The Flaw in the Sapphire. Charles M. Snyder
and dismissing Dennis with a nod he withdrew into the warehouse.
The main feature of discouragement which presented itself to Dennis as he left this locality to ponder over its possibilities, was that the end of the week was five days off.
This was serious.
His rupture with Muldoon, senior, had left him but poorly provided with linen and lucre; and a campaign of assault upon the barricades of prejudice and suspicion, which was involved in the anxious solicitude of the man seeking employment, demanded every possible accessory of personal appearance and a reasonably equipped commissariat.
Anxious, therefore, to subject his meager resources to the least strain possible, Dennis at last succeeded in securing, in one of the more pretentious stores on Baxter Street, a contrivance for the relief of penury and threadbare gentility known at that time by the name of “dickey.”
This convenience consisted in a series of three shirt bosoms made of paper to resemble the luxury of linen.
When the surface first exposed showed symptoms of soil or wear, its removal revealed a fresh bosom directly under.
Adjusted to his waistcoat, it was almost impossible to detect the agreeable sham, which, under favorable auspices, could be made to last for a week.
Thus equipped, Dennis proceeded to his hotel, where, after according the cheerful salutation of the industrious barkeeper the acknowledgment of a lively Irish nod, in which there was both fellowship and refusal, he proceeded to the rear, to banquet upon whatever offered the most for his money.
During the two days succeeding, Dennis, true to the apprehensive calculation natural to the unemployed, did not propose to rest upon the assurances of his Irish friend in the publishing house.
Anything untoward might occur.
In fact, he was familiar with this seamy side of Providence.
He had been so often misled by promises that it was only his wholesome Celtic faith and prompt capacity to rebound which kept him from becoming entirely blasé.
His experience, however, left him alert. So he applied industriously at various establishments for employment, and received his first lessons in the courteous duplicity which ostentatiously files the application for future reference, and the cruel kindness of frank rebuff.
On the morning of the third day of this futile foray, Dennis noticed that the exposed bosom of his dickey was not altogether presentable.
It appeared to have registered the record of his applications and failures, and, as such, was not a good campaign document, so to speak.
Having progressed in his simple toilet up to the point of embellishment, he proceeded to tear away the soiled surface, and in doing so discovered not only the clean bosom beneath, but that the rear of the one just detached was covered with a block of minute print.
Drawing the solitary chair close to the window, he read by the light of early dawn the following extraordinary compilation.
CHAPTER II
In the city of—— there lived one Rodman Raikes, unpopularly known as the “Fist.”
The title, however, was not in recognition of personal prowess, for no more cringing, evasive creature ever existed.
He was little in mind, little in body, and little in his dealings.
If a principle could ever be concrete, Raikes was the embodiment of the grasping and the uselessly abstemious.
He appeared to shun a generous sentiment as one would avoid an infected locality, and usually walked with head tilted and body bent as if engaged in following a clue or intent upon the search of some stray nickel.
He was thoroughly despised by all who knew him, a sentiment which he returned with vicious interest, and never neglected an opportunity of lodging some sneering shaft where it would cause the most irritation.
His character was so much in harmony with these generalizations that he had been described as dividing his laughter into chuckles—if the strident rasp which he indulged could be called by that name—in order that it might last the longer; and that he grinned in grudging instalments.
His obvious possession was an entire row of brick houses, in the most insignificant of which he dwelt.
Over this sparse domicile a spinster sister presided, who reflected, on compulsion, in the manner of a sickly moon, the attenuity and shrivel of her brother.
A nephew of Raikes’ completed the circuit.
This young man intruded upon this strange household an aspect so curiously at variance with that of his rickety elders that he suggested to the fanciful the grim idea of having exhausted the contents of the larder and compelled the other two to shift for themselves.
He was, in the eyes of the disapproving Raikes, offensively plump; an example of incredible expenditure applied to personal gratification and gluttonous indulgence.
The miser behaved as if he appeared to consider it a mark of studied disrespect to be compelled to contrast his gaunt leanness with the young man’s embonpoint, and was propitiated only by the reflection that he contributed in no way to his nephew’s physical disproportion, since the latter was able to be at charges for his own welfare from resources derived from steady outside employment.
Adjoining the house occupied by Raikes, and connected with it by a doorway let into the wall, was a series of three dwellings used as a boarding-establishment by a widow who had seen better days and was tireless in alluding to them.
These buildings had been remodeled to communicate with each other, a continuity that concluded with the Raikes apartments.
For some reason this miserable man preferred to occupy the portion just indicated with no other tenants than his gaunt sister and the robust Robert.
This arrangement was all the more curious from the fact that Raikes made no attempt to dispose of, in fact, strangely resented any suggestion of letting, the lower floor of his end of the row.
That one of his avaricious disposition could thus forego such a prospect of advantage was the occasion of much speculation.
If Robert understood he gave no hint; and if the boarders on the other side of the partition indulged in curious comment they refrained from doing so in his presence.
The suggestion had been made that Raikes secreted something about that portion of the premises he occupied, but since none had the courage to investigate such a possibility, the problems it created were permitted to pass unsolved or serve to tantalize the imagination.
Regularly, at meal-time, the door leading from the Raikes apartment would open, and the mean figure of the miser, after presenting itself for one hesitating, suspicious moment, would slip silently through and subside into a near-by chair at one of the tables.
Directly after, the spinster would filter through with the mien of an apologetic phantom, and Raikes at once established the basis of indulgence by tentative nibbles of this and that, which were almost Barmecidian in their meagerness, and the sister, under his sordid supervision, followed his miserable example.
With singular perversity, in the midst of reasonable abundance, he forbore to accept the full measure of his privileges.
The discipline of denial was essential to the austere economies he practiced in all other directions, and his sister, rather than submit to the hardness of his rebukes, acquiesced with dismal resignation.
Robert was able to endure the table behavior of his uncle no more than the others, and so occupied a seat in the dining-room surrounded by more agreeable conditions.
If this course was intended as a diplomatic frankness to indicate to Raikes