University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.
YAHCOB BUNK.

Before retiring Dennis as usual took his Bible from
his trunk to read a chapter. He was now in a very different
mood from that of a few hours ago. The suggestion
of his bar-room acquaintance was a light upon his way.
And with one of Dennis's age and temperament, even a
small hope is potent. He was eager for the coming day in
order to try the experiment of wringing bread and opportunity
for further search out of the wintry snows.

But that which had done him the most good—more
than he realized—was the kindness he had received, rough
though it was; the sympathy and companionship of another
human being,—for if he had been cast away on a
desert island he could not have been more isolated than
in the great city, with its indifferent multitudes.

Moreover the generous supper was not without its decided
influence; and with it he had drank a cup of good
coffee, that nectar of the gods whose subtile, delicate influence
is felt in body and brain, in every fibre of the nature
not deadened and blunted by stronger and coarser
stimulants. He who leaves out physical causes in accounting
for mental and moral states, will usually come
wide of the mark.

But while giving the influences above referred to their
due force, so far from ignoring, we would acknowledge
with emphasis the chief cause of man's ability to receive
and appreciate all the highest phases of truth and good,
namely, God's help asked for and given. Prayer was a
habit with Dennis. He asked God with childlike faith for
the bestowment of every Christian grace, and those who
knew him best saw that he had no reason to complain that
his prayers were unanswered.

But now at a time when he would most appreciate it,
God was about to reveal to him a truth that would be a rich
source of help and comfort through life, and a sudden
burst of sunshine upon his dark way at the present hour.
He was to be shown how he might look to heaven for help
and guidance in respect to his present and earthly interests,
as truly as in his spiritual life.

As he opened his Bible his eyes caught the words of
our Lord, “Launch out into the deep and let down your
nets for a draught.”

Then Peter's answer—“Master, we have toiled all the
night and have taken nothing: nevertheless, at Thy word
I will let down the net.”

The result —“They inclosed a great multitude of
fishes.”

With these words light broke in upon his mind. “If
our Lord,” he mused, “helped His first disciples catch
fish, why should He not help me to find a good place?”

Then unbelief suggested—“It was not for the sake of the
fish; they were only means to a higher end.”

But Dennis, who had plenty of good common sense, at
once answered this objection—“Neither do I want position
and money for low selfish purposes. My ends are the
best and purest, for I am seeking my own honest living and
the support of my mother and sisters—the very imperative
duties that God is now imposing on me. Would God reveal
a duty and no way of performing it?”

Then came the thought—“Have I asked Him to help
me? Have I not been seeking in my own wisdom, and
trusting in my own strength? And this too when my ignorance
of business, the dull season of the year, and every
thing was against me, when I specially needed help. Little
wonder that I have fared as I have.”

Turning the leaves of his Bible rapidly he began
searching for instances of God's interference in behalf of
the temporal interests of His servants—for passages where
earthly prosperity was promised or given. After an hour
he closed the Bible with a long breath of wonder, and
said to himself,

“Why, God seems to care as much for the well-being
and happiness of His children here, as He will when He
gets us all about Him in the blessed home above. I've
been blind for twenty-one years to one of the grandest
truths of this Book.”

Then as the thought grew upon him, he exclaimed joyously,
“Take heart, Dennis Fleet; God is on your side in
the struggle for an honest success in this life, as truly as
in your fight against sin and the devil.”

It was long before he slept that night, but a truth had
been revealed that rested and strengthened him more than
the heavy slumbers after the weary days that had preceded.

The dawn of the Winter morning was cold and faint,

when Dennis appeared in the bar-room the next day.
The jolly-faced Teuton was making the fire, stopping often
to blow his cold fingers, and wasting enough good breath
to have kindled a furnace. His rubicund visage, surrounded
by shaggy hair and beard of yellow, here appeared
in the dust and smoke he was making like the sun
rising in a fog.

“Hillo!” he said on seeing Dennis; “vat you up dis
early for? Don't vant anoder dinner yet, I hope?”

“I will take that in good time,” said Dennis; “and
will want a bigger one than that which so astonished you
at first.”

“O my eyes!” said the German; “den I go and tell
de cook to begin to get him right avay.”

Laughing good-naturedly Dennis went to the door and
looked out. On side-walk and street the snow lay six or
eight inches deep, untrodden, white and spotless, even in
the heart of the great city. “How differently this snow will
look by night,” thought he; “how soiled and black. Perhaps
very many come to this city in the morning of life
like this snow, pure and unstained; but after being here
awhile they become like this snow when it has been tossed
about and trodden under every careless foot. God grant
that however poor and unsuccessful I may remain, such
pollution may never be my fate.”

But feeling that he had no time for moralizing if he
would secure bread for the coming day of rest, he turned
and said to the factotum of the bar-room—

“How much will you give to have the snow cleared off
the side-walk in front of your house?”

“Zwei shillen.”

“Then I will earn my breakfast before I eat it, if you
will lend me a shovel.”

“I taut you vas a shentlemans,” said the German staring
at him.

“So I am; just the shentlemans that will clean off your
sidewalk for `zwei shillen,' if you will let him.”

“You vant to do him for exercise?”

“No! for zwei shillings.”

“I taut you vas a shentlemans,” said the man, still
staring in stolid wonder at Dennis.

“Didn't you ever know of a gentleman who came from
Germany to this country and was glad to do anything for
an honest living?”

“Often and often I haf. You see von here,” said the
man with a grin.

“Well, I am just that kind of a gentleman. Now if
you will lend me a shovel I will clean off your side-walk
for two shillings, and be a great deal more thankful than
if you had given me the money for nothing.”

“Little fear of dat,” said the man with another grin.
“Vel you are de queerest Yankee in Chicago, you are; I
tink you are 'bout haf sherman. I tell you vat — here,
vat's your name?—if you clean off dat side-walk goot, you
shall haf breakfast and dinner, much as you eat, vidout
von cent to pay. I don't care if de cook is cooking all
day. I like your vat you call him—spunk.”

“It's a bargain,” said Dennis, “and if I can make a
few more like it to-day, I shall be rich.”

“You may vel say dat. I will go into de market and
see if dare be enough for me to keep my part of de bargain
goot.”

For half an hour Dennis worked away lustily, and then
called his task-master and said,

“Will you accept the job?”

Surveying with surprise the large space cleared, and
looking in vain for reason to find fault, he said,

“I kin say nothin' agin him. I hope you will eat your
dinner as quick. Now come into your breakfast.”

He pretended to be perfectly aghast at Dennis's onslaught

on the buckwheat cakes, and rolled up his eyes despairingly
as each new plate was emptied.

Having finished, Dennis tipped him a wink, and said,

“Wait till dinner time.”

“Ah! dare vill be von famine,” said the German in a
tone of anguish, wringing his hands.

Having procured the needful implement, Dennis started
out, and though there was considerable competition,
found plenty to do, and shovelled away with little cessation
till one o'clock. Then counting his gains, found that
he had paid for his shovel, secured breakfast and dinner,
and had a balance on hand of $2.50, and he had nearly
half a day yet before him. He felt rich—nay more than
that, he felt like a man who, sinking in a shoreless ocean,
suddenly catches a plank that bears him up, while shore
appears in the distance.

“This is what comes from asking God to help a fellow,”
said he to himself. “Strange, too, that He should answer
my prayer in part before I asked, by causing that queer
jumble of good and evil, Bill Cronk, to suggest to me this
way of turning an honest penny. I wish Bill was as good
a friend to himself as he is to others. I fear that he will
go to the dogs. Bless me! the gnawings of hunger are
bad enough, but what must be those of conscience? I think
I can astonish my German friend to-day as never before,”
and shouldering his shovel he walked back to dinner, feeling
like a prince bearing aloft the insignia of his power.

When he entered the bar and lunch-room, he saw that
something was wrong. The landlord met him instead of
his jolly, satirical friend.

Now the owner of the place was a wizen-faced, dried-up
old anatomy, who seemed utterly exhaling away in tobacco
smoke, while his assistant was becoming spherical
generally under the expansive power of lager. It was his
custom to sit up and smoke most of the night, and therefore

get down late in the morning. When he appeared,
his assistant told him of the bargain he had made with
Dennis, as a good joke. But old Hans hadn't any faculty
for jokes. Dollars and cents and his big meerschaum
made up the two elements of his life. The thought of
losing zwei shilings or zwei cents by Dennis, or any one
else, caused him anguish, and instead of laughing, his fun-loving
assistant was aghast at seeing him fall into a passion.

“You be von big fule. Vat for we keep mens here
who haf no money? You should cleared him off, instead
of making bargains for him to eat us out of de house.”

“We haf his trunk,” said Jacob, for that was his name.

“Nothin' in it,” growled Hans, and yet somewhat mollified
by this fact.

When Dennis appeared, he put the case without any
circumlocution—

“I make my livin' by keepin' dis house. I can no
make my livin' unless everybodies pay me. I haf reason
to tink dat you haf no money. Vat ish the truf? Cause
if you haf none, you can no longer stay here.”

“Have I not paid for everything I have had so far?”
said Dennis.

“Dat ish not de question? Haf you got any moneys?”

“What is your bill in advance up to Monday morning?”

“Zwie dollar and a quarter if you take breakfast.”

“Deduct breakfast and dinner to-day for clearing off
the sidewalk.”

“Dat ish too much; you did it in half hour.”

“Well, it would have taken you three. But a bargain
is a bargain, the world over. Did not you promise it?”—
to Jacob.

“Yah! and you shall haf him, too, if I be de loser.
Yahcob Bunk is not the man to go back on his wort.”

“Vel den,” said old Hans, “von dollar seventy-five to
Monday morning.”

“There is the money; now let me have my dinner, for
I am in a hurry.”

At the sight of money Hans at once became the most
obsequious of hosts, and so would remain while it lasted.
But Dennis saw that his purchased courtesy would change
the moment it was gone, and he trembled at his narrow
escape from being thrust out into the Wintry streets, friendless,
penniless, to beg or starve—equally hard alternatives
to his mind.

“Come Yahcob, thou snail, give the shentlemans his
dinner,” said Hans.

Jacob, who had been looking on with heavy, stolid
face, now brightened up on seeing that all was right, and
gave Dennis a double portion of the steaming pot-pie, and
a huge mug of coffee. When Dennis had finished these
and crowned his repast with a big dumpling, Jacob came to
him with a face as long and serious as his harvest moon of
a visage could be made, and said—

“Dare is nothing more in Chicago, you haf cleaned it
out. We must vait till de evenin' train comes before we
haf supper.”

“That will be time enough for me,” said Dennis, laughing,
for he could laugh to-day at little things,—and started
off again with his shovel.