Part 30 (1/2)

”He's not for sale--I won't sell him.”

”Well, I'll make it a hundred.” A hundred dollars! The money seemed a fortune to me; but I could not sell Dix.

”No. I tell you the dog is not for sale. I won't sell him.”

”What is your price, anyhow?” demanded McSheen. ”I tell you I want the dog. I promised my daughter to get the dog back.”

”Mr. McSheen, I have told you the dog is not for sale--I will not sell him at any price.”

He suddenly flared up.

”Oh! You won't! Well, I'll tell you that I'll have that dog and you'll sell him too.”

”I will not.”

”We'll see. You think you're a pretty big man, but I'll show you who's bigger in this town--you or Coll McSheen. I helped you once and you haven't sense enough to appreciate it. You look out for me, young man.”

He turned slowly with his scowling eye on me.

”I will.”

”You'd better. When I lay my hand on you, you'll think an earthquake's. .h.i.t you.”

”Well, get out of my office now,” I said.

”Oh! I'm going now, but wait.”

He walked out, and I was left with the knowledge that I had one powerful enemy.

I was soon to know Mr. Collis McSheen better, as he was also to know me better.

A few days after this I was walking along and about to enter my office when a man accosted me at the entrance and asked if I could tell him of a good lawyer.

I told him I was one myself, though I had the grace to add that there were many more, and I named several of the leading firms in the city.

”Well, I guess you'll do. I was looking for you. You are the one she sent me to,” he said doubtfully, when I had told him my name. He was a weather-beaten little Scotchman, very poor and hard up; but there was something in his air that dignified him. He had a definite aim, and a definite wrong to be righted. The story he told me was a pitiful one. He had been in this country several years and had a place in a locomotive-shop somewhere East, and so long as he had had work, had saved money. But they ”had been ordered out,” he said, and after waiting around finding that the strike had failed, he had come on here and had gotten a place in a boiler-shop, but they ”had been ordered out” again, ”just as I got my wife and children on and was getting sort of fixed up,” he added. Then he had resigned from the union and had got another place, but a man he had had trouble with back East was ”one of the big men up here now,” and he had had him turned out because he did not ”belong to the union.” He was willing to join the union now, but ”Wringman had had him turned down.” Then he had gotten a place as a driver. But he had been ill and had lost his place, and since then he had not been able to get work, ”though the preacher had tried to help him.” He did not seem to complain of this loss of his place.

”The wagon had to run,” he said, but he and his wife, too, had been ill, and the baby had died and the expenses of the burial had been ”something.” He appeared to take it as a sort of ultimate decree not to be complained of--only stated. He mentioned it simply by way of explanation, and spoke as if it were a mere matter of Fate. And, indeed, to the poor, sickness often has the finality of Fate. During their illness they had sold nearly all their furniture to live on and pay rent. Now he was in arrears; his wife was in bed, his children sick, and his landlord had levied on his furniture that remained for the rent. At the last gasp he had come to see a lawyer.

”I know I owe the rent,” he said, ”but the beds won't pay it and the loan company's got all the rest.”

I advised him that the property levied on was not subject to levy; but suggested his going to his landlord and laying the case before him.

”If he has any bowels of compa.s.sion whatever--” I began, but he interrupted me.

”That's what the preacher said.” But his landlord was ”the Argand Estate,” he added in a hopeless tone. He only knew the agent. He had been to him and so had the preacher; but he said he could do nothing--the rent must be paid--”the Argand Estate had to be kept up, or it couldn't do all the good it did”--so he was going to turn them out next day.

He had been to one or two lawyers, he said; but they wouldn't take the case against the Argand Estate, and then the lady had sent him to me.

”What lady?”