"That's the way with you," he said presently: "you put things into a fellow's head.You've given me a regular boost, Little Ann."It is not unlikely that but for the sensible conviction in her voice he would have felt less bold when, two weeks later, Biker, having gone upon a "bust " too prolonged, was dismissed with-out benefit of clergy, and Galton desperately turned to Tembarom with anxious question in his eye.
"Do you think you could take this job?" he said.
Tembarom's heart, as he believed at the time, jumped into his throat.
"What do you think, Mr.Galton?" he asked.
"It isn't a thing to think about," was Galton's answer."It's a thing I must be sure of.""Well," said Tembarom, "if you give it to me, I'll put up a mighty hard fight before I fall down."Galton considered him, scrutinizing keenly his tough, long-built body, his sharp, eager, boyish face, and especially his companionable grin.
"We'll let it go at that," he decided."You'll make friends up in Harlem, and you won't find it hard to pick up news.We can at least try it."Tembarom's heart jumped into his throat again, and he swallowed it once more.He was glad he was not holding his hat in his hand because he knew he would have forgotten himself and thrown it up into the air.
"Thank you, Mr.Galton," he said, flushing tremendously."I'd like to tell you how I appreciate your trusting me, but I don't know how.
Thank you, sir."
When he appeared in Mrs.Bowse's dining-room that evening there was a glow of elation about him and a swing in his entry which attracted all eyes at once.For some unknown reason everybody looked at him, and, meeting his eyes, detected the presence of some new exultation.
"Landed anything, T.T.?" Jim Bowles cried out."You look it.""Sure I look it," Tembarom answered, taking his napkin out of its ring with an unconscious flourish."I've landed the up-town society page--landed it, by gee!"A good-humored chorus of ejaculatory congratulation broke forth all round the table.
"Good business!" "Three cheers for T.T.!" "Glad of it!" "Here's luck!"said one after another.
They were all pleased, and it was generally felt that Galton had shown sense and done the right thing again.Even Mr.Hutchinson rolled about in his chair and grunted his approval.
After dinner Tembarom, Jim Bowles, and Julius Steinberger went up-stairs together and filled the hall bedroom with clouds of tobacco-smoke, tilting their chairs against the wall, smoking their pipes furiously, flushed and talkative, working themselves up with the exhilarated plannings of youth.Jim Bowles and Julius had been down on their luck for several weeks, and that "good old T.T." should come in with this fairy-story was an actual stimulus.If you have never in your life been able to earn more than will pay for your food and lodging, twenty dollars looms up large.It might be the beginning of anything.
"First thing is to get on to the way to do it," argued Tembarom."Idon't know the first thing.I've got to think it out.I couldn't ask Biker.He wouldn't tell me, anyhow.""He's pretty mad, I guess," said Steinberger.
"Mad as hops," Tembarom answered."As I was coming down-stairs from Galton's room he was standing in the hall talking to Miss Dooley, and he said: `That Tembarom fellow's going to do it! He doesn't know how to spell.I should like to see his stuff come in.' He said it loud, because he wanted me to hear it, and he sort of laughed through his nose.""Say, T.T., can you spell?" Jim inquired thoughtfully.
"Spell? Me? No," Tembarom owned with unshaken good cheer."What I've got to do is to get a tame dictionary and keep it chained to the leg of my table.Those words with two m's or two l's in them get me right down on the mat.But the thing that looks biggest to me is how to find out where the news is, and the name of the fellow that'll put me on to it.You can't go up a man's front steps and ring the bell and ask him if he's going to be married or buried or have a pink tea.""Wasn't that a knock at the door?" said Steinberger.
It was a knock, and Tembarom jumped up and threw the door open, thinking Mrs.Bowse might have come on some household errand.But it was Little Ann Hutchinson instead of Mrs.Bowse, and there was a threaded needle stuck into the front of her dress, and she had on a thimble.
"I want Mr.Bowles's new socks," she said maternally."I promised I'd mark them for him."Bowles and Steinberger sprang from their chairs, and came forward in the usual comfortable glow of pleasure at sight of her.
"What do you think of that for all the comforts of a home?" said Tembarom."As if it wasn't enough for a man to have new socks without having marks put on them! What are your old socks made of anyhow--solid gold? Burglars ain't going to break in and steal them.""They won't when I've marked them, Mr.Tembarom," answered Little Ann, looking up at him with sober, round, for-get-me-not blue eyes, but with a deep dimple breaking out near her lip; "but all three pairs would not come home from the wash if I didn't.""Three pairs!" ejaculated Tembarom."He's got three pairs of socks!
New? That's what's been the matter with him for the last week.Don't you mark them for him, Little Ann.'Tain't good for a man to have everything.""Here they are," said Jim, bringing them forward."Twenty-five marked down to ten at Tracy's.Are they pretty good?"Little Ann looked them over with the practised eye of a connoisseur of bargains.
"They'd be about a shilling in Manchester shops," she decided, "and they might be put down to sixpence.They're good enough to take care of."She was not the young woman who is ready for prolonged lively conversation in halls and at bedroom doors, and she had turned away with the new socks in her hand when Tembarom, suddenly inspired, darted after her.
"Say, I've just thought of something," he exclaimed eagerly."It's something I want to ask you.""What is it?"