The Gem Collector | Page 4

be
pleased for fair when he gets back. So I has a try, and dey gets me
while I'm at it. We'll cut out dat part."
"Well, it's over now, at any rate. What have you been doing since you
came to England?"
"Gettin' moved on by de cops, mostly. An' sleepin' in de park."
"Well, you needn't sleep in the park any more, Spike. You can pitch
your moving tent with me. And you'll want some clothes. We'll get
those to-morrow. You're the sort of figure they can fit off the peg.
You're not too tall, which is a good thing."
"Bad t'ing for me, Mr. Chames. If I'd bin taller I'd have stood for being
a New York cop, and bin buying a brownstone house on Fifth Avenue
by this. It's de cops makes de big money in old Manhattan, dat's who it
is."
"You're right there," said Jimmy. "At least, partly. I suppose half the
New York force does get rich by graft. There are honest men among
them, but we didn't happen to meet them."
"That's right, we didn't. Dere was old man McEachern."

"McEachern! Yes. If any of them got rich, he would be the man. He
was the worst grafter of the entire bunch. I could tell you some stories
about old Pat McEachern, Spike. If half those yarns were true he must
be a wealthy man by now. We shall hear of him running for mayor one
of these days."
"Say, Mr. Chames, wasn't youse struck on de goil?"
"What girl?" said Jimmy quietly.
"Old man McEachern's goil, Molly. Dey used to say dat youse was her
steady."
"If you don't mind, Spike, friend of my youth, we'll cut out that," said
Jimmy. "When I want my affairs discussed I'll mention it. Till
then--See?"
"Sure," said Spike, who saw nothing beyond the fact, dimly realized,
that he had said something which had been better left unsaid.
Jimmy chewed the stem of his pipe savagely. Spike's words seemed to
have touched a spring and let loose feelings which he had kept down
for three years. Molly McEachern! So "they" used to say that he was
engaged to Molly. He cursed Spike Mullins in his heart, well-meaning,
blundering Spike, who was now sitting on the edge of his chair drawing
sorrowfully at his cigar and wondering what he had done to give
offense. The years fell away from Jimmy, and he was back in New
York, standing at the corner of Forty-second Street with half an hour to
wait because the fear of missing her had sent him there too early;
sitting in Central Park with her while the squirrels came down and
begged for nuts; walking--Damn Spike! They had been friends.
Nothing more. He had never said a word. Her father had warned her
against him. Old Pat McEachern knew how he got his living, and could
have put his hand on the author of half a dozen burglaries by which the
police had been officially "baffled". That had been his strong point. He
had never left tracks. There was never any evidence. But McEachern
knew, and he had intervened stormily when he came upon them
together. And Molly had stood up for him, till her father had

apologized confusedly, raging inwardly the while at his helplessness. It
was after that----
"Mr. Chames," said Spike.
Jimmy's wits returned.
"Hullo?" he said.
"Mr. Chames, what's doing here? Put me next to de game. Is it de old
lay? You'll want me wit' youse, I guess?"
Jimmy laughed, and shut the door on his dreams.
"I'd quite forgotten I hadn't told you about myself, Spike. Do you know
what a baronet is?"
"Search me. What's de answer?"
"A baronet's the noblest work of man, Spike. I am one. Let wealth and
commerce, laws and learning--or is it art and learning?--die, but leave
us still our old nobility. I'm a big man now, Spike, I can tell you."
"Gee!"
"My position has also the advantage of carrying a good deal of money
with it."
"Plunks!"
"You have grasped it. Plunks. Dollars. Doubloons. I line up with the
thickwads now, Spike. I don't have to work to turn a dishonest penny
any longer."
The horrid truth sank slowly into the other's mind.
"Say! What, Mr. Chames? Youse don't need to go on de old lay no
more? You're cutting it out for fair?"

"That's the idea."
Spike gasped. His world was falling about his ears. Now that he had
met Mr. Chames again he had looked forward to a long and prosperous
partnership in crime, with always the master mind behind him to direct
his movements and check him if he went wrong. He had looked out
upon the richness of London, and he had said with Blücher: "What a
city