Part 4 (1/2)

Which was a very foolish thought for a man that worked in a cage to dream. Very foolish, even if the cage were of gla.s.s. Just about that time the Pippin went out in a black smolder, and from a nearby church, hidden between great sky-sc.r.a.pers, a big ding-dong bell said resonantly that it was half-past one.

He returned to the office. Every afternoon, now, was a tingling trial. He worked with head down, sweating with repression. An obsession tormented him. He wanted to walk out of his gla.s.s cage. Out, not through the door, but through the gla.s.s. Not gently, like Alice going into Wonderland, but with ostentation and violence, with a heralding crash of shattered panes, scandalously. Out of his cage, into the next; out of that, into the next; from one end of the big room, in fact, to the other, cras.h.i.+ngly, through cage after cage--and then out upon the street through the plate front.

Half-past five finally freed him; and taking his place in a packed herring-box on wheels, he was rolled back to Dolly--and the shearing.

Thus for a while did the young people live securely on a clown's tissue-paper hoop. Then one evening, just as Charles-Norton, after successfully resisting all day his anarchistic gla.s.s-smas.h.i.+ng impulse, was watching the hands of the clock approach the minute that was to free him, his chief, raising his bald head at the end of his long, thin neck, said casually, ”We work all night, to-night, you know, Mr. Sims.”

CHAPTER VII

”We work all night to-night, Mr. Sims.” It is always with just such a sentence, quiet, drab, and seemingly insignificant, that Mr. Catastrophe introduces himself.

”Yes?” said Charles-Norton, adjusting his neck-tie and looking at the calendar.

He was not surprised, for this happened twice a year. Twice a year, on a day in December and a day in June, a part of the force worked all night to prepare a statistical table for the benefit of the stockholders.

He telephoned to Dolly. Her voice came to him over the wire in a scared little squeak. ”Oh, Goosie,” she pleaded; ”come up before starting in again. I'll let you go off right away. But please come up, please do!”

”Can't,” shouted Charles-Norton. ”We're allowed only an hour for dinner, and it would take more than that just to go up and back.”

”They won't care if you are a little late,” suggested Dolly.

”No, can't come up,” said Charles-Norton, astonished at his own firmness (it is much easier to be firm over a telephone, anyway). ”There's too much to do. I'll be up in the morning, maybe.”

”But Goo-oo-sie----”

”Nope. Can't. Good-by, dearie,” said Charles-Norton, and hung up the receiver, and with a bad conscience and a soaring heart, went off to dinner. No shearing to-night--gee! He ordered a dinner which made the red-headed waitress gasp. ”Must have got a raise, eh?” she diagnosed.

”No, not a raise, not a raise,” hummed Charles-Norton; ”skip now; I'm hungry.”

The night was a long and toilsome one, but an inexhaustible bubble was at the pit of Charles-Norton's being; gradually through the night he felt, beneath his coat, his shoulders deliciously swelling. And when in the morning he stepped out upon the sidewalk, a cry left his lips.

It had showered during the night, and to the rising sun the whole city was glowing as with a golden dew. The air was fresh; Charles-Norton gulped it down. He felt as though a broad river were streaming through him--a clear, cool river. Suddenly, his heels snapped together, his head went back; his hands rose to his armpits and his arms began to vibrate up and down. A policeman came running across the street. ”Say, wot de 'ell are you doing?” he bellowed, red-faced and outraged.

”I'm going to breakfast,” answered Charles-Norton, c.o.c.kily.

He went into the bakery, his hat a-tilt, with the air of a conqueror. For he had decided not to go up to the flat, but to breakfast right here and to spend an hour in the square before going back to the gla.s.s cage at nine. His chest pouted; his eyes glistened; wine ran in his veins. He ordered ham-and-eggs and hot-cakes. An orgy!

He was eating fast, in a hurry for the Pippin and the loll on the bench, when he felt someone sit down by him. There was a pause; then, ”h.e.l.lo, chicken!” piped a thin voice in his ear.

”h.e.l.lo, Pinny,” answered Charles-Norton, even before looking. He had recognized the voice of the pale youth whom he had elbowed on the L a few weeks before, and whom later he had placated here in the bakery.

”S'pose you're a millionaire by this time, chicken,” said the youth, jocularly.

”Sure, Pinny,” answered Charles-Norton.

”But really, honest, did yuh win anything?” went on Pinny, more seriously.

”Win?” Suddenly Charles-Norton remembered the lottery ticket that he had bought. He had forgotten it completely. ”The drawings was three days ago,” Pinny was saying; ”got 'em here,” and out of his pocket he drew a soiled newspaper clipping.

Charles-Norton also was searching his pockets with much contortion; and it was some time before his hand flashed out triumphantly with a piece of dog-eared, yellow cardboard. ”Wot's your number?” asked Pinny.

”Nineteen thousand, eight hundred and ninety-seven,” Charles-Norton read.