David gaped at him without answering. About him vision tumbled into chaos.
“Or a fly-cop on his wheel?” He continued, manipulating imaginary handle-bars. “What were ye chasin’? One o’ thim noo Stootzes? But look what oiv got fer ye.” He uncurled beefy red paws — a square of brown chocolate cake in one and a red apple in the other. “How does that suit ye?”
He began crying again.
“Hey—! Arrrh, yer a quair one! Here I’ve gone an’ got ye chawklit cake — in a beer saloon of all the damn places — an’ gotten ye apples, and there y’are cryin’ all over the precinct! What’s the matter?”
“W-w-w’istles!” he wailed. “W-wistles!”
“Whistles?
“Yeaa-a-aow!”
“Is it a whistle yer after?” He made a motion toward his pocket.
“N-n-o-o-o! B-blowin’!”
“Me?”
“No-o-o! My — my mama! Ow!”
“Orrch! Fergit it. Here’s a foin bit o’ cake fer ye. C’mon! Take it! And the apple. That’s the way! Forst ye eat one and then the other! Anhann! And I’ll git ye a sup o’ wawther and ye’ll be as snug as — No!” He bawled.
David had dropped both the cake and the apple. A voice! A voice he never hoped to hear again. A voice! He stared at the doorway rigid with hope.
“Now look what yev—” He stopped, turned round.
A light tread hurried toward them. Out of the slow blur of a myriad meaningless faces, one condensed into all meaning.
“David! David!”
“Mama!” He screamed leaping toward her. “Mama! Mama! Mama!”
She caught him up in her arms, moaning, pressed his cheek against her cold one. “David, beloved! David!”
“Mama! Mama!” The screaming of her name was itself sheer, stark ecstasy, but all bliss was outplumbed in the clasping of her neck.
“Well yer safe now be the looks of it,” came the voice at his back.
Still pressing him to her, she carried him into the outer room where the bareheaded one leaned against the rail watching them.
“Hmm, I see he knows his mama.”
“T-tanks so — so viel!” she stammered.
“Oh, that’s all right, lady. Glad to have a visitor once in a while. It’s pretty quiet here.”
“And lady,” the helmeted one came up, “I’m thinkin’ ye’d best put a tag on him, fer he sure had us up a tree with his Pother an’ Body an’ Powther! Now ye spell it bee — ay—”
“T’anks so viel!” she repeated.
“Oh!” He smiled crookedly, nodded. “Yer acquainted with it.”
The other man rested the corner of a grin on his finger nail.
“Now oi’ll tell ye an odd thing, Lieutenant,” said the helmeted one. “He’s after plaguin’ me about a whistle. Now it’s an odd thing I tell ye — would make a man be thinkin’. He said to me, he said. I’m after hearin’ me own mother’s whistle. Now would ye believe it? And she still a good ways off!”
“Did he?” The bareheaded man snorted with amusement. “The only whistle I heard was the four-ten over at Chandler crossing, and that was about—”
“Er—” his mother began timidly. “Herr — Mister. Ve — er — ve go?”
“Oh certainly, lady! Just walk right out any time.” He opened his arms in a flowing gesture. “He’s all yours.”
“T-tanks.” She said gratefully and turned to go.
“Hey, hold on a minute!” The helmeted one pursued them. “Would ye be leavin’ us without yer cake?” He pried it into David’s hand. “And yer apple? No? Too much? Well, I’ll kaip it fer ye till ye drop around again. Good-bye! And don’t ye go runnin’ after telegraph poles!”
XIV
THE doorway out! Freedom! The cold air of the street. The sky tightening with dusk. And she, carrying him, her face close to his! Things he never hoped to see again, bliss he never hoped to feel! Deliverance too enormous even to grasp!
“How did you—?” She stopped. “Do you want me to carry you, darling?”
“No, I can walk, Mama! I can walk, Mama! Mama! Mama!” The magic in the word seemed inexhaustible, gave him new strength. He laughed at the sheer joy of the sound.
She set him down. And hand in hand they walked as rapidly as his pace permitted.
“We’re not very far,” she informed him, “though far enough for a weary child. Now tell me, how did you ever stray into that place? How did you get there?”
“Somebody was chasing me, Mama, and I ran and I ran and I ran.” Claws of sudden fear grazed him. “Is he still?”
“Still? Who? Who was chasing you?”
“Yussie. And — and the other boys. They called me crybaby — crybaby because — Papa — hit — hit me. Yussie — he told.”
“He didn’t tell me that.”
“Is he — is he still, Mama?”
“What do you mean?”
“I only — only pushed because he was running after me. Mama, I didn’t want to make him still.”
“Oh! That boy? There’s nothing wrong with him.”
“No?” He bounded before her electrified with relief. “No? I didn’t? Mama-a-a!”
“Did you think you hurt him, you silly one?”
“I didn’t! I didn’t! I didn’t!” he cheered, “Oooh, I didn’t do anything!”
“No. Except to frighten me to death! But why didn’t you run upstairs if they were chasing you? Hymie said you ran inside. Where did you go?”
“Is this where we live?” They had turned a corner and he scanned the darkening street. “Doesn’t look like—?”
“No. Several blocks yet. Are you tired?”
“No mama!”
“We must hurry then or Albert will be there before us. He won’t know what’s happened to us when he comes into an empty house.”
“Who told you?”
“What?”
“Where I was.”
“A policeman.”
“Were you scared?”
“I was frantic!”
“Because the policeman?”
“No, because of you, silly child! I had just rushed weeping into the street when I met him.”
“A real policeman? For me? Did he tell you how— how to come?”
“He wrote it down for me. And people on the way directed me. He has it, that master in there.”
“Oh.”
“Yes! Now you tell me! First where did you go? Did you hide somewhere and run out again? What kept you from coming up?”
“I–I went — down — I went down in the cellar.” Buoyancy seeped out of him. His voice ended dully.
“The cellar?” She stopped in mid-stride to look down at him. “Of all the strange places! Why did you go there?”
“I don’t know — I don’t know. I wanted to — to hide from the — the policeman. Mama!” He suddenly whimpered in terror. “Mama!”
“What? What is it, sweet.” She gripped his hand. “Do you feel ill?”
“N-no.” He was wrestling feebly with himself. “N-no.”
“Frightened again? That cellar? I can’t understand why you’d want to go down — Oh, but let’s wait! Later, darling? You’ll tell me?” They walked rapidly awhile in silence. “Are you warm?”
“Yes.”
“What did you do there? In that — in that — Ach! I can’t say it! With the police?”
“They made me sit down. And first — first they took me to the toilet. And then the big policeman gave me the apple. And then the cake.”
“That’s a handsome cake!” She smiled down at him. “An American one. I couldn’t bake it myself. Do you know where you are now?”
He looked around at the twilit street. “We went a lot of blocks,” he said tentatively.
“Yes. But that street, that next one?”
He shook his head. In the thickening gloom, the street ahead looked as alien as any he had passed.
“That’s Boddeh Street,” she informed him. “Your school is that way, further off. But it’s too dark to see. Now two — three blocks that way—” She pointed to the left—“is where we live.”