Part 12 (2/2)
But as soon as the carriages begun comin' and I gets busy callin' for the seat checks, I forgets how I looks and stops huntin' for some place to stow my hands. It was a cinch job. There was only a few lady b.u.t.t-ins that had strayed over from the shoppin' district and smelled out a free show.
”We're intimate friends of the bride,” says a pair of 'em; ”but we've forgotten our tickets.”
”That's good, but musty. b.u.t.t out, please,” says I.
Chee! but I ain't used up so much politeness since I can remember! It was wearin' them clothes did it, I guess.
Well, I was gettin' to feel real gay, for most everyone that was due was inside, and I hadn't made any breaks to speak of, and it was near time for the Lady Mildred to be floatin' in, when I pipes off a tall, husky-lookin' gent, with a funny black lid and an umbrella tucked under one arm, gawpin' up at the sign on the church.
”Tourist from Punk Hollow lookin' for the Flatiron Buildin',” says I to myself; but the next minute he comes meanderin' up the steps, fis.h.i.+n' a card out of his pocket. You can bet I plants myself in the door and calls for credentials!
But, say, he had the goods. There was the ticket, all right, with the name wrote on it, and it didn't need but one squint at the pasteboard for me to break into a cold sweat. It wa'n't anybody else but Mr.
William Morgan!
”Say,” says I, as hoa.r.s.e as a huckster, ”are you Brother Bill?”
”Why,” says he, kind of surprised, but not half so stunned as I thought he'd be,--”why, I suppose I am.”
You wouldn't have guessed it. Not that he didn't look the brother part; for he did. He went Mildred two or three inches better in height, and he had snappy black eyes and black hair like hers. The points that goes with a striped suit and the lock step was missin', though. But how you goin' to tell, in these times when our toniest fatwads is sittin' around the mahogany votin' to raise the price of chewin' gum to-day, and gettin' a free haircut to-morrow? There wa'n't any time for me to stand there guessin' whether he'd been pardoned, or had slid down the rain pipe. Somethin' had to be done, and done quick.
”Dodge in here and wait a minute,” says I. ”There's some word been left for you.”
With that I sneaks down the side aisle and into the little cloakroom, where Mr. Robert was keepin' Benny's mind off'n what was comin' to him by makin' him count the geranium leaves in the carpet.
”Mr. Robert,” says I, luggin' him off to one side, ”you want to give up predictin' the future. Bill's come!”
”What Bill?” says he.
”The one from the rock pile, Brother Bill,” says I.
”That's lovely!” says he.
”It's all of that,” says I.
”I hope he's not wearing his uniform still,” says Mr. Robert.
”Not on the outside,” says I. ”He looks like he'd pinched a minister's Monday suit somewhere. But it ain't the way he looks that's worryin' me; it's what he's liable to do any minute to put the show on the blink.”
”That's so, Torchy,” says he. ”Can't we get him out of the way somehow?”
”It's a tough proposition,” says I; ”but if you'll put on a sub for me at the door, and give me leave to make any play that I happens to think of, I'll tackle it.”
”Good!” says Mr. Robert. ”And I'll make it worth a hundred to you to keep him away from here until it's all over.”
”I'm on the job,” says I.
As I skips back I grabs my hat out from under a rear seat and makes straight for Brother Bill. ”Come on,” says I. ”She's waitin' for you now. We've got just half an hour to do it in.”
Bill, he looks sort of jarred and reluctant; but I has him by the arm and is chasin' him down the steps before he can ask any dippy questions.
First off I thought of runnin' him up the avenue until he's clean winded; but I see by the way he strikes out that it would take more lungs than I've got to do that.
There was a lot of weddin' cabs and such waitin' round the corner, though; so I steers him into the first one that has the ap.r.o.n up, jumps in after him, shoves up the door in the roof, and sings out:
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