The Box of Robbers
No one intended to leave Martha alone that afternoon, but it happened that
everyone was called away, for one reason or another. Mrs. McFarland was
attending the weekly card party held by the Women's Anti-Gambling League. Sister
Nell's young man had called quite unexpectedly to take her for a long drive.
Papa was at the office, as usual. It was Mary Ann's day out. As for Emeline, she
certainly should have stayed in the house and looked after the little girl; but
Emeline had a restless nature.
"Would you mind, miss, if I just crossed the alley to speak a word to Mrs.
Carleton's girl?" she asked Martha.
"'Course not," replied the child. "You'd better lock the back door, though,
and take the key, for I shall be upstairs."
"Oh, I'll do that, of course, miss," said the delighted maid, and ran away to
spend the afternoon with her friend, leaving Martha quite alone in the big
house, and locked in, into the bargain.
The little girl read a few pages in her new book, sewed a few stitches in her
embroidery and started to "play visiting" with her four favorite dolls. Then she
remembered that in the attic was a doll's playhouse that hadn't been used for
months, so she decided she would dust it and put it in order.
Filled with this idea, the girl climbed the winding stairs to the big room
under the roof. It was well lighted by three dormer windows and was warm and
pleasant. Around the walls were rows of boxes and trunks, piles of old
carpeting, pieces of damaged furniture, bundles of discarded clothing and other
odds and ends of more or less value. Every well-regulated house has an attic of
this sort, so I need not describe it.
The doll's house had been moved, but after a search Martha found it away over
in a corner near the big chimney.
She drew it out and noticed that behind it was a black wooden chest which
Uncle Walter had sent over from Italy years and years ago--before Martha was
born, in fact. Mamma had told her about it one day; how there was no key to it,
because Uncle Walter wished it to remain unopened until he returned home; and
how this wandering uncle, who was a mighty hunter, had gone into Africa to hunt
elephants and had never been heard from afterwards.
The little girl looked at the chest curiously, now that it had by accident
attracted her attention.
It was quite big--bigger even than mamma's traveling trunk--and was studded
all over with tarnished brass headed nails. It was heavy, too, for when Martha
tried to lift one end of it she found she could not stir it a bit. But there was
a place in the side of the cover for a key. She stooped to examine the lock, and
saw that it would take a rather big key to open it.
Then, as you may suspect, the little girl longed to open Uncle Walter's big
box and see what was in it. For we are all curious, and little girls are just as
curious as the rest of us.
"I don't b'lieve Uncle Walter'll ever come back," she thought. "Papa said
once that some elephant must have killed him. If I only had a key--" She stopped
and clapped her little hands together gayly as she remembered a big basket of
keys on the shelf in the linen closet. They were of all sorts and sizes; perhaps
one of them would unlock the mysterious chest!
She flew down the stairs, found the basket and returned with it to the attic.
Then she sat down before the brass-studded box and began trying one key after
another in the curious old lock. Some were too large, but most were too small.
One would go into the lock but would not turn; another stuck so fast that she
feared for a time that she would never get it out again. But at last, when the
basket was almost empty, an oddly-shaped, ancient brass key slipped easily into
the lock. With a cry of joy Martha turned the key with both hands; then she
heard a sharp "click," and the next moment the heavy lid flew up of its own
accord!
The little girl leaned over the edge of the chest an instant, and the sight
that met her eyes caused her to start back in amazement.
Slowly and carefully a man unpacked himself from the chest, stepped out upon
the floor, stretched his limbs and then took off his hat and bowed politely to
the astonished child.
He was tall and thin and his face seemed badly tanned or sunburnt.
Then another man emerged from the chest, yawning and rubbing his eyes like a
sleepy schoolboy. He was of middle size and his skin seemed as badly tanned as
that of the first.
While Martha stared open-mouthed at the remarkable sight a third man crawled
from the chest. He had the same complexion as his fellows, but was short and
fat.
All three were dressed in a curious manner. They wore short jackets of red
velvet braided with gold, and knee breeches of sky-blue satin with silver
buttons. Over their stockings were laced wide ribbons of red and yellow and
blue, while their hats had broad brims with high, peaked crowns, from which
fluttered yards of bright-colored ribbons.
They had big gold rings in their ears and rows of knives and pistols in their
belts. Their eyes were black and glittering and they wore long, fierce
mustaches, curling at the ends like a pig's tail.
"My! but you were heavy," exclaimed the fat one, when he had pulled down his
velvet jacket and brushed the dust from his sky-blue breeches. "And you squeezed
me all out of shape."
"It was unavoidable, Luigi," responded the thin man, lightly; "the lid of the
chest pressed me down upon you. Yet I tender you my regrets."
"As for me," said the middle-sized man, carelessly rolling a cigarette and
lighting it, "you must acknowledge I have been your nearest friend for years; so
do not be disagreeable."
"You mustn't smoke in the attic," said Martha, recovering herself at sight of
the cigarette. "You might set the house on fire."
The middle-sized man, who had not noticed her before, at this speech turned
to the girl and bowed.
"Since a lady requests it," said he, "I shall abandon my cigarette," and he
threw it on the floor and extinguished it with his foot.
"Who are you?" asked Martha, who until now had been too astonished to be
frightened.
"Permit us to introduce ourselves," said the thin man, flourishing his hat
gracefully. "This is Luigi," the fat man nodded; "and this is Beni," the
middle-sized man bowed; "and I am Victor. We are three bandits--Italian
bandits."
"Bandits!" cried Martha, with a look of horror.
"Exactly. Perhaps in all the world there are not three other bandits so
terrible and fierce as ourselves," said Victor, proudly.
"'Tis so," said the fat man, nodding gravely.
"But it's wicked!" exclaimed Martha.
"Yes, indeed," replied Victor. "We are extremely and tremendously wicked.
Perhaps in all the world you could not find three men more wicked than those who
now stand before you."
"'Tis so," said the fat man, approvingly.
"But you shouldn't be so wicked," said the girl; "it's--it's--naughty!"
Victor cast down his eyes and blushed.
"Naughty!" gasped Beni, with a horrified look.
"'Tis a hard word," said Luigi, sadly, and buried his face in his hands.
"I little thought," murmured Victor, in a voice broken by emotion, "ever to
be so reviled--and by a lady! Yet, perhaps you spoke thoughtlessly. You must
consider, miss, that our wickedness has an excuse. For how are we to be bandits,
let me ask, unless we are wicked?"
Martha was puzzled and shook her head, thoughtfully. Then she remembered
something.
"You can't remain bandits any longer," said she, "because you are now in
America."
"America!" cried the three, together.
"Certainly. You are on Prairie avenue, in Chicago. Uncle Walter sent you here
from Italy in this chest."
The bandits seemed greatly bewildered by this announcement. Luigi sat down on
an old chair with a broken rocker and wiped his forehead with a yellow silk
handkerchief. Beni and Victor fell back upon the chest and looked at her with
pale faces and staring eyes.
When he had somewhat recovered himself Victor spoke.
"Your Uncle Walter has greatly wronged us," he said, reproachfully. "He has
taken us from our beloved Italy, where bandits are highly respected, and brought
us to a strange country where we shall not know whom to rob or how much to ask
for a ransom."
"'Tis so!" said the fat man, slapping his leg sharply.
"And we had won such fine reputations in Italy!" said Beni, regretfully.
"Perhaps Uncle Walter wanted to reform you," suggested Martha.
"Are there, then, no bandits in Chicago?" asked Victor.
"Well," replied the girl, blushing in her turn, "we do not call them
bandits."
"Then what shall we do for a living?" inquired Beni, despairingly.
"A great deal can be done in a big American city," said the child. "My father
is a lawyer" (the bandits shuddered), "and my mother's cousin is a police
inspector."
"Ah," said Victor, "that is a good employment. The police need to be
inspected, especially in Italy."
"Everywhere!" added Beni.
"Then you could do other things," continued Martha, encouragingly. "You could
be motor men on trolley cars, or clerks in a department store. Some people even
become aldermen to earn a living."
The bandits shook their heads sadly.
"We are not fitted for such work," said Victor. "Our business is to rob."
Martha tried to think.
"It is rather hard to get positions in the gas office," she said, "but you
might become politicians."
"No!" cried Beni, with sudden fierceness; "we must not abandon our high
calling. Bandits we have always been, and bandits we must remain!"
"'Tis so!" agreed the fat man.
"Even in Chicago there must be people to rob," remarked Victor, with
cheerfulness.
Martha was distressed.
"I think they have all been robbed," she objected.
"Then we can rob the robbers, for we have experience and talent beyond the
ordinary," said Beni.
"Oh, dear; oh, dear!" moaned the girl; "why did Uncle Walter ever send you
here in this chest?"
The bandits became interested.
"That is what we should like to know," declared Victor, eagerly.
"But no one will ever know, for Uncle Walter was lost while hunting elephants
in Africa," she continued, with conviction.
"Then we must accept our fate and rob to the best of our ability," said
Victor. "So long as we are faithful to our beloved profession we need not be
ashamed."
"'Tis so!" cried the fat man.
"Brothers! we will begin now. Let us rob the house we are in."
"Good!" shouted the others and sprang to their feet.
Beni turned threatingly upon the child.
"Remain here!" he commanded. "If you stir one step your blood will be on your
own head!" Then he added, in a gentler voice: "Don't be afraid; that's the way
all bandits talk to their captives. But of course we wouldn't hurt a young lady
under any circumstances."
"Of course not," said Victor.
The fat man drew a big knife from his belt and flourished it about his head.
"S'blood!" he ejaculated, fiercely.
"S'bananas!" cried Beni, in a terrible voice.
"Confusion to our foes!" hissed Victor.
And then the three bent themselves nearly double and crept stealthily down
the stairway with cocked pistols in their hands and glittering knives between
their teeth, leaving Martha trembling with fear and too horrified to even cry
for help.
How long she remained alone in the attic she never knew, but finally she
heard the catlike tread of the returning bandits and saw them coming up the
stairs in single file.
All bore heavy loads of plunder in their arms, and Luigi was balancing a
mince pie on the top of a pile of her mother's best evening dresses. Victor came
next with an armful of bric-a-brac, a brass candelabra and the parlor clock.
Beni had the family Bible, the basket of silverware from the sideboard, a copper
kettle and papa's fur overcoat.
"Oh, joy!" said Victor, putting down his load; "it is pleasant to rob once
more."
"Oh, ecstacy!" said Beni; but he let the kettle drop on his toe and
immediately began dancing around in anguish, while he muttered queer words in
the Italian language.
"We have much wealth," continued Victor, holding the mince pie while Luigi
added his spoils to the heap; "and all from one house! This America must be a
rich place."
With a dagger he then cut himself a piece of the pie and handed the remainder
to his comrades. Whereupon all three sat upon the floor and consumed the pie
while Martha looked on sadly.
"We should have a cave," remarked Beni; "for we must store our plunder in a
safe place. Can you tell us of a secret cave?" he asked Martha.
"There's a Mammoth cave," she answered, "but it's in Kentucky. You would be
obliged to ride on the cars a long time to get there."
The three bandits looked thoughtful and munched their pie silently, but the
next moment they were startled by the ringing of the electric doorbell, which
was heard plainly even in the remote attic.
"What's that?" demanded Victor, in a hoarse voice, as the three scrambled to
their feet with drawn daggers.
Martha ran to the window and saw it was only the postman, who had dropped a
letter in the box and gone away again. But the incident gave her an idea of how
to get rid of her troublesome bandits, so she began wringing her hands as if in
great distress and cried out:
"It's the police!"
The robbers looked at one another with genuine alarm, and Luigi asked,
tremblingly:
"Are there many of them?"
"A hundred and twelve!" exclaimed Martha, after pretending to count them.
"Then we are lost!" declared Beni; "for we could never fight so many and
live."
"Are they armed?" inquired Victor, who was shivering as if cold.
"Oh, yes," said she. "They have guns and swords and pistols and axes
and--and--"
"And what?" demanded Luigi.
"And cannons!"
The three wicked ones groaned aloud and Beni said, in a hollow voice:
"I hope they will kill us quickly and not put us to the torture. I have been
told these Americans are painted Indians, who are bloodthirsty and terrible."
"'Tis so!" gasped the fat man, with a shudder.
Suddenly Martha turned from the window.
"You are my friends, are you not?" she asked.
"We are devoted!" answered Victor.
"We adore you!" cried Beni.
"We would die for you!" added Luigi, thinking he was about to die anyway.
"Then I will save you," said the girl.
"How?" asked the three, with one voice.
"Get back into the chest," she said. "I will then close the lid, so they will
be unable to find you."
They looked around the room in a dazed and irresolute way, but she exclaimed:
"You must be quick! They will soon be here to arrest you."
Then Luigi sprang into the chest and lay fat upon the bottom. Beni tumbled in
next and packed himself in the back side. Victor followed after pausing to kiss
her hand to the girl in a graceful manner.
Then Martha ran up to press down the lid, but could not make it catch.
"You must squeeze down," she said to them.
Luigi groaned.
"I am doing my best, miss," said Victor, who was nearest the top; "but
although we fitted in very nicely before, the chest now seems rather small for
us."
"'Tis so!" came the muffled voice of the fat man from the bottom.
"I know what takes up the room," said Beni.
"What?" inquired Victor, anxiously.
"The pie," returned Beni.
"'Tis so!" came from the bottom, in faint accents.
Then Martha sat upon the lid and pressed it down with all her weight. To her
great delight the lock caught, and, springing down, she exerted all her strength
and turned the key.
* * * * *
This story should teach us not to interfere in matters that do not concern
us. For had Martha refrained from opening Uncle Walter's mysterious chest she
would not have been obliged to carry downstairs all the plunder the robbers had
brought into the attic.
(from American Fairy Tales , by L. Frank Baum)
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