought bewitch the heart of frail woman. But they had no effect upon her. Only goodness seemed to cling to her, and evil fell far off from her. You may set two plants side by side in the same soil--one will draw only bitterness and poison from the earth; while the other will gather, from the same nurture, nothing but sweetness and perfume.

'For virtue, as it never will be moved, Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven; So l.u.s.t, though to a radiant angel linked, Will sate itself in a celestial bed, And prey on garbage."

"Among the men who pestered Christina with their attentions was a young fellow named Nathan Brederhagan, the son of a rich widow. He was one of those weak and shallow brains to whom wealth becomes only a vehicle in which to ride to destruction. He was in reality all that I pretended to be--a reckless, drunken, useless spendthrift, with no higher aim in life than wine and woman. He spent his days in vanity and his nights in debauchery. Across the clouded portal of this fool's brain came, like a vision, the beautiful, gentle, gifted Christina. She was a new toy, the most charming he had ever seen, and, like a child, he must possess it. And so he began a series of persecutions. He followed her everywhere; he fastened himself upon her at the theater; he showered all sorts of gifts on her; and, when he found she returned his presents, and that she refused or resisted all his advances, he grew so desperate that he at last offered to marry her, although with a consciousness that he was making a most heroic and extraordinary sacrifice of himself in doing so. But even this condescension--to his unbounded astonishment--she declined with thanks. And then the silly little fool grew more desperate than ever, and battered up his poor brains with strong drink, and wept in maudlin fas.h.i.+on to his acquaintances. At last one of these--a fellow of the same kidney, but with more enterprise than himself--said to him: 'Why don't you carry her off?' Nathan opened his eyes very wide, stopped his sniffling and blubbering, and made up his mind to follow this sage advice. To obtain the necessary nerve for such a prodigious undertaking he fired up with still more whisky; and when the night came he was crazy with drink. Obtaining a carriage and another drunken fool to help him, he stationed himself beside the pavement, in the quiet street where Christina lived, and but a few doors distant from her house; and then, as she came along with her mother, he seized upon her, while his companion grasped Mrs. Jansen. He began to drag Christina toward the carriage; but the young girl was stronger than he was, and not only resisted him, but began to shriek, ably seconded by her mother, until the street rang. The door of their house flew open, and Mr. Jansen, who had recognized the voices of his wife and daughter, was hurrying to their rescue; whereupon the little villain cried in a tone of high tragedy, 'Then die!' and stabbed her in the throat with a little dagger he carried. He turned and sprang into the carriage; while the poor girl, who had become suddenly silent, staggered and fell into the arms of her father.

"It chanced that I was absent from the house that night, on some business of the Brotherhood, and the next morning I breakfasted in another part of the city, at a restaurant. I had scarcely begun my meal when a phonograph, which, in a loud voice, was proclaiming the news of the day before for the entertainment of the guests, cried out:

PROBABLE MURDER--A YOUNG GIRL STABBED.

Last night, at about half-past eleven, on Seward Street, near Fifty-first Avenue, a young girl was a.s.saulted and brutally stabbed in the throat by one of two men. The girl is a singer employed in Peter Bingham's variety theater, a few blocks distant from the place of the attack. She was accompanied by her mother, and they were returning on foot from the theater, where she had been singing. The man had a carriage ready, and while one of them held her mother, the other tried to force the young girl into the

carriage; it was plainly the purpose of the men to abduct her. She resisted, however; whereupon the ruffian who had hold of her, hearing the footsteps of persons approaching, and seeing that he could not carry her off, drew a knife and stabbed her in the throat, and escaped with his companion in the carriage. The girl was carried into her father's house, No. 1252 Seward Street, and the distinguished surgeon, Dr. Hemnip, was sent for. He p.r.o.nounced the wound probably fatal. The young girl is named Christina Jansen; she sings under the stage-name of Christina Carlson, and is the daughter of Carl Jansen, living at the place named. Inquiry at the theater showed her to be a girl of good character, very much esteemed by her acquaintances, and greatly admired as a very brilliant singer.

LATER.--A young man named Nathan Brederhagan, belonging to a wealthy and respectable family, and residing with his mother at No. 637 Sherman Street, was arrested this morning at one o'clock, in his bed, by police officer No. 18,333, on information furnished by the family of the unfortunate girl. A b.l.o.o.d.y dagger was found in his pocket. As the girl is likely to die he was committed to jail and bail refused.

He is represented to be a dissipated, reckless young fellow, and it seems was in love with the girl, and sought her hand in marriage; and she refused him; whereupon, in his rage, he attempted to take her life. His terrible deed has plunged a large circle of relatives and friends into great shame and sorrow.

"I had started to my feet as soon as I heard the words, 'The girl is a singer in Peter Bingham's Variety Theater,' but, when her name was mentioned and her probable death, the pangs that shot through me no words of mine can describe.

"It is customary with us all to think that our intellect is our self, and that we are only what we think; but there are in the depths of our nature feelings, emotions, qualities of the soul, with which the mere intelligence has nothing to do; and which, when they rise up, like an enraged elephant from the jungle, scatter all the conventionalities of our training, and all the smooth and automaton-like operations of our minds to the winds. As I stood there, listening to the dead-level, unimpa.s.sioned, mechanical voice of the phonograph, pouring forth those deadly sentences, I realized for the first time what the sunny-haired little songstress was to me.

"'Wounded! Dead!'

"I seized my hat, and, to the astonishment of the waiters, I rushed out. I called a hack. I had to alter my appearance. I grudged the time necessary for this very necessary precaution, but, paying the driver double fare, I went, as fast as his horses' legs could carry me, to the place, in a saloon kept by one of the Brotherhood, where I was in the habit of changing my disguises. I dismissed the hack, hurried to my room, and in a few minutes I was again flying along, in another hack, to 1252 Seward Street. I rushed up the steps. Her mother met me in the hall. She was crying.

"'Is she alive?' I asked.

"'Yes, yes,' she replied.

"'What does the doctor say?' I inquired.

"'He says she will not die--but her voice is gone forever,' she replied.

"Her tears burst forth afresh. I was shocked--inexpressibly shocked.

True, it was joy to know she would live; but to think of that n.o.ble instrument of grace and joy and melody silenced forever! It was like the funeral of an angel! G.o.d, in the infinite diversity of his creation, makes so few such voices--so few such marvelous adjustments of those vibrating chords to the capabilities of the air and the human sense and the infinite human soul that dwells behind the sense--and all to be the spoil of a ruffian's knife. Oh! if I could have laid my hands on the little villain! I should have butchered him with his own dagger--sanctified, as it was, with her precious blood.

The infamous little scoundrel! To think that such a vicious, shallow, drunken brute could have power to 'break into the b.l.o.o.d.y house of life' and bring to naught such a precious and unparalleled gift of G.o.d. I had to clutch the railing of the stairs to keep from falling.

Fortunately for me, poor Mrs. Jansen was too much absorbed in her own sorrows to notice mine. She grieved deeply and sincerely for her daughter's sufferings and the loss of her voice; but, worse than all, there rose before her- the future! She looked with dilated eyes into that dreadful vista. She saw again the hard, grinding, sordid poverty from which they had but a little time before escaped-she saw again her husband bent down with care, and she heard her children crying once more for bread. I read the poor woman's thoughts. It was not selfishness--it was love for those dear to her; and I took her hand, and--scarcely knowing what I said--I told her she must not worry, that she and her family should never suffer want again. She looked at me in surprise, and thanked me, and said I was always good and kind.

"In a little while she took me to Christina's room. The poor girl was under the influence of morphine and sleeping a troubled sleep. Her face was very pale from loss of blood; and her head and neck were all bound up in white bandages, here and there stained with the ghastly fluid that flowed from her wounds. It was a pitiable sight: her short, crisp yellow curls broke here and there, rebelliously, through the folds of the linen bandages; and I thought how she used to shake them, responsive to the quiverings of the cadenzas and trills that poured from her bird-like throat. 'Alas!' I said to myself, 'poor throat! you will never sing again! Poor little curls, you will never tremble again in sympathy with the dancing delight of that happy voice.' A dead voice! Oh! it is one of the saddest things in the world! I went to the window to hide the unmanly tears which streamed down my face.

"When she woke she seemed pleased to see me near her, and extended her hand to me with a little smile. The doctor had told her she must not attempt to speak. I held her hand for awhile, and told how grieved I was over her misfortune. And then I told her I would bring her a tablet and pencil, so that she might communicate her wants to us; and then I said to her that I was out of a job at my trade (I know that the angels in heaven do not record such lies), and that I had nothing to do, and could stay and wait upon her; for the other children were too small, and her mother too busy to be with her all the time, and her father and I could divide the time between us. She smiled again and thanked me with her eyes.