b
ud phillips says the boy is going to the devil,” announced stebbins, as he strolled into the smoking room at the sherwood club, after beating perkins three games of billiards.
“well, bud is certainly in a position to be accurately informed on that subject,” answered the colonel; and the truth of his reply was so apparent, that everyone smiled.
bud was night clerk at the algonquin, the hotel where the boy had a suite. so he had a chance to see at what hour and how the guests came home. he also knew just how many times a week the boy’s rooms were a rendezvous for the young subalterns from fort blair, who came into town every time they could get leave, to gamble away their month’s scanty pay.
but as bud phillips also said, the boy wasn’t[128] entirely to blame, for he had never had a mother’s care; and, though no one in preston city except the colonel and i knew the facts of his early life, everyone had a good word for him, and was inclined to overlook many indiscretions on the part of popular billy richards, the boy.
colonel wade and i could remember the day when stewart sloan shocked the good people back in sioux city by bringing home for a wife la petite mabelle, skirt dancer from a vaudeville theatre in des moines. the predictions of the sewing-club gossips were more than fulfilled, for la petite mabelle ran away one fine day before the year was up, leaving sloan with a two-months-old baby boy, and a little note of farewell. la petite mabelle told him in melodramatic sentences, covering two sheets of note paper, that the attractions of the old life, with its cheap finery and grease paint, were too strong for her. she could never remain in sioux city, where nobody called on her, stewart himself seemed ashamed of her, and where there was nothing going on. she said further, that he mustn’t think too badly of her, and that he ought to try and forget her.
this sloan had certainly tried hard enough to do. that fall he secured a divorce, and when the legislature convened in des moines next year, he had the name that la petite mabelle had disgraced changed to richards, his mother’s maiden name. so young william richards, as[129] sloan rechristened the boy, grew up to manhood, never knowing the tragedy of his father’s early life, and never having felt the softening influence of a mother’s love.
his father died when the lad was twelve, naming as his son’s guardian colonel wade, who looked after him as well as an old bachelor of fifty, loaded down with business cares, could be expected to look after a growing and spirited youth.
when billy attained his majority, and had finished his college days, bluff old colonel wade took him aside as gently as a warm-hearted old man could do, told him the story of his first appearance on the stage of life, turned over to him a property more than sufficient for every reasonable need, and sent him out in the world which still called him the boy, a nickname he had acquired in college. the boy pondered over his early history for a few days, and then apparently forgot that any such unpleasant thing as history existed, concerning himself wholly with the present, which may be history, though at the time not recognized as such.
lately the boy had been drinking and doing some other things more than was good for him; but when the colonel remonstrated in a fatherly way, he promised to “take a brace,” the same as he would have promised back in his college days, when he was under the discipline of the old professors. stebbins’s remark, therefore,[130] that the boy was going to the devil, was rather a surprise to me, for i knew that he usually kept his word.
“did any of you see the fairy that came in on the express this afternoon?” asked perkins a little later, and as no one answered, he proceeded to explain:
“i went down to the three o’clock to meet kitty, who came in from denver to-day; and the first person who stepped off the train was the d——st looking female you ever saw. she must have been forty-five; but she had locks as golden as a maid of fifteen, and actually, i believe there was half a box of rouge on her cheeks. she had a little woolly dog in her arms, so covered with ribbons that i don’t believe it could walk alone. kitty said she was flirting with the conductor all the way down from butte, and some one on the train christened her ‘the painted lady.’”
“where’s she stopping?” asked the colonel, and i knew what was in his mind.
“she rode up town on the same ’bus with kitty and me, and got out at the algonquin,” answered perkins. “you’d better look out for that protégé of yours, colonel, he may be doing something rash. the boy appears to be partial to blondes.”
the next day as i was coming down town i nearly upset a woman hurrying in the opposite direction. i picked up the parasol which i had[131] knocked out of her hand, and as i glanced at her, i knew from perkins’s description that she was the painted lady.
she probably wasn’t more than thirty-seven or thirty-eight, but there were deep lines about her eyes and the corners of the mouth which ought not to be in the face of a woman of sixty. her hair, under the stimulating influence of peroxide, was a bright yellow, and her cheeks had on them the bloom usually found on buxom irish lasses, or in small, round boxes in a drug store. at the end of a silver chain, and covered with ribbons, was a diminutive french poodle.
she was stylishly dressed, and her figure, though making me wonder at the time (and strength) taken to produce it, was still quite pleasing to look upon in the final result. her name, as i found out at the club that evening, was madame mabel fortesque, and one of the evening papers stated that she was a young widow taking a western trip for her health. she had a suite at the algonquin, and spent most of her time driving about the city, for she had sent to denver for a showy turnout, and it was not long before it became a common sight to see her riding about with some one of the young officers from fort blair beside her.
dame rumor, never inclined to be delicate in her handling of young widows who travel about the country without chaperons, of course had a[132] fling at madame fortesque; and if only half the stories which were circulated about her were true, she must have found preston city a lively place.
the day of her arrival the boy had been called away to chicago on business, so the colonel and i were relieved of any immediate worry as to an acquaintance being established between him and the painted lady, as nearly everyone in preston city quickly came to call the widow.
the boy came back two weeks later, however, and our worst fears were then realized, for he immediately became as attentive to madame fortesque as any of the young subalterns from the fort. most of the men at the club talked it over good-naturedly, and, man-fashion, considered it a good joke; but the wives of these same club men regarded it differently; it was even rumored that old mrs. burton, the worst gossip in the city, had written to a girl in boston to whom the boy was engaged.
“if she were only some young thing and good-looking,” groaned the colonel, “it wouldn’t be so bad; but what he can find in that fudged-up old woman is more than i can see. why, man, she is old enough to be his mother.”
he intended to speak to the boy about it but never did, for he knew he could not talk to the young man when there was a woman in the case, the same as he could when it was merely a question of his gambling or drinking too much.
[133]things were going on badly enough, when one evening as i was seated in the reading-room at the sherwood, looking over a paper, i heard stebbins talking to a group in the next room.
“yes, i’ve found out the whole history of the painted lady,” he was saying; “she’s all that old lady burton says, and more. she’s been living down at the rapids for a year or two; and i saw jack denvers when i was down there last week, and he gave me the whole story. she was a skirt-dancer among other things when she was young, and some way got her hooks onto a young fellow from sioux city named sloan. he came from a fine family, and his people were all broken up over the affair, for she proved a bad lot, i reckon. she ran away from him before they had been married a year, and has been going down the line ever since. denvers says that if she stops up here the married women would better watch out. she’s the woman that was mixed up in the stanley divorce case down at the rapids last year; and they say she got—hello! what’s the matter with billy? same old story?”
alarmed, for i had not the slightest idea that the boy was there, i turned and saw him staggering blindly from the room. he ran against a hat-tree, and some of the men laughed, but i saw his face, and i knew that it was not the drink that made him look so ghastly.
[134]i hurried up to the card-room where the colonel was playing his evening game of whist, and, whispering a word in his ear, i got him into an alcove and told him what had just taken place.
“good god! this is horrible,” he muttered; “why, it’s his own mother, and he knows it.”
we hastened from the club, but there were no carriages in sight outside.
“the boy just staggered out bareheaded, and drove off toward his hotel in the only cab here,” said perkins, who was coming up the steps. “what’s the matter with him? i spoke to him, but he didn’t answer. stewed again?”
we did not stop to satisfy his curiosity, but walked rapidly up to the algonquin.
“he went up-stairs about ten minutes ago,” the clerk told us in answer to our question, and grinned knowingly.
the door of his room was not locked, and after knocking several times without getting any reply, we went in, and found just what i had feared we should find, the boy lying face downwards on the floor, one hand clasping a discharged revolver. i looked at the powder-stained cheek, and though i felt that it was absolutely hopeless, i left the colonel kneeling by his side, and hurried out in search of a doctor. as i stood by the front door hesitating which way to go, a trap was driven up under the electric lights, and a beardless youth in[135] lieutenant’s uniform helped a loudly-dressed woman to alight. they walked through the foyer, and entered the elevator laughing and talking, while a little yellow dog, covered with ribbons, capered and barked in front of them.
it was the painted lady—and another boy.
