The Wood Fire in No. 3 Part 10

PART V

_In which Boggs Becomes Dramatic and Relates a Tale of Blood._

Mr. Alexander Macwhirter's great picture, "Early Morning on the East River," was still on his easel. The Hanging Committee had taken the outside measurement of the frame; had hung the other pictures up to the line of this measurement; had inserted the t.i.tle and price in the official catalogue, and were then awaiting Mac's finis.h.i.+ng touches.

MacWhirter had struck a snag in the middle distance, and until this was repainted to his satisfaction the picture would not leave his studio, official catalogue or no official catalogue.

On this afternoon Lonnegan was the first to arrive. The great architect on his way downtown must have dropped in upon some social function, or was about to attend one later in the day, for he wore his morning frock-coat, white waistcoat, and a decoration in his b.u.t.ton-hole--an unusual attire for Lonnegan unless the affair was of more than customary brilliancy and importance.

"Let up, Mac," cried Lonnegan from behind the Chinese screen, as he looked over its top; "the light's gone and you can't see what you're doing."

"I've got light enough to see where to put my foot," Mac shouted back.

"Easy, easy, old man! Don't smash it; masterpieces are rare! Let me have a look at it. Why, it's all right! What's the matter with it?"

"Shadow tones under the cliffs all out of key. There are a lot of wharves, sheds, and vessels lying there half-smothered in mist. I do not want to do more than suggest them, but they've got to be right."

"Well, but you can't see to paint any longer. Give it up until morning."

"Haven't got time! Hanging Committee has sent here three times to-day."

Marny, Pitkin, Boggs, and Woods walked in and joined the group about Mac's easel, a "sick picture" (pictures get ill and die, or recover and become famous, as well as men) being a matter of the very first importance.

Each new arrival had some advice to offer. Pitkin thought the sky reflections were not silvery enough. Woods wanted a touch of red somewhere on the sides or sterns of the boats, with a "click" of high light on their decks to relieve them from the haze of the background.

"Right out of the tube, old man, and don't touch it afterward. It'll make it _sing_!" Boggs ignored all suggestions by saying, in a dictatorial tone:

"Don't you do anything of the kind, Mac; you don't want any drops of red sealing wax spilt on that middle distance, or any blobs of white; only make it worse. All you need is a touch here and there of yellow-white against that purple haze. But you don't want to guess at it. This East River is a _fact_, not a _dream_. And it's right here under our eyes.

Everybody knows it and everybody knows how it looks. If you want it true, the best thing for you to do is to go there to-morrow morning at daylight and wait until the sun gets to your angle. You fellows that insist on painting things out of your heads instead of following what is set down before you will run to seed like cabbages. Why you want to scoop up the emptyings of everybody's wash-basins, when it is so easy to get buckets of pure water fresh from nature's well, is what gets me."

"Talks like an art critic," growled Pitkin.

"And with as little sense," added Woods.

"More like a plumber, I should think," remarked Lonnegan drily. "Only don't you go up on that hill at five o'clock in the morning, Mac, or you'll never finish that picture or anything else. Some thug will finish _you_. That's the worst hole on the river--regular den of thieves live under that hill. I came near being murdered there myself once."

Lonnegan's statement caused a sensation.

"You came near being murdered, you dear Lonny?" Mac asked nervously.

"Yes."

"When?"

"Some three years ago."

Boggs, who was still smarting under the contempt with which his suggestion had been received, now shouted in the voice of a newsboy selling an afternoon edition:

"Full and graphic account of the hair-breadth escape of a great architect. Sit down, gentlemen, and listen to a tale that will clog your veins with dynamite and make goose s.h.i.+vers go up and down your spine.

Here, Lonnegan, rest your immaculately upholstered body in this chair and tell us all about it. Put up your brushes, Mac; I'll help you wash 'em. Everybody draw up to the fire." (Here Boggs dropped into his own chair.) "The modern Moses is going to tell us how he was pulled out of the bulrushes and why he has an excuse for still walking around among his fellow-men instead of being tucked away in some comfortable cemetery on a hill under a mausoleum of his own designing.

"Ladies and gentlemen"--Boggs was again on his feet, a ring in his voice like that of a showman--"it is my especial privilege, and one of the greatest honors of my life, to introduce to you this afternoon the distinguished architect, Mr. Archibald Perkins Lonnegan, who----"

"Will you keep still!" cried Pitkin, putting both hands on Boggs's shoulder and forcing him into his chair. "Sit on him, Marny!"

Mac by this time had laid his palette on his painting table and had moved to the fire.

"You never told me anything about that, Lonny."

"Well, don't know that I did; 'twas some time ago."

"You're sure that you aren't really murdered, me long-lost che-ild?"

whined Boggs in an anxious tone; these changes of manner, tone, and gesture of the Chronic Interrupter,--imitating in one sentence the newsboy, in another the showman, and now the anxious mother--were as much a part of his personality, and as much enjoyed by the coterie, despite their constant protests, as the bubbling good nature which inspired them.

"Feel that," said Lonnegan, tapping his biceps as he frowned at Boggs, "and you'll find out how much of a corpse I am."

Boggs' plump fingers squeezed the corded muscles of the speaker with the dexterity of a surgeon hunting for broken bones. Then he cast his eyes heavenward.

"Saved by a miracle, gentlemen. Thank G.o.d, he is still spared to us! Now go on, you fas.h.i.+on-plate! When, where, and in what part of your valuable and talented person were you almost murdered?"

Everybody was now seated and had his pipe filled, all except Lonnegan, who stood on the rug with his slender, well-built and, to-day, well-dressed body in silhouette against the blazing logs, his shapely legs forming an inverted V.

"This isn't much of a story. I wouldn't tell it at all if it wasn't to save Mac's life. There are two or three places under that East River hill where it is unsafe to walk even in broad daylight, let alone in the gray of the morning. When I tried it I was looking for one of my foremen--or, rather, for one of his derrick-men. I knew the street, but I didn't know the number. After dinner I started up Third Avenue, turned to Avenue A, and found that my only way to reach the place was down a long street leading to the river, flanked on each side by barren lots used as dumping-grounds and dotted here and there with squatters'

shanties built of refuse timber, old tin roofs, and junk; gas lamps a block apart, with the sidewalks flagged only in the centre.

"I went myself because I wanted the derrick-man, and I wanted him at seven o'clock on Monday morning, and I knew he'd come if I could see him.

"Half-way down this long street, say two blocks from the avenue, which was brilliantly lighted and thronged with people--it was Sat.u.r.day night--I saw the lights of a bar-room, the only brick building fronting either side of the walk."

"Were you rigged out in this royal apparel, Lonny?" broke in Boggs.

"No; I was in a dress-suit and wore an overcoat. Without thinking of the danger, I stepped inside and walked up to the barkeeper--a villainous-looking cutthroat, in his s.h.i.+rt sleeves.

"'I am looking for a man by the name of Dennis McGrath,' I said; 'I thought some of you men might know him.'

"The fellow looked me all over, and then he called to two men sitting at the table behind the stove. As he spoke I caught the flash of a wink quivering on his eyelid--the lid farthest from me. Nothing uncovers the workings of a man's brain like a carefully concealed wink. It may mean anything from ridicule to murder.

"One of the men winked at got up from a table and approached the bar, followed by a larger man, with a face like a bull terrier.

"'What yer say his name is--McGrath?'

"All this time his eyes were sizing me up, scrutinizing my hat, my s.h.i.+rt-studs, watch-chain, overcoat, gloves, down to my shoes. The smaller man--'Shorty,' the barkeeper called him--now repeated the larger man's question.

"'Did yer say his name's McGrath? What's he do?'