CHAPTER I

I TAKE A RIDE

To be quite honest about it, I have no very clear idea what happened in that private room at the Princeton Inn the night of the last nip-and-tuck baseball game with Yale, except that every one of the crowd with the exception of myself was anything but sober. There were Roupell and Frean, Hewitt and Ashton--to mention only a few--who were quarrelsome and ready to take exception to everything I said. I didn't mind particularly about Roupell and Frean, but Bob Hewitt, being a particularly old friend, his condition pained me exceedingly.

I don't recollect precisely what our particular difference was about, my memory being notoriously faulty over trifles, but I know that somehow Hewitt and I had become the focal point of interest for the crowd. They were gathered round our table, and something seemed to have happened. Perhaps I had said a brilliant thing worth remembering--I often do--for Tommy Ashton, who is a lawyer, had his fountain pen out and was busy writing. No doubt he intended to be my Boswell. He was smiling; so was everybody but Hewitt, who looked as serious as the war.

"See here, Pete," said Hewitt, leaning over the table and eying me hard, "you take witness before all present that you're perfectly sober----"

"Of course I'm sober! Did you ever see me when I wasn't? I was born sober! Why do you persist in insinuating that I'm drunk instead of yourself?"

"Oh, that's a particular failing of Hewitt's," laughed a fat voice; and, to my astonishment, I recognized Howard Roupell.

"Oh, hello!" I greeted. "When did you blow in?"

"With you," he chuckled. "You know I've been sitting next you all evening."

"The Harry you have! You aren't a Princeton man and you're old enough and, I dare say, unmoral enough to be the father of us all."

"I dare say," agreed Roupell, patting his fat paunch. "But I was at the game, you know, and since you invited me here----"

"_I_ invite you? Nonsense! How could I, when this is the first time I've seen you since--well, I forget how long. It doesn't matter, anyway. I'm sorry to see that you're drunk, Roupell. It isn't right, it isn't decent, especially in an old man like you. You should set a good example, have more honor for your graying hairs and our youthful purity."

"It's _you_ who's drunk--drunk as a fool," said another voice; and, again to my astonishment, I recognized Arnold Frean. Of course he had a perfect right to be there, but it was just like him to come sneaking in by a back door and slink among the crowd. A furtive fellow, Frean, with large, outstanding ears--otherwise he was quite handsome--that seemed designed expressly for listening at keyholes. There was no love lost between us, and, to his ridiculous and monstrous charge concerning my sobriety, he now had the audacity to add that, like Roupell, he had been present from the first, even sitting behind me at the ball game. Moreover, he stated that I had brought Roupell to the feast by intimidation and violence, threatening him with mayhem, and I forget what else, if he didn't join the party.

"For that matter you invited the whole town," finished Frean. "All the ragtag and bobtail--friends, I suppose, of your former days--and we had a hard time keeping 'em out."

"You're drunk, Frean," I said. "Drunk like Roupell. I'm sorry to see it, and I object to your face. Between ourselves, and speaking in strict privacy, I don't like it and never did. Take it away."

"You're like all the Lawtons," he said. "You can't take a drink----"

"I can! I'll have one now. Thanks for reminding me. I'll have more than one, and then I'll remove your face. That face of yours and Roupell's alleged funny stories are too much; as a combination----"

"Oh, cut it out!" exclaimed Hewitt, seizing my arm. "And you quit chipping him, Frean. Can't you stop your rowing? Don't get quarrelsome, Pete----"

"I'm not," I protested. "I'm the most peaceable man in the world. I'll fight anybody who says I'm not--_anybody_. I'm the only sober man in the room, too. You know that, Bob. You're all half shot and trying to pick a row, but you can't do it with me. No, sir. I'm perfectly willing to fight anybody who says he can--_anybody_. Only sober man in the room; never more sober in my life."

"Very well," said Hewitt. "That's what I've been trying to get at. You say you're perfectly sober? All right; now read over the agreement."

It was the first I had heard of any agreement, but Hewitt being so far gone, poor fellow--much further gone than I had even suspected--I decided to humor him. You have to humor the drunk; it is the only way to deal with them. He was in that perverse state where, if I had even hinted a denial of any agreement, he would have claimed triumphantly that I was drunk and he sober.

I confess, however, to astonishment when Ashton handed me a paper. But evidently, being a quick-witted fellow, he was helping me on the spur of the moment to humor poor Hewitt. And when I glanced at the paper I saw he had been at some pains to fake up an agreement, though I could not quite grasp what it was all about, it being couched in the cloudy phraseology of the law which, coupled with Ashton's weird handwriting, rendered it quite unintelligible. Indeed, it made me dizzy to look at it, though, to humor poor Hewitt, I made a solemn pretense of reading it through.

"Is that right?" asked Hewitt. "You understand it?"

"Of course," I said angrily. Did he think I couldn't understand plain English put in plain writing?

"Very good. Then let it be signed and witnessed."

Ashton handed me his pen, one of those foolish affairs that start off with dumping half their contents down your sleeve, and then splutter all over the map. For that reason I found some little difficulty in signing my name.

"That's yours," said Hewitt. "Now sign my copy. Compare it with your own."

I did so dutifully. And now Ashton's writing had so improved by practice that I was able to understand, amid a wilderness of "Whereases" and "Aforesaids," the following words:

And furthermore I, Peter Lawton, being in full possession of all my faculties, do promise faithfully to earn my living by manual labor for a period of at least one month, dating from this seventeenth day of June, 1916.

"Very well," I said, tossing the signed document back to Hewitt. "Because I came into a pot of money and you didn't, you've always been throwing it up to me! Because I don't have to work and you do, you're sore----"

"It's not that at all, Pete. You started this argument about being able to earn your own living, even by manual labor----"

"I did nothing of the kind!"

"You did. And every fellow here knows you did. You can only repudiate your signature and that agreement by admitting what you would never admit before--that you weren't capable of----"

"I'm capable of anything--I mean everything!" I exclaimed. "I'll show you and the whole crowd! I can't earn my own living, eh? I'll show you. I stand over my signature and repudiate nothing!"

I forget what else I said, but it must have been very witty--I seemed to be in a rather happy vein that evening--for they all laughed and clapped me on the back--all except Frean, who stood aloof with amused sarcastic eyes. Then we all sang the old glees, and after an extremely pleasant time, of which I remember nothing, I found myself outside, talking with my chauffeur.

"Jensen," I said, "you're discharged. Who's got your job? _I_ have. I've got to go to work right away, and the only thing I can do with my hands is to feed myself and run a car. I can't feed if I don't work. Ergo, you're discharged. I know your employer, too; he's a good fellow, one of the best. I approve of him, and if I have to work, I'd rather work for him."

Jensen was a Swede, and at times rather stupid. Unfortunately this was one of the times and, moreover, he had been drinking like everybody else but myself. A drunken Swede--a terrible combination; no wonder I found it impossible to get him to understand my simple and dramatic statement. "_You_ ban my boss," he kept repeating like a litany, his bleak face never changing. "How you work for yourself? You make a yoke, yes?"

"I make a yoke, no. I've got your job and that's all there's to it."

"But, boss----"

"There are no buts, my friend. Didn't you say the other day you were thinking of making a change? Well, you've made it. And don't let me hear you say again, 'Ay tank you ban drunk again, boss,' or I'll put you past thinking anything. How could I be drunk again when I've never been drunk in my life? I'm sorry to see that you've been at the bottle. However, I've now engaged a sober chauffeur."

He blinked at me. "You ban going to fire me----"

"I ban! Here, now, immediately, if not sooner! I've got your job and I'll hang on to it. I'm going to take the old bus all the way home myself and run it in future. I've got your job. I'm working for Pete Lawton."

It took some time for the truth to sink into Jensen's square dome, but when he saw I was quite sober, and in deadly earnest, he accepted the situation like a philosopher, the more so, perhaps, as I handed him a hundred-dollar bill in mistake for a twenty. Anyway, he disappeared, though I don't remember seeing him go.

I experienced some unexpected trouble in getting the car started and out of the parking space, but this was finally accomplished with the aid of a very obliging person with two faces, an oddity I had not remarked in him previously.

Five of the crowd, including Hewitt, were to return home with me to New York, but when I appeared with something of a flourish--if there is anything I can do it's drive a car--and they saw I was minus Jensen, their behavior was very peculiar. It became downright insulting when they learned what had happened to Jensen, and that I meant to take the wheel myself. One and all positively declined to accompany me, and, to further aggravate matters, they insinuated I was in no condition to drive even a baby carriage.

"For the love of Heaven, you mad devil, come out of there!" cried Hewitt at length, springing on the running board and trying to shut off the spark. "You'll kill somebody or break your fool neck----"

"I'll break yours if you don't get off!" I shouted above the roar of the engine. "I've stood your insults long enough. You jeer at me for not working, and then, when I get a job with a good employer, a fellow I like and approve of----"

"One of you fellows run for a cop!" cried Hewitt. "And, say, can't the rest of you help me? Come on and do something! Don't you see he'll do what he says and that he isn't able to bite his finger?"

"I don't want to bite it!" I cried. "But you evidently do." For he had followed his words by coming over the door like a cyclone.

It only needed that personal contact, the employment of brute force, to snap my long-suffering patience and send my peaceful nature up in flame. I slung Hewitt into the road with one hand, while with the other I threw in the clutch. At the same moment Jensen appeared, and he and the other four fellows rushed me, followed by, it seemed, half the town.

What happened next could only be described by half a dozen moving-picture machines working together at top speed. The high-powered six gave a bound like a tiger, and I took the sharp turn into the highroad at a forty-mile clip amid a parting scene that resembled a lunatic's dream of the battle of the Marne.

It was not until I had passed several towns that it began to dawn on me that some one had changed the map placing New York in a remote corner, where I was unable to find it. Meanwhile it was a lovely, warm, moonlight night--indeed, there were several moons--and, ceasing to brood over my wrongs, I began to find a certain pleasure in the ride.

It would appear that neither Paul Revere nor John Gilpin had anything on me when it came to rousing public interest and enthusiasm. Everybody I met made way for me instantly as if I were a king, showering benedictions and good wishes after me in the most approved manner. In several towns fire bells were rung, and the police force hastily mobilized. Even trolley cars stopped so that their passengers might have a glimpse of me as I passed; women fainted with joy, and several horses ran away through sheer excitement. No one ever had such a tremendous popular ovation, such a triumphal procession. My heart was filled with gratitude toward all these good people, and if I had not been in such a hurry to find out what had happened to New York, I should certainly have stayed and accepted of their proffered hospitality.

In due time it occurred to me that rather than search at random I had better make inquiries as to the new location of Manhattan, for I had an important engagement the following day, and it would prove rather awkward if at the last moment I discovered the city to have been shifted, say, to Alaska. For you never know what those fellows at the topographical bureau in Washington are up to.

With me, to make up my mind is to act, and accordingly I now stopped the car and alighted. Perhaps it would have been just as well if the idea had come to me at another time and place, for now I discovered there was no one whom I could ask for information. In other words, I found myself absolutely alone on a deserted country road.

"I've always heard it said," I thought injuredly, "that to make up one's mind and to act promptly is a great virtue. But see what it has done for me! Now I must tramp about here until I find somebody who knows where New York is."

So I set off down the road. You will ask, perhaps, why I did not go in the car. But I have confessed to a memory that is faulty over trifles, and, for the moment, the trifling matter of the car had escaped me.

The next scene--for, somehow, this night everything happened in scenes--found me at a crossroads, hat in hand, talking to a man and a girl. They sat in a town car de luxe, upholstered in maroon, electrically lighted within, and with a flower vase containing a bunch of violets that went wonderfully with the girl's hair.

Her companion was a little, dried-up old gentleman, rather foppishly dressed, and the color of bronze. I assure you he was. It was not sunburn, nor was he a foreigner; his face and hands were a distinct and emphatic greenish-bronze color, the like of which I had never seen before.

I have no wish to criticize his looks, for I am not a handsome man myself. In fact my cherished nickname at Old Nassau was "Mug." Taken singly, and if transposed, I have been assured by friends that my features are quite classical; I mean if my nose was turned upside down, and my nether lip projected inward instead of outward, and a good bit of my chin was shoved south--you get the idea. They are all good features, judged separately, but undoubtedly a serious mistake was made by somebody when they were being assembled.

The result is a tumultuous something, with knobs and projections in unexpected places, properly termed a "mug." Even though I wore a mustache in order to veil the subject as decently as possible, the result was still a mug. Indeed Arnold Frean would have had infinitely more reason to object to my face than I to his; he really had one worth looking at--velvety brown eyes and all that Valentino stuff. I suppose I objected to it because it kept reminding me so poignantly of my own.

No, I am not a handsome man, and yet, do you know, I made the greatest possible impression on the little bronze gentleman and his beautiful companion. I assure you I did. How? Why, by my manner and bearing. There is something princely about me--there is no other word for it and, as I had noticed it before this evening, I needn't try to be mock modest about it--that is infinitely superior to mere good looks.

Real princes aren't handsome, nor princesses either; if you doubt it, take a look at the family album of the crowned heads of Europe. I own a sort of royal and magnificent bearing that commands the utmost attention, homage, and respect. One is born that way; there is no acquiring it. The little bronze gentleman and the girl, from the moment I appeared, couldn't remove their eyes from me--and they had many eyes, indeed more than their fair share; they had at least half a dozen between them. I welcomed the phenomenon in the girl's case, for one cannot have too much of a pretty thing, but the man's resembled holes burned in a blanket.

"You are mistaken, sir," I said, endeavoring to explain the situation and correct the bronze man's ridiculous error that I had tried to get myself run over. "I am not a would-be suicide. The fact is I have lost something, something of infinite value, and I wished merely to solicit the help of the first passer-by."

"Oh, we must help him!" said the girl.

"Be quiet!" snapped the little mummy. "What have you lost?" he demanded of me, tapping a Malacca cane against his thin shanks.

"I have lost New York," I confided solemnly.

"Eh? What's that?" He had begun to sniff, as though preparatory to bursting into tears at the enormity of my misfortune, and against this contingency, he now produced a flowered silk handkerchief and held it to his nose. I was touched, deeply so; such sympathetic souls are all too rare in this world.

"Don't weep, sir," I said. "I can't bear to see you cry. True, I have lost New York, or rather it has been stolen from me; some vandal has removed it. But no doubt you can help me find it. I must be in New York without fail to-morrow, for I've an appointment which I can't neglect. In strict confidence, I may explain that I'm to be buried; so if I'm not there, how can there be a funeral? You see the point? Now, what would you advise?"

"That you enter the alcoholic ward of the nearest hospital!" he answered, with sudden and unwarranted ferocity. "Faugh! You smell like a distillery. Go away, you sot!"

"Anything to oblige, sir. Where _is_ the nearest hospital? If you will kindly take me----"

"Get out of here!" he roared. "Take your foot away, sir! Jules!"

Jules was the chauffeur, and he appeared, armed with a spanner.

The proceedings became a trifle involved. Not that in the presence of the girl I had any idea of making a scene; but I considered it only due to my self-respect to correct the bronze man's erroneous conception of my character and condition. And this I endeavored to do with the utmost politeness and amiability.

The girl appeared to understand my position, for her eyes--I now ascertained she had no more than the customary number--were quite sympathetic. I gathered that she wished to assist me, and, no doubt referring to some one else, she stated that it was cruel and inhuman to leave them when it was plain to be seen that they were helpless as a baby.

I was about to applaud her for this excellent sentiment when the little old gentleman banged the door in my face, Jules sent me sprawling, and the car whirled off, leaving me no wiser as to the fate of New York. Still, I was the better for the adventure, for it left me with the happy memory of a beautiful, gracious, and charming young girl.

I now remembered my own car, and hastened to leave the crossroads down which the other had sped. I found my car where I had left it, and I found also a man cranking the engine.

"Thank you, so much," I said. "It's very kind of you to take the trouble. I've met quite a number of nice, obliging people to-night."

Evidently he had been so engrossed in his kindly, self-appointed task, that he had not heard me approach; for at my words he jumped back, crank in hand, as if I had demanded his money or his life. I could see him quite plainly by the light of the several summer moons. He was a big fellow, about my own height and weight, and quite respectably dressed.

It being a night of the most astounding phenomena--to mention only one fact, witness the several moons, to which I meant subsequently to direct the attention of Lick Observatory--I was not greatly astonished to discover that this new acquaintance had six fingers. I assure you he had; I saw them plainly as he held the crank. Nor was this all; far from it. He was the proud possessor also of a miraculous mustache capable of intelligent self-movement. I assure you of the truth of this too. When first he turned toward me, the mustache was in a most curious and humiliating position, one end pointing to his Adam's apple, the other to his right ear. You will agree that no ordinary mustache can act like that even in its most abandoned moments. When next I looked at him, behold, it was in the conventional position, straight across his upper lip! An astounding, intelligent mustache that must be capable of moving automatically! It pleased and interested me exceedingly; it suggested the solution of many problems. Such an article would remove the terrors of eating soup--something of which I'm very fond, but which I've given up attempting in public. Such a mustache could be adjusted, nay, commanded, to any position and no longer behave like a strainer. I must try and get mine to behave that way, ask him how he had trained his.

"Say, is this your car, boss?" he asked in unaffected surprise. "I was goin' to take her to the nearest lockup--wherever that is. I thought she'd been swiped, see? You don't generally find such things layin' round a country road this time of night. How'd you come to leave her?"

Seeing he was such an altogether obliging fellow, distinguished, moreover, by owning six fingers and a movable mustache, I considered it only proper to explain how the car came to be there. He listened politely, scratching an ear with the tip of the crank, but I wasn't sure whether he had any better understanding than Jensen, for he had an absent-minded way of looking up and down the deserted road.

"You now understand my predicament," I finished, taking out my wallet and giving him a bill for his thoughtfulness in cranking the car. "Perhaps you can tell me where New York is?"

"Sure, boss. You're almost in it. It's right over there."

"Where?"

"There," he said. "See the lights?"

I turned to follow his pointing finger, and, sure enough, I saw the lights. Indeed, I never saw so many in my life as something fell upon my head with a resounding crash. Then the lights went out as suddenly as they had come, and I lost all interest in finding New York.