CHAPTER I.
THE “DOWN-AND-OUTER.”
Elliot Nash walked leisurely down Hill Street, and at Sixth turned into Central Park. The diagonal walks of reddish-brown cement contrasted strangely with the graceful and feathery pepper trees, the wide-spreading, sturdy palms, and the profusion of scarlet geranium blossoms, the rainbow-hued hydrangea, and the climbing wistaria. A faint wind, tempered by the ocean and by the flood of California sunshine, brought the mist from the towering fountain against his cheeks.
“Dear old Los Angeles!” Nash murmured to himself, drinking deep of the beauty that nature had lavished about him. “I’m surely glad to get back here—even if I am about——”
He broke off with a shrug, and continued slowly along between the rows of peopled benches, hands in his pockets. With a sudden determination, he turned into one of the narrower walks and sank down on the nearest bench, barely glancing at its solitary occupant, who seemed interested in a book. Behind him, a bed of heliotrope sent up a faint and soothing odor, which, after a time, lulled Nash into half a doze.
He was awakened abruptly by a hand falling upon his arm. Turning, he found the man beside him on the bench had closed his book and had moved nearer.
“Say, partner,” the man was saying, in a peculiar, husky voice, “would you be willin’ to give a lift to a fellow that’s up against it?”
Nash studied the other with interest. He bore the marks of the professional “down-and-outer,” from his patched, unlaced shoes to the usual puffy and stubbled face. At the same time, Nash noticed the book lying in his lap.
“What’s the matter with you?” Nash asked.
“Matter?” The stranger laughed bitterly. “What you askin’ that for? Don’t I look the answer? I’m down and out, and ain’t got a copper. This cussed town has pumped me dry, jus’ like it does all the rest of the fools what come out here to find a—paradise. I’m tryin’ to get enough coin together to beat it back to God’s country.”
“Where’s that?”
“Why, New York, of course!” snapped the other. “Where else? All this golden sunshine and flower business makes me sick. I want to see it snowin’, I do—yes, sir, real snow. I want to get back to Broadway.”
“Wonder you didn’t stay there,” observed Nash, for he was Los Angeles born and bred himself, and it went against his grain to have what he considered the best town on earth “panned,” especially by such a character. “We don’t need your kind here.”
The vagabond lifted a pair of watery blue eyes, and stared at Nash. “Oh, you’re one of these native sons, are you? Well, excuse me. I didn’t know—that’s all. I thought you was like—like the rest of the poor hobos settin’ around these parks. This sunshine and summer in the winter, and flowers and palm trees don’t feed a man’s stomach, or put clothes on his back.”
“Have you tried to find work?”
“Tried? I’ve been lookin’ for six months! I’m a good man, I am, when I leave the booze alone.” He shook his head and passed a grimy hand across the reddish stubble on his chin. “I’m an engineer—worked on the Barge Canal, in New York State, and on the aqueduct there. I’m no slouch. I’ve tackled every contractin’ firm in the city. Guess they didn’t like my appearance. I thought I had a line on somethin’ the other day. Went and met one of the big bugs that hire the help on this Los Angeles Aqueduct. Said he’d fix me up. Gave me a letter to a foreman on the job.”
“Did you get the position?”
“Get it?” He laughed hoarsely. “I guess not! Before I went, I found out I’d probably have to work with the wops and the greasers, haulin’ sand and mixin’ cement. Well, none of that in mine! I’m too smart for that sort of work.”
“You could have started in at the bottom, and shown the foreman you were capable of better things,” argued Nash. “A good man never stays down.”
“Rot! Don’t start preachin’ to me. I’m done with this town and the whole State. I’ll get back to New York if I have to ride the rods all the way.”
“I’m not overloaded with coin,” said Nash, with a smile; “but I’m more than willing to slip you a couple of dollars, just to get you out of Los Angeles. We don’t want any knockers here.”
The man grinned his appreciation. “You can’t hand them out any too quick, partner.”
Without further argument, Nash took two silver dollars from his pocket and placed them in the other’s open, expectant palm.
“Thanks, partner,” the man said, his long fingers closing over the money. “These cart wheels sure look good to me. You’re a gentleman, you are, even if you do like this burg.”
The vagrant started away, and then impulsively stopped.
“Say,” he remarked, “I want to show my appreciation for this here gift of yours. Do you like poetry?”
“I’m very fond of it,” responded Nash. “Why?”
The other man took the book he had been reading from his pocket, peered at the title, and thrust it into Nash’s hand.
“Take this. I can’t swallow the stuff. Poetry never did make a hit with me.”
Nash examined the little, leather-bound volume. It was a new, well-bound edition of Kipling’s “Barrack-room Ballads.”
“Oh, it don’t belong to me,” the man said, apparently reading Nash’s mind. “I found it on a bench about an hour ago. Just read it, partner, and remember the down-and-outer that wanted to get back to God’s country.”
“Thank you for it,” Nash replied. “I’ve always wanted a good copy of these verses.”
The vagrant rubbed his hands together and looked over to where the big, white Auditorium rose above the slim eucalyptus trees.
“Well,” he said, “I’m off this time! It’s me for the Santa Fe Station and the softest rod on the Limited. Your two silver boys ought to keep me in eats for a couple of days. Say,” he drawled, “maybe I won’t be joyful to see real paper dollars again! And just let me get a peek at that Metropolitan Tower once more!” He lowered his voice impressively, as if imparting a great secret: “And, say, you can talk till you’re black in the face about this town, and the climate, and the perpetual flowers; but, honest, now—you’ve been in New York—did you ever smell anything sweeter than them flowers in Madison Square in May?”
“I never had much time to sit in parks when I was in New York,” responded Nash.
“Too bad! Don’t know what you’ve missed. Well, by-by.”
The man waved a friendly hand, still grinning, and disappeared around a corner.
Five minutes later Nash followed, going around the large fountain. He walked slowly past the beds of tropical plants, and on to Olive Street. Suddenly remembering the gift the disparager of Los Angeles had bestowed upon him, Nash took it from his pocket, and for the first time examined it closely. As he turned the leaves—some of them uncut—an envelope fell out. He picked it up.
It was unsealed, and addressed to a “Mr. Wilson Hooker, Foreman, Camp No. 47, Los Angeles Aqueduct.”
“I wonder if this was of any value to my New York friend?” Nash asked himself. “Or did it belong to him at all?”
He looked at the envelope again, aware by the feel of it that there was a letter inside.
“If it belongs to him, and it’s unsealed, I don’t see any objection to my looking inside. Possibly I can learn where to send it to him.”
Nash drew out the inclosure. The same address that the envelope bore was at the top of the single sheet of paper. Below this ran the following:
“Dear Wilson: Bearer is O.K. You can trust him. Give him a job at anything. Sincerely,
J. Sigsbee.”