The Bunsby papers Part 31

MORNING THOUGHTS.

The early grey of dawn peeped furtively through the shutters of Tom Bobolink's home, and as they strengthened and strengthened, fell upon a figure which could scarcely be recognized as the same joyous-hearted individual of the day before. On the floor lay Tom; the candle, which had completely burned out in its socket, close to his head; one hand grasped the empty bottle, and the other was tightly clutched within his breast.

And now another scarcely less sorrowful-looking figure is added. Polly gazes, with tearful eyes, upon the prostrate form. He is evidently in the maze of some terrible dream, for his head rolls fearfully about, his limbs are convulsed, and his breathing is thick and heavy.

Polly stooped down to awake him gently, when, at the slightest touch, he started at one bound to his feet, muttering incoherent words of terror and apprehension; his eyes rolled about wildly. He seized Polly, and held her at arms' length for an instant, until he fairly realized his actual situation, when he burst into a loud laugh, that chilled his poor wife's very blood.

"Ha! ha! Pol, is that you?" he cried, wildly. "I've been a bad boy, I know; but I'll make up for it gloriously, my girl. Ugh! what a dream I've had. Ah! the darkness is a terrible time to get over when one's conscience is filling the black night with fiery eyes." Then, turning to his wife, he said, loudly: "Polly, darling, I'm ashamed of myself; but it will be all right by and by. You were cut out for a rich woman, Pol."

"Dear Thomas, let me be rich in the happiness of our humble home; 'tis all I ask."

"Oh, nonsense! Suppose now you got a heap of money a prize in the lottery, wouldn't you like to elevate your little nose, and jostle against the big bugs in Broadway?"

"Not at the price of our comfort, Thomas," she answered, solemnly.

"You're a fool! Money can buy all sorts of comfort."

"What do you mean, Thomas, by those hints about money? has anything happened?"

"Oh! no--no!" he replied, quickly, turning his eyes away; "but there's no knowing when something might. Now I'll try her," thought he. "It's my dream, Pol. Shall I tell it to you?"

"Do, my dear Tom. Oh! I'm so glad to see you yourself once more."

"Well, dear," he continued, sitting close to her, and placing his arm around her waist, "I dreamed that as I was returning from a job, what should I see in the street, under my very nose, but a pocket-book, stuffed full of money. Presently the owner came along. He asked me if I had found it. I said no, and came home a rich man--oh! so rich!"

"I know your heart too well, Tom, to believe that such a thing could happen except in a dream," said his wife, to his great annoyance. He started up, and after one or two turns about the little, now untidy, room, exclaimed, angrily:

"Why not? I should like to know if fortune did--I mean--was, to fling luck in my way, do you think I'd be such a cursed fool as not to grab at it?"

"Thomas, you have been drinking too much," said she, sadly.

"No, no," he interrupted, "not enough; give me some more."

"Not a drop, husband," she replied, seriously, and with determination.

"If you will poison yourself it shall not be through my hand."

"Don't be a fool," he cried, savagely, "or it may be the worse for you.

I'm master of my own house, I think."

"Home! ah, Thomas, some evil spirit has stolen away our once happy home for ever," said Polly, as she slowly and sorrowfully returned again to weep in the silence of her own room.

"There has, there has," cried Tom, as she quitted him. "And this is it"--pulling out the pocket-book, which he had not left hold of for an instant, and frowning desperately at it--"Confound your skin, it's you that has stolen away our comfort. I'll take the cursed thing back; I wouldn't have Polly's eyes wet with sorrow to be made of money--I'll take it back this very blessed morning; and somehow that thought brings a ray of sunlight back to my heart." So saying, he thrust the pocket-book, as he thought, safely within his vest, but in his eagerness to take extra care of it, it slipped through, and dropped upon the floor; his mind being taken off for a moment by the entrance of Bryan, to tell him that the horse and truck were ready.

"Very well, I'm glad of it," cried Tom. "Now I'll see what the fine, bracing, morning air will do for this cracked head of mine; now then, to take this back," and he slapped his chest, under the full impression that the pocket-book was there. "Bryan, I don't want you for half an hour; just wait till I come back, will you?"

"That I will, sir, and welcome," said Bryan, and with a merry song once more at his lip, and a cheerful good-bye to Polly, to whose heart both brought comfort in her great sadness, Bobolink mounted his truck, and trotted off.

Meantime Bryan, now left alone in the room, dived into the recesses of his capacious coat-pocket, and producing from thence a piece of bread and cheese, moralized the while upon the pleasant change in his prospects.

"Long life to this tindher-hearted couple," said he. "Shure an' I'm on the high road to good luck at last; plenty of the best in the way of atin', and an elegant stable to sleep in, with a Christian-like quadruped for company; av I had only now a trifle o' money to get myself some clothes--these things doesn't look well in this part of the world," casting his eyes down in not over-delighted contemplation of his nether integuments. "A little bit o' money now would make me so happy an' industrious, I could take the buzz out of a hive o' bees. The saints between us and all mischief, what's that?" he continued, starting to his feet, as his glance fell upon the pocket-book which Tom had dropped. "It serves me right," he went on, his face suddenly becoming pale as paper, "to wish for any such thing. I don't want it--it was all a mistake," cried he, apologetically. "This is the devil's work; no sooner do I let a word out o' me mouth, that I didn't mane at all at all, but the evil blaggard sticks a swadge of temptation right before me. I won't have it--take it away."

At that instant Polly returned into the room. "Take care how you come--don't walk this way," said Bryan. "Look!"

"What is it?" cried Polly, in alarm.

"Timptation!" shouted Bryan. "I was foolish enough just now to wish for a trifle of money, and may I niver see glory if that lump of a pocket-book didn't sprout up before me very eyes."

"Pocket-book, eh?" cried Polly, seizing it in her hands, despite of the comic apprehension of Bryan, who insisted that it would burn her fingers. The whole truth flashed across her mind at once. Tom's dream was no dream, but a reality, and the struggle in his mind whether to keep or return it, had caused that sleepless and uncomfortable night.

"Bryan," said she, quickly, "did you hear any one say that they had lost any money yesterday?"

"Let me see," replied the other. "Yes, to be sure, 44 came out of the hall-door, and axed me if I saw a pocket-book."

"It must be his. Thank G.o.d for this merciful dispensation," cried the agitated wife. "Quick, quick, my bonnet and shawl, and come you, Bryan, you know the place; this money must be that which was lost."

"I'm wid you, ma'am," answered Bryan. "Who knows but that may be the identical pocket-book; at any rate it'll do as well if there's as much money in it, and if there isn't, there'll be another crop before we come back."

CHAPTER VIII.

RETRIBUTION.

Snugly ensconced in his own particular apartment, Mr. Granite had flung himself in post-prandial _abandon_ into his easiest of easy-chairs.

Leisurely, and with the smack of a true connoisseur, he dallied with a gla.s.s of exquisite Madeira. The consciousness of the enviable nature of his worldly position never imbued him so thoroughly as at such a moment. Business was flouris.h.i.+ng, his health was excellent, and his son, on whom he concentrated all the affection of which his heart was capable, had recently distinguished himself at a college examination.

Everything, in fact, seemed to him _couleur de rose_.

It can readily be imagined that to be disturbed at such a period of enjoyment was positive high treason against the home majesty of the mercantile monarch.

Fancy, therefore, what a rude shock it was to his quiet, when he was informed that Mr. Sterling wished to see him on a matter of the greatest importance. "I cannot, I will not see him, or anybody," said the enraged potentate; "you know, he knows, my invariable rule. It must not be infringed, for any one whatever, much less for such a person,"

and, closing his eyes in a spasm of self-sufficiency, he again subsided into calmness, slightly ruffled, however, by the outrageous attack upon his privacy.

He had just succeeded in restoring his disturbed equanimity, when he was once more startled into ill-humor by the sound of voices as if in altercation, and a sharp knock at the chamber-door.

The next instant, to his still greater surprise and anger, the old clerk, Sterling, who had been ignominiously dismissed since the last interview between him and Granite, stood before him. Every particle of his. .h.i.therto meekness and humility had apparently vanished, as for a few moments he regarded the merchant with a fixed and penetrating look.

"What villainous intrusion is this? Where are my servants? How dare they permit my home to be thus invaded?" cried Granite, with flas.h.i.+ng eyes and lowering brow.

"I am here, not for myself," replied Sterling, calmly, "but for the victim of your rapacity--of your terrible guilt. I have intruded upon you at this unusual time to inform you of the extremity in which Travers is placed, and from my carelessness--my criminal carelessness.

Will you not at least remedy that?"

"No!" thundered the exasperated merchant. "Your indiscreet zeal has ruined both you and those for whom you plead. I'll have nothing to do with any of ye--begone!"

"Not before I have cautioned you that my lips, hitherto sealed for fear of injury to him, shall henceforward be opened. Why should I hesitate to denounce one who is so devoid of common charity?"

"Because no one will believe you," responded the other, with a bitter sneer. "The denunciations of a discharged servant are seldom much heeded; empty sounds will be of no avail. Proof will be needed in confirmation, and where are you to find that?"