The Complete Works of James Whitcomb Riley, vol 10 | Page 5

enough to buy and pay for a comfortable house for his mother and himself, and, still a lad, maintained the expense of companion, attendant and maid servant for the mother. Yet, with all this burden on his shoulders, the boy had worried through some way, with a jolly smile and a good word for every one. "A boy, sir," the enthusiastic senior concluded--"a boy, sir, that never was a boy, and never had a taste of genuine boyhood in his life--no more than he ever took a taste of whisky, and you couldn't get that in him with a funnel!"
At this juncture Mr. Clark himself appeared, and in a particularly happy frame of mind. For an hour the delighted senior and myself sat laughing at the fellow's quaint conceits and witty sayings, the conversation at last breaking up with an abrupt proposition from Mr. Clark that I remain in the city overnight and accompany him to the theater, an invitation I rather eagerly accepted. Mr. Clark, thanking me, and pivoting himself around on his high stool, with a mechanical "Good afternoon!" was at once submerged in his books, while the senior, following me out and stepping into a carriage that stood waiting for him at the curb, waved me adieu, and was driven away. I turned my steps up the street, but remembering that my friend had fixed no place to meet me in the evening, I stepped back into the storeroom and again pushed open the glass door of the office.
Mr. Clark still sat on the high stool at his desk, his back toward the door, and his ledger spread out before him.
"Mr. Clark!" I called.
He made no answer.
"Mr. Clark!" I called again, in an elevated key.
He did not stir.
I paused a moment, then went over to him, letting my hand drop lightly on his arm.
Still no response. I only felt the shoulder heave, as with a long-drawn quavering sigh, then heard the regular though labored breathing of a weary man that slept.
I had not the heart to waken him; but lifting the still moistened pen from his unconscious fingers, I wrote where I might be found at eight that evening, folded and addressed the note, and laying it on the open page before him, turned quietly away.
"Poor man!" I mused compassionately, with a touch of youthful sentiment affecting me.--"Poor man! Working himself into his very grave, and with never a sign or murmur of complaint--worn and weighed down with the burden of his work, and yet with a nobleness of spirit and resolve that still conceals behind glad smiles and laughing words the cares that lie so heavily upon him!"
The long afternoon went by at last, and evening came; and, as promptly as my note requested, the jovial Mr. Clark appeared, laughing heartily, as we walked off down the street, at my explanation of the reason I had written my desires instead of verbally addressing him; and laughing still louder when I told him of my fears that he was overworking himself.
"Oh, no, my friend," he answered gaily; "there's no occasion for anxiety on that account.-- But the fact is, old man," he went on, half apologetically, "the fact is, I haven't been so overworked, of late, as over-wakeful. There's something in the night I think, that does it. Do you know that the night is a great mystery to me--a great mystery! And it seems to be growing on me all the time. There's the trouble. The night to me is like some vast incomprehensible being. When I write the name 'night' I instinctively write it with a capital. And I like my night deep, and dark, and swarthy, don't you know. Now some like clear and starry nights, but they're too pale for me--too weak and fragile altogether! They're popular with the masses, of course, these blue-eyed, golden-haired, 'moonlight-on-the-lake' nights; but, somehow, I don't 'stand in' with them. My favorite night is the pronounced brunette--the darker the better. To- night is one of my kind, and she's growing more and more like it all the time. If it were not for depriving you of the theater, I'd rather just drift off now in the deepening gloom till swallowed up in it--lost utterly. Come with me, anyhow!"
"Gladly," I answered, catching something of his own enthusiasm; "I myself prefer it to the play."
"I heartily congratulate you on your taste," he said, diving violently for my hand and wringing it.
"Oh, it's going to be grimly glorious!--a depth of darkness one can wade out into, and knead in his hands like dough!" And he laughed, himself, at this grotesque conceit.
And so we walked--for hours. Our talk--or, rather, my friend's talk--lulled and soothed at last into a calmer flow, almost solemn in its tone, and yet fretted with an occasional wildness