章节正文
handkerchief with vinegar on it and--rings the bell for the
bell-boy!
He comes.
As I said, he's a prompt, gentle little bell-boy, slight, looks
rather young for his job, but that very youth and innocence of
his make him such a fellow to trust!
"Nat," says Mrs. Kingdon, tearfully pressing half a dollar into
the nice lad's hand, "I--I've lost something and I want you
to--to help me find it."
"Yes'm," says Nat. He's the soul of politeness.
"It must be here--it must be in this room," says the lady,
getting wild with the terror of losing. "I'm
sure--positive--that I went straight to the shoe-bag and slipped
it in there. And now I can't find it, and I must have it before I
go out this afternoon for--for a very special reason. My daughter
Evelyn will be home to-morrow and--why don't you look for it?"
"What is it, ma'am?"
"I told you once. My key--a little flat key that locks--a box
I've got," she finishes distrustfully.
"Have you looked in the shoe-bag, ma'am?"
"Why, of course I have, you little stupid. I want you to hunt
other places where I can't easily get. There are other places I
might have put it, but I'm positive it was in the shoe-bag."
Well, I looked for that key. Where? Where not? I looked under the
rubbish in the waste-paper basket; Mrs. Kingdon often fooled
thieves by dropping it there. I pulled up the corner of the
carpet and looked there--it was loose; it had often been used for
a hiding-place. I looked in Miss Evelyn's boot and in her ribbon
box. I emptied Mrs. Kingdon's full powder box. I climbed ladders
and felt along cornices. I looked through the pockets of Mrs.
Kingdon's gowns--a clever bell-boy it takes to find a woman's
pocket, but even the real masculine ones among 'em are half
feminine; they've had so much to do with women.
I rummaged through her writing-desk, and, in searching a
gold-cornered pad, found a note from Moriway hidden under the
corner. I hid it again carefully--in my coat pocket. A
love-letter from Moriway, to a woman twenty years older than
himself--'tain't a bad lay, Tom Dorgan, but you needn't try it.
At first she watched every move I made, but later, as her
headache grew worse, she got desperate. So then I put my hand
down into the shoe-bag and found the key, where it had slipped
under a fold of cloth.
Do you suppose that woman was grateful? She snatched it from me.
"I knew it was there. I told you it was there. If you'd had any
sense you'd have looked there first. The boys in this hotel are
so stupid."
"That's all, ma'am?"
She nodded. She was fitting the key into the black box she'd
taken from the top drawer. Nat had got to the outside door when
he heard her come shrieking after him.
"Nat--Nat--come back! My diamonds--they're not here. I know I
put them back last night--I'm positive. I could swear to it.
I can see myself putting them in the chamois bag, and--O my God,
where can they be! This time they're gone!"
Nat could have told her--but what's the use? He felt she'd only
lose 'em again if she had 'em. So he let them lie snug in his
trousers pocket--where he had put the chamois bag, when his eyes
lit on it, under the corner of the carpet. He might have passed
it over to her then, but you see, Tom, she hadn't told him to
look for a bag; it was a key she wanted. Bell-boys are so stupid.
This time she followed his every step. He could not put his hand
on the smallest thing without rousing her suspicion. If he
hesitated, she scolded. If he hurried, she fumed. Most unjust, I
call it, because he had no thought of stealing--just then.
"Come," she said at last, "we'll go down and report it at the
desk."
"Hadn't I better wait here, ma'am, and look again?"
She looked sharply at him.
"No; you'd better do just as I tell you."
So down we went. And we met Mr. Moriway there. She'd telephoned
him. The chambermaid was called, the housekeeper, the electrical
engineer who'd been fixing bells that morning, and, as I said, a
bell-boy named Nat, who told how he'd just come on duty when Mrs.
Kingdon's bell rang, found her key and returned it to her, and
was out of the room when she unlocked the box. That was all he
knew.
"Is he telling the truth?" Moriway asked Mrs Kingdon.
"Ye--es, I guess he is; but where are the diamonds? We must have
them--you know--to-day, George," she whispered. And then she
turned and went upstairs, leaving Moriway to do the rest.
"There's only one thing to do, Major," he said to the
proprietor. "Search 'em all and then--"
"Search me? It's an outrage!" cried the housekeeper.
"Search me if ye loike," growled McCarthy, resentfully. "Oi
wasn't there but a minute; the lady herself can tell ye that."
Katie, the chambermaid, flushed painfully, and there were
indignant tears in her eyes, which, I'll tell you in confidence,
made a girl named Nancy uncomfortable.
But the boy Nat; knowing that bell-boys have no rights, said
nothing. But he thought. He thought, Tom Dorgan, a lot of things
and a long way ahead.
The peppery old Major marched us all off to his private office.
Not much, girls, it hadn't come. For suddenly the annunciator
rang out.
Out of the corner of his eye, Nat looked at the bell-boy's bench.
It was empty. There was to be a ball that night, and the bells
were going it over all the place.
"Number Twenty-one!" shouted the clerk at the desk.
But Number Twenty-one didn't budge. His heart was beating like a
hammer, and the ting--ng--ng of that bell calling him rang in his
head like a song.
"Number Twenty-one!" yelled the clerk.
Oh, he's got a devil of a temper, has that clerk. Some day, Tom,
when you love me very much, go up to the hotel and break his face
for me.
"You.--boy--confound you, can't you hear?" he shouted.
That time he caught the Major's ear--the one that wasn't deaf. He
looked from Powers' black face to the bench and then to me. And
all the time the bell kept ringing like mad.
"Git!" he said to the boy. "And come back in a hurry."
Number Twenty-one got--but leisurely. It wouldn't do for a
bell-boy to hurry, particularly when he had such good cause.
Oh, girls, those stone stairs, the servants' stairs at the St.
James! They're fierce. I tell you, Mag, scrubbing the floors at
the Cruelty ain't so bad. But this time I was jolly glad
bell-boys weren't allowed in the elevator. For there were those
diamonds in my pants pocket, and I must get rid of 'em before I
got down to the office again. So I climbed those stairs, and
every step I took my eye was searching for a hiding-place.
I could have pitched the little bag out of a window, but Nancy
Olden wasn't throwing diamonds to the birds, any more than Mag
here is likely to cut off the braids of red hair we used to play
horse with when we drove her about the Cruelty yard.
One flight.
No chance.
Another.
Everything bare as stone and soap could keep it.
The third flight--my knees began to tremble, and not with
climbing. The call came from this floor. But I ran up a fourth
just on the chance, and there in a corner was a fire hatchet
strapped to the wall. Behind that hatchet Mrs. Kingdon's diamonds
might lie snug till evening. I put the ends of my fingers first
in the little crack to make sure the little bag wouldn't drop to
the floor, and then dived into my pocket and--
And there behind me, stealthily coming up the last turn of the
stairs was Mr. George Moriway!
Don't you hate a soft-walking man, Mag? That cute fellow was
cuter than the old Major himself, and had followed me every inch
of the way.
"There's something loose with this hatchet, sir," I said,
innocently looking down at him.
"Oh, there is? What an observing little fellow you are! Never
mind the hatchet; just tell me what number you were sent to
answer."
"Number?" I repeated, as though I couldn't see why he wanted to
know. "Why--431."
"Not much, my boy--331."
"'Scuse me, sir, ain't you mistaken?"
He looked at me for full a minute. I stared him straight in the
eye. A nasty eye he's got--black and bloodshot and cold and full
of suspicion. But it wavered a bit at the end.
"I may be," he said slowly, "but not about the number. Just
you turn around and get down to 331."
"All right, sir. Thank you very much. It might have got me in
trouble. The ladies are so particular about having the bells
answered quick--"
`I guess you'll get in trouble all right," he said and stood
watching--from where he stood he could watch me every inch of the
way--till I got to 331, at the end of the hall, Mrs. Kingdon's
door.
And the goods still on me, Tom, mind that.
My, but Mrs. Kingdon was wrathy when she saw me!
"Why did they send you?" she cried. "Why did you keep me
waiting so long? I want a chambermaid. I've rung a dozen times.
The whole place is crazy about that old ball to-night, and no one
can get decent attention."
"Can't I do what you want, ma'am?" I just yearned to get inside
that door.
"No," she snapped. "I don't want a boy to fasten my dress in
the back--"
"We often do, ma'am," I said softly.
"You do? Well--"
"Yes'm." I breathed again.
"Well--it's indecent. Go down and send me a maid."
She was just closing the door in my face--and Moriway waiting for
me to watch me down again.
"Mrs. Kingdon--"
"Well, what do you want?"
"I want to tell you that when I get down to the office they'll
search me."
She looked at me amazed.
"And--and there's something in my pocket I--you wouldn't like
them to find."
"What in the world--my diamonds! You did take them, you little
wretch?"
She caught hold of my coat. But Lordy! I didn't want to get away
a little bit. I let her pull me in, and then I backed up against
the door and shut it.
`Diamonds! Oh, no, ma'am. I hope I'm not a thief. But--but it
was something you dropped--this."
I fished Moriway's letter out of my pocket and handed it to her.
The poor old lady! Being a bell-boy you know just how old ladies
really are. This one at evening, after her face had been massaged
for an hour, and the manicure girl and the hair-dresser had gone,
wasn't so bad. But to-day, with the marks of the morning's tears
on her agitated face, with the blood pounding up to her temples
where the hair was thin and gray--Tom Dorgan, if I'm a vain old
fool like that when I'm three times as old as I am, just tie a
stone around my neck and take me down and drop me into the
nearest water, won't you?
"You abominable little wretch!" she sobbed. "I suppose you've
bell-boy!
He comes.
As I said, he's a prompt, gentle little bell-boy, slight, looks
rather young for his job, but that very youth and innocence of
his make him such a fellow to trust!
"Nat," says Mrs. Kingdon, tearfully pressing half a dollar into
the nice lad's hand, "I--I've lost something and I want you
to--to help me find it."
"Yes'm," says Nat. He's the soul of politeness.
"It must be here--it must be in this room," says the lady,
getting wild with the terror of losing. "I'm
sure--positive--that I went straight to the shoe-bag and slipped
it in there. And now I can't find it, and I must have it before I
go out this afternoon for--for a very special reason. My daughter
Evelyn will be home to-morrow and--why don't you look for it?"
"What is it, ma'am?"
"I told you once. My key--a little flat key that locks--a box
I've got," she finishes distrustfully.
"Have you looked in the shoe-bag, ma'am?"
"Why, of course I have, you little stupid. I want you to hunt
other places where I can't easily get. There are other places I
might have put it, but I'm positive it was in the shoe-bag."
Well, I looked for that key. Where? Where not? I looked under the
rubbish in the waste-paper basket; Mrs. Kingdon often fooled
thieves by dropping it there. I pulled up the corner of the
carpet and looked there--it was loose; it had often been used for
a hiding-place. I looked in Miss Evelyn's boot and in her ribbon
box. I emptied Mrs. Kingdon's full powder box. I climbed ladders
and felt along cornices. I looked through the pockets of Mrs.
Kingdon's gowns--a clever bell-boy it takes to find a woman's
pocket, but even the real masculine ones among 'em are half
feminine; they've had so much to do with women.
I rummaged through her writing-desk, and, in searching a
gold-cornered pad, found a note from Moriway hidden under the
corner. I hid it again carefully--in my coat pocket. A
love-letter from Moriway, to a woman twenty years older than
himself--'tain't a bad lay, Tom Dorgan, but you needn't try it.
At first she watched every move I made, but later, as her
headache grew worse, she got desperate. So then I put my hand
down into the shoe-bag and found the key, where it had slipped
under a fold of cloth.
Do you suppose that woman was grateful? She snatched it from me.
"I knew it was there. I told you it was there. If you'd had any
sense you'd have looked there first. The boys in this hotel are
so stupid."
"That's all, ma'am?"
She nodded. She was fitting the key into the black box she'd
taken from the top drawer. Nat had got to the outside door when
he heard her come shrieking after him.
"Nat--Nat--come back! My diamonds--they're not here. I know I
put them back last night--I'm positive. I could swear to it.
I can see myself putting them in the chamois bag, and--O my God,
where can they be! This time they're gone!"
Nat could have told her--but what's the use? He felt she'd only
lose 'em again if she had 'em. So he let them lie snug in his
trousers pocket--where he had put the chamois bag, when his eyes
lit on it, under the corner of the carpet. He might have passed
it over to her then, but you see, Tom, she hadn't told him to
look for a bag; it was a key she wanted. Bell-boys are so stupid.
This time she followed his every step. He could not put his hand
on the smallest thing without rousing her suspicion. If he
hesitated, she scolded. If he hurried, she fumed. Most unjust, I
call it, because he had no thought of stealing--just then.
"Come," she said at last, "we'll go down and report it at the
desk."
"Hadn't I better wait here, ma'am, and look again?"
She looked sharply at him.
"No; you'd better do just as I tell you."
So down we went. And we met Mr. Moriway there. She'd telephoned
him. The chambermaid was called, the housekeeper, the electrical
engineer who'd been fixing bells that morning, and, as I said, a
bell-boy named Nat, who told how he'd just come on duty when Mrs.
Kingdon's bell rang, found her key and returned it to her, and
was out of the room when she unlocked the box. That was all he
knew.
"Is he telling the truth?" Moriway asked Mrs Kingdon.
"Ye--es, I guess he is; but where are the diamonds? We must have
them--you know--to-day, George," she whispered. And then she
turned and went upstairs, leaving Moriway to do the rest.
"There's only one thing to do, Major," he said to the
proprietor. "Search 'em all and then--"
"Search me? It's an outrage!" cried the housekeeper.
"Search me if ye loike," growled McCarthy, resentfully. "Oi
wasn't there but a minute; the lady herself can tell ye that."
Katie, the chambermaid, flushed painfully, and there were
indignant tears in her eyes, which, I'll tell you in confidence,
made a girl named Nancy uncomfortable.
But the boy Nat; knowing that bell-boys have no rights, said
nothing. But he thought. He thought, Tom Dorgan, a lot of things
and a long way ahead.
The peppery old Major marched us all off to his private office.
Not much, girls, it hadn't come. For suddenly the annunciator
rang out.
Out of the corner of his eye, Nat looked at the bell-boy's bench.
It was empty. There was to be a ball that night, and the bells
were going it over all the place.
"Number Twenty-one!" shouted the clerk at the desk.
But Number Twenty-one didn't budge. His heart was beating like a
hammer, and the ting--ng--ng of that bell calling him rang in his
head like a song.
"Number Twenty-one!" yelled the clerk.
Oh, he's got a devil of a temper, has that clerk. Some day, Tom,
when you love me very much, go up to the hotel and break his face
for me.
"You.--boy--confound you, can't you hear?" he shouted.
That time he caught the Major's ear--the one that wasn't deaf. He
looked from Powers' black face to the bench and then to me. And
all the time the bell kept ringing like mad.
"Git!" he said to the boy. "And come back in a hurry."
Number Twenty-one got--but leisurely. It wouldn't do for a
bell-boy to hurry, particularly when he had such good cause.
Oh, girls, those stone stairs, the servants' stairs at the St.
James! They're fierce. I tell you, Mag, scrubbing the floors at
the Cruelty ain't so bad. But this time I was jolly glad
bell-boys weren't allowed in the elevator. For there were those
diamonds in my pants pocket, and I must get rid of 'em before I
got down to the office again. So I climbed those stairs, and
every step I took my eye was searching for a hiding-place.
I could have pitched the little bag out of a window, but Nancy
Olden wasn't throwing diamonds to the birds, any more than Mag
here is likely to cut off the braids of red hair we used to play
horse with when we drove her about the Cruelty yard.
One flight.
No chance.
Another.
Everything bare as stone and soap could keep it.
The third flight--my knees began to tremble, and not with
climbing. The call came from this floor. But I ran up a fourth
just on the chance, and there in a corner was a fire hatchet
strapped to the wall. Behind that hatchet Mrs. Kingdon's diamonds
might lie snug till evening. I put the ends of my fingers first
in the little crack to make sure the little bag wouldn't drop to
the floor, and then dived into my pocket and--
And there behind me, stealthily coming up the last turn of the
stairs was Mr. George Moriway!
Don't you hate a soft-walking man, Mag? That cute fellow was
cuter than the old Major himself, and had followed me every inch
of the way.
"There's something loose with this hatchet, sir," I said,
innocently looking down at him.
"Oh, there is? What an observing little fellow you are! Never
mind the hatchet; just tell me what number you were sent to
answer."
"Number?" I repeated, as though I couldn't see why he wanted to
know. "Why--431."
"Not much, my boy--331."
"'Scuse me, sir, ain't you mistaken?"
He looked at me for full a minute. I stared him straight in the
eye. A nasty eye he's got--black and bloodshot and cold and full
of suspicion. But it wavered a bit at the end.
"I may be," he said slowly, "but not about the number. Just
you turn around and get down to 331."
"All right, sir. Thank you very much. It might have got me in
trouble. The ladies are so particular about having the bells
answered quick--"
`I guess you'll get in trouble all right," he said and stood
watching--from where he stood he could watch me every inch of the
way--till I got to 331, at the end of the hall, Mrs. Kingdon's
door.
And the goods still on me, Tom, mind that.
My, but Mrs. Kingdon was wrathy when she saw me!
"Why did they send you?" she cried. "Why did you keep me
waiting so long? I want a chambermaid. I've rung a dozen times.
The whole place is crazy about that old ball to-night, and no one
can get decent attention."
"Can't I do what you want, ma'am?" I just yearned to get inside
that door.
"No," she snapped. "I don't want a boy to fasten my dress in
the back--"
"We often do, ma'am," I said softly.
"You do? Well--"
"Yes'm." I breathed again.
"Well--it's indecent. Go down and send me a maid."
She was just closing the door in my face--and Moriway waiting for
me to watch me down again.
"Mrs. Kingdon--"
"Well, what do you want?"
"I want to tell you that when I get down to the office they'll
search me."
She looked at me amazed.
"And--and there's something in my pocket I--you wouldn't like
them to find."
"What in the world--my diamonds! You did take them, you little
wretch?"
She caught hold of my coat. But Lordy! I didn't want to get away
a little bit. I let her pull me in, and then I backed up against
the door and shut it.
`Diamonds! Oh, no, ma'am. I hope I'm not a thief. But--but it
was something you dropped--this."
I fished Moriway's letter out of my pocket and handed it to her.
The poor old lady! Being a bell-boy you know just how old ladies
really are. This one at evening, after her face had been massaged
for an hour, and the manicure girl and the hair-dresser had gone,
wasn't so bad. But to-day, with the marks of the morning's tears
on her agitated face, with the blood pounding up to her temples
where the hair was thin and gray--Tom Dorgan, if I'm a vain old
fool like that when I'm three times as old as I am, just tie a
stone around my neck and take me down and drop me into the
nearest water, won't you?
"You abominable little wretch!" she sobbed. "I suppose you've
- handkerchief [´hæŋkətʃif]
n.手帕，手绢 (初中英语单词) - terror [´terə] n.恐怖；惊骇 (初中英语单词)
- stupid [´stju:pid] a.愚蠢的；糊涂的 (初中英语单词)
- hidden [´hid(ə)n] hide 的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
- desperate [´despərit] a.拼死的；绝望的 (初中英语单词)
- grateful [´greitful] a.感谢的；令人愉快的 (初中英语单词)
- drawer [drɔ:ə] n.抽屉 (初中英语单词)
- carpet [´kɑ:pit] n.地毯 vt.铺地毯 (初中英语单词)
- suspicion [sə´spiʃən] n.怀(猜)疑；嫌疑 (初中英语单词)
- sharply [´ʃɑ:pli] ad.锋利地；剧烈地 (初中英语单词)
- knowing [´nəuiŋ] a.会意的，心照不宣的 (初中英语单词)
- temper [´tempə] n.韧度 v.锻炼；调和 (初中英语单词)
- fierce [fiəs] a.残忍的；强烈的 (初中英语单词)
- fasten [´fɑ:sən] v.扎牢；闩住；钉牢 (初中英语单词)
- waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
- prompt [prɔmpt] a.敏捷的 vt.促使 (高中英语单词)
- innocence [´inəsəns] n.无罪；天真 (高中英语单词)
- positive [´pɔzətiv] a.确定的 (高中英语单词)
- hurried [´hʌrid] a.仓促的，慌忙的 (高中英语单词)
- housekeeper [´haus,ki:pə] n.主妇，女管家 (高中英语单词)
- cruelty [´kru:əlti] n.残忍；残酷行为 (高中英语单词)
- elevator [´eliveitə] n.电梯；升降机 (高中英语单词)
- repeated [ri´pi:tid] a.反复的；重复的 (高中英语单词)
- decent [´di:sənt] a.体面的，正派的 (高中英语单词)
- vinegar [´vinigə] n.醋 (英语四级单词)
- masculine [´mæ:skjulin] a.男性的 n.男子 (英语四级单词)
- unjust [ʌn´dʒʌst] a.不公平(正)的 (英语四级单词)
- upstairs [,ʌp´steəz] ad.在楼上 a.楼上的 (英语四级单词)
- painfully [´peinfuli] ad.痛苦地；费力地 (英语四级单词)
- leisurely [´leʒəli] a.从容地，慢慢地 (英语四级单词)
- hatchet [´hætʃit] n.短柄小斧 (英语四级单词)
- abominable [ə´bɔminəbəl] a.可憎的；极坏的 (英语四级单词)
- fitting [´fitiŋ] a.适当的 n.试衣 (英语六级单词)
- beating [´bi:tiŋ] n.敲；搅打；失败 (英语六级单词)
- calling [´kɔ:liŋ] n.点名；职业；欲望 (英语六级单词)
- stealthily [´stelθili] ad.偷偷地，隐秘地 (英语六级单词)
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章节正文
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