The Poor Little Rich Girl Page 10

  CHAPTER X

  What she first saw was a face!--straight ahead, at the top of a steeprise, where the wide road narrowed to a point. The face was a man's, andupon it the footlights beat so strongly that each feature wasstartlingly vivid. But it was not the fact that she saw _only_ a facethat set her knees to trembling weakly--nor the fact that the face wasfearfully distorted; but because it was _upside down!_

  She stared, feeling herself grow cold, her flesh creep. "Oh, I want togo home!" she gasped.

  The face began to move nearer, slowly, inch by inch. And there sounded ahoarse outcry: "_Hoo! hoo! Hoo! hoo!_"

  It was the little old gentleman who reassured her somewhat--by his evenvoice. "Ah!" said he with something of pride, yet as if to himself. "Herealizes that the black eye is a beauty. And I shouldn't wonder if heisn't coming to match it!"

  But what temporary confidence she gained, fled when Jane, tettering fromside to side, began to threaten in a most terrifying way. "_Now_, youngMiss!" she cried. "_Now_, you're goin' to be sorry you didn't mind Jane!Oh, _I_ told you he'd git you some fine day!"

  The Man-Who-Makes-Faces retorted--what, Gwendolyn did not hear. She wassick with apprehension. "I guess I won't find my father and moth-ernow," she whispered miserably.

  Then, all at once, she could see _more_ than a face! Silhouetted againstthe lighted sky was a figure--broad shouldered and belted, withswinging cudgel, and visored cap. It was like those dreaded figures thatpatroled the Drive--yet how different! For as the Policeman came on, hiswild face peered between his coat-tails!--peered between his coat-tailsfor the reason that he was _upside down_, and walking _on his hands!_

  "_Hoo! hoo!_ Hoo! hoo!" he clamored again. His coat flopped about hisears. His natural merino socks showed where his trousers fell away fromhis shoes. His club bumped the side of his head at every stride of hislong blue-clad arms.

  His identification was complete. For precisely as Thomas had declared,he was _heels over head_.

  "My!" breathed Gwendolyn, so astonished that she almost forgot to beanxious for her own safety. (What a marvelous Land was this--whereeverything was really as it ought to be!)

  The Man-Who-Makes-Faces addressed her, smiling down. "You won't mind ifwe don't start for a minute or two, will you?" he inquired. "ThisOfficer will probably want to discuss the prices of eyes. You see, Igave him his black one. If he wants another, though, I shall be obligedto ask the Piper to collect."

  "Aren't--aren't you afraid of him?" stammered Gwendolyn, in a whisper.

  "_Afraid?_" he echoed, surprised. "Why, no! Are _you?_"

  Somehow, she felt ashamed. "N-n-not very," she faltered.

  No sooner did she partly deny her fear than she experienced a mostdelicious feeling of security! And this feeling grew as she watched thenearing Policeman. For she saw that he was in a mournful state.

  It was worry and grief that distorted his face. The dark eyes above thevisor (both the black eye and the other one) were streaming with tears,tears which, naturally enough, ran from the four corners of his eyes,down across his forehead, and on into his hair. And it was evident thathe had been weeping for a long time, for his cap was full!

  And now she realized that the hoarse cries which had filled her withterror were the saddest of complaints!--were not "Hoo! hoo!" but "_Boo!_hoo!"

  "Poor man!" sympathized the little old gentleman, wagging his beard.

  Jane, however, with characteristic lack of compassion, hopped about,_tee-heeing_ loudly--and straightening out any number of wrinkles. "Oh,ain't he a sight!" she chortled. She had entirely given over herthreatening.

  Gwendolyn now felt secure enough. But she did not feel like laughing.She was sober to the point of pitying. For though he looked ridiculous,he was so absolutely helpless, so utterly unhappy.

  "Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" he exclaimed as he came on--hand over hand, legsheld together, and swaying from side to side rhythmically, like thependulum of the metronome. "What shall I do! What shall I do!"

  "Need any sharpening?" called out the Man-Who-Makes-Faces, brandishingthe curved knife. "Is there something wrong?"

  "Wrong!" echoed the Policeman dolefully. "I should say so! Oh, _dear!_Oh, dear!" And still weeping copiously, so that his forehead glistenedwith his tears, he plodded across the border of the Face-Shop.

  It was then that Gwendolyn recalled under what circumstances she hadseen him last. Only two or three days before, when bound homeward in thelimousine, she had spied him loitering beside the walled walk. "Whatmakes his club shine so?" she had asked Jane, whispering. "Eh?"whispered Jane in return; "what else than _blood?_" The wind was blowingas the automobile swept past him: The breeze lifted the tail of hisbelted coat. And for one terrifying instant Gwendolyn caught a glimpseof steel!

  "And if he don't mean harm to anybody," Jane had added when Gwendolynturned scared eyes to her, "why does he carry a _pistol?_"

  But there was no need to fear a weapon now. The falling away of hiscoat-tails had uncovered his trouser-pockets. And as he halted,Gwendolyn saw that his revolver was gone, his pistol-pocket empty.

  She took a timid step toward him. "How do you do, Mr. Officer," shesaid. "Can't you let your feet come down? Then you'd be on your back,and you could get up the right way."

  Up came his face between his coat-tails. He stared at her with his newblack eye--with the other one, too. (She noted that it was blue.) "But I_am_ up the right way," he answered, "Oh, no! It isn't that! It isn'tthat!" His hands were encased in white cotton gloves. He rocked himselffrom one to the other.

  "No, it _isn't_ that," agreed the little old gentleman; "but I firmlybelieve that, you'd feel better if you'd order another eye."

  "Another eye!" said the Policeman, bitterly. "Would another eye help meto find him?"

  "Oh, I see." The Man-Who-Makes-Faces spoke with some concern. "Then he'sflown?"

  Gwendolyn, puzzled, glanced from one to the other. "Who is 'he'?" sheasked.

  The Policeman bumped his head against his night-stick. "The Bird!" hemourned.

  At that, Jane hopped up and down in evident delight.

  But Gwendolyn fell back, taking up a position beside the little oldgentleman. That Bird again! And it was evident that the Policemanthought well of him!

  Pity swiftly merged into suspicion.

  "I s'pose you mean the Bird that tells people things," she ventured--tobe sure that she was not misjudging him.

  He wiped his black eye on a coat-tail. "Aye," he answered. "That's theone. And, oh, but he could tell _you_ things!"

  Gwendolyn considered the statement. At last, "He's a tattletale!" shecharged, and felt her cheeks crimson with sudden anger.

  He nodded--so vigorously that some of his tears splashed over the rim ofhis cap. "That's why the Police can't get along without him," hedeclared. "And, oh, here I've gone and lost him! And They'll put me offthe Force!" (Bump! bump! bump!)

  "They?" she questioned. "Do you mean the soda-water They?"

  "And They know so much," explained the little old gentleman, "becausethe Bird tells 'em."

  "He tells 'em everything," grumbled the Officer. "They send him aroundthe whole country hunting gossip--when he ought to be workingexclusively in the interest of Law and Order."

  Law and Order--Gwendolyn wondered who these two were.

  "He knows everything _I_ do," asserted the Policeman, "and everything_she_ does--" Here he jerked his head sidewise at Jane.

  She retreated, an expression of guilt on that front face.

  "And everything _you_ do," he went on, indicating Gwendolyn.

  "I know that," she said in an injured tone. "He told Jane I was here."

  At that, the Policeman gave himself a quick half-turn. "You've _seen_him?" he demanded of the nurse.

  She shifted from side to side nervously. "It ain't the same one," sheprotested. "It--"

  He interrupted. "You couldn't be mistaken," he declared. "Did he have abumpy forehead? and a lumpy tail?"

  "You don't mean _a lump of salt_," said Gwendolyn, as
tonished.

  "He does," said the little old gentleman. "And the bumpy forehead isfrom having to remember so many things."

  She heaved a sigh of relief. "Well, I think I'd like _that_ Bird," shesaid. "And I don't believe he's far. 'Cause when you whistled I heardflying."

  "_Running_ and flying," corrected the Policeman; "--running and flyingto _me_." (He said it proudly.) "The squirrels and the robin-redbreasts,and the sparrows, all follow me here from the Park of a night, knowing Iprotect 'em."

  "Oh?" murmured Gwendolyn. "You protect 'em?" She looked sidewise atJane, reflecting that the nurse had given him quite another character.

  "Yes; and I protect old, old people."

  "Huh!" snorted the Man-Who-Makes-Faces. "You protect old people, eh?Well, how about old _organ-grinders?_"

  "You ought to know," answered the Officer promptly. "I guess you didn'tgive me that black eye for nothing."

  Whereat the little old gentleman suddenly subsided into silence.

  "Yes, I protect old people," reiterated the other, "and the blind, ofcourse, and the trees and the flowers and the fountains. Also, thestatues. There's the General, for instance. If I didn't watch out, folkswould scribble on him with chalk."

  Gwendolyn assented. Once more she was beginning to have belief in him.

  "Then," he resumed, "I look after the children, so that--"

  She started. The children!--_he?_ "But," she interrupted, "Jane'salways told me that you grab little boys and girls _and carry 'em off_."Then, fairly shook at her own boldness.

  "I never!" denied Jane, sullenly.

  He laughed. "I _do_ carry 'em off. But _where?_"

  "I don't know,"--in a flutter.

  "Tell her," urged the little old gentleman.

  The Policeman leaned his feet against the bill-board. "I'm the man,"said he, "that takes lost little kids to their fathers and mothers."

  To their fathers and mothers! Gwendolyn came round upon Jane, liftingaccusing eyes, pointing an accusing finger, "So!" she breathed. "Youtold me he stole 'em! It isn't _true!_" And she wiggled the finger.

  Jane edged away, head on one side "Oh, I was jokin' you," she declaredlightly. But--accidentally--- she turned aside her grinning front faceand gave the others a glimpse of the back one. And each noted how thesquare mouth was trembling with anxiety.

  "Ah-ha!" exclaimed Gwendolyn, triumphantly. "I'm finding you out!"

  The Policeman crossed his feet against the bill-board, taking care notto injure any of the articles there displayed. "Yes, I've taken a lot oflost little kids to their fathers and mothers," he repeated. "And I wasjust wondering if you--"

  She gave him no chance to finish his sentence. In her joy at findingthat here was another friend, she ran to him and leaned to smile intohis face.

  "You'll help _me_ to find my fath-er and moth-er, won't you?" she cried.

  "_Cer_-tainly!"

  "We were starting just as you came," said the Man-Who-Makes-Faces.

  "Well, let's be off!" His whistle hung by a thin chain from abutton-hole of his coat. He swung it to his lips, _Toot! Toot!_ It was acheery blast.

  The next moment, coming, as it were, on the heels of her sudden goodfortune, Gwendolyn closed her right hand and found herself possessed ofa bag of candy!--red-and-white stick-candy of the variety that she hadoften seen selling at street corners (out of show-cases that went onwheels). More than once she had longed, and in vain, to stop at one ofthese show-cases and purchase. Now she suddenly remembered having doneso with a high hand. The sticks were striped spirally. Boldly sheproduced one and fell to sucking it, making more noise with her suckingthan ever the strict proprieties of the nursery permitted.

  Then, candy in hand, and with the little old gentleman on her right, thePoliceman on her left, and Jane trailing behind, doing aone-two-three-and-point, she set forward gayly along the wide, curvingroad.