THE COP AND THE ANTHEM

On his bench in Madison Square Soapy moved uneasily. When wild geese

honk high of nights, and when women without sealskin coats grow kind

to their husbands, and when Soapy moves uneasily on his bench in the

park, you may know that winter is near at hand.

A dead leaf fell in Soapy's lap. That was Jack Frost's card. Jack is

kind to the regular denizens of Madison Square, and gives fair warning

of his annual call. At the corners of four streets he hands his

pasteboard to the North Wind, footman of the mansion of All Outdoors,

so that the inhabitants thereof may make ready.

Soapy's mind became cognisant of the fact that the time had come for

him to resolve himself into a singular Committee of Ways and Means to

provide against the coming rigour. And therefore he moved uneasily

on his bench.

The hibernatorial ambitions of Soapy were not of the highest. In them

there were no considerations of Mediterranean cruises, of soporific

Southern skies drifting in the Vesuvian Bay. Three months on the Island

was what his soul craved. Three months of assured board and bed and

congenial company, safe from Boreas and bluecoats, seemed to Soapy the

essence of things desirable.

For years the hospitable Blackwell's had been his winter quarters. Just

as his more fortunate fellow New Yorkers had bought their tickets to

Palm Beach and the Riviera each winter, so Soapy had made his humble

arrangements for his annual hegira to the Island. And now the time

was come. On the previous night three Sabbath newspapers, distributed

beneath his coat, about his ankles and over his lap, had failed to

repulse the cold as he slept on his bench near the spurting fountain

in the ancient square. So the Island loomed big and timely in Soapy's

mind. He scorned the provisions made in the name of charity for the

city's dependents. In Soapy's opinion the Law was more benign than

Philanthropy. There was an endless round of institutions, municipal and

eleemosynary, on which he might set out and receive lodging and food

accordant with the simple life. But to one of Soapy's proud spirit

the gifts of charity are encumbered. If not in coin you must pay in

humiliation of spirit for every benefit received at the hands of

philanthropy. As Caesar had his Brutus, every bed of charity must have

its toll of a bath, every loaf of bread its compensation of a private

and personal inquisition. Wherefore it is better to be a guest of the

law, which though conducted by rules, does not meddle unduly with a

gentleman's private affairs.

Soapy, having decided to go to the Island, at once set about

accomplishing his desire. There were many easy ways of doing this.

The pleasantest was to dine luxuriously at some expensive restaurant;

and then, after declaring insolvency, be handed over quietly and

without uproar to a policeman. An accommodating magistrate would do

the rest.

Soapy left his bench and strolled out of the square and across the

level sea of asphalt, where Broadway and Fifth Avenue flow together. Up

Broadway he turned, and halted at a glittering cafe, where are gathered

together nightly the choicest products of the grape, the silkworm and

the protoplasm.

Soapy had confidence in himself from the lowest button of his vest

upward. He was shaven, and his coat was decent and his neat black,

ready-tied four-in-hand had been presented to him by a lady missionary

on Thanksgiving Day. If he could reach a table in the restaurant

unsuspected success would be his. The portion of him that would show

above the table would raise no doubt in the waiter's mind. A roasted

mallard duck, thought Soapy, would be about the thing--with a bottle of

Chablis, and then Camembert, a demi-tasse and a cigar. One dollar for

the cigar would be enough. The total would not be so high as to call

forth any supreme manifestation of revenge from the cafe management; and

yet the meat would leave him filled and happy for the journey to his

winter refuge.

But as Soapy set foot inside the restaurant door the head waiter's eye

fell upon his frayed trousers and decadent shoes. Strong and ready hands

turned him about and conveyed him in silence and haste to the sidewalk

and averted the ignoble fate of the menaced mallard.

Soapy turned off Broadway. It seemed that his route to the coveted

island was not to be an epicurean one. Some other way of entering

limbo must be thought of.

At a corner of Sixth Avenue electric lights and cunningly displayed

wares behind plate-glass made a shop window conspicuous. Soapy took a

cobblestone and dashed it through the glass. People came running around

the corner, a policeman in the lead. Soapy stood still, with his hands

in his pockets, and smiled at the sight of brass buttons.

"Where's the man that done that?" inquired the officer excitedly.

"Don't you figure out that I might have had something to do with it?"

said Soapy, not without sarcasm, but friendly, as one greets good

fortune.

The policeman's mind refused to accept Soapy even as a clue. Men who

smash windows do not remain to parley with the law's minions. They take

to their heels. The policeman saw a man half way down the block running

to catch a car. With drawn club he joined in the pursuit. Soapy, with

disgust in his heart, loafed along, twice unsuccessful.

On the opposite side of the street was a restaurant of no great

pretensions. It catered to large appetites and modest purses. Its

crockery and atmosphere were thick; its soup and napery thin. Into

this place Soapy took his accusive shoes and telltale trousers without

challenge. At a table he sat and consumed beefsteak, flapjacks,

doughnuts and pie. And then to the waiter be betrayed the fact that

the minutest coin and himself were strangers.

"Now, get busy and call a cop," said Soapy. "And don't keep a gentleman

waiting."

"No cop for youse," said the waiter, with a voice like butter cakes and

an eye like the cherry in a Manhattan cocktail. "Hey, Con!"

Neatly upon his left ear on the callous pavement two waiters pitched

Soapy. He arose, joint by joint, as a carpenter's rule opens, and beat

the dust from his clothes. Arrest seemed but a rosy dream. The Island

seemed very far away. A policeman who stood before a drug store two

doors away laughed and walked down the street.

Five blocks Soapy travelled before his courage permitted him to woo

capture again. This time the opportunity presented what he fatuously

termed to himself a "cinch." A young woman of a modest and pleasing

guise was standing before a show window gazing with sprightly interest

at its display of shaving mugs and inkstands, and two yards from the

window a large policeman of severe demeanour leaned against a water

plug.

It was Soapy's design to assume the role of the despicable and execrated

"masher." The refined and elegant appearance of his victim and the

contiguity of the conscientious cop encouraged him to believe that he

would soon feel the pleasant official clutch upon his arm that would

insure his winter quarters on the right little, tight little isle.

Soapy straightened the lady missionary's ready-made tie, dragged his

shrinking cuffs into the open, set his hat at a killing cant and sidled

toward the young woman. He made eyes at her, was taken with sudden

coughs and "hems," smiled, smirked and went brazenly through the

impudent and contemptible litany of the "masher." With half an eye Soapy

saw that the policeman was watching him fixedly. The young woman moved

away a few steps, and again bestowed her absorbed attention upon the

shaving mugs. Soapy followed, boldly stepping to her side, raised his

hat and said:

"Ah there, Bedelia! Don't you want to come and play in my yard?"

The policeman was still looking. The persecuted young woman had but to

beckon a finger and Soapy would be practically en route for his insular

haven. Already he imagined he could feel the cozy warmth of the

station-house. The young woman faced him and, stretching out a hand,

caught Soapy's coat sleeve.

"Sure, Mike," she said joyfully, "if you'll blow me to a pail of suds.

I'd have spoke to you sooner, but the cop was watching."

With the young woman playing the clinging ivy to his oak Soapy walked

past the policeman overcome with gloom. He seemed doomed to liberty.

At the next corner he shook off his companion and ran. He halted in the

district where by night are found the lightest streets, hearts, vows and

librettos. Women in furs and men in greatcoats moved gaily in the wintry

air. A sudden fear seized Soapy that some dreadful enchantment had

rendered him immune to arrest. The thought brought a little of panic

upon it, and when he came upon another policeman lounging grandly in

front of a transplendent theatre he caught at the immediate straw of

"disorderly conduct."

On the sidewalk Soapy began to yell drunken gibberish at the top of his

harsh voice. He danced, howled, raved and otherwise disturbed the

welkin.

The policeman twirled his club, turned his back to Soapy and remarked to

a citizen.

"'Tis one of them Yale lads celebratin' the goose egg they give to the

Hartford College. Noisy; but no harm. We've instructions to lave them

be."

Disconsolate, Soapy ceased his unavailing racket. Would never a

policeman lay hands on him? In his fancy the Island seemed an

unattainable Arcadia. He buttoned his thin coat against the chilling

wind.

In a cigar store he saw a well-dressed man lighting a cigar at a

swinging light. His silk umbrella he had set by the door on entering.

Soapy stepped inside, secured the umbrella and sauntered off with it

slowly. The man at the cigar light followed hastily.

"My umbrella," he said, sternly.

"Oh, is it?" sneered Soapy, adding insult to petit larceny. "Well, why

don't you call a policeman? I took it. Your umbrella! Why don't you call

a cop? There stands one on the corner."

The umbrella owner slowed his steps. Soapy did likewise, with a

presentiment that luck would again run against him. The policeman

looked at the two curiously.

"Of course," said the umbrella man--"that is--well, you know how these

mistakes occur--I--if it's your umbrella I hope you'll excuse me--I

picked it up this morning in a restaurant--If you recognise it as yours,

why--I hope you'll--"

"Of course it's mine," said Soapy, viciously.

The ex-umbrella man retreated. The policeman hurried to assist a tall

blonde in an opera cloak across the street in front of a street car that

was approaching two blocks away.

Soapy walked eastward through a street damaged by improvements. He

hurled the umbrella wrathfully into an excavation. He muttered against

the men who wear helmets and carry clubs. Because he wanted to fall into

their clutches, they seemed to regard him as a king who could do no

wrong.

At length Soapy reached one of the avenues to the east where the glitter

and turmoil was but faint. He set his face down this toward Madison

Square, for the homing instinct survives even when the home is a park

bench.

But on an unusually quiet corner Soapy came to a standstill. Here was an

old church, quaint and rambling and gabled. Through one violet-stained

window a soft light glowed, where, no doubt, the organist loitered over

the keys, making sure of his mastery of the coming Sabbath anthem. For

there drifted out to Soapy's ears sweet music that caught and held him

transfixed against the convolutions of the iron fence.

The moon was above, lustrous and serene; vehicles and pedestrians were

few; sparrows twittered sleepily in the eaves--for a little while the

scene might have been a country churchyard. And the anthem that the

organist played cemented Soapy to the iron fence, for he had known it

well in the days when his life contained such things as mothers and

roses and ambitions and friends and immaculate thoughts and collars.

The conjunction of Soapy's receptive state of mind and the influences

about the old church wrought a sudden and wonderful change in his soul.

He viewed with swift horror the pit into which he had tumbled, the

degraded days, unworthy desires, dead hopes, wrecked faculties and base

motives that made up his existence.

And also in a moment his heart responded thrillingly to this novel

mood. An instantaneous and strong impulse moved him to battle with

his desperate fate. He would pull himself out of the mire; he would

make a man of himself again; he would conquer the evil that had taken

possession of him. There was time; he was comparatively young yet;

he would resurrect his old eager ambitions and pursue them without

faltering. Those solemn but sweet organ notes had set up a revolution in

him. To-morrow he would go into the roaring downtown district and find

work. A fur importer had once offered him a place as driver. He would

find him to-morrow and ask for the position. He would be somebody in the

world. He would--

Soapy felt a hand laid on his arm. He looked quickly around into the

broad face of a policeman.

"What are you doin' here?" asked the officer.

"Nothin'," said Soapy.

"Then come along," said the policeman.

"Three months on the Island," said the Magistrate in the Police Court

the next morning.

Date: 2015-01-11; view: 768