Dan Drummond of the Drummonds

Chapter I

The sun was shining cheerily down on a great Western city one morning, and, as a tiny part of the great city’s total, it shone on a little bootblack, who stood, now on one foot and now on the other, as he shivered in the March wind and waited for shines.

A late March wind is sometimes not so cold, but that is when it is in some other place than the South Side of Chicago with the lake to put chill into it. And even on the South Side the wind is not so severe on comfortably-clad people as upon poorly-clothed, ill-fed little boys.

But the little fellow was not thinking of the cold, though his teeth were chattering. He was grateful for the sun. The sun meant an increase

of business to him, and every day now it would 5 grow warmer. So he kept on hopping first on one foot and then on the other, drawing up a shoulder to the side of the wind, half turning this way and that, and all the time keeping a sharp lookout for “ shines.”

This was a new place to him, and he must work up a trade. He had no chair for the gentlemen to sit on while he worked upon their shoes ; he could not afford it. His customers must stand, and he thouglit they might be willing to do so when once he had made them understand that he meant to do good work for his money. He had been here a week now, every day, and to-morrow would be the first of April. No wonder that March wind blew ! It felt itself belated and blew with zeal. And the little bootblack, who had been a newsboy all winter and had tired of that jostling, yelling occupation, took it patiently and hopped about and shivered.

He was twelve years old, with not a relative that he knew of. His mother was the only one he remembered, and she had died a year before and left to her son nothing but high ideals which she had carefully implanted in his soul, ideals that made him as alone in the swarming tenement where he lodged as here upon this empty street.

But of all that coarse, rough tenement crew no one disliked the boy. To them he was simply queer.

And now when, in spite of all the shining of the sun and all his own efforts to keep warm, the wind had him in a chill, two gentlemen rounded the corner and came toward him. The little fellow’s eyes brightened. One was a “shine” he knew, and perhaps the other might be. Yes, the other was. “ Now there ’ll be hot coffee for breakfast,” he thought gleefully. And he went to work with a will while the two continued their conversation.

The boy, intent upon his task and the breakfast to come, paid no attention until he heard one say to the other, “ Yes, the Drummonds are a fine family — a fine family. I never knew one of them to do a mean act.”

Why should the little lad shoot that keen look at the speaker from his dark eyes, and then smile a little smile that was full of gratification ? Why should he all that day hold up his shapely head with the grace and dignity that were his birthright ?

He was a Drummond. In all the twelve years of his life he had never heard of another. He had supposed that his mother had left him entirely alone in the world. And here there were more of them, and they were a “fine family.” His heart swelled with pride. He did not know where they were, but they were somewhere, and the world was a better and a brighter place.

Thoroughness was born in him and had been developed by his mother’s training. He had never neglected his work, but now he began to take particular pains with it. “ To take money for doing something, and then not do your best at it, is mean,” he said to himself. “ I ’ll not be the first Drummond to do a mean trick.”

Nobody knew he was a Drummond. Nobody asked him his name, but his work spoke exceedingly well for him, and was ably seconded by his quiet, respectful manner. And he presently had so much to do that his small, thin arms ached.

“ Bootblacking is a very good job for those that like it,” he said to himself one day when he was unusually tired. “But I believe a Drummond can do something better. I do n’t like this city, anyway. I ’d like to get to live in the country and go to school. The country ’s something like Lincoln Park, I suppose. All the rich folks are crazy to get to it in summer, so of course it ’s nicer than the city.”

But how ? He was entirely alone. The other bootblacks whom he knew thought him queer. And as for him, he thought they were no fit company for a Drummond. “ Not ’cause they ’re bootblacks,” he carefully explained to himself, “but' ’cause they talk rough, and ain’t above doing mean tricks.”

He was a bright little fellow, and he knew there were societies that found homes for poor children in the country. But someway he did not like to have any society find a home for him. He was glad that nobody seemed to think he needed any help. “ 1 do n’t want to be a nohject^^' he said to himself. “ If I do get me a home I expect to work for it. I do n’t want nobody to think I ’d sit down and take what I could get up and earn.”

Warmer and warmer grew the days until June had come. Soon the tenements would again be unbearable with summer heat and crowding. “ Guess if I want me a home I ’ll have to be my own society and just go and hunt one. And I won’t be a tramp neither, for I ’ll be looking for something, and they ain’t looking for nothing but to get along without doing anything.”

He had managed to save a little money and had it safely hidden. Perhaps there would be enougli to buy his food for a week, and he could sleep out of doors.

He was polishing a shoe when the thought came to him, and he paused a second, brush in air, and then redoubled his efforts until the shoe was finished. But his mind had worked faster than his brush, for, when the gentleman tossed him a coin, he said, “ Thank you, sir, and good-bye.”

“ Going to leave the city ? ” asked his customer good-naturedly.

“ Yes, sir, I ’m going to-morrow.”

“ Good luck to you, my boy,” said the gentleman kindly, as he made room for his successor.

The bootblack was unusually busy that day with “shines” and good-byes, and if good wishes were ever burdensome he would have been fairly weighed down, for all his customers liked him.

There was one thing to be thought of. The rent for his closet of a room was always paid two weeks in advance. “’Cause,” he had said to himself with a shrewdness belonging to his scrambling life, and not to his years, “ if I get sick I ’ll not be likely to be put on the street, for I can get well in less than two weeks, I hope.”

The boy had never been sick in his life, and so had set two weeks as ample time for recovery from any illness that was likely to come to him. “ Of course,” he had explained to himself, “ there are some that are sick all the time, but I’m different.”

Now there was still a week until the rent came due again. “ I do n’t want to wait, and I do n’t want that room to go to waste. What shall I do ? ”

Swiftly he thought. There was one girl in the tenement, a frail, nervous child who had sometimes done a little mending for him. And the close, stale air of the crowded rooms which she shared with father, mother, brother, and sister Avore upon her. He had it. Mattie should have his room that week. It had an outside window and she could breathe better there. He hurried to tell her about it, for he liked girls and women. His gentlemen, as he called his customers, liked them too. They took off tlieir hats to them, helped them in and out of cabs, and on and off the street cars, and held store doors open for them, and smiled upon them, and spoke pleasantly to them. He had seen and heard them.

If one of his gentlemen were in his place, and going to leave the city with his room rent paid for a week ahead, he would want Mattie to have the room, of course. And so the boy made haste to offer her this courtesy.

“What you going for? Aren’t you coming back any more?” asked Mattie’s mother.

“ No,” said the boy in answer to the last question.

“ You will,” said the woman shrewdly. “ The country is a lonesome place, I tell you, and more particular to them that ’s used to the city. But Mattie ’ll be glad of the room for a week. So much noise does n’t agree with her. I like it myself, and would n’t live in the country if you ’d give it to me.”

The boy opened his eyes. “Why, the country ’s beautiful,” he said.

“ Ever been there ? ” asked Mrs. Burton.

“No, but I’ve been to Lincoln Park over on the North Side, and I s’pose that ’s like it.”

“ Well, it ain’t, then,” was the response. “ There ’s weeds in the country, and long, dusty roads with fences alongside of ’em, and a good bit o’ ways between houses, and nothing going on, and mud when it rains, and work all the time, indoors and out. You never see a crowd witliout you go to the nearest little town, and not then without it ’s show day or Fourth of July.”

“ But is n’t there grass there ? ” asked the boy anxiously. What if he were making a mistake ? Rich people liked strange things sometimes. Suppose the country should be one of them!

“ Oh, yes, there ’s grass I ”

“And trees, and sky, and birds?” followed breathlessly.

“ Yes,” admitted Mrs. Burton. “ I was brought up on a farm but I married a city man and here I am, and here I ’m going to stay. I like it,” she concluded defiantly. And then a far-away look came into her eyes.

The “city man,” a garbage cart driver, now lounged in, his face red with drink, and the boy with a significant nod of good night fled to his room. For the “ city man ” was likely to make things unpleasant when he had been drinking.

Chapter II

The next morning the “ city man ” went out, and the boy, having made all things ready for leaving, went to the rooms of the Burton family with his key.

“Mother had a room to herself all the time when she was a girl,” said Mattie shyly, as he put the key into her hand. Her eyes were bright with happiness. “She was tellin’ me about it last night when father had got to sleep.”

Then Mrs. Burton came to the door, and he shook hands with them both, lifted his hat to them, and was off.

His only baggage was the small sum of money in his trousers pockets, and his heart was light, for he had left the tenement as a gentleman and a Drummond should — with kindness to the women.

Fifteen cents at a bakery bought him a lunch put up in a box, and then he made his way to the Chicago & Rock Island depot. Wh}^ he could

hardly have told, except that Rock Island had an 14 attractive sound to him. And yet there is nothing attractive in the word “rock” either. It must have been the “island” that charmed him. He followed the track on foot, and after a while came out in the open where ugly houses stood on stilts on the flat prairie, and where every now and then were little suburban towns. He followed the track all day, and at night was not clear of the outskirts of the great city.

“ The country is a long way off,” he sighed, “ but I ’m going to it.”

That night he slept under a shed and the next day bought his breakfast, had a lunch put up, and started on. But not to follow the track very long. A wagon road running in sight in the same general direction lured him off. On he trudged all that day and the next, with liberal rests thrown in. Sometimes he saw a tramp, and more often lie was himself mistaken for one, to his indignation ; for, having no mirror, he did not know that he was to the full as dust-begrimed and disreputable-looking as any of the vagrant brotherhood .

“ Well,” commented an old lady when the boy had laid down what he considered a fair price for the cold bits he had received, “ I never saw a tramp before that offered to pay for what he got. I ’ve seen them that pretended to want to work, but I never saw one that wanted to pay money for what he got.” And she gazed at him over her spectacles as if she never expected to see his like again.

Under all the tan of wind and sun that he had accumulated in his brief wandering, and under all the dust that overlaid the tan, the boy blushed.

“ I ’m not a tramp ! ” he said vigorously.

“ Law sakes ! ” ejaculated the old lady looking him over. “ What are you then ? You look like one.”

“Well, I’m not. I’d like to buy a lunch if you ’ll put me one up.”

The old lady looked at him still more curiously.

“ What for ? ” she asked mechanically.

“ So I won’t have to stop at noon if I do n’t want to. I do n’t like this being taken for a tramp.”

The old lady bestirred herself more actively than the boy had thought possible, and presently came back to the door, which she had taken the precaution to shut in his face upon leaving it. A good-sized box was in her hand.

“ There,” she said, “ I shut the door because

I m afraid of tramps and never let them come into the house.”

The boj began to look indignant.

“ Now do n’t get mad,” said the old lady. “ I believe you ’re a nice boy. Nice boys will get all dirt the same as bad ones sometimes. And when a body ’s got as good a habit as shutting the door to keep out tramps, stick to it, says I.”

The boy smiled. “Am I all dirt ? ” he asked.

“ You are. You are awful dirty. I believe a body could e’enamost plant a garden on you and have it grow.”

The boy laughed. “ I have n’t seen myself since I left Chicago,” he said, “ and sleeping nights in my clothes has got them wrinkled, I suppose.”

“ I suppose so, too. Now it ’s against my rules, but I ’ll tell you what I ’ll do. Go to the pump and wash yourself good, and I ’ll let you have a towel.”

“ Thank you,” responded the boy, with a bow, and a lift of the hat which surprised the old lady and sent a shower of dust down on the owner.

“Now where ’d he get them manners?” queried

the old lady silently. “ I ’ve seen boys right in 2 good families that you could n’t beat manners into, to save you. I believe he tells the truth. Paying for what he gets and being polite to an old woman are two things I do n’t believe any tramp ever did.”

“ Wait a minute, boy ! ” she called, and hurried into the house and out again. “ Soap ’s what you need. I never furnished a stranger with soap and towel before, either. ’T is n’t safe, you see.”

The boy smiled. He rather liked this old lady with her independent ways.

“Now I’m not a bit prying,” she went on when she could really see his face, “ but I wish you ’d tell me where you ’re going and what you ’re going for.” And she looked kindly at him.

The boy laughed heartily. “ Not prying, indeed ! ” he thought. “ What does she call it then?” But he was willing to answer. “I’m going into the country to find me a home,” he said.

“Well, you’re in the country now,” said the old lady.

“ I know it. And I ’m going to begin to look to-day.”

“Well, we don’t need any boys here,” and she handed him the box that was filled with the best she had, and took his coin in return, “ but I ’ll just give you a sort of a hint. Keep on being willing to pay for what you get, and do n’t forget your manners, and you won’t hunt long.”

Again he lifted his hat as he took the box and started down the path to the road.

“ Pay for what you get and do nt forget your manners. Pay for what you get and do 71' t forget your manners f hummed the little ex-bootblack to a tune of liis own as he trudged down the road looking about him.

“ That was a nice old lady,” he thought, “ and she was n’t a bit prying.” Then he laughed, and stopped laughing to go on humming, “ Pay for what you get and do nt forget your mannersP Then a thought struck him.

“Why, tliat ’s what my gentlemen always did,” he said. “ They always had manners even for me. That’s a smart old lady. ^ Pay for what you get and do nt forget your manners,’’ Tliat ’ll do for a Drummond to go by. I ’ll not forget.”

He looked back, but the place where tlie old lady lived was out of sight, hidden by a fringe of willows that lined the road and hung their lower boughs down over the fence. Then he came to a bend in the road. Should he turn around the corner and go south or keep straight on? A look to the south decided him, for there, a quarter of a mile away, stood a comfortable-looking house.

“ I believe I ’ll try that house,” he said. “ My money ’s most gone, and if I should have to beg I ’d be a tramp in spite of myself.”

He tried the house and found there a cross looking woman, a surly man, and a fierce dog. No boys of any sort were wanted there, and glad enough our boy was of it ; but for all that he did not forget his manners, thougli the only effect of his lifted hat was to call forth a stare.

“ Next house ! ” he cried cheerily to liimself, reaching into the box for a slice of delicious cake. The bread and butter would keep. But the next house was nowhere in sight, though diligent trudging after a while brought it to his view.

“What can you do?” asked the farmer who answered his knock. He was a large, heavy man, and lie eyed the slight little figure before him doubtfully.

Now during the three days of his journey he had anticipated that question and had with much care prepared his answer. He knew, young as he was, that to pretend to know what he did not know was a sure road to failure and disgrace.

TRA3IPING even if such a course had been honorable to a Drummond. So he looked calmly up at the big man and said: “I can’t do any lifting, and I never was on a farm a day in my life, so I do n’t know what there is to do. But I can try to do just what you tell me.”

“Well!” said the farmer staring. “Guess I never saw anybody just like you before. What ’s your name ? ”

“Drummond,” replied the boy proudly.

It was one o’clock and the farmer was about to return to the field. He glanced through the window into the kitchen where his wdfe, a tired-looking woman, moved listlessly about her work. Then turning back to the waiting boy he said,

“ Hired girl left yesterday morning. Got mad at something or other. You are n’t above waiting on the women, are you ? ”

“ No, sir,” was the prompt answer.

“ Well, then, you go right into the kitchen and do everytliing my wife tells you. And see to it you help her all you can. She ’s about beat out.”

“ All right,” said the boy.

“Say,” said the farmer turning back again, “ what ’s your first name? ”

“ Dan.”

DAN DRUBBIOND

“Hum! that’s a good name. None of those soft, sickish names you sometimes hear nowadays till you do n’t know from the sound of them whether folks are calling their dogs or not. I can’t abide ’em. Give me good names with some sense to ’em,” went on the farmer wrathfully, for names were his hobby. “ I do n’t know what the women folks think their boys are coming to when they give ’em such names. It’s ’noiigh to sink a boy to have to lug ’em ’round, I know that. I ’d just as soon call a boy Towser as Alplionso myself.”

And away went the farmer, while Dan looked after him wondering.

Chapter III A Girl-boy

Through the open window Mrs. Brink, the farmer’s wife, had heard her husband’s instructions to Dan, and she gave him a wan smile as he entered the room lifting his hat politely and then returning it to his head. Thus had Dan seen the gentlemen whom he thought it fitting for a Drummond to copy salute the ladies of their acquaintance. But having never seen a gentleman indoors, he did not know that a hat was an article for outdoor wear exclusively.

Mrs. Brink was not particular, however. The polite bow she appreciated, and she was used to seeing men and boys wearing their hats in the house. The table had been cleared.

“Do you know how to wash dishes?” she asked.

“ No, ma’am,” was the respectful answer.

Mrs. Brink sighed. The hired girl who had just left in dudgeon did not know how either;

and, what was more, she did not propose to have 23

Mrs. Brink show her. The ashes of her greasy dishcloth were now in the ash-barrel and Mrs. Brink, with a new cloth, began to show a boy how to wash dishes.

It did not take him long to learn, for Pay for what you get and do n't forget your manners " was yet ringing in his mind. “ I ’ve got to get board and lodging and washing and a new shirt here,” he said, “ and work is all I ’ve got to pay with. Good work ought to be as good as good money. No counterfeits,” said this twelve-year-old boy, made old by life on city streets.

This is nothing at all to bootblacking,” he told himself. “ Pretty warm day to be having your hands in hot soapsuds, and I never had an apron on before, but I guess I can stand it.”

All that afternoon Mrs. Brink instructed Dan, and witli every task he mastered her face grew more rested looking.

“Do you think you can remember to morrow, Dan ? ” she would ask anxiously.

“ Yes, ma’am. That is, I can try.”

“ Well, Dan,” she said when supper was on the table, “if ever a boy earned his supper and night’s lodging you ’ve done it this afternoon. Are n’t you tired ? ”

A GIRL- BOY

“Yes, ma’am,” answered truthful Dan. “But I guess walking so much and not having a bed to sleep in has made me more tired than working. I ’ve heard say traveling is hard on a body, and when you foot it into the bargain, why it is hard.”

Mrs. Brink looked sympathetically at the boy’s thin face. She had been tired so much herself, poor soul ! And she took away the glass of skimmed milk she had put at his plate, and instead placed there a glass of milk with the cream stirred in. Dan’s quick eyes noted it, and he smiled with satisfaction. “Women are so awful good,” he thought. “ No wonder gentlemen are polite to them, and help them all they can.”

It was a bountiful supper, and the farmer was, as usual, very hungry. Biscuits and butter and honey and milk and cold meats and cake and pie all disappeared down his capacious throat, while Jiis wife, taking a mouthful now and then, recited Dan’s praises to him.

But Dan’s look of pleasure at the recital changed to one of wonder as the farmer seemed to think it something remarkable that he should not have been above waiting on a woman. Dan had observed that gentlemen always assisted ladies in every way that they could. He knew that the men and boys among whom his lot had been cast looked down upon women and girls as their inferiors ; that they snubbed and slighted them and demanded waiting upon at their hands. But all this he had set down as being characteristic of those that were not fit company for a Drummond. And he could not see why it was any more beneath a gentleman to help a woman in the liitcheii than to help her in the street. So, in his child’s mind, he could not approve of Mr. Brink. He measured him by his gentlemen, and he found Mr. Brink at fault.

“And so you can’t do any lifting, hey?” said the farmer when he had finished eating. His supper had made him good-natured and ready for a joke. “Well, well, that’s bad on a farm ! ” He laughed and went out to sit on the cool porch.

Dan flushed a little as he began to gather the dishes together. But Mrs. Brink said with spirit, “ Yes, he can do lifting. He can lift a mighty big load off my shoulders.”

“ Glad of it,” called back Mr. Brink. “ Glad of it. Just let him keep on lifting that way, and he ’s welcome to stay.”

And now Dan perceived that Mr. Brink was

A GIRL-BOY really a kind-hearted man who wished his wife to have all the help possible. And yet he looked down on Dan for being willing to give it! The boy could not understand it, though he thought of it when he went to bed. “ I ’ll stick to my gentlemen,” was his last waking thought.

It was a peculiarity of Dan’s nature, and one that had been wisely strengthened by his mother, that no criticism nor influence, not even ridicule, could turn him from what he believed to be right. And his life since her death had further developed it. He had seen rude and rough boys jeering at what even to his childish eyes seemed far above them ; and he had come thus early to see that a thing laughed at and scorned was not necessarily bad, or worthy of such treatment. He was so afraid, too, that some day he might have to face the Drummonds, stained in his own consciousness with a mean act, that he watched carefully his gentlemen and copied them as perfectly as he could.

So it came to pass that when he had been six weeks with Mr. and Mrs. Brink he felt that he must look farther for a home. He could not have explained why, but this was the reason — the atmosphere did not suit him. The little waif had been gifted with a fine and noble nature which blindly sought externals suited to it. There were no books at Mr. Brink’s, no magazines and no papers with the exception of one weekly.

“ That ’s all I want,” said Mr. Brink. “ It ’s got the markets, and that ’s enough.”

Neither did he sympathize witli Dan’s desire to go to school, and although he was glad to have his wife receive the benefit of Dan’s help about the house, every day, the sensitive boy perceived more clearly that the big, burly man thought less and less of him for being willing to render it.

He began to see why Mrs. Burton had hated the farm. What if the grass and sky and birds were there, if one never had time to look at them ; and if the people about thought one queer for wanting to do so ? Grass in the spring was for grazing, and later for hay ; birds were to protect the crops; and as for the sky, Mr. Brink only looked at it to predict what the weather would be.

Dan did not hate the farm yet. He only thought he must look for a different kind of a farmer. He knew they were not all like Mr. Brink, even in that neighborhood, but he could not bear to stay anywhere else near by and know