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CHAPTER XL
OLD GLORY AGAIN
Before the fall of Louvain, Jack and his friends were across the border in France. Ultimately they were lucky enough to rejoin the St. Mark– sent for the accommodation of refugees – at Marseilles.
A cable was despatched to America, telling of Tom Juke’s safety.
Pottle, the young photographer, cabled his paper, asking for permission to remain in the battle zone. This was granted.
So the trio – Jack, Bill and Tom – said farewell to Pottle.
“When I get back – possible – the paper will make – hurrah! – look me up – eh?”
“We sure will, old top,” promised Tom.
The voyage across was without incident, save that, as was expected, they were stopped by British warships.
So, one fine morning, unannounced, Jack called upon Uncle Toby Ready. The old tar gave vent to a great cry of joy. Though Jack had often been away for long periods, Uncle Toby never fully knew the thrilling adventure Jack had participated in. Now there was no hiding of the truth. The war was at hand. The Germans were sweeping everything before them. How had it fared with Jack? This uncertainty had worried Uncle Toby. He felt that he would never be able to forgive himself, had anything happened to Jack.
When the first greetings were over, Uncle Toby could not help but ask about his Golden Embrocation and Universal Remedy for Man and Beast.
“Did you meet up with the King of England?” he queried.
“No, Uncle Toby,” laughed Jack, “I did not.”
“Be it so with the Kaiser?”
“No, not the Kaiser, either.”
“How now – was it the Czar?”
Jack shook his head.
“But made a – use of ’em?”
“Yes,” replied Jack with a twinkle in his eye. “I did make – ”
At this moment there came a sharp rap on the door. Jack opened it, and a messenger, upon ascertaining who he was, handed him a telegram.
“What now?” demanded Uncle Toby.
Jack tore open the envelope. The inclosed sheet read:
“Congratulations and grateful appreciation. Report immediately.
“Jacob Jukes.”
“Yeou ain’t a-goin’ back to Europe!” declared Uncle Toby emphatically.
“Don’t worry, Uncle,” replied Jack. “I don’t think it is for that Mr. Jukes wants me.”
“Well, if he don’t,” replied the old captain, “give ’im a bottle of my Golden Embrocation and Universal Remedy for Man and Beast with my compliments.”
“All right,” laughed Jack as he put the bottle in his pocket, never intending, of course, to carry out the errand.
Jack found Mr. Jukes in earnest conversation with his son, Tom. However, the moment Jack entered, father and son arose.
“Jack,” said Mr. Jukes, extending his hand, “let me thank you.”
It was said sincerely and simply. Their handclasp was hearty and true.
Mr. Jukes began to pace the office.
Tom looked at Jack and winked.
“Young man,” suddenly said Mr. Jukes, sternly addressing Jack, “you are bound to succeed in life. You have the makings. You have your trade – or shall I call it profession? But operating wireless is not everything. You can be a wireless operator all your life and your salary will be your only means of keeping the wolf from the door. Too many of our people have to depend on that means of support. Some day I feel it will be different. At all events, I shall make a beginning with you. So Tom and I have decided to give you a number of shares in our Combine.”
Thereupon Mr. Jukes went on to explain the value of the shares, instructing Jack just what he should do with them. To tell the truth, Jack had never troubled himself very much with the intricacies of stock values.
Finally Jack left Mr. Jukes’ office feeling like a millionaire.
“Strange,” mused Jack, “that this good fortune should come to me when thousands of others are losing their all in Europe.”
Feeling thus satisfied, Jack decided to acquaint Helen Dennis with the good news. As he strolled down to the dock, he could not help but note that in so far as New York was concerned, the war did not exist. People went about their business in their accustomed way. Beyond the usual set or serious expression characteristic of the average New Yorker when he is engaged in earning his dividends or salary, as the case may be in different instances and walks of life, the average person seemed absolutely unconcerned of the World Tragedy that was unfolding itself across the sea.
At the docks, however, there was increased activity. The demand upon American ammunition and commodities had jumped by leaps and bounds. Shippers were reaping a harvest.
The Silver Star, Captain Dennis’ ship, was in port. Jack had little difficulty in getting aboard. Captain Dennis was delighted to see Jack. He could spare but little time, so when Jack had told him only briefly of his experiences, the wise tar, his eyes twinkling with mischief, said:
“Really, Jack, don’t you think Helen would be more interested in your adventures?”
Jack blushed.
“Never mind, lad,” laughed the captain, “we all have those days, you know.”
So Jack made his way to the captain’s cabin.
But let us say nothing more of them; rather let us ask what became of Bill Raynor?
CHAPTER XLI
WAR IN TIMES OF PEACE
Just before Jack called upon his Uncle Toby, Bill had expressed a desire to stroll about the Great City.
“You see,” Bill said in explanation, “the sight of old New York makes me glad to be back again. They say it’s a selfish place. Well, perhaps there are towns that make you feel more at home, but once you know Manhattan’s ways, you don’t want to change!”
“Have it your way,” agreeably laughed Jack.
So they parted for the time being.
Feeling hungry, Bill decided to visit one of the select downtown restaurants his purse seldom allowed him to patronize. Now, as the reader will remember, Bill had no need to worry over funds – at any rate, not for the immediate future.
Bill thoroughly enjoyed his meal. He left the restaurant feeling like a prince.
“Those prices are steep,” he reflected, “but the food and service are worth it.”
Barely had he walked a block when he recognized Tom Jukes a few strides in front of him. Bill’s first impulse was to hail Tom, but something about the latter made him hesitate.
“Something seems queer,” muttered Tom, puzzled. He was undecided. Should he follow the millionaire’s son?
Tom Jukes seemed anxious to avoid being seen. Every now and then he glanced about him hurriedly. He kept close to the building line, his cap pulled over his eyes. He turned into one of those ancient alleys down in the financial district of New York.
Bill Raynor came to a quick decision.
“I’ll follow him!” he muttered.
A moment later Bill was also in the moldy alleyway. Tom swung south, then west, and south again, and finally halted before a pair of ornamental iron gates of the most antique and peculiar design.
Bill, mystified that such places still existed in the Great Metropolis, dogged Tom’s footsteps, always careful to keep well out of sight.
He saw Tom pass through these iron gates. A moment later Bill had followed Tom through, though now he had to be far more careful, for every flagstone seemed to give up a hollow bellow.
Tom walked up an iron staircase clinging to a decaying bulk of a dirt-gray stone ramshackle building. He climbed one flight and then disappeared from view.
Bill, very carefully – every nerve alert – followed. A moment later he stepped into a long, dim, lofty corridor, walled with marble of a greenish tint, and smelling faintly of dry-rot.
Picking his steps with the greatest caution, Bill felt his way forward. Somewhere in front of him he saw the shadowy form of Tom.
Bill saw Tom pause before a door, which he opened very slowly. A faint light came from within. A moment later Tom had disappeared from view.
Bill crept forward.
Should he open the door?
“I wish Jack were here,” said Bill to himself.
Jack, it was, who had won the approval of Jacob Jukes, head of the great shipping combine, and father of Tom, for his masterly handling of many difficult situations.
Under the circumstances, Bill did not flinch in his determination to learn what was going on behind that door!
Bill put his ear to the door – and at once heard a faint tick-tick, as well as a muffled voice. Slowly Bill felt the door for the knob and to his surprise he found there was none!
“Entrance by signal only!” instantly decided Bill.
But how was he to get in without it?
His eyes were now more accustomed to the gloom. He looked about him, hoping to find a window or some outlet that might lead to the barred room.
Farther down the corridor, to his right, he saw a stairway – or what appeared to be a stairway. He walked toward it, always bearing in mind to be extremely careful.
He climbed up one flight without mishap. On this floor, the feeling of desertion and forlorn desolation grew deeper. Bill could barely suppress a shiver.
Suddenly a rat scampered across the floor.
“Phew!” ejaculated Bill, “this is some place!”
He noticed a thin ray of daylight a short distance from him. Bill at once decided to discover its origin. A moment later he saw that the light flowed from the cracks of a door.
A brief investigation proved the door to be unlocked. As he quietly pulled the door open he saw that the room was absolutely bare, and that the light came from the mud-pasted windows facing a brick wall not five feet from them.
Bill tip-toed across the room, and raised one of the windows. To his satisfaction he at once noticed the drain pipe at arm’s length. A moment later he had slid to the floor below.
To his surprise he saw the window of that mysterious room wide open. He could see only part of it. There seemed many men listlessly sitting about, though the majority kept unseeing eyes on a blackboard.
“A blind tiger!” breathed Bill, amazed.
Bill meant that it was a fake racing broker’s place. In years gone by there were many such dens of evil in New York, where congregated the broken-hearted, the reckless, the unscrupulous, all of whom tempted fate on this horse or that. As a rule the proprietor controlled the destinies of his victims, for he could “fake” any information he desired as to what horse won or lost. Happily these dens are now more scarce than hen’s teeth. It was these dens, the graves of dupes, that were called blind tigers.
“Does Tom play the ponies?” wondered Bill.
He listened intently.
Somewhere a ticker droned, and a husky voice announced:
“Gas a half – five eighths; Steel six – nine hundred at a quarter – a thousand – five-hundred – a quarter – an eighth – Erie – an eighth – Steam – an eighth – ”
“What does this mean?” questioned Bill. “It sounds like stock quotations. Can it be – ?”
He decided to risk glancing into the room.
At some risk of losing his hold he balanced himself in order to accomplish his wish.
He saw a room, unclean and unwholesome. The men seemed to be of the discarded of the street, the diseased and maimed of the financial district; here and there was a younger, smarter type, the kind that makes the gangster, the pickpocket and worse. He also saw Tom sitting quietly yet alert. At his elbow was a young man, somewhat older than Tom. On the wall facing the window was a great blackboard, and as the ticker spelled out its information, and the slovenly dressed clerk gave it voice, a second clerk chalked away without cessation.
Beyond this clerk’s announcements everything was quiet. Bill felt himself slipping, so he silently swung back to his former position. The light of understanding was in his eyes.
“By Jove, it’s a bucket shop!”
Now a bucket shop is where people buy and sell stock on less margin or in smaller quantity than is accepted on the curb on Broad Street or on the Stock Exchange. These establishments, too, are fast disappearing, though as is always possible in New York, an exception – as in all directions of semi-organized crime – manages to keep from the sharp talons of the law for a longer period of time.
The bucket shops were where messenger boys and clerks gamboled with Dame Fortune. Sooner or later they lost – lost not only every cent to their names, but much of their self-respect and honesty. It was also the place for the men who had gone down to defeat in the great battle fought bitterly every minute of the day in the great financial arena. These men were unfit for everything else, so they turned to the bucket shops as a drowning man grasps at a straw. But we have digressed enough – though this was really necessary – and let us continue with the narrative.
Bill did not know what to make of it all.
Surely Tom Jukes had little need to play for stakes. His father was sufficiently wealthy and knew the great money game, and its pitfalls, not to have acquainted his son with them. The more Bill thought, the more puzzled he became.
Suddenly he heard Tom shout:
“You robber, you thief!”
“Git out,” bawled the voice, evidently that of the proprietor, “or I’ll have you put out!”
“You do, and I’ll have you in the hands of the police within twenty-four hours!”
“You will, will you?” came the snarling challenge, followed by a general commotion.
“Here’s where I take a hand!” decided Bill, and leaped into the room, now in fearful confusion.
“Stop!” cried Bill, drawing his revolver, which he had a special permit to carry at any time he wished, “or I’ll fire!”
His command was obeyed.
“Stand where you are!” Bill demanded, noting a suspicious movement on the part of several to escape.
“Bill, good old Bill!” exclaimed Tom, overjoyed.
“Yes, it’s Bill,” was the reply. “Call up Headquarters while I hold them in line.”
“That’s your tip, Fred,” said Tom, turning to the young man Bill had noticed before. “On the run now!”
The young man called Fred seemed to need no further invitation.
Tom now joined Bill. From one of the drawers of the desk at which the proprietor had been seated, Tom brought to light an ugly-looking Colt.
“Let’s move ’em toward the rear!” suggested Tom. “Some of ’em are showing signs of restlessness.”
“All right!” acquiesced Bill.
So, at the point of the revolvers, everyone in the room was lined up against the rear wall. The older men, who had seen better days, appeared indifferent to it all. To them life meant very little. Spirit, youth, ambition, success had long passed them by. They still clung to the vain hope of winning something out of sheer habit. Stock gambling, like opium, oftentimes urges on its victim until the sands of life slowly ebb away. The younger no-accounts scowled darkly. But what could they do? Those two lads were too business-like to attempt anything rash.
“Say,” growled the proprietor, addressing Tom, “can’t we call this quits?”
“Nothing doing!” was the curt reply, both boys at once becoming more alert that ever.
“Aw, take a joke,” pleaded the man. “I’ll square it with you. Honest I will.”
Both boys remained silent.
“I’ll tell you what,” continued the owner, “just to square myself, I’ll throw in one hundred dollars.”
Silence.
“Five hundred!”
“You’re going out of business,” announced Tom. “Save your breath!”
“One thousand dollars!”
“One more word,” warned Bill, “and I won’t be responsible for my action. Keep still.”
Defeated, the man depicted his silent disdain.
A moment later Fred and the police arrived. The police captain in charge wanted the boys to go along to press the charge, but Tom, upon quickly satisfying the officer of their intentions of doing so the next day – especially establishing that Tom was the son of Jacob Jukes, the multimillionaire – were at liberty to proceed as they pleased.
“Explanations are now in order.”
“Correct,” replied Tom. “Let me first introduce Fred Strong, an old-time friend of mine. Bill Raynor, one of the finest boys in the world!”
The introduction was acknowledged with appropriate remarks. Tom then unfolded a most interesting story. Fred was a Wall Street clerk – and, like many others, dabbled in stocks. He kept on losing. So, desperate, he attempted to court luck at the bucket shop a friend of his had told him of. For a time he won. His hopes rose. Then the inevitable reverses began. The proprietor meanwhile had studied his victim. Fred, without realizing it, became one of his dupes. He loaned money from every one. He began to tamper with his books. Disgrace stared him in the face when he met Tom. A few hours had straightened out all tangles. Tom, however, insisted on bringing the bucket shop keeper to book.
“Well, that’s all to it!” interspersed Tom.
“Hold on,” expostulated Bill, “why did you sneak along the street as if wishing to be unrecognized?”
“Easy,” replied Tom. “Saw dad, across the street, so had to – as you say —sneak.”
“Phew!” whistled Bill, astonished. “I never saw him. One other point, how did you know the revolver was in that desk?”
“It seems,” answered Tom, “that the bucket shop proprietor made it a practice to show new customers that weapon. I suppose it was an effective reminder that all disagreements might be settled rather abruptly.”
“Well,” chimed in Fred, “let us forget about it. I’ll never play the market again. But, boys, I want you to come with me. I have to tell this story to the sweetest girl in town. You’ve got to meet her!”
“If you insist, lead on,” replied Tom. “But suppose you tell her the truth of the matter, and then, – well – I guess Bill and I will be honored, I’m sure!”
Bill laughed outright.
“I never suspected,” he said, “you had so much of the so-called ‘society sass’.”
Tom chuckled with glee. He was highly satisfied with the first day’s adventure in America. In excellent spirits, the trio rode uptown. While en route Bill briefly told, in turn, of catching sight of Tom, and the consequences thereof.
An hour later Fred brought them to a neatly nestled house. There was a hand-ball court on the property, and Fred saw to it that they were made to feel at home. Then he entered the house.
“Elsie,” said Fred, when first greetings were over and they were comfortably settled, “I’ve something to tell you.”
“What is it, Fred?”
“I – I couldn’t buy you the engagement ring – be – because I lost the money.”
“That is too bad! But don’t mind it, dear. I can wait.”
“It’s nice of you to say it, but I lost the money on stocks.”
“Tell me about it,” she requested calmly, though there was a break in her voice.
So Fred related the facts already familiar to us. Nor did he spare himself in the recital. At its conclusion, there was a moment’s silence. Then —
“Fred,” said the girl softly, “I’m glad you told me of this. Please, Fred, don’t gamble again – whether it be on cards or stocks – and if you were younger – I’d add buttons and marbles.”
“I’ve already promised not to do so – but Elsie, I have something else to tell you. I have a new position at a higher salary – thirty dollars a week.”
“That’s great!”
“It’ll be more – if I make good.”
“Fred, I’m so glad.”
A pause.
“The cost of living is very high now,” asked Fred – “isn’t it?”
“I should say so! Diamonds will soon be cheaper than onions or potatoes or cut sugar.”
“Elsie!”
“Yes?”
“Would you like – could you – I mean – er – do you think two persons could live on thirty dollars a week?”
“Certainly!”
“How about us?”
“Oh, George!”
“Elsie!”
A blissful interval. Then —
“Elsie – I’ve completely forgotten! Those two boys I told you of are playing handball. They insisted that I confess my crimes before you met them!”
A moment later Fred was introducing Tom and Bill to Elsie. The young lady’s form of greeting was most unexpected and unconventional. Before either of the boys could surmise her intention, she had kissed them!
Of course general laughter and banter followed. Of this let us say no more.
The reader, however, may rest assured that the boys whose adventures we have followed through six volumes were always true to American ideals and aspirations. They participated in many strange and thrilling adventures. We may write of these in the near future, but for the time being, with every good wish for the bright future that appears assured to them, we will bid farewell to the Ocean Wireless Boys.
