Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1889-04-12
THE BIRD DETECTIVE.

of ightish brown color, a pair of sharp, sas-
picious eyes which darted at your face now
and again very keenly, and a mouth that
seemed to have been wrung away from bit
ing knotty crusts, or perhaps by the ravages
of neuralgia.
Truthfully Dick had taken his share of
crusts with the world, for they seemed to
have been his natural Inheritance. He was
put Off with crusts when too small to re-
monstrate at the injustice, and every one
seemed to have followed in the track of his
parents with their donations of crusts, sup
posing him to be receptacle for them. This
is a way that the world seems to have. This
stinting and stunting had warped Dicks ma
ture and given him a dry, harsh tone as it
had an unlovely face and figure, but he had
never budged at his destiny, taking to the
crusts as they came along and crunching
them bitter or sweet with the logged hope
that some day the people who had been get
ting the gingerbread would change places
with him.
This was not nice spirit for young man
to cultivate, and some peoplea good deal bet
ter off than Dick might criticise it, although
they might have no objection to his eating
their crusts.
1t WAS, therefore, the fortune of Dick not
to be loved much either by his family or his
neighbors, while against his greater neighbor,
mankind, he nursed almost insensibly a little
well deserved grudge on his own account.
Withal, he was prosperous in way, very
humble one, and in an avocation not usually
chosen by ambitious people. 1t was not
chosen by Dick, with whom necessity sup
piled the place of preference in a good many
matters.
He was engaged in the sale Of second hand
clothing in the great center of that trade, the
renowned Baxter street, of which the sur
roundings, although unique, are painfully
unromantic, and where the names of the house
Of Isaac predominant over all others, ancient
and modern. The store was not tho property
of Dick, but Of the Widow Creecy, upon
whose death it would belong to Dick, his
brother and two sisters
Dick, however, constituted the manage
ment, as the widow was bedridden the daugh-
tiers lazy and the brother worthless
With these conflicting elements it was
hardly possible to expect an angelic dispo-
sition of Dick, who, in order to get the crusts
which kept body and soul together, was shut
up eternally in thegrim looking store among
the cast off garments, while the others
amused themselves as they liked best and
abused Dick for variation.
The drudge confined his attention to bust
ness and let them go, course he had found
to be the most profitable and had consequent
ly adopted. By this means he had brought
the affairs of the family from bankruptcy
into the comfortable condition of thousand
dollar surplus
This thousand dollars was kept in a safe in
store ready to be expended at any moment
when a favorable opportunity presented for
sorting up stock.
The sole companion of Dick during all this
long apprenticeship to patience and thrift
and the miscellaneous virtues which go to
make successful merchant, was a meager
and dilapitated jackdaw.
Between Dick and the jackdaw existed
strong sympathy and something of resem-
blance. They both looked Injured to hard
knocks. The jackdaw was minus leg and
ON eye. His survival was due to the inter-
ference of Dick. who had purchased its i'm
munity from further mutilation at the hands
of brother by administering licking to him.
Since then the bird had devoted itself to
Dick with the gratitude which the dumb Gre
alton invariably shows for kindness from
man. There was even a similarity in the
manner of speech Of the jackdaw and it's
master, for the bird could speak fuently
few sentences which Dick with some care
had taught it to remember, and the incisive
style in which it said these things had been
copied unconsciously by Dick.
There was also a sagacious and sententious
manner about the jackdaw which Dick, prob
ably from studying it, had adopted to adj
vantage.
But if the jackdaw's preference for its de-
iverer was marked, its dislike for the brother
who had MANNED it was quite as conspicuous.
At his approach JACK would select dark and
secure corner, from which retreat it would
never venture till he had left the place. From
this corner, with the red light of Its eyes
cleaning like diabolic fire, it would watch its
enemy with a malignant look terrible to wit
ness even in a bird.
Enthusiastically they loathed one another,
and it was doubtful if the vanity of the jack
daw could ever have been appeased for the
loss of its leg and eye, even if its hatred ad
been overcome, pride being such a strong in
gredient in its nature.
: It. was the custom of Dick to close up his
store at about 10 p. M, and after boiling
himself securely in, to retire to comfortable
crib he had made himself in the back of the
store. Sometimes, it was true, he consoled
himself for an hour with his story paper, but
more often, being tired, he went straight to
bed
The jackdaw, perched on a beam some ten
feet above him, watched over the slumbers
of the young merchant as If it had been his
guardian angel
1t was some two hours after he had ad-
journed to bed, one wet, miserable winters
night, that Dick was awakened by his friend
the jackdaw in the way it usually awoke him
when he oversight himself in the morning OF
WIZ SoundC ronca1 fha fnal-c of
the watcher.
1t was by pecking gently at its masters
nose that the jackdaw reused Dick from his
sumbers and brought him, rubbing his eyes,
to his feet
Dick soon discovered the cause of the jaci-
davis alarm. There was some one tapping
gently on the window. Pulling on his troas-
ers, Dick went Immediately to the front of
the store, and found that his brother Harry
WAS outside beseeching admittance. There
was not much love lost between the brothers,
as Dick looked upon Harry as scapegrace,
whose deficiencies he had to mako good by
extra labor, and Harry considered Dick as
the worst kind of q curmudgeon.
So with some reluctance Dick let the door
drop, and his brother walked In, smelling
very strongly of rum and tobacco and az
pearing to be in no good humor. Dick care
fully bolted the door after him and led the
way up the store to where the stove still
burned brightly, and pushing seat toward
his brother he sat down opposite to him
saying:
"Weu, what is it you want with me now
you are insde"
A drunken smile came over the face of the
loafer as he blurted out:
''Some of that stuff as you have salted
down, my boy. Pm in hole, and ! want g
hundred dollars to get me out of it."
"a hundred dollarsl" answered Dick with
amazement and Indignation; land what do
you think have scraped and worked early
and late fora That you might go off and
spend hundred dollars of the savings when
you thought of it, You might have spared
yourself the trouble of calling me out of bed,
for YOU certainly won't get nickel here"
"Listen to de boss" said the other with a
derisive chuczle. "Think yell bluff me off,
do you. mateyl Now. look ye here Dick.