Chapter 3
Concerning Item #2: The Gold-Tipped Cane 2 (continued)
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News spread about Spot, and his night with the Brooklynites. About a week later, some more boys came in to see if the story was true.
Cat was immediately cleaned up by Mrs. Barrenger, given a sponge bath and proper dresses. She looked even nicer clean, Spot decided. But she was still just a girl, a girl in which Spot had little romantic interest. They were all family to him.
Though Spot had promised that Cat only stay one night, like him, one night turned into two, and two turned into a week, and three months later, here she still was. Mrs. Barrenger seemed to like her best, always keeping her in the kitchen teaching her how to cook and clean.
But this particular night was a slow one, and the late hour made the place deserted. Spot was cleaning up so that he could close up shop, and Cat had taken to the floors to scrub. Red made himself useful by sweeping the storage room. Mr. Barrenger had already called it a night, like was usual around this time, and left the kids to do the routine close up.
Cat worked hard on that floor, scrubbing with so much vigor that it aroused Spot to say something.
"Don't scrub a hole in there, now."
She laughed and eased up a bit.
"You know what I wish?" she said dreamily.
"That we had a thousand dollars?" Spot offered.
"Besides that. I wish we had a piano in here. Then I could play for the customers all day, and you… at closing time."
When she said the last part her cheeks flushed red, and she quickly went back to scrubbing.
Spot smirked.
"You know how to play piano?"
"I could learn!" she insisted.
Then the bell above the door jingled. Two mean looking men entered. They were large fellows too, but that didn't matter to Spot.
"Can I help you, gents?" he said, greeting them as they came through the entryway.
"Yeah, uh, give me a beer, will ya? And another for my brother here."
As Spot poured the drinks the tall man stared at him. Cat looked up from scrubbing the floor to watch.
"You Spot?"
"No, we only except cash."
The man chuckled, along with his buddy.
"Funnyman," he observed. "We heard you roughed some Brooklyners around here a while ago."
"You hear correctly," Spot slammed down the beer glass just as he spitefully said the word: "Sir."
"Haze's boys, we even heard."
"And they had weapons," the other piped in.
"Can I get you anythin' else?" Spot insisted. The man smiled and shook his head no, so Spot went back to wiping the counter.
"Pretty girl," the first man, who seemed to be the talker of the two, said. "She your sister?"
"No."
"Girlfriend?"
Cat
perked up to see what Spot would say. Spot shot her a harsh look and
said with a hinting tone:
"No."
"Then you got no claim on her then, huh?"
"Did ya happen to hear why your friends from last week got roughed up? They put a hand on that same goil over there."
"What makes you think they was our friends?"
"He sent ya over here to spy on me. I ain't stupid."
"Could've fooled me."
Spot lunged just as Cat yelled:
"Spot, NO!"
But Spot was too busy throwing punches and receiving them. When she tried to get to him, she was only struck to the ground. It only made Spot angrier.
"Spot!" Cat cried, as another man came flying onto a table next to her, which only crumbled underneath his weight. "Please!"
She hit around the counter as glasses flew and crashed all around, and spotted Red come running from the storage room to join the fight. Spot hopped the counter and knelt next to her, as the commotion continued behind them.
"You alright?" he demanded.
"I'm fine. But they aren't from Brooklyn!"
"How do you know that?"
"I've seen those men on the street. They're the Delancey brothers. They work for a paper, the World, I think. They just go around causing trouble."
"Then trouble's what dey found!" he said, hopping the counter again and getting back into the fight.
"Spot!"
"We're gonna get you back for this!" the brother Oscar said as Spot and Red ran them out. "You're gonna get it, all of you! Especially that little girl!"
"Why don't you practice fighting your brother for a bit more before you come back here, eh?" Spot said cynically.
"You can't even beat little kids half your size, you dopes!" Red shouted as they ran off. He patted Spot and turned back into the bar.
"Com'on, let's get this place cleaned up."
-
Spot couldn't sleep that night. He tossed and turned, but something made him restless. The hard floor he laid upon wasn't helping either. He finally sat up, and decided to visit the bathroom. It's when he got out, when he heard it. A crash, then men laughing.
Without second thought, Spot grabbed his hat and ran downstairs. He saw the Delancy's just running out the smashed front door, and in the middle of the bar, a broken beer bottle in the middle of the floor, and out of the mouth a flaming white cloth. The fire ignited the beer spilled onto the hardwood floor, and threatened to do the same to pile of all the ale taken from the shelves, and a few more barrels thrown into the mound. Spot grabbed a cloth from the table, and sprayed it from the water faucet behind the counter, before beating the flames.
But in a matter of seconds the whole mound ignited. There was nothing left to be done.
Spot abandoned the tablecloth and raced up the stairs.
"Red! Mr. Barrenger! Cat! Com'on we have to get outta here!"
Mr. and Mrs. Barrenger came running out in their robes, just as the smoke began to rise into the second floor.
"The whole first floor is in flames!" Red announced. "We hafta take the fire escape!"
"Oh," Mrs. Barrenger said, fanning herself with her hand worriedly. "I hoped we'd never have to use that rickety thing."
"Spot, get Cat!" Mr. Barrenger commanded.
Spot ran into the room and to her bed. He tried to rouse her by shaking her gently and shouting, but she only groaned and flicked his hand away.
"Cat, ya dope!" he said harshly. "How can ya sleep through all me yellin'? Get up, ya lazy goil!"
"Huh?"
Spot scooted his hands underneath her and lifted, running back to the window where the fire escape was. Mrs. Barrenger was already on the ground, and Red was just starting down.
"One atta time, now!" Mr. Barrenger told Spot. "That escape is too old to hold ya! One atta time, hear? Wait for Red to get down! I'll be right back!"
So Spot impatiently waited with Cat still in his arms. The smoke rising up the stairs turned into flames, and Cat coughed through the smoke.
"Hurry up, you rat!" Spot called down to Red. Cat, now wide-awake, kept her eyes on Spot, her saving grace, while he kept his gaze to Red. Spot saw that Mr. Barrenger was right. The escape was giving way.
"Red!"
The stair he was climbing on crumbled under his foot, and the metal began to fold under him.
"Just jump, you bum!" Spot yelled. So Red closed his eyes and leaped.
"We can't go down that way," Spot decided. He looked down at Cat in his arms. "It's too much of a risk."
"What now?" Cat wondered. Spot looked around for some inspiration. To the left of the escape was a large clothesline, with many garments hanging down from them.
"Here, get down." Spot said, putting Cat down for a moment. He tested the line, which was hooked up to a pulley near the roof. It seemed sturdy enough.
"Hold on!"
Spot grabbed Cat around her waist, and took a deep breath.
"What? Spot, what do you think you're—AHHHHH!"
And he leapt. Cat screamed the whole way down.
It was only then Spot realized he had forgot Mr. Barrenger.
"Mr. Barrenger!" Spot called upward. He set Cat down on the ground and began to climb back up the fire escape.
"Spot, what are you doing?" Cat said, grabbing at him.
"Shut up, woman, I can't lose another father! Let go!"
"You can't!"
"I said, let go!" he said, prying her hand from him and continuing his ascent. Mrs. Barrenger held her fists up to her mouth and yelled.
"Be careful, deary!"
He didn't reply. He just set his sights on that window, and kept climbing. He was about halfway there, when he saw Mr. Barrenger. He heard his screams at first, then saw him. The old man ran to the window, engulfed in flames, shouting and waving his arms in pain.
"Mr. Barrenger!"
But as soon as Spot saw him, Mr. Barrenger fell beyond sight, and was gone.
"Oh, God!" Mrs. Barrenger called from the street. "Spot, get down! It's giving way!"
Spot looked down and saw the metal cave. He scrambled to get down, but it was going fast. When he made it to the second-to-the-last landing, it fell, taking him with it.
-
Please review, I
really want to know what you think… Thank you so
much!
Signed,
--RedRogue
