Paine Albert Bigelow
The Bread Line: A Story of a Paper

XIX
A LETTER FROM MR. TRUMAN LIVINGSTONE OF NEW YORK TO MISS DOROTHY CASTLE OF CLEVELAND

New York, December 28, 1897.

Dear, dear Dorry: Well, Dorry, it's all over. All our hopes and dreams have come to nothing. Perny pulled down the sign in the hall this morning, and the furniture is being taken out of the rooms below to sell for whatever it will bring to pay as far as it will go on the rent. Perny said he wouldn't go into a new year with this hanging over us, nor Van Dorn, either, and I think it's just as well myself.

"You see, Dorry, it would be no use. Our plan looked well, but it was all wrong; and even if it hadn't been, it would have taken more money than we could ever have got hold of, and a long, long time besides, to get started. Of course, Frisby did it without money, but that was a good while ago, and he was first in the field. It is like a prize drawn in a lottery – the chances are against another being won by anything near the same ticket number. And then, even Frisby may not have done exactly as he said – people don't always tell things of this kind just as they happened.

"Barrifield still hopes against hope that sometime he may find some one with capital who will bring the 'Whole Family' to life. He has taken the lists and books and things away to show to such people; but I think it would be better if he did not show them, for they could not seem much of an inducement to any one with money already made and safely locked in the bank. The Colonel has gone, too, and Bates, and the last is the one bright spot in all this sad affair. He went some weeks before the Colonel – I believe I wrote you at the time. Bates was a great trial to us all – a greater trial even than I ever told you, for though I did not speak of it before, he drank to excess, and we also know now that he was unreliable in many ways. On all the advertising he placed for us he received a commission, while from the advertising he obtained for us we received no returns, for it was all taken on trial, or in some such way, and he had no contracts at all except the one of two dollars I once mentioned. That was genuine, and we got the two dollars.

"We thought, Dorry, with all of us together, we had a good combination of people for starting a paper, but I realize now that we probably had about the worst one that could be imagined. Artists and writers can make a good paper, and the 'Whole Family' was not bad, as papers go, but it takes somebody else to run it, and even Perny's ten years' business experience was worse than nothing after being mixed with about as many more years of bohemia. He says so himself now. The Colonel was as bad as the rest of us – worse, because he is older, and with him the habit of getting rich on paper has had time to grow and become fixed. He will go on chasing rainbows, I suppose, until the end of his days. Poor old chap! When I shut my eyes I can imagine him in his frayed clothes, with his white hair and his eager face, racing madly across rain-wet meadows for the imaginary pot of gold. That is what we have all been doing, Dorry, and had our combination been ever so strong and our feet ever so swift, we never should have found it.

"For I realize a great many things now that none of us realized at the start. The cost of producing a paper is very great, and there were many things that we did not know of at all. Perny knows all about it now, and has figured it out for me and Van, so that we see clearly at last that no matter how much money we had started with, or how capable we were, we should only have failed, for, unless we changed our plans and charged higher for the paper and gave less premiums, the more subscribers we got the more we should have lost. It is some consolation to know that, for we might have lost a hundred thousand dollars very easily in a year if we had had it, or had raised it by subscription, as we tried to do. Your little thousand would have been but a drop in the ocean, and would have lasted only a few days. So I send back the draft to you, now that everything is ended and you cannot refuse to take it. As for my part of the assessments, I managed to keep up and a little more, for I was still in favor of going on when the others had reached the limit of their means.

"And now comes the hardest part of all. For oh, Dorry dear, I am going to do what I once said I would do if anything happened to me, or if the paper failed and ruined us all. I am going to release you. I could not think, Dorry, after all that has passed, of letting you come here now to share my poverty. For that is what it is, dear – just poverty; and poverty in a big city is more humiliating and deadening to all the joys of life than it can possibly be elsewhere. I have nothing now but my hands, Dorry, and they are of little value, for times have changed and there is much less work than formerly. I have less even than that, because there are some debts that have accumulated and must be paid.

"I never realized what riches were until I had them, – I mean until I thought I had them, which was the same thing while it lasted, – nor what poverty meant. And Perny says so, too, and Van. Barry, of course, still has his salary. But I realize now, and I am not going to let you leave comfort and plenty, without care, to come here and share only privation and care, without comfort, with me. It breaks my heart to give you up, Dorry, but I know it is right, and while you might still be willing, if I asked it, to fulfil your promise to me, and do not realize all that it would mean, I cannot ask you – I cannot allow you – to do it.

"Some day, Dorry, things may be different again. Some day, if we both live and you are still free, and still care, I may come to you and ask you to give me back your promise. For you are free now, Dorry. I would be less than I am if I did not give you your freedom now, after holding out to you all the promises of wealth, and leading you to believe in all my vain dreams. How beautiful you were through it all! You only thought of others. Dear heart, what will the poor poets and artists do now without the beautiful place you were going to build for them? I suppose they must always be poor dreamers like me to the end, and it is that poverty and that end, darling, that I cannot ask you to share.

"Good-by, Dorry. We have been friends from childhood, and friends we must still, be, for, whatever comes, I am always

"Your faithful

"True."

"P.S. I believe I wrote you that your Christmas remembrance came. I thank you for it once more. It is very beautiful. I thought you might care for the book because it is an autograph copy. I must not forget to wish you a happy and beautiful New Year. It will be different from what we had planned – different from the year just passed, which, I suppose, has been happy, too, though I would not, for some reasons, wish to repeat it. I forgot to tell you about my picture. I am only waiting for a cold sleet to come, so I can finish it. I had intended it, you know, for Perny's Christmas, to hang over his desk in the new house; but there is no new house, and he would not let me give it to him now, so I shall try to sell it.

"True."

XX
THE BARK OF THE WOLF

In the studios near Union Square, where two artists and a writer lived and toiled together, there was an atmosphere of heavy gloom. It was a bitter, dark day without, for one thing, raw and windy, while within there was little in the way of cheerfulness besides the open fire, which, for economy's sake, was not allowed to manifest any undue spirit of enterprise. Being the last day in the year – a year that had not been overkind to them – also added something to the feeling of pervading melancholy, and the fact that no one of the three had eaten since the previous evening was not conducive to joy.

They were not altogether without hope. They had tobacco, such as it was, and coal for the time being. Food was more or less of a luxury compared with these. They had scraped together their last fractional funds and invested them in necessaries. Then, too, there was to be more money; not much, of course, – there was not much money anywhere now, – but enough to satisfy for a time the gaunt wolf that was marching up and down in the hall outside, pausing now and then to grin up at the spot where the sign of the "Whole Family" had hung, and show his gleaming white teeth. It was Van Dorn who had pictured the situation in this manner, and added:

"I'm afraid to go out in the hall after dark, for fear he'll get me by the leg."

And Perner:

"I think we'd better invite him in. Maybe he's brought something."

Livingstone looked wearily in the fire.

"I wish the 'Decade' would send me that check they promised to-day," he muttered presently.

"And 'Dawn' the one they were to send me," said Van Dorn.

"And the 'Columbian' mine," echoed Perner. "If I thought I could get it now by going over there, I'd go."

"Too late, Perny; they're closed. You should have got it when you were there yesterday."

"Yes, I know; but I thought some of us would surely get one, and I didn't want to appear broke. I suppose, if they'd mentioned it, I'd have been fool enough to have said, 'No hurry – any time – I don't need it.'"

Van Dorn regarded Perner gravely.

"Perny," he said severely, "it is my opinion that you did say those very words. Were you, or were you not, offered a check yesterday in the 'Columbian' office?"

"I were not! Though I believe there was some mention of having it made out if I wished it, and – "

"And you told them that any time next week, or next month, or next year would do! Let in the wolf, Stony; we're betrayed."

"Well," said Perner, "it'll be next year before it's next week, anyway."

Livingstone arose and marched up and down the floor.

"Don't do that," said Van Dorn. "It'll make you hungrier."

"I suppose Barry's gone home," reflected Perner, "hasn't he, Van, by this time?"

"Yes; and he lives seven miles beyond the bridge – too far to walk to-night."

Livingstone paused in his exercise.

"I believe there's one more mail," he said; "isn't there, fellows?"

"Why, yes, that's so!" declared Perner. "And if there isn't, go down anyway. Maybe somebody's put something in the Colonel's mail-box that we can eat or sell."

Livingstone disappeared and was gone for some minutes.

"I guess the wolf's got him," said Perner.

Then they heard him coming three steps at a time.

"Bully!" said Van Dorn. "That means a check!"

"A check, sure as the world!" echoed Perner, joyfully.

Livingstone plunged in – his face flushed, his eyes shining, and an open letter in his hand.

"How much is it?" asked Van Dorn and Perner together.

Livingstone regarded them as if he did not understand.

"How much is what?" he asked – then added joyously: "Oh, yes – oh, no; it isn't from the 'Decade' – it's – it's a letter!"

Van Dorn and Perner rose grimly. Van Dorn's voice was very stern.

"And what do you mean," he demanded, "by looking as you do now over a letter – simply a letter?"

But Livingstone was in no wise daunted.

"Sit down, Van!" he shouted, "you and Perny! I've always wanted to tell you, and never could quite do it before. Sit down now, and I'll read you this letter! It's from the girl that sent in our first subscription. It's the best letter that was ever written – from the best girl that God ever made!"

XXI
THE LETTER LIVINGSTONE READ

My own dear foolish True: I wonder if you think that because we have all been asleep, dreaming wonderful dreams, – chasing a rainbow, as you say, – that it is going to make any real difference in our lives now that we are awake. It may seem to make differences for a time – trifling differences in trifling things; it may even give us something to look back on and laugh about – something in the way of experience that to such as Van and Perny and yourself may be of use as material: but as to making any vital difference in whatever makes life full and beautiful and worth having, and that is love, – our love for each other, I mean, – why, True, the very thought of it is so absurd that I try not to be offended with you for even thinking it.

"Do you remember, True, long ago, when you first wrote me about the paper, and I wrote you that, while I was glad for your sake, I was not enthusiastic over the undertaking? That was my real self, True, and was from the heart – the same heart that is more enthusiastic now over the failure of it all than it ever was over the beginning. If I was dazzled for a time by the fair colors in the sky, – if I seized your hand, and with you and Barry and Perny and Van and the Colonel went racing down the wet meadows for the pot of gold, – it does not mean that I am any the less glad to wake up now and find that life is something better than all that; that true life lies in doing conscientiously whatever we can do best; that such dreams only serve to make our best work better, and that still better than all of these is youth and love – our youth, True, and our love for each other.

"No, True; I am not going to take back my promise. What do you suppose I care for the few dollars you have lost? You are no less good and noble – no less capable than before; and as for the times, they will change – they always do. It almost hurts me to realize that you could think I would ever let you send me off even for what you considered my own good. And I will not go, you see. You can't send me away – unless, indeed, you do not want me any more, and then, of course, you will say so, and I will go. Forgive me, True; I do not mean that; but I must punish you the least bit because – because I am a woman, I suppose.

"And now, True, about this draft for a thousand dollars which I am sending back to you. It was right, of course, for you to hold it as you did when you felt that it could do no good, and it is better to have it now, when it will. I want you to have it cashed at once, and let Van and Perny have just whatever they need of it to tide them over, and I want you to help the Colonel, too, if you can find him. Then you are to take the rest of it, and, after using whatever you need for yourself, go out and find the smallest and cheapest little apartment in New York that we can live in. Furnish it with the fewest things you can buy, and if there is any money left, we will take a wedding trip on it just as far as it will take us. Then we will come back to our little apartment, you will go back to your beloved art, and we will start really as Mr. Frisby did this time – without a dollar! I have no preparation to make. Let me know when you are coming and I will be ready.

"And now, True, good-by, with the happiest of New Years for you and your good friends, who will, I am sure, be my good friends, too, though I take you away from them in part. I wonder if it would be right for me to say I am glad we failed? I am afraid that, even if it is wrong, it is the truth. I know it is! There are many things that we could do with wealth, but there are so many things so much sweeter that we might not have; and oh, dear True, I am only a woman, and selfish, after all.

"Always and always your

"Dorothy.

"P.S. I almost forgot to thank you for the autograph volume. You could not have pleased me more.

"Dorry."

XXII
THE BREAD LINE

Livingstone did not read quite all the letter. There were lines and paragraphs here and there that he entered, stumbled, and backed out of – taking at last a road around that was so evidently his own as to make Perner remark once:

"Don't revise, Stony; you can't improve on the original."

And when he had finished, none of the three spoke for at least a minute. Then Van Dorn said huskily:

"I knew she was a bully girl when she sent that subscription – I could tell by the writing."

And Perner added:

"That subscription letter is mine, Stony. As acting manager of the 'Whole Family' I claim it."

Then, all at once, they had hold of Livingstone's hands, and when the three faced the fire again it reflected in their eyes with unusual brightness.

"I can't get it cashed to-night," Livingstone reflected presently; "it's too big."

"No; and you are not to get it cashed any night until you find that apartment," said Van Dorn.

Perner nodded.

"Van and I are grateful," he assented, "but with our few wants, and our marvelous talents, coupled with my ten years' business experience – "

"But you haven't had any dinner, nor any lunch, nor breakfast," interrupted Livingstone, speaking as one who had himself fared sumptuously.

"A letter like that is worth more than a good many dinners," said Van Dorn.

"Yes," agreed Perner; "it is – to all of us."

The faces of the two older men had become reminiscent. Perhaps they were remembering – one a wife, the other a sweetheart – both memories now for a dozen years or more.

"Boys, do you recollect the dinner we had a year ago to-night?" This from Livingstone.

The others nodded. They were remembering that, too, perhaps.

"Then the bread line afterward?" said Perner. "We gave them a nickel apiece all around, and were going to give them a dollar apiece to-night. And now, instead of that – "

"Instead of that," finished Van Dorn, "we can go down to-night and get into the line ourselves. Light up, Stony; we'll take a look at your picture, anyhow."

There was a brisk, whipping sound against the skylight above them. It drew their attention, and presently came again. Livingstone arose hastily.

"Sleet!"

He spoke eagerly, and looked up at the glass overhead. Then he added in a sort of joyous excitement:

"Fellows, let's do it! Let's go down there and get into the line ourselves! I've been waiting for this sleet to see how they would look in it. Now we're hungry, too. Let's go down and get into the line and see how it feels!"

Van Dorn and Perner stared at him a moment to make sure that he was in earnest. There was consent in the laugh that followed. The proposition appealed to their sense of artistic fitness. There was a picturesque completeness in thus rounding out the year. Besides, as Livingstone had said, they were hungry.

They set forth somewhat later. There was a strong wind, and the sleet bit into their flesh keenly. It got into their eyes and, when they spoke, into their mouths.

"I don't know about this," shouted Van Dorn, presently. "I think it's undertaking a good deal for the sake of art."

"Oh, pshaw, Van, this is bully!" Livingstone called back. He was well in advance, and did not seem to mind the storm.

Perner, who was tall, was shrunken and bent by the cold and storm. His voice, however, he lifted above it.

"Art!" he yelled. "I'm going for the sake of the coffee!"

The line that began on Tenth Street had made the turn on Broadway and reached almost to Grace Church when they arrived. The men stood motionless, huddled back into their scanty collars, their heads bent forward to shield their faces from the sharp, flying ice. Strong electric light shone on them. The driving sleet grew on their hats and shoulders. Those who had just arrived found it even colder standing still. Van Dorn's teeth were rattling.

"Do you suppose there's always enough to go round?" he asked of Perner, who stood ahead of him.

Talking was not pleasant, but the waif behind him answered:

"Wasn't last night. I was on the end of the line and didn't git no coffee. Guess there'll be enough to-night, though, 'cause it's New Year."

"If they don't have coffee to-night I'll die," shivered Perner.

Livingstone stood ahead of Perner in the line.

"If it stops with me I'll give you mine," he said. "I'm not hungry, nor cold, either."

The waif in front of him and the waif behind Van Dorn both made an effort to see Livingstone.

"What are you doing here, then?" growled the man behind. He saw that the three ahead of him were better dressed than the others and regarded them suspiciously. "What did you fellers come here for, anyway?"

There was a chance for a final joke. It fell to Perner:

"We've been keeping up a whole family," he chattered, – "several whole families. Now we're broke."

"You can have my place in the line," added Livingstone, and they changed.

The incident attracted little attention. Storm, cold, and hunger had deadened the instinct of curiosity natural to every human bosom. Presently Livingstone leaned forward and murmured to Van Dorn:

"Look at that old chap ahead yonder – around the corner. How he crouches and shivers! Isn't that great?"

Van Dorn looked as directed – then more keenly.

"Good God!" he said, "it's Colonel Hazard!" He leaned forward to Perner. "Isn't that the Colonel," he asked, – "that old fellow just around the corner, with his collar full of sleet?"

"By gad, it is!" decided Livingstone.

"We'll take him back with us," said Perner. "Poor old Colonel!"

The waif from behind was talking again. He had turned around so they could hear.

"Last New Year there was some blokes come along an' give us a nickel apiece all round. I was on the end an' got two. When they went away one of 'em said they was comin' back to-night to give us a dollar apiece."

"They won't come," said Perner.

"How d' y' know?"

"We're the men."

"Aw, what yeh givin' us?"

"Facts. We've started a paper since then."

A party of roisterers came shouting across the street.

"Come and have a drink," they called. "Come on, you fellows, and have a drink with us!"

A number of men left their places in the line and went. Perner watched one of them intently.

"If that fellow isn't Bates you can drink my coffee," he said, pointing.

Van Dorn and Livingstone looked, but could not be certain. They did not see him return.

It was somewhat after midnight, and the chimes of Grace Church, mingled with a pandemonium of horns and whistles, were still roaring in the glad New Year, when they finally obtained the brown loaf and the cup of hot coffee, which by this time they needed desperately. The bread they thrust under their coats, and some minutes later were in the studios.

Colonel Hazard was with them. He had maintained a wonderful self-possession when overhauled at Fleischmann's.

"Excellent place to study character," he remarked, after the first moment of surprise. "I come here now and then for the feeling."

And Van Dorn had answered:

"I've got enough to last me forever!"

The coals were still red in their grate, and over them they toasted the bread. For a while they attended to this busily, and talked but little. Then came the tobacco. It was like heaven.

Presently Perner told the Colonel of some Egyptian articles wanted by the "Columbian."

"They offered them to me," he said, "and I took them, because I haven't had the courage to refuse anything lately. But I had you in mind at the time to help me on with them, and now I've something else on hand, I'll turn them over to you altogether, if you'll take them."

The Colonel was very near to losing his quiet dignity at this news. He was obliged to clear his throat several times before replying. At last he said, quite naturally:

"I shall be happy to oblige you, Mr. Perner – very happy indeed." Then he turned suddenly and shook Perner's hand.

They talked on. By and by the Colonel refilled his pipe and leaned back in his chair.

"Fortune is a fickle jade," he said. "I have won and lost her seven times. I do not know that I shall ever do so again – it takes money to make money. Such resources as I have are not at present convertible into cash. Speculation without capital may win," he continued, "but the chances are much against it. It takes money to start anything, even a paper, as you gentlemen can testify."

The others assented silently.

"I might have told you that, in the beginning," Colonel Hazard went on, "had you asked me. Of course, I did not know the true condition of affairs until a state of dissolution had been reached. I could have advised you from past experience and observation."

The Colonel drew a number of luxurious whiffs from his pipe. The others only listened. The Colonel resumed:

"I knew a man some years ago who started a paper with forty thousand dollars in cash and an excellent scheme – premiums similar to yours. He spent that forty thousand, and another forty thousand on top of it – money from his people. Then he borrowed all he could get, at any rate of interest. He was bound to make it go, and he did make it go at last; but when the tide turned and commenced to flow his way he didn't have a dollar – not a dollar!"

Colonel Hazard looked into the fire and smoked reflectively.

"Humph!" commented Perner, "that part of it was like Frisby."

The Colonel turned quickly.

"Frisby – yes, that was his name. Why, do you know him?"

"What!"

The others had shouted this in chorus, and were staring at the Colonel stupidly.

"Why, yes," he repeated, looking from one to the other; "Frisby of the 'Voice of Light.' I saw a copy of it lying here on the table one day. It's a big property now. Do you know him?"

Perner had risen and was standing directly in front of the Colonel.

"We do," he admitted. His voice sounded rather unusual in its quality, and he spoke very deliberately. "At least, we know of him. It was what happened to Frisby, or, at least, what we heard happened to Frisby, that we were banking on."

"By gad, yes," put in Livingstone.

"What did you hear happened to Frisby?" asked the Colonel, quietly.

"We heard," continued Perner, "that Frisby bought the 'Voice of Light' without putting down a dollar – that he didn't have a dollar to put down – that he contracted for papers and advertising without a dollar – that he didn't have a dollar when his first advertising appeared – that he got a thousand dollars in the first mail, and six thousand dollars in one day! That's what we heard happened to Frisby."

Colonel Hazard rose and walked across the room and back. Above him the gray of the New Year lay on the sleet-drifted skylight like the dawn of truth. He paused in front of the fire and regarded the three listening men.

"Well," he said, "it didn't happen to us, did it?"