"They call you Tink for short, don't they?" says I, and he admits that they do. "All right," I goes on. "Now the address, Tink. Jersey, eh?

Well, it's likely you'll hear from Mr. Ellins before the week's out. But don't get your hopes up; for he turns down enough propositions to fill a waste basket every day. Express elevator at No. 5. So long," and I chokes off Mr. Tuttle's vote of thanks by wavin' him out the door.

It's well along in the afternoon before I sees an openin' to drop this option in front of Old Hickory, grabbin' a minute when his desk is fairly clear, and slammin' it down just as though it had been sent in through Piddie.

"Delivered on," says I. "Wants rush answer by mail."

"Huh!" grunts Old Hickory, lightin' up a fresh Ca.s.sadora.

That's all I expected to hear of the transaction; so about an hour later, when Piddie comes out lookin' solemn and says I'm to report to Mr. Ellins, I don't know what's up.

"Is it a first degree charge, Piddie," says I, "or only for manslaughter?"

"I presume Mr. Ellins will discover what you have done," says he.

"Well, hope for the worst, Piddie," says I. "Here goes!"

And the minute I sees what Old Hickory has in front of him, I'm wise.

"Torchy," says he, givin' me the steely glitter out of them cold storage eyes of his, "Mr. Piddie seems to know nothing about this Michigan option."

"If he admits that much," says I, "it must be so. It's a record, though."

"What I want to know," goes on Mr. Ellins, "is how in blue belted blazes it got here. You brought it in, didn't you?"

"Yep," says I. "It was this way, Mr. Ellins: Piddie had it put up to him and wouldn't even hang it on the hook; but the guy that brings it looked so mournful that I b.u.t.ts in and takes a chance on pa.s.sin' it along to you on my own hook."

"Oh, you did, eh?" he snorts.

"Sure," says I. "I got to do the fresh act once in a while, ain't I?

Course, if you want a dead one on the gate, I can hand in my portfolio; but I thought all you had to do with punk options like this was to toss 'em in the basket and then have 'em fired back at----"

"Fire nothing back!" says Mr. Ellins. "Why, you lucky young rascal, we've been trying to get hold of this very property for eight months!

And Piddie! Bah! Of all the pin-headed, jelly brained----"

"Second the motion," says I, springin' the joyous grin.

"That will do," says Old Hickory, catchin' himself up. "Just you forget Mr. Piddie and listen to me. Know this Tuttle person by sight, don't you?"

"Couldn't forget him," says I. "Want him on the carpet?"

"I do," says he. "Have him here at ten-thirty to-morrow morning. But find him to-night, and see that you don't open your head about this business to anyone else."

"I get you," says I, doin' the West Point salute. "It's me to trail and shut up Tuttle. He'll be here, if I have to bring him in an ambulance."

That's why I jumps out before closin' time and mingles with the Jersey commuters in a lovely hot ride across the meadows. It's a scrubby station where I gets off, too; one of these fact'ry settlements where the whole population answers the seven o'clock whistle every mornin'.

There's a brick barracks half a mile long, where they make sewin'

machines or something, and snuggled close up around it is hundreds of these four-fam'ly wooden tenements, gettin' the full benefit of the soft coal smoke and makin' it easy for the hands to pike home for a noon dinner. Say, you talk about the East Side double deckers; but they're brownstone fronts compared to some of these corporation shacks across the meadows!

Seventeen dirty kids led me to the number Tuttle gave me, and in the right hand first floor kitchen I finds a red faced woman in a faded blue wrapper fryin' salt pork and cabbage.

"Mrs. Tinkham Tuttle?" says I, holdin' my breath.

"No," says she, glancin' suspicious over her shoulder. "I'm his sister."

"Oh!" says I. "Is Tink around?"

"I don't know whether he is or not, and don't care!" says she.

"Much obliged," says I; "but I ain't come to collect for anything.

Couldn't you give a guess?"

"If I did," says she, "I'd say he was over to the factory yard. That's where he stays most of the time."

It's half-past five; but the fact'ry's runnin' full blast, and I has to jolly a timekeeper and the yard boss before I locates my man. Fin'lly, though, they point out a big storage shed in one corner of the coal cinder desert they has fenced in so careful. The wide double doors to the shed are shut; but after I've hammered for a while one of 'em is slid back a few inches and Tuttle peeks out.

"Oh!" he gasps. "You! Say, are they going to take it? Are they?"

"Them's the indications," says I, "providin' it's all O. K. and your price is right."

"Oh, I'll make the price low enough," says he. "I'll sell out for two thousand, and it ought to be worth twice that. But two is all I need."

"Eh?" says I. "What kind of finance do you call that? Say, Tuttle, you know you can't work any 'phony deal on the Corrugated. Better give me the straight goods and save trouble."

"I will," says he. "Come in, won't you!"

With that he leads the way through the dark shed to a sort of workshop at the back, where there's a window. There's a tool bench, a little hand forge with an old coffee pot and a fryin' pan on it, and a cot bed not ten feet away.

"Campin' out here?" says I.

"I'm not supposed to," says he; "but the yard superintendent lets me.

This is where I've lived and worked for nearly two years, and until you came a minute ago it was where I expected to end. But now it's different."

"It is?" says I. "How's that?"

Which is Tink Tuttle's cue to open up on the story of his life. It's a soggy, unexcitin' yarn, most of it. As I'd kind of guessed by the way he talked, he wa'n't just an ordinary fact'ry hand. He'd been through some high cla.s.s scientific school up in Ma.s.sachusetts, where he'd lived before his father lost his grip. Seems the old man was a crackerjack boss machinist; but he got to monkeyin' with fool inventions, drifted from place to place, got to be a lunger, and finally pa.s.sed in. The last four years in the fact'ry here had finished him. Tink had worked there, too, and his sister had married one of the hands.

"It's the graveyard of the Tuttle family, this place is, I suppose,"

says Tink. "It got father, and it has almost got me. Some folks can breathe bra.s.s filings and carbon dioxide and thrive on it; but we can't.

So I gave up and hid myself away in here to work out one of my silly dreams. Last spring I caught a bad cold, and Sister sent me West. There we have an uncle. She thought the change of climate might help my cough.

It didn't do a bit of good; but it was out there that I picked up this option. That was when I saw a chance of making my dream come true. You saw what I've been building, didn't you, as we came through?"

"I didn't notice," says I. "What is it, anyway?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "TUT, TUT," SAYS THE BOSS OF THE RESTORIUM.]

"Wait until I light the lantern," says Tuttle. "Now come. This way.

Don't hit your head on those wings. There!"

And, say, it's a wonder I could walk right by a thing of that kind without gettin' next, even if it was kind of dark. But all I needs now is one glimpse of the outlines.